1001 toons you need to watch before you die

The 1936 Oscar Loss

In 1936, Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad the Sailor was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Short. Lavishly animated and technically groundbreaking, it was Fleischer Studios’ most ambitious cartoon to date.

But the Oscar went to Disney’s The Country Cousin, a gentle, dialogue-free short about a country mouse visiting the big city. The Academy favored Disney’s polished charm over Popeye’s bold adventure.

Though it didn’t win, Sindbad remains a classic - widely praised, historically important, and now in the public domain.

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