Rubber Hose Animation - Wikipedia

Early American Animation Style

Rubber-hose animation was the first animation style that became standardized in the American animation industry field. The defining feature of the style is "rubber-hose limbs"—arms, and sometimes legs, that are typically drawn as flowing curves, without articulation (no hinged knees or elbows).[1] This style makes most moving animated objects exhibit a curving motion, resembling the physical properties of a rubber hose.[2] The most famous examples of this style are Mickey Mouse, Popeye, Betty Boop,[3] and Felix the Cat. While the rubber hose art style fell out of fashion by the late 1930s, it has experienced a renewed interest since the early 2010s.

History

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Beginnings and rise

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In the early days of hand drawn animation in the 1920s, studios in the United States of America were not located in Hollywood but in New York City. Back then, animation was a new phenomenon and there were no experienced animators around; yet there were skilled artists employed at newspapers creating comic strips, another relatively new medium.[4] Many of them became fascinated with the introduction of moving drawings, and put their skills into this new exciting format.

As animated cartoons became popular, the industry's small workforce of animators struggled to keep up.[5] Their design choices were a mix of intention and necessity.[5]

Studios had to be sensitive to any new business trend to survive the competition. A consequence of this was that the designs of the most successful and popular cartoons had a great impact on the rest of the animation business. One such example was Otto Messmer's Felix the Cat, who quickly spawned imitators from different studios.[6] Bill Nolan is credited with the introduction of the rubber-hose style while animating Felix the Cat shorts in the 1920s.[7] Nolan altered the design of the title character, giving Felix a rounder, smoother look. This new design, besides being faster to draft, also gave characters the "rubbery" limbs, with no knees or elbow joints, which they could stretch to far distances or be neatly tied in knots.[5][8] Using such fluid, flexible movements made the animation process easier and faster, and the surreal quality of the resulting pictures captivated the audiences.[4]

Decline

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Rubber-hose animation gradually faded away as cartoons were made more sophisticated. The fad of realism in animation, with the appearance of lifelike anatomy and natural movement, added to more advanced film techniques like Technicolor, led to the decline of the rubber-hose style.

Walt Disney's massive success with his first full-length animated feature film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, released in 1937, was key in changing the trend.[9][10] In Hollywood, most cartoon studios of the early '30s (many of them founded by former Disney animators) copied this new realistic trend. In New York, Disney's influence took longer to grab hold. Fleischer Studios held on to the rubber-hose style the longest, finally conforming to the more contemporary West Coast animation style by 1940.

Influence

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The rubber-hose style eventually appeared in some later cartoons, such as The Warner Siblings from Animaniacs by Warner Bros. Animation. It was a major influence in the video game Cuphead and its associated cartoon show.[11][12][13]

Theatrical film

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In 2013, Walt Disney Animation Studios produced Get a Horse!, a 3D animated slapstick comedy short film using the style.[14] It combines black-and-white hand-drawn animation with color CGI.[15] The short features characters from late 1920s Disney cartoons and archival recordings of Walt Disney in a posthumous role as Mickey Mouse.[16][17] It is the first original Mickey Mouse theatrical animated short since Runaway Brain (1995) and the first appearance of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit in a Disney animated production in 85 years.

Television

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Disney Television's Mickey Mouse uses rubber hose animation. The series has the zany comedy slapstick feel of the original Mickey Mouse shorts, while providing a modern update with the extensive use of Toon Boom and Flash animation.[18]

In the episode "Truth or Square" from Nickelodeon's cartoon show SpongeBob SquarePants, Patchy the Pirate introduces how the show would have looked like if it had been made in the 1930s. The animation is done in rubber hose style.[19]

See also

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• Golden age of American animation

References

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1. ^ Kricfalusi, John (2006-04-26). "Help Me Do Some Rubber Hose Crap". John K. Stuff.
2. ^ Beiman, Nancy (2017-08-06). Animated Performance: Bringing Imaginary Animal, Human and Fantasy Characters to Life. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 70. ISBN 978-1-350-03962-9. While "rubber-hose" characters can be amusing, it is difficult to create a subtle acting performance in this style of animation. Rubber-hose animation handles squash, stretch, elastic, and other distortions in a technique that calls attention to itself.
3. ^ Poch Eulalia (2025-08-07). "Betty Boop's enduring charm dances through the decades". Manila Bulletin.
4. ^ a b Kricfalusi, John (2006-04-26). "2 Types of cartoonists - Origin of styles 2 - Rubber Hose animation"". John K. Stuff.
5. ^ a b c "Rubber hose animation explained: examples and techniques". Adobe. 2022-06-30.
6. ^ Richard Gottlieb (December 29, 2020). "Felix the Cat Was a Big Star but There Were Copy Cats Even Then". Global Toy News.
7. ^ Arnold, Gordon B. (2017). Animation and the American Imagination. Abc-Clio. p. 30. ISBN 9781440833601.
8. ^ Martin Goodman (2007-06-12). "Dr. Toon: Creation, Evolution, Intelligent Design". AWN.
9. ^ "Tales From Ward K: Of Rubber Hoses and Fred Moore". 2006-09-28.
10. ^ John Wills (2017-12-20). "Snow White at 80: Disney may be flawed, but we are still in thrall to its cartoon magic". The Conversation.
11. ^ Mike Suszek (January 4, 2014). "1930s cartoon-inspired Cuphead targeting late 2014 on PC". Joystiq. AOL Tech. Archived from the original on January 7, 2014. Retrieved August 2, 2014.
12. ^ Mallory, Michael (January 25, 2022). "Creating a Rubber Hose Wonderland for 'The Cuphead Show!'". Animation Magazine. Archived from the original on January 26, 2022. Retrieved January 28, 2022.
13. ^ Suszek, Mike (January 4, 2014). "1930s cartoon-inspired Cuphead targeting late 2014 on PC". Joystiq. AOL Tech. Archived from the original on August 8, 2014. Retrieved August 2, 2014.
14. ^ "Disney Animation preview: 'Frozen,' 'Big Hero 6' at Disney's D23; Plus 'Zootopia' announced". EW.com.
15. ^ "Old-school Mickey Mouse gets future shock in 'Get a Horse!'". EW.com. Archived from the original on 2014-11-01. Retrieved 2018-05-10.
16. ^ Keegan, Rebecca (23 April 2013). "Walt Disney Animation releases new Mickey Mouse short". Los Angeles Times.
17. ^ Breznican, Anthony (12 August 2013). "Old-school Mickey Mouse gets future shock in 'Get a Horse!' FIRST LOOK". EW.com. Archived from the original on 2014-11-01. Retrieved 2021-11-20.
18. ^ "Mickey Mouse to Star in All-New Cartoon Shorts With Classic Comedy, Contemporary Flair". TV by the Numbers. Archived from the original on 11 August 2017. Retrieved 2 November 2025.
19. ^ "SpongeBob: Truth or Square".

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