Ub Iwerks's Flip the Frog series of cartoons was short lived, only lasting from 1930 to 1933. On the most part the Flip the Frog cartoons are not great or cartoon/animated masterpieces and it is sort of understandable as to why Flip didn't make it bigger. However they are far from terrible ones either and do hold some interest, enough of them even being good.
Despite not being historically significant like 'Fiddlesticks', which other than that was actually to me a lesser Flip the Frog cartoon, was, 'Circus' is still pretty good. Not one of the best of the series, but far from one of the worst. It is not perfect but there are things here that improve quite a bit and done much better than many other Flip the Frog cartoons.
A lot of good things in 'Circus'. The animation is very good good, with beautifully detailed backgrounds, nice shading and characters that aren't drawn too crudely. There is some nice character animation here. The music makes even more of an impact, it is lushly and cleverly orchestrated, full of lively energy and not only adds brilliantly to the action it enhances it.
There are plentiful sight gags, and they are beautifully timed and very amusing, even when unoriginal. Maybe not always hilarious but they hardly fall flat, the hotdog sequence is a riot. There is a nice natural charm and a good deal of zest.
Characters are lively. There is a lot of excitement and fun as well as a sense of danger. The pacing is never dull.
Flip is a bit bland still though, he never was one of animation's most compelling, most interesting or personality-filled lead characters.
A lack of originality and moving forward too, there is some gag borrowing and reuse here and with not enough freshness. Structurally, on top of being slight and occasionally on the sentimental side, it's at times repetitive and random.
Overall, pretty good. 7/10 Bethany Cox