Popeye is a cartoon character who has been popular in comic strips and in animated motion pictures since the early 1930’s. Popeye is a sailor with a gruff voice and bulging, muscular arms. He smokes a corncob pipe. He is tough, but kind-hearted and virtuous. Most of Popeye’s movie adventures involve violent encounters with his enemy, the bully Bluto. The two usually battle over Popeye’s skinny, squeaky-voiced girlfriend, Olive Oyl. At the moment when Popeye seems defeated, he reaches for a can of spinach, swallows the contents, and instantly gains enormous strength that enables him to win the fight.
The American cartoonist E. C. (Elzie) Segar created Popeye the Sailor in 1929 as a character in the comic strip “Thimble Theatre.” Popeye soon became the main character in the strip. Other characters included Castor Oyl, Ham Gravy, Swee’pea, the Sea Hag, and the hamburger-loving Wimpy. Film producer Max Fleischer began making animated short movies starring Popeye in 1933. Fleischer supervised more than 230 of these cartoons through 1957. The Popeye movies gained renewed popularity with children when they were shown on television beginning in 1956. Robin Williams starred as Popeye in a live-action film version in 1980.
