Top Cat is underrated IMO. Loved characters, loved backgrounds, loved theme music and underscores. The "Space Monkey" is my favourite TC episode.

Whenever I have the conversation of what is my favorite cartoon character, I always say "Top Cat", which then perks up the other's in the conversation, who always say, "Oh yeah, Top Cat, he's cool."

I'm from Britain and Top Cat was one of my favourite cartoons as a kid

This show deserves more attention, I find it one of the best shows Hanna Barbera has ever made

Top Cat may be a cat, but he is top dawg in Hanna-Barbera's many wonderful cartoons.

As a kid growing up in the 60's , I LOVED TOP CAT AND ALL OF THE CHARACTERS ! It's a shame that it only lasted from 1960 to 1961 . I bought the complete series on DVD in my library collection !

One of the best Hanna Barbara shows

😻Top cat is my favorite cartoons series ever, I was a huge fan of the character Choo Choo. Very cut & likable character. It was great that Hannah-Barbera air this show, sometimes on Boomerang. Hopefully it will be added reruns on Adult Swim Checkered Past one day.

The series in Latin America was renamed Don Gato y su Pandilla instead of top cat, the origins were changed and also the way of speaking of each cat and the one chosen for this was the undoubted and very talented Julio Lucena, a Mexican actor of Catalan descent who gave it the characteristic touch and so full of personality that made Don Gato a very famous cartoon throughout Latin America, Another one who was also there and gave voice to several characters was Tata Arvizu who gave voice to the blue kitty who was called Benito and to the other cat with a turtleneck sweater who was called Cucho and who spoke with a Yucatecan Spanish accent from Mexico. Basically Don gato was modified and also the one who directed was Tata Arvizu, he was the director of this great work with his brother Ruben who was the script writer, translator and adaptor of this animated series.

Top Cat, The Flintstones, Quick Draw McGraw, Charlie Brown, Jonny Quest, The Jetsons, Yogi Bear, Rocky and Bullwinkle, The Bugs Bunny Show, etc. It was great being a kid in the 1960s.

Everything that Hanna-Barbera did had a heart put into it they did Stick with you because the characters were not just jokes as Joe said they have their own human feelings

I loved Top Cat, in 1961 and now. It was one of the shows that convinced me to become an animator. Over the years, I have collected a few great cel set ups from the show and told Joe Barbera how much I liked it. I was one of the first people to get a hold of copies of the underscoring tracks from the original reel to reel master back in the early 1990s. I agree with a lot of your assessments in this video. Nice work!

I loved Top Cat as a child, teenager and adult. Only 30 episodes ? It always seems so fresh I though there must be far more.

This show was actually my childhood favourite haha so this video is right up my alley ❤

I loved this cartoon as a little kid. It was on just when I came home from kindergarten. (DOB 07-19-71) It aired on an independent station from Pittsburgh, and I have never seen it aired since. I still remember the theme and background music. It was far more clever than I think people realize. Great video! Thanks!

Cade - You did it again. Another great HB tribute. I agree with all that you said about Top Cat. I would add, it seems that most of the episodes were directed by many of the best directors at HB, many of which were done by Carlo Vinci, Don Patterson, etc. Combined with Hoyts genius underscores made for one of the best HB shows ever.

Top Cat has THE BEST intro song of ALL cartoons past and present. 🎵🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎵

Top Cat always deserved more episodes than it got. I almost would want it to have a modernized revival, but a part of me worries it just wouldn't be done right.

A show ahead of its time. It needed the continued build up and love of Bilko/Phil Silvers show brings into the full characterisation of the guys here , add in a crossover to Tom and Jerry for a Cat theme - the Jazz passed me over with "Cat" at the time - which was a hangover from the late 1950s and a underground scene in NYC. The final thing when watching in the 1970s was a parallel to "Kojak" where the NY backdrop was echoed.

Glad there are ppl who appreciate this funny cartoon I recently started watching it again at night before I went to bad it feels really good to watch old cartoons like this they have such a charm

"The Long Hot Winter" (S1.E15) is my favorite.

This was one of my Dad’s favorite cartoons when he was a kid in the 60’s alongside Rocky and Bullwinkle and the animated Beatles show. Our favorite cat in the TC gang is Choo-Choo 🩷🤍

I watched Top Cat as a kid, and I loved the characters. A very interesting video, thanks for all the insights.

Top Cat theme is my phone ringtone. One of the best cartoons ever!

I never left this cartoon back in the 1960s. Marvin Kaplan did the voice for Benny. Love this cartoon! When I was a kid, I had a very cool orange tabby cat that I named, "Top Cat." Thanks, CartoonCade! 😸

Thank you for the memories! I loved the show now I think of it again!

Luckily, the show has been reran on MeTV Toons, but they are the same prints that are on the DVDs. Warner Archive is making a complete Blu-Ray set with new 4K masters from the original camera negatives. This makes me very happy.

Arnold Stang was a brilliant choice for TopCat he gave him so much personality

Honestly I love many things about this show, especially the writing. While it’s not perfect and has its flaws like any other works, every time I come back to watch the show, the funnier and more charming it is. It’s my favorite HB cartoon.

One of the best Hanna Barbera shows

The cartoon was beloved here. It first appeared in the 80s, as "Kot Tip-Top" ("Tip-Top the Cat"), and later, in the 90s, after the revolutions of 1989, it returned in a new (and inferior) version, under a new title - "Kocia ferajna", i.e. "Catfellas". I remember first going online in 1997, eventually looking for "Top Cat" resources on the Internet, and being surprised to discover that it seemed to be barely known or largely forgotten in USA. When the US DVD set with the series came out, I ordered it from across the ocean immediately... and I wonder if most of that set's buyers came, in fact, from outside USA - particularly since T. C. does seem to be extremely popular in Mexico. My little six-year-old self considered "Top Cat" to be something of a cartoon companion to "West Side Story". There was a C64 game based on the "Beverly Hills Cats", by the way; there was also an abandoned prototype of another game for the '64, developed by Codemasters. This one was supposed to be based on the series itself, and its surviving descriptions suggest that it might partially resemble "Alley Cat".

Well done Cade! Thanks for the acknowledgment! Congrats also on acquiring that great TC cel!

Good stuff! Always happy to see ya show up in my feed

The "Boss Cat" name change in the UK came about because there actually was a cat food named "Top Cat" in the UK at that time and "Top Cat" aired on the BBC TV channel which does not allow advertising, In the 1950s it blacklisted the Andrews Sisters' song "Rum and Coca-Cola" for the same reason.

Very well liked in the UK too

I loved the show as a kid, i remember an episode where the cats sing "i dream of Genie with the light brown hair" and always wanted to hear a full version of it lol

I'm truly back in my childhood watching Top Cat. (I used to tell people it was my nickname).

I must admit, the Hanna -Barbera dogs get the bulk of my love. From Huckleberry Hound to Dynomutt, Dog Wonder. That said, I love TC and his crew! Especially Spook, because I'm a jazz buff. The writing on Top Cat was excellent! In my opinion, it is one of Hanna -Barbera's best written shows. I love the banter between Top Cat and Officer Dibble, especially!

Man this channel is so good, you need more subscribers. Really well made docs about cartoons, I watched the Hoyt video yesterday while I animated and it gave me some good inspiration

We loved topcat out here in New Zealand in the 70s it's undisputable still know that awesome theme tune🐈

great video cade! i’ve been really into top cat and hanna barbera in general thanks to jellystone. hell i even thought about eventually making a video on all the 3 movies and maybe a whole retrospective going through every episode if i had the time, i have the whole series on dvd and should really give it a rewatch sometime. hope to see more hanna barbera stuff from you!

One of my favorites cartoon, "The Maharaja Pokoji" !

Nice work. I can tell that you really love your subject matter! And thanks for the soundtrack link. The same uploader has some other cool stuff up at the archive, too.

One of the best Hanna Barbara shows, used to watch Top Cat as a kid

topcat is my favorite show till this day🎉

This was a wonderful presentation ! Thank you !

"Boss Cat" (as it was known in the UK) was appointment viewing for me in the 60s. Still my favourite from the H-B stable, closely followed by Snagglepuss.

Cade, my Dad's cousin, Gloria Wood (Woody Woodpecker song with Kay Keyser) was the woman of 1,000 voices. Through the 50's and 60's, she made a nice living singing commercial and radio jingles. Growing up, watching television in our home often included: "Is that Gloria?". She IS that voice singing the Dobie Gillis theme. Early on, she was very adept at singing tracks with herself. Her voice is so familiar to me, given her connection to me family-wise. I cannot confirm, but ALWAYS thought, hers was one of the voices in the opening and close themes to Top Cat. I would be VERY grateful to know if you had any info surrounding this. Jay Deane, Athol, Massachusetts.

great stuff! love Top Cat!!!

If every episode of Top Cat has a score of 7 or higher on IMDB, it should be more than definitely get a cult following if it hasn't already.

Top Cat was definitely the character who sparked my enjoyment of lovable schemers which lead to me enjoying characters like Ed, Edd n Eddy, Bender and Nick Wilde

I managed to catch the show in reruns and honestly it's one of the best shows that they've done wish it got more love Also please keep up this documentary series I love in-depth looks like this at shows like this

I always loved this show. My dad told me that he used to watch it all the time in Mexico. It’s very much a comfort show for him. Also, I’ve been obsessed with this show as well :DD

No doubt, but Top Cat has got to be one of the best shows in cartoon history, I wish this series got a reboot

I just watched the episodes the new METVToons has aired and it's now one of my favorites. I love the chill relaxed vibe all the characters have, they just banter so naturally back and fourth. Also, unlike other HB shows, where the character feel a little too mean to be likable, top cat just being a scam artist and kinda sketchy guy makes him much more lovable. Good show.

Underrated show

Top cat was my grandpa's favorite show when he was a kid.

I grew up watching this in reruns and I love it so much! Great video thanks!

Your videos are high quality! God you are so underrated, thank you for talking about my favourite cartoon cat :)

Also, on the Phil Silvers show was Allan Melvin who went on to be the voice of Magilla, gorilla and appeared as Sam, the Butcher on the Brady Bunch

Always loved this show and its jazzy groove... and the catchiest theme song EVER! (And I AM a music theory nerd!)

Loved watching it on CN when it was in it's early days.

What's usually considered to be the first comic strip in U.S. history was called "the Yellow Kid," and it took place in a part of New York called Hogan's Alley. Hoagie's Alley looks strikingly similar. It was about, more or less, a gang of lower class kids, getting into mischief.

If Top Cat and the Jetsons had been made for Saturday mornings they would have been hits But they were made for Prime Time and failed so they went to Saturdays and were on for years

I grew up in the 2000s and I loved this series. The characters and vibe is amazing.

top cat my favorite as a kid.

This is such a great review for my second favorite cartoon ever

My fave cartoon as a kid. Plus The Flintstones and Johnny Quest. 😊

I got to say I really like how the gendered swapped versions and Chooch and Brain in Jellystone park on max.

I recently found out about Top Cat after watching Quick Draw McGraw, and I really liked both! As a fellow Cartoon hound I gotta sub right away

I watched this cartoon in the netherlands and i loved it.

I loved watching HB when I was younger (late 2000's) because my parents could also watch along and get the same joy. TC was very popular in the UK, but I can not tell you why.

happy to see a good video about this cartoon, shot my favorite from the studio, which was never there one of my favorites. Top Cat from my father's time, a classic without a doubt

Wonderful video and tribute to one of Hanna Barbera's great series, although you unfortunately missed the Phil Silvers connection. As mentioned in a previous comment, Top Cat was an obvious "cartoonification" of a popular live action sitcom of its day. Like the Flintstones was a cartoon version of the Honeymooners, so was Top Cat based on the popular "The Phil Silvers show," AKA Sergeant Bilko, a fast talking army Sergeant/con man who had a group of privates as his "gang." The fabulous Arnold Stang, the voice of TC, made his voice sound a bit like Silvers' Bilko, the voice and design of TC's nemesis, Officer Dibble mimicked Colonel Hall on Bilko played hilariously by Paul Ford, and even the small innocent character Benny was based on Bilko favorite character, Doberman, played by Maurice Gosfield. Many of the episode plots were even simplified versions of Bilko plots. The stripped down limited animation design and layout that Hanna Barbera pioneered for TV made TC one of the all time great HB series.

Love the top cat series very underated show its one of my all time favourite hanna barbera cartoons along side the flintstones scooby doo the jetsons yogi bear and secret squirrel I would also include the classic tom and jerry shorts in that list watched those alot on vhs and dvd as a kid

Massive thumbs up for a fantastic video! Terrific research, production and presentation! Thoroughly enjoyed it.

I had a TV in my room when I was a kid but no cable. I was able to pick up Top Cat with rabbit ears on TV 55. Looked fwd to this show.

I love top-cat! Here in Brazil he is called "manda-chuva" wich just feels different, it has a different meaning aswell (It, most likely, means hes "the boss" or the one who gives the orders, the "leader". The person who only wants to give rules but no obey them. I might be wrong but in general this is the meaning). I remember being a small kid and watching the movie in 2011-2016, i dont remember the date but oh boy, id play for hours on end pretending i was TC. such good memories

your presentation was perfect, I appreciate every aspect. Your passion for Top Cat is palpable and real and projects authentic, which is so rare on youtube. I have the dvd set I bought yeeeears ago. I was born in 68 but watched reruns in the 70s. then lived life and then bought the dvd in 04 and still love it at 55. I hope you get more subscribers. I just did. peace out!

Top Cat. Some of my best childhood memories!

On October 15, 1951, the premiere of I Love Lucy, the very first person viewers get to see in the Ricardo apartment is John Stephenson, for the show's sponsor, Philip Morris cigarettes. I believe that Lucy was a Chesterfield smoker.

When i was a kid Top Cat was one of my favorate cartoons from San Fran Steve Venegas

Great job on reviewing Top Cat! Thank you. I've got one cel, a group portrait of Duck Dodgers In The 24 1/2 Century. TC would really be cool!

As a musician, I've always loved and admired that Hoyt Curtin theme song. If you slow it down a little and play it like dinner music, it's a great soft-jazz song

That 2011 short you can't identify may be an anniversary short dedicated to Joseph Barbara, hence why Top Cat references a "Mr. B" and from what I've found, 1961 was the year Top Cat premiered, so it was probably meant to be a 50 Year Top Cat Anniversary in the UK, as they cared about the character outside of Latin America.

Absolutely agree, he's the most tip-top, Top Cat. I grew up watching TC and the gang in mid-70s re-runs. I've always preferred TC to Scooby-Doo. The Flintstones give him a run for his money, but TC himself is still my favourite character of the bunch. I also loved early Captain Caveman and the Shmoo, both of which seem to have evolved later in ways that did not improve them, IMO.

Im always surprised how few episodes (outside of The Flintstones & Jetsons) these shows had. Growing up i always thought the likes of TC & Scooby had multiple seasons but no, most barely made it past 25 episodes. Crazy

really great video! it's so nice to see that more people are getting to know and loving it Top Cat, i have fallen in love with these characters since i started watching Jellystone, i actually watched as a kid, but i never really was crazy about, but now it became an obcession watching this video was really good, and you are right! the original show had so many great things that it's weird that it was flop on the US, i'm from Brazil and the characters are so very well known here, i have seen so many grafiti of the characters in my city, i have found 12 already, and they pretty close of each other, there is even a restaurant with the Top Cat theme 😂 this video is a masterpiece, thank you so much for this incredible video and thank you so much for sharing the entire soundtrack, i'm going to listen to it very very much hehe!

I grow up watching top cat on boomerang I have found memories of it

I haven’t watched this show since I was a young boy in the UK in the early 1979s, but listening to the music you provided a link to bought it all rushing back. By the way in the UK at that time, the show was called Boss Cat. And the reason for the name change was that it was shown on the BBC who at the time had strict regulations against advertising and “Top Cat” was the name of a leading brand of cat food. So for years I knew it as Boss Cat, not Top Cat.

Very cool congratulations....top cat îs one of our favorite characthers...and we will soon make a sculpture of him

I freaking love topcoat 😊

Top Cat is my favorite as well. Great video!

Another great video Cade Definitely gonna pick up the dvd set if I spot it I remember boomerang always aired TC reruns before school so me and my sister would watch it while waiting for the schoolbus I should give it another look!

I wish I could ID the cel I own of Officer Dibble. It's the only one I own that I can't seem to see in the show, despite watching it so many times! Arguably my favourite HB cartoon and one that I never ever tire of revisiting. It definitely seems a few notches above most other cartoons in terms of the level of the humour and I just love the atmosphere and the heart it has. Basically all the reasons you highlight! l also love cats, so that's a nice bonus! In a sense, I'm sort of glad the show didn't run too long and get oversaturated, like Scooby-Doo for example, but another season's worth of episodes wouldn't have gone amiss! Perhaps it was too cerebral for audiences? Mind you, speaking as a Brit, 30 episodes is pretty decent for a sitcom, so I don't really notice. it's funny you suggest the Flintstones was more adult, because I have heard people say vice versa. Top Cat had more intellectual exchanges between characters and less silly slapstick. But not so much that you'd notice at first glance perhaps. I always felt the gags in Top Cat were more subtle and played out well because of the great acting and the characters, rather than just the gags themselves. I love The Flintstones just as much, so its no wonder that they did very well, but what amazes me is that The Jetsons surpassed Top Cat in popularity in their native country, given how much more interesting the TC cast is, to me at least. I think I may have TC to thank for getting me into Sgt. Bilko which, like Top Cat, ran a LOT on BBC until the early 2000s. In the 90s, the Boss Cat thing was dropped though. I don't ever recall that name change from my youth, perhaps because I was more familiar with him via VHS tape. I also think it's worth noting that Benny is a fair bit smarter and less slobbish than Doberman. Also, In Mad World, Arnold Stang and Marvin Kaplan share a scene with...Phil SIlvers! So, you listen to the music a lot too eh? ;) I've been collecting the scores here and there for years. At some points I even tried cobbling them together on cassette tape from various portions of the show, not easy when it's so talky. I had more success with other cartoons, ones that had less dialogue. I actually don't mind portions where the music is absent however, because it's a nice little breather and allows us to hear those wonderful voices all the more. Overall, thank you for this intelligent and thoughtful analysis of one of my all-time favourite series. I enjoyed it a lot and like the show, this video had me grinning from ear to ear.

I watched TC when it originally aired, which would put me at 11 years old then. I loved it then and still do. I have the complete series on DVD. So fun to watch. Most "reviews" of older cartoons are not as in-depth as yours. Nice to know about the Underscore and such. Hoyt Curtain was a great composer. As you said, his music for Jonny Quest is quite good. Thank you for the wonderful 'review' of this short-lived classic.

Never heard the theme song properly = i though it was "Whipped Cream for Tea"

I may have to add this gem to my library of DVDs or what I call my answer to a mid life crisis. Cheaper than a sports car but perfect for revived youth. Shame it was only one season.

I've recently been watching top cat (idk why I didn't when I discovered the series back in 2020) but thx to Jellystone I actually got to sit down and watch tc and man I love it a lot ! One of my favorite episodes is All That Jazz (I miss jazz I wish he showed up more smh) but whatever

I don't know how, but I remember seeing promotional commercials for Top Cat in the late summer of '61. I was almost five at the time. I had to beg my folks to let me stay up after my bedtime to watch it. I think it was broadcast on ABC at 8:30 Wednesday nights. I suspect the time slot helped it to fail with the children's demographic and the cartoon nature of the show doomed it with many adults. The network dropped the ball on this one. ABC did that a lot back then.