Ub Iwerks's Willie Whopper series of cartoons was short-lived, only lasting a year from 1933 to 1934. On the most part the Willie Whopper cartoons are not great or cartoon/animated masterpieces and it is sort of understandable as to why Willie didn't make it bigger. However they are far from terrible ones either and do amuse and charm. 1934's 'Insultin the Sultan' is one of the wildest Willie Whopper cartoons. It's still very entertaining though and to me it is one of the better ones. And this is coming from somebody who has only just gotten acquainted with the series as a huge animation fan. Just don't expect a masterpiece or too much. 'Insultin the Sultan' may be on the formulaic side with conflict that is somewhat predictable, it is not hard to figure out at all how it all ends. Willie himself is slightly bland and a fairly limited character, while still being likeable. The animation sometimes lacks finesse especially in some of the drawings. However, there is a lot of nice background work, smooth drawing, lively black and white (although it was originally meant to be in colour) and inventive little things. The music is energetic and characterful with appealing orchestration. The cartoon goes at a lively pace, has an appealing charm and the tale is wonderfully outlandish. There are a lot of very amusing, even hilarious (it is one of the funniest Willie Whopper cartoons), and sweet little laughs which makes it entertaining. Although slightly bland, Willie avoids being annoying and he avoids being sickly sweet as well, fairly likeable. The supporting characters are a lively bunch, especially the sultan.Overall, wild and entertaining. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Willie Whopper was an interesting sort of character from Ub Iwerks. However, the character wasn't very consistent and was drawn several different ways and had different voices...as if the studio wasn't quite sure what they wanted. However one thing was constant...the character was either getting into amazing adventures or was a complete liar. This cartoon definitely falls into the liar category!It begins with Willie annoying a rather dim looking student in his classroom and begins to regale him with stories about being in Constantinople and fighting a sultan for the return of his girlfriend...the same girl you see in many of the Willie cartoons. What's next? See it...or don't!You'll not see this one on TV--partly because it's a bit old fashioned and partly because many of the characters are VERY stereotypical and will likely offend. Enjoyable, despite this...so it is worth seeing this one at archive.org...

This is a cartoon in the Willie Whopper series produced by Iwerks studio. There will be spoilers ahead: I'm not overly enthusiastic about the Willie Whoppers for the most part, but I like this one. It uses a framing device, with Willie relating his tall tale to his friend, Goofy, in the middle of class.His claim this time is that he and his girlfriend Mary were sightseeing in Constantinople. There are some great gags in here, like a snake which pulls the lid on its basket because the snake charmer is asleep and snoring. Willie and Mary stop in front of an auction for dancing girls. Given that this cartoon was made some 80 years ago, it almost goes without saying that there's "offensive" material in here (matter of fact, there's probably something in here to offend pretty much everybody). The sultan rejects two girls for various reasons.Meanwhile, the snake, having spotted Willie and Mary, delivers a rather funny vocal resignation to the sleeping charmer and follows them. It then is the center of some jokes which are rather risqué for the 1930s and also trigger the meat of the cartoon, in that when Mary realizes there's a snake, she freaks out and winds up on the auction platform, where the sultan is smitten with her and buys her.Willie tries to get her back when he realizes something's wrong and then gives chase, using the snake as a means of transportation. The sultan's slaves are black stereotypes, of course. Willie follows the sultan to his palace, where we see Mary is a horrible dancer, but that doesn't bother the sultan, who has other ideas.Willie gets in and the sultan knocks him out of the room and he bounces into the harem. The women in the harem all jump on Willie and start kissing him, but Willie gets free and tries to leave. There's a gag in here involving the harem guards that I'm not going to spoil. Willie gets out of the harem and goes back to fight the sultan.He and the sultan start wrestling and Willie sends the sultan spinning, with the sultan turning into a barber pole and shedding clothes. The closing gag of the scene is good, so I won't spoil it here. Cut back to Willie in the classroom and the final joke of the cartoon, which is perfect.This short, along with all the others in the series, are now available on a Blu-Ray/DVD combo released by Thunderbean. The shorts look great and this short and the set are recommended.

Don't confuse this Willie The Whopper cartoon with the famous long "Popeye the Sailor meets Sinbad the Sailor" although both are entertaining in their own right. This "Sinbad" is a Whopper tale about the time "me and my gal were over in Constaninople" and she was kidnapped by a sheik. The evil sheik thought Willie's girl was hot so he kidnapped her. A lot of Willie's adventures seem to have a similar theme, although wildly different venues.It did offer something really different. How many times have you ever seen a cobra pictured in a good light? The was the first time for me. The cobra, who isn't happy because his "boss" is snoring, sneaks out when he hears Willie and his girl whistling down the street. He takes an instant shine to the foreigners and follows them. When the girl is kidnapped, the snake helps out Willie is some very creative ways!This was a lot of fun to watch. In the few "Willie The Whopper" cartoons I have seen, they've all been very entertaining. Why they aren't seen or respected, I don't know. The 1930s had some very edgy and entertaining animated short features like Betty Boop and Popeye, just to name two. Willie is good, too, at least from what I've seen.