User Reviews

Whatever the real Beatles may have thought of this, it is what turned me on to them. I was 8 and thought I didn't like them. The language I most understood was cartoons, and when this came on, I completely turned around.

I actually don't remember the story cartoons very much. Mainly, I remember the "singalong" segment in the middle. Paul, John, or George would introduce the segment (which was sort of a Mitch Miller "follow the bouncing ball" breakfaster, only without the ball). He then would call for the "prop man," and Ringo would come out and say, "The regular prop man's sick, so I'm taking his place." The other Beatle would say something like, "Well, this next song is a really swinging number," and Ringo would say, "Swinging number, eh? I think I've got just the thing," and would go offstage and then reappear on a trapeze, which he would proceed to screw up. It was totally predictable, stupid, and always funny, or is in retrospect.

The Beatles cartoon has become beloved and notorious for its production values: wonderful songs used as a backdrop for cookie-cutter stories and shoddy yet funkylicious animation that fits the time period these shorts were made. I've only ever seen this cartoon through bootlegs; and that's another thing, this cartoon has NEVER seen an official release on home video formats. There aren't even official VHS tapes of the show. You can only get bootlegs on eBay or YouTube if you're lucky. This show is like The Star Wars Holiday Special of hard-to-get television 'gems' that we're still waiting to be released on DVD.

This show has The Beatles, and the real stars of the show are really the songs themselves; it doesn't matter what context they're played in, they're always good tunes to listen to. Now Apple Corps, King Features Syndicate and company, can we PLEASE get an official DVD release of this nugget of television animation history?

I saw them on Ed Sullivan in February 1964 and liked them, but I never heard their records. The radio belonged to my mom, and she listened to country music. We had a stereo, but all the records were the ones they bought (which did include some Bill Haley singles). So this cartoon series was the first chance to hear all these great Beatles songs, and I loved them. As for the animation - well I was used to limited 60's TV animation and couldn't have said whether the Beatles cartoons were worse than that. I did prefer the animation whenever a classic Warner Brothers or MGM cartoon from the 40's was shown. I have a DVD, made in New Guinea of all places, which has 39 episodes. It was amusing to see which ones I remembered. So, I'll give it a 6/10 - cartoon stories themselves not so good, but great songs.

I remember watching episodes of this on Sunday mornings on KPLR, channel 11 in St. Louis in the late 1970s or early 1980s. The one that sticks out in my mind for some reason was "Ticket to Ride". I loved the singalongs, and as my father only had the later Beatles albums, it got me familiar with their earlier work. All I've seen is crummy copies of copies sold on Ebay and at Beatlefest...when will this actually be released on video/DVD, good quality copies? You know there's a market for it...there's even a wonderful book about the cartoon series!

love these cartoons. the animation looks like cartoon veteran Gene Dietch had something to do with them. it looks more like Dietch than the style of Brodax's other Beatles toon 'Yellow Submarine'.

i can't say the voices sounded anything like the Beatles, and i very much doubt the Beatles would say things like "guv'nor". still, the animation is very cute and lively and the sing-a-longs just adorable. i even heard a few Beatle songs i'd never heard before (thought i'd heard 'em all).

these little cartoons are so cute and adorable that i'm surprised they aren't easier to get ( i had to order from a foreign seller). and i wish someone would restore them and make a better DVD transfer. but then again, just try to find a decent, restored copy of the BBC television classic 'Magical Mystery Tour'.

these are a great way for parents to introduce their babies to the ever pleasing sounds of the Fab Four.

In 1965 Ed Vane took over as head of daytime programming at ABC. Saturday mornings were dominated by CBS- Vane wanted to change that. He felt the best bet was a Beatles cartoon. Working with Al Brodax at King Features, a deal was made for 26 shows with 2 cartoons per show at a budget of $32,000/show (cheap for 1965). And Brodax had just 5 months before the premiere. Result was a rush job with all the animation outsourced outside the U. S. Results were as you would expect-simple animation with lots of cycles repeating. Still, "The Beatles" was the top rated cartoon for the year, and ABC came in #1 on Saturday mornings. That shocked CBS into opening its wallet and spending millions on a complete revamp of their lineup.

13 more Beatles cartoons were made over the next two seasons- since they're not as rushed the quality is noticeably better. Al Brodax went on to produce the Yellow Submarine film.

The Beatles were huge in the 60s with just about everyone. Why not turn little kids onto their great music right? Well, this was a nice try, but this cartoon series was really lacking in something. It wasn't very funny or clever, and every plot was created to wrap around a Beatles song, making each episode like a poor animated music video. This wasn't a horrible show, it just wasn't very good.

John, Paul, George and Ringo go on lots of exciting adventures, and tucked away in each of their journey's is a special song they share with the audience. The plots may be nonsensical and stupid, and the animation may pale in comparison to already poorly animated shows, like the Flintstones, but the music in each short is what made this not a complete flop.

One of the major problems with this show was the voices. It's as though the casting directors just picked random people to do the Beatles speaking voices, because they sound nothing like their real life counterparts. When they are talking the entire episode, and then go into song, with music from the actual Beatles it sounds weird that their voices do an 180 degree flip. Anyone who doesn't pay attention or isn't a fan of the Beatles may not notice this.

The animation is really bland. When the Beatles are playing instruments, they like to reuse animation a lot, and it's just not very good looking, except for the interesting caricatures of the Beatles used as the characters. The writing is poor, but occasionally an interesting plot came about. Really, this was just kiddie fair with music that could be enjoyed by anyone.

My rating: ** out of ****. 30 mins.

I couldn't have been more than four or five when this show came out! Many years later (like 25!) "I'll Follow The Sun" came on the radio at work. I mentioned to my friend how whenever I heard this song I could vividly recall how it was featured in one of the episodes of the cartoon, even though I only saw the episode once in my life. She said she saw it as a child as well and clearly remembered the scene, with the sun in one corner and the Beatles in a cluster looking up and following it. And strangely, it was the one and only element either one of us could remember about the series at all. I would love to have the opportunity to see this series again, perhaps on Cartoon Network or TV Land.

I first saw the cartoon when I was 14 at Beatlefest 2000 of Chicago, IL. My first cartoon was "Got To Get You Into My Life", and it's really funny. I got the cartoon on the video I got from ebay.com called "Best of The Beatles Cartoon Show". There were 11 cartoons and 10 sing-alongs on the tape. My dad saw the cartoon when he was 11-years-old. My favoritest Beatle of all is Ringo. He's VERY funny from the way he laughs, the way he walks like Groucho Marx, and the way he talks. I've been Ringo's fan since I was 8. I also like the REAL Ringo besides the CARTOON Ringo. I've seen 43 cartoons so far. There were 78 cartoons. 2 cartoons in each episode, which is 39 episodes. I'm still gonna love the cartoon forever.

The thing I remember most about this series was the fact that George's speaking voice sounded exactly like Frankenberry's, from the Frankenberry/Count Chocula breakfast cereal commercials that were popular at the time...In other words, nothing even remotely resembling the baritone nasal scouse of the real George Harrison. I also seem to recall a couple of occasions where the animators didn't quite get the lead vocalist correct (in one episode, Paul was singing lead on "No Reply"). In spite of all that, the series still managed to be quite entertaining, and was the first place I had ever heard the songs "From Me To You" and "Paperback Writer." I only owned Beatle albums and not singles, and neither of those songs were on any Beatle LPs at the time.

I recall only bits and pieces of the show and would love to see it again on TV. It probably is dated but would bring back a lot of memories. I remember the scene where the Beatles were performing in the Roman Coliseum and the beat was causing it to fall apart.

I remember several of this show's episodes because it replayed on Teletoon in Canada (I think, it might've been the Family Channel). Anyways, the cartoons were very Monkey-esque, that is they usually ended up in some sort of a jam or situation, but then they sang a song and everything worked out well. I realize that it's silly to describe the Beatles' cartoons as Monkey-esque, because the Beatles predated the Monkees, however that seems like the most apt way to describe these cartoons. They were NOT very good. They typically invoked rarer songs that really didn't get a lot of airplay (not the hits). For the longest time I understood that the Beatles actually voiced themselves, however this apparently was not the case. They don't really voice themselves in 'Yellow Submarine' either, except in the live-action epilogue. These cartoons seemed very formulaic for the time, and the basic premise was often redone to correspond to the musical group of the time. For example, I recall large similarities between the Beatles cartoons and the Jackson 5 cartoons, however the Jackson 5 typically had a more 'futuristic' viewpoint (they went into space and encountered aliens and stuff like that). I'm also reminded of old Scooby-Doo cartoons, where there were those interminable chase scenes over the dubbing of a musical number. Apparently the Beatles themselves were not overly enamoured with these pieces either. Having said that, I'm sure that now is a good time to get these cartoons out as a DVD collection to span the entire Beatles' media contributions. I'm sure that a lot of people would be all over them purely for the sake of nostalgia, entertainment, and curiosity.