The strip was in its tenth year when Popeye made his debut, but the one-eyed sailor quickly became the lead character, and Thimble Theatre became one of King Features' most popular properties during the 1930s.

In his debut storyline, Popeye's superhumanly proportioned strength and endurance stemmed from the "luck" he acquired by rubbing the feathers of the head of Bernice, a "whiffle hen", thus enabling him to survive fifteen gunshot wounds.

Thimble Theatre's first main characters were the lanky, long-nosed slacker Harold Hamgravy (rapidly shortened to simply "Ham Gravy") and his scrappy, headstrong girlfriend Olive Oyl.

As its first year progressed, however, numerous elements of this premise would be relinquished (including the recurring character "Willie Wormwood", introduced as a parody of melodrama villainy), soon rendering the strip a series of episodic comic anecdotes depicting the daily life and dysfunctional romantic exploits of Ham Gravy and Olive Oyl.

He was initially hired by Castor Oyl and Ham Gravy to crew a ship for a voyage to Dice Island, the location of a casino owned by the crooked gambler Fadewell.

Castor intended to break the bank at the casino using the unbeatable good luck conferred by stroking the head feathers of Bernice the Whiffle Hen.

[30] Weeks later, on the trip back, Popeye was shot many times by Jack Snork, an undercover stooge of Fadewell's, but survived by rubbing Bernice's head.

Other regular characters introduced into the strip following its retool in 1930 were George W. Geezil, an irascible cobbler who spoke in a heavily affected accent and habitually attempted to murder or wish death upon Wimpy; Rough-House, the temperamental owner of a budget diner who served as a long-suffering foil to Wimpy; Eugene the Jeep, a yellow, vaguely doglike animal from Africa with magical powers; the Sea Hag, a terrible pirate and the last witch on Earth; Alice the Goon, a monstrous creature who entered the strip as the Sea Hag's henchwoman and continued as Swee'Pea's babysitter; the hapless, perpetually anxious King Blozo; Blozo's unintelligent lackey Oscar; Popeye's lecherous, scheming father Poopdeck Pappy; and Toar, an ageless, dim-witted caveman.

The stories were more complex (often spanning months or even years), with a heavier emphasis on verbal comedy and many characters that never appeared in the cartoons (among them King Blozo, Toar, and Rough-House).

Comics historian Brian Walker stated: "Segar offered up a masterful blend of comedy, fantasy, satire and suspense in Thimble Theater Starring Popeye".

Tom Sims, the son of a Coosa River channel-boat captain, acted as the writer for Thimble Theatre beginning in August 1938 and established the Popeye the Sailorman spin-off.

[37] On January 1, 2009, 70 years since the death of his creator, Segar's comic strips (though not the various films, TV shows, theme music, and other media based on them) became public domain in most countries,[38] but remained under copyright in the United States.

Popeye also had his own manga series published by Shōnen Gahōsha, written and drawn by Robotan and Marude Dameo creator Kenji Morita, which ran from 1961 to 1965.

Critic PS Hayes in reviewing the series stated: Langridge writes a story with a lot of dialogue (compared to your average comic book) and it's all necessary, funny, and entertaining.

[63] In November 1932, King Features signed an agreement with Fleischer Studios to have Popeye and the other Thimble Theatre characters begin appearing in a series of animated cartoons released by Paramount Pictures.

Many of the Thimble Theatre characters, including Wimpy, Poopdeck Pappy, and Eugene the Jeep, eventually made appearances in the Paramount cartoons, though Olive Oyl's extended family and Ham Gravy were absent.

Upon swallowing the spinach, Popeye's physical strength immediately becomes superhuman, and he is easily able to save the day, and very often rescue Olive Oyl from a dire situation.

When Turner Entertainment acquired the cartoons in 1986, a long and laborious legal struggle with King Features kept the majority of the original Popeye shorts from official video releases for more than 20 years.

Its style was influenced by the 1930s Fleischer cartoons, and featured Swee'Pea, Wimpy, Bluto, Olive Oyl, Poopdeck Pappy, and the Sea Hag as its characters.

September 10, 1935, through March 28, 1936, on the NBC Red Network (87 episodes), initially sponsored by Wheatena, a whole-wheat breakfast cereal, which routinely replaced the spinach references.

A co-production of Paramount Pictures and Walt Disney Productions, the movie was filmed almost entirely on Malta, in the village of Mellieħa on the northwest coast of the island.

[114] In March 2014, Sony Pictures Animation updated its slate, scheduling the film for 2016, and announcing Tartakovsky as the director of Hotel Transylvania 2, which he was directing concurrently with Popeye.

"[116] In March 2015, Tartakovsky announced that despite the well-received test footage, he was no longer working on the project, and would instead direct Can You Imagine?, which is based on his own original idea,[117] but it too was cancelled.

[123] On March 19, 2024, it was announced that a new live action Popeye film is being developed at Chernin Entertainment with a screenplay written by Michael Caleo for King Features.

[146][18] Additional hometown residents of Chester have inspired other Segar characters, including Dora Paskel, an uncommonly tall, angular lady who ran a general store in town and was the origin for Popeye's gal, Olive Oyl.

William "Windy Bill" Schuchert, a rather rotund man who owned the local opera house (and was Segar's early employer), was the seed for the character J. Wellington Wimpy.

[143][147][18] A conjecture presented in a 2009 book raised the idea that while living in Santa Monica, Segar might have based some of Popeye's language on a local fisherman, even though the article has yet to make a definitive claim.

[158] Initially Popeye's chief superhuman characteristic was his indestructibility, rather than super strength, which was attributed to his having rubbed the head of Bernice the Whiffle Hen numerous times after being shot.

[162] A frequently circulated story claims that Fleischer's choice of spinach to give Popeye strength was based on faulty calculations of its iron content.

[169] In honor of Popeye's 75th anniversary, the Empire State Building illuminated its notable tower lights green the weekend of January 16–18, 2004 as a tribute to the icon's love of spinach.