Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: June 14, 1939 Stars: Popeye, Bluto, Olive Oyl Rating: ★★ Review:
‘Ghosks is the Bunk’ is the second of four 1939 Popeye cartoon with alternate titles.
The cartoon starts with Olive reading a ghost story to Bluto and Popeye. When a storm wind makes Popeye hide beneath the couch, Bluto fakes tiredness, only to rush out to an abandoned hotel to play some ghost tricks on the sailor. However, he’s discovered all too soon, and with the help of invisible paint Popeye returns the trick on him.
‘Ghosks is the Bunk’ is the first cartoon to show the major weakness of invisibility gags: when invisible one becomes practically invincible, and the viewer’s sympathy soon goes to the poor ex-bully who gets clobbered. This problem would return in the invisibility cartoons ‘The Vanishing Private‘ (1942) featuring Donald Duck, and ‘The Invisible Mouse‘ (1947) starring Tom & Jerry.
Watch ‘Ghosks is the Bunk’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Wotta Nightmare’ essentially stars Popeye only, as we watch him dreaming, having a nightmare in which a devil-like Bluto courts an angel-like Olive Oyl. Popeye is having a hard time in his own dream, while we watch him tossing and turning in his bed, and even sleepwalking across the room. In the end spinach comes to the rescue, but then Popeye awakes before he can take his revenge, so he rushes out of his house to clobber a bewildered Bluto in real life.
‘Wotta Nitemare’ is the first Popeye cartoon to show the familiar love triangle of Popeye, Bluto and Olive Oyl since ‘Learn Polikeness’ (1938), being absent for more than a year. More striking is the welcome return to Fleischer’s surreal world of the early 1930s during dream sequence , with its metamorphosis gags, floating faces, and extreme body deformations when the dream-Bluto clobbers Popeye.
Watch ‘Wotta Nitemare’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Ben Hardaway & Cal Dalton Release Date: August 12, 1939 Stars: proto-Bugs Bunny Rating: ★★½ Review:
In 1939 Ben Hardaway revisited the rabbit he had introduced in ‘Porky’s Hare Hunt‘ (1938).
The rabbit was completely redesigned, and received the colors that would make Bugs Bunny. However, the rabbit retained his loony character and Woody Woodpecker laugh, and is a far cry from the cool guy Bugs Bunny would become. But as he was Ben “Bugs” Hardaway’s bunny, it was this character that gave Tex Avery’s later star his name.
‘Hare-Um Scare-Um’ stars an anonymous red-nosed man who goes hunting when meat prices soar. In the forest he encounters the loony rabbit, who at one point even sings a song about how crazy he is.
There’s remarkably little to enjoy in ‘Hare-um Scare-um’, as neither hunter nor rabbit are sympathetic, and one doesn’t care for either. However, the short introduces cross-dressing, when the rabbit disguises himself as a female dog to attract the hunter’s pooch. This cross-dressing would become a popular feature of the later Bugs Bunny.
Watch ‘Hare-Um Scare-Um’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Hare-Um Scare-Um’ is available on the Blu-Ray set ‘Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2’
This is the third of four cartoons featuring a Bugs Bunny forerunner
To the first proto-Bugs Bunny cartoon: Prest-O Change-O
To the next proto-Bugs Bunny cartoon: Elmer’s Candid Camera
Director: Chuck Jones Release Date: March 25, 1939 Stars: Two Curious Dogs, proto-Bugs Bunny Rating: ★★½ Review:
Chuck Jones uses the silly rabbit from Ben Hardaway’s ‘Porky’s Hare Hunt‘ (1938) and makes it a magician’s rabbit in a cartoon featuring his earliest stars, the “Two Curious Dogs”, which had made their debut in January in ‘Dog Gone Modern’.
In ‘Prest-O Change-O” the two dogs flee from a dog catcher into a magician’s house, where the tall dog meets the rabbit, while the small dog struggles with a “hindu rope”.
Jones’s handling of the material is very Disney-like, slow in action and with much attention for situation comedy. Unfortunately, his two dog characters are anything but funny, and the complete film fails to impress. The rabbit, a forerunner of Bugs Bunny, is as unsympathetic as he was in ‘Porky’s Hare Hunt’ and rightfully gets punched in the end. He doesn’t talk, however, but shows the weird laugh he got in ‘Porky’s Hare Hunt’.
‘Prest-O Change-O’ doesn’t add anything, however, and the rabbit remains unappealing. So, after this film this particular rabbit was transformed into another design, making its debut in ‘Hare-um Scare-um’ of five months later.
Watch ‘Prest-O Change-O’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Prest-O Change-O’ is available on the Blu-Ray set ‘Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2’
This is the second of four cartoons featuring a Bugs Bunny forerunner
To the first proto-Bugs Bunny cartoon: Porky’s Hare Hunt
To the next proto-Bugs Bunny cartoon: Hare-um Scare-um
Director: Ben Hardaway Release Date: April 30, 1938 Stars: Porky Pig, proto-Bugs Bunny Rating: ★★★½ Review:
‘Porky’s Hare Hunt’ was Ben Hardaway’s last solo cartoon before he teamed up with story artist Cal Dalton to co-direct fourteen shorts.
The film is a clear attempt to duplicate Tex Avery’s ‘Porky’s Duck Hunt’ (1937). Now Porky is hunting rabbits, and Daffy’s loony character is now transferred to a rabbit, which even jumps and whoo-hoos like Daffy does. However, the rabbit has got a unique, weird laugh, which at several occasions is clearly Woody Woodpecker-like. Although this rabbit appears three years before the woodpecker himself, this is no coincidence, as both this rabbit and Woody Woodpecker were conceived By Ben Hardaway, and voiced by Mel Blanc.
‘Porky’s Rabbit Hunt’ is an uneven and only moderately funny cartoon that contains a few typical Warner Bros. gags, like a sniffing gun and ‘hare remover’, which makes the rabbit disappear completely (in cartoons rabbits and hares are completely interchangeable).
More importantly, it is the first of three cartoons featuring rabbits that anticipate the coming of Bugs Bunny. This rabbit has little in common with the world famous hare: he’s far from sympathetic, even heckling Porky in the hospital. Moreover, he’s a clear loon, like Daffy, not the cool hero Bugs Bunny would become. However, this rabbit already does perform a fake death scene, something that would become a Bugs Bunny trademark, and he quotes Groucho Marx from ‘A Night at the Opera’ (1935), saying ‘Of course you know that this means war’, which would become a Bugs Bunny catchphrase.
Watch ‘Porky’s Hare Hunt’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Porky Pig cartoon no. 39
To the previous Porky Pig cartoon: Porky’s Five and Ten
To the next Porky Pig cartoon: Injun Trouble
This is the first of four cartoons featuring a Bugs Bunny forerunner
To the next proto-Bugs Bunny cartoon: Prest-o Change-o
‘Porky’s Hare Hunt’ is available on the Blu-Ray set ‘Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 2’ and on the DVD-set ‘Porky Pig 101’
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: July 7, 1939 Stars: Betty Boop Rating: ★★ Review:
In ‘Rhythm on the Reservation’ Betty Boop visits and Indian reservation, trying to buy a tom-tom drum.
Meanwhile, her car full of musical instruments, is emptied by the native Americans, who are too dumb to use them properly, and use them for various purposes. But when Betty starts a swinging tune, they join in, sort of.
These scenes make ‘Rhythm on the Reservation’ a late variation on ‘Trader Mickey‘ (1932), which had featured cannibals. Of course, such scenes make the short an offensive and hopelessly dated cartoon. Unfortunately, it was to be Betty Boop’s last. It’s a sad ending for a once so promising career. But Betty Boop had lost most of her charm already in 1934, and by 1939 she felt like a leftover from another era. With her series, and that of the Silly Symphonies ending (the latter series ended in April 1939), one can say more or less goodbye to the 1930s.
Nevertheless, Betty was surely missed, as the Fleischers never came with another successful star of their own to replace her: Gabby (1940-1941) or the donkey duo of Hunky and Spunky (1938-1941) hardly count, and Popeye and Superman were owned by King Features and DC Comics, respectively. Meanwhile at Warner Bros. people were defining a new cartoon style that would dominate the 1940s…
Watch ‘Rhythm on the Reservation’ yourself and tell me what you think:
This is Betty Boop’s 83rd and last cartoon
To the previous Betty Boop cartoon: The Scared Crows
‘Rhythm on the Reservation’ is available on the French DVD Box Set ‘Betty Boop Coffret Collector’
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: May 12, 1939 Stars: Betty Boop Rating: ★★ Review:
In the opening scene of ‘Musical Mountaineers’ Betty Boop’s car stops in the middle of nowhere, and she gets stranded in ‘feud county’.
Betty seeks for help in a poor barn, where she encounters a fully armed hillbilly family. The hostile hillbillies make Betty Boop dance by shooting at her feet, but Betty’s inspired dancing brings out their musical element, and soon we watch them all singing and dancing together.
It’s hard to enjoy ‘Musical Mountaineers’, as the short features cliche caricatures of mountain people, even if the Appalachians are treated better than in the extremely backward ‘Be Up To Date’ from one year earlier. Nevertheless, the musical routine feels trite, and seems to belong to the early 1930’s, when song-and-dance routines were all too common. The best gag is Margie Hines’s, who, as Betty Boop’s voice, adlibs “it looks like the people who moved out, don’t live here anymore”.
Watch ‘Musical Mountaineers’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: March 31, 1939 Stars: Betty Boop Rating: ★★★★ Review:
In ‘So Does an Automobile’ Betty Boop owns a car hospital for ill anthropomorphized cars.
Although this cartoon features a musical number, it mainly consists of inspired spot gags, making this short the only Betty Boop entry in the spot gag genre. And, in true gag cartoon fashion, this cartoon saves its best gag for last.
For a Betty Boop cartoon from the second half of the 1930s, ‘So Does an Automobile’ has a surprisingly silly atmosphere, which harks partly back to the early 1930’s, Betty Boop’s heydays. The number of gags and the silly atmosphere arguably make the short one of the best Betty Boop cartoons of the second half of the 1930’s, right behind ‘Betty Boop and Grampy’ (1935) and ‘Pudgy Picks A Fight‘ (1937). Unfortunately, ‘So Does an Automobile’ was to be Betty Boop’s last great cartoon, as her series stopped four months later.
Watch ‘So Does an Automobile’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: December 2, 1938 Stars: Betty Boop Rating: ★★ Review:
In the opening scene of ‘On with the New’ we watch Betty Boop working at the ‘Ye olde quainte coffee house’.
Betty has to work hard: she must cook and wash the dishes at the same time. She clearly hates her job, but luckily she gets a job as a nurse in ‘Bundle from Heaven Nursery’. At the nursery we watch the babies being cleaned at an assembly line. However, as soon as Betty has them in their beds and said goodnight to them, the babies cause havoc. The uncontrollable babies behave so badly that Betty quits her job on the spot and rushes back to her old job, which she does with renewed enthusiasm.
There’s little to enjoy in ‘On With The New’, although the assembly line sequence is rather nice. The uncontrollable baby material go all the way back to ‘Mickey’s Orphans‘ (1931) and ‘Mickey’s Nightmare‘ (1932), and by 1939 such antics, with its multitude of animation cycles, had become old fashioned and trite. The assembly line sequence, on the other hand, looks forward to a similar sequence in the Warner Bros. classic ‘Baby Bottleneck’ (1946).
Watch ‘On with the New’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: April 28, 1939 Stars: Popeye, Olive Oyl Rating: ★ Review:
‘Leave Well Enough Alone’ opens with Popeye visiting Olive Oyl’s pet shop, buying all her animals (dogs) for $500, only to set them free immediately.
Only a parrot stays behind. He sings the cartoon’s title tune, in which he tells us that it’s better to be safe inside, being cared for than free in the outer world. Indeed, in no time all the dogs have been caught by a dog catcher. Popeye buys them all from the dog catcher and restores them to the shop.
‘Leave Well Enough Alone’ is low on gags, its title song is trite, but most importantly, its message is highly questionable. It’s very strange to watch such a free spirit as Popeye finally obeying to this extremely conservative motto. Was it a hidden message from Max to his employees?
Watch ‘Leave Well Enough Alone’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: April 7, 1939 Stars: Popeye, Olive Oyl Rating: ★★★★ Review:
‘Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp’ is the last of three Popeye two-reelers in Technicolor.
Like ‘Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad the Sailor’ (1936) and ‘Popeye the Sailor meets Ali Baba’s Forty Thieves’ (1937) the short has a clear 1001 Arabian Nights setting. In fact, it’s a rather faithful retelling of the classic fairy tale, until Spinach comes along. Unlike the earlier two-reelers ‘Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp’ doesn’t either feature Fleischer’s table-top technique, Wimpy or Bluto, with an anonymous villain taking Bluto’s place.
The film is introduced as being a script Olive is writing for ‘Surprise Pictures’, and, of course, she herself stars as the princess. It’s the first scene in which we can hear Margie Hines as Olive Oyl’s voice. Hines had replaced Mae Questel, who didn’t make the move to Miami together with the rest of the Fleischer studio. Margie Hines would remain Olive’s voice until the end of 1943, after which Mae Questel picked it up again.
‘Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp’ is wonderfully made. Its background art is no less than gorgeous, and some of the animation is outstanding, for example that on Popeye’s horse. The final battle is a delight, when Popeye uses cans of spinach as his own magic against the magic of the lamp, now in the villain’s hands.
The film contains a novelty: in the cave scene and in the scene in which Popeye parades the streets as a prince, he suddenly has eyes with pupils, foreshadowing his design of the Paramount studio years.
Watch ‘Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: January 27, 1939 Stars: Popeye, Bluto, Wimpy Rating: ★★★★ Review:
In 1937 the Fleischer Studio suffered a severe strike. In 1938 they moved their studios to Miami, Florida to break up union activity, and because of the state’s more favorable financial climate.
The new studio opened in October 1938, and devoted a lot of its resources to the Fleischer’s first feature film, ‘Gulliver’, which was released at the end of 1939.
The move to Florida had several consequences for the Popeye series: as the studio’s top animators now worked on ‘Gulliver’, the series was laid in hands of some lesser men, and this shows in many 1939 Popeye cartoons. More importantly, there were some voice changes: Mae Questel and Gus Wickie (Bluto’s voice) had stayed behind in New York, so Olive’s voice was taken over by Margie Hines, who would do her voice until the end of 1943. Bluto’s voice was now done by Pinto Colvig, whom the Fleischers had hired away from Disney. Jack Mercer, Popeye’s voice, got along very well with Margie Hines – in fact the two were married on March 8, 1939.
The move may have had a particular impact on ‘Customers Wanted’, for this cartoon is a ‘cheater’: it only partially features new material, some scenes are reused from two earlier Popeye cartoons, albeit in the most natural way.
‘In ‘Customers Wanted’ Popeye and Bluto as competing arcade owners at a Coney Island-like amusement park. They’re both out of customers, and dive on Wimpy, when he seems interested.
The competing entrepreneurs are so eager to show Wimpy their films on their mutoscopes, they don’t even charge him money. The mutoscope films are excerpts from ‘Let’s Get Movin” (1936) and ‘The Twisker Pitcher’ (1937). Soon, however, Bluto’s and Popeye’s competition turns into a fight, and it’s Wimpy who cashes in by advertising their row as ‘the fight of the century”.
‘Customers Wanted’ is an early compilation cartoon, but a very entertaining one. Bluto’s and Popeye’s tricks to lure Wimpy away from the competition are delightful, and so are the voices. The amusement park itself is beautifully designed, and is reminiscent of the futuristic fair of ‘All’s Fair at the Fair‘ (1938).
Watch ‘Customers Wanted’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Meanwhile esteemed Disney historian Didier Ghez has written the first review on my book on his Disney History Blog. Ghez writes:
“I just received my personal copy of Mickey’s Movies by Gijs Grob. I absolutely love this book. Gijs discusses all of Mickey’s shorts and his insights are absolutely fascinating.
To be read in small installments. A “must have” for Mickey enthusiasts.”
You can buy the book on Amazon. There is both a paperback and a Kindle edition. I hope you’ll enjoy it! And if you’ve already grabbed a copy: 1) thanks! and 2) I’d love it if you could review the book on Amazon.
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: June 9, 1939 Stars: Betty Boop, Pudgy Rating: ★ Review:
In the opening scene of ‘The Scared Crows’ we watch Betty and Pudgy planting seeds, which are immediately eaten by crows.
Betty chases them away using a scarecrow, but one flies against a tree, and Betty takes the poor bird inside to nurse it. However, the crow soon invites all his friends inside, and the flock creates havoc in Betty’s kitchen. Using the scarecrow as a disguise Betty chases them all away, restoring peace.
‘The Scared Crows’ is a slow and tiresome cartoon, and it’s difficult to see anything noteworthy in it, apart from being Pudgy’s last theatrical cartoon. The little cute dog had hardly made an impression during its five year career, never reaching the stardom of its owner, let alone Popeye, Fleischer’s major star, and he wasn’t missed.
Watch ‘The Scared Crows’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: January 27, 1939 Stars: Betty Boop, Pudgy Rating: ★★ Review:
Below Betty Boop’s window there’s an Italian organ grinder with a monkey.
Betty invites the monkey inside to play with Pudgy. But the mischievous little animal immediately aims for her food, and Pudgy has a hard time trying to chase the intruder out of the house. When Pudgy finally succeeds, the monkey returns in Betty’s arms, as she has just bought him from the organ grinder.
‘My Friend The Monkey’ is the closest the Betty Boop series ever came near becoming a chase cartoon, a new genre that was emerging at the time. However, the cartoon is far from a gag rich chase cartoon, being more tiresome than funny. Even the pay off scene is anything but a surprise, as we could watch Betty negotiating with the organ grinder throughout the picture.
The animation of the monkey dancing was reused from Pudgy swinging in ‘The Swing School‘, even using the same music, but now in barrel organ form.
Watch ‘My Friend the Monkey’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Dave Fleischer Release Date: December 23, 1938 Stars: Betty Boop, Pudgy Rating: ★★ Review:
In ‘Pudgy in Thrills and Chills’ Betty and Pudgy board on a mountain train for winter sport.
Betty wears a rather sexy winter outfit and goes skating on the frozen lake, in a rotoscoped action to the music of a nice waltz version of ‘Jingle Bells’. Meanwhile a dumb skier wants to kiss her.
However, in the cartoon world, skating often takes place near a waterfall (see also the Popeye cartoon ‘Seasin’s Greetinks!‘ (1933) and the Mickey Mouse short ‘On Ice‘ from 1935), and ‘Pudgy in Thrills and Chills’ is no exception. Thus soon Pudgy and Betty fall off the waterfall, only to be saved by the dumb skier. He returns both Betty and Pudgy into safety, and finally earns the desired kiss… from Pudgy.
There are actually remarkably few thrills and chills in this slow cartoon, as most screen time goes to Betty Boop skating, the antics of the dumb skier, and some boring actions by Pudgy. Most remarkable is the very convincing scene of Betty Boop and Pudgy playing tic-tac-toe on a steamy train window.
Watch ‘Pudgy in Thrills and Chills’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Bob Clampett Release Date: March 29, 1941 Rating: ★★★½ Review:
‘Goofy Groceries’ was the first Merrie Melodie directed by Bob Clampett, and thus his first color film.
In this film Clampett made a follow up to Frank Tashlin’s cartoons, ‘Have You Got any Castles?‘ and ‘You’re and Education‘ (both 1938), in which things come alive at night, featuring Hollywood caricatures. Moreover, he maintains Tashlin’s high production standards and original cinematography. Thus, ‘Goofy Groceries’ is a beautiful and well-made picture, even though it makes little sense.
As the title implies, now things come to life in a grocery store, including caricatures of Ned Sparks, Jack Benny and Leopold Stokowski. The best parts are a Busby Berkeley ballet of some feminine sardines, and Tomato cans dancing a can-can. The musical number is interrupted by a King Kong-like gorilla, which prompts the stock battle scene, until he’s called home by his mother.
‘Goofy Groceries’ is far from a classic, but it shows that the Leon Schlesinger studio was capable to incorporate the innovations by one director, in this case Frank Tashlin, into other directors’ films, making the studio improve with a remarkably speed.
Watch ‘Goofy Groceries’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Director: Bob Clampett Release Date: December 16, 1939 Stars: Porky Pig Rating: ★★½ Review:
‘The Film Fan’ is one of those cartoons on cinema itself.
In this short Porky Pig is still a kid, sent to the grocery store by his mother. But when he passes a cinema with free admittance for kids, he rushes inside. What follows are some typical cinema annoyances, and advertisements for films like ‘Gone with the Breeze’. However, when an employee interrupts the program to say that “if there’s a little boy in this theater, that was sent to the store by his mother, he’d better go home right away’, Porky leaves the theater, together with all other kids…
There’s little to enjoy in ‘The Film Fan’, which is remarkably low on gags, most of them trite, and the film can’t stand the comparison with the similar ‘She Was An Acrobat’s Daughter‘ (1937).
Watch ‘The Film Fan’ yourself and tell me what you think:
The title ‘Thugs with Dirty Mugs’ is a parody of the 1938 Warner Bros. gangster picture ‘Angels with Dirty Faces’, and the short is indeed a gangster picture itself.
Starring ‘Edward G. Robesome’ as Killer Diller, the cartoon tells the story of a notorious bank robber, mostly by newspaper headlines.
However, much more than a story, ‘Thugs with Dirty Mugs’ is a genuine gag cartoon. Its arguably the first Tex Avery film to show his mature style from start to end. It’s simply packed with the director’s unique gag style: cars can contract like harmonicas, a safe can become a caravan or a radio, and a bank can turn into a slot machine. Meanwhile the police can cross a split screen, and cigars and guns can hang in mid-air only to be picked up again. And finally, the crooks are betrayed by a man in the audience, who has seen the picture twice. With this film Tex Avery definitely proved to be a unique voice in the cartoon world, and his influence can hardly be overstated.
The pin gag was reused by Bob Clampett in ‘The Great Piggy Bank Robbery’ (1946).
Watch ‘Thugs with Dirty Mugs’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Thugs with Dirty Mugs’ is available on the DVD set ‘Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume Three’
In ‘Daffy Duck in Hollywood’ Daffy visits ‘Wonder Pictures’ only to sabotage the shooting of a film by a pig director with an irritating accent.
Halfway Daffy edits a film of his own, which is eventually shown to the studio’s boss, and which consists of unrelated spot gags on live action news reels, with the visuals totally out of tune with the soundtrack.
‘Daffy Duck in Hollywood’ is disappointingly unfunny. Avery’s timing is remarkably sloppy and Daffy Duck is, if anything, utterly annoying. The short’s best gags do not involve the duck, and are the opening shot of Wonder Pictures, with its slogan ‘If it’s a good picture, it’s a wonder‘ and the studio boss’s reaction to Daffy’s film. Indeed, after this film Avery never worked with the duck again, and it was left to other directors to transform the annoying duck into a likable character.
Watch ‘Daffy Duck in Hollywood’ yourself and tell me what you think:
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‘Ghosks is the Bunk’ is the second of four 1939 Popeye cartoon with alternate titles. 
Dr. Grob's Animation Review 