Hey Sailor! It’s D’Anconia eye for the Popeye guy…

It was time for the original sailor among sailors to get a little make-over…(￣▽￣)…re-imagined…into a new universe of Yakuza-Eiga and Wasabi-flavored dreams.

I started this project off by diving into an ocean of vintage Popeye animation along with much of the original Segar drawings. And while it is not a likely area that animation history buffs would focus on, I thought that the Paramount years of Popeye cartoons hit the nail on the head in terms of creating a heroic, masculine and idealized image of the eternal sailor. Even olive looked a lot sexier in those flicks although I used that as the subject of a second print dedicated specially to her. (she’s still ravishingly un-sexy in this print)

Instead I threw in one of the L’Adoria chicks with an Olive-esque body to round things out for our muscle man.

Of course, the first thing to go was the Spinach in traditional form. Instead, we have Wasabi Flavored Spinach and a totally fictional brand - SEABOLD - under the control of the famous YABUKI SIMULATED FOOD CORPORATION. “Yabuki” being “Jo Yabuki” of “Ashita No Joe” fame of course.

So Astroboy meets Sweet Pea in this (Japanified) rendition of Popeye’s adopted son. Eugene the Jeep rests on his shoulder begging for re-entry to the 4th dimension. And continuing down the arm…the clouds begin…

I aimed to hit some nice Irezumi tattoo points here by giving Popeye a big improvement over his previous tats. The Orochi is smiling that evil smile of his, as are the clouds and angry waves in this clear homage to some of Takakura-Ken’s arm and back work during the Ninkyo-eiga film period.

Olive is present on Popeye’s arm although I have her missing from the print as a character as I considered that Popeye’s maturity might result from losing his love and finally moving on to being solo Popeye…without his muse…although there is a replacement moving in as seen below…The flower tattoo here is right off of Ike Reiko’s body from Sex & Fury (Furyô anego den: Inoshika Ochô) - highly recommended.

Bluto or is it Brutus? Seems that his name changes depending on the week. In any event, I tried to capture him at his most iconic moment of the 1950’s, from that cartoon where he bashes Popeye in the ring. I’ve also tattooed him up with some geisha chicks. I’m sure she’s happy to be arm candy for Bluto. Threw in some nice crashing waves in the background actually redrawn/reformed from a very old Japanese print circa 1850.

And how could we forget Wimpy…

This a redrawn “SEGAR-Style” Popeye, paying our respects to the master himself. Popeye kinds of looks older when Segar drew him vs the animation that he appeared in later. I would imagine that my rendition of Popeye is probably taken in his mid-30’s and Segar’s is likely late 40’s or early 50’s.

Finally, I went to work on that classic Popeye face, body and arms, pumping up the torso and letting those legs go down to where they belonged. This is a Popeye who is eternal, living forever in the heyday of his Schwarzeneggerian glory. And that sparkle in the eye…reminding us that old legends never die, they just take little vacations to come back bigger, better and stronger.

Vintage Paramount-era Popeye.

Eat your spinach!
Sean

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