Matthew Hunter
07-12-2001, 06:23 PM
I recently conducted a tape trade, and I will leave the trade-ee anonymous, unless he wishes to be announced. Don't bother asking me to trade because I won't be here for over a week and won't get your messages, and I don't want to fool with it right now (no offense.:)) Anyway, I got a bunch of rare/unusual titles, and thought I'd review them:
Speedy Gonzales:
"Mexican Boarders"
I am surprised this was never on that Golden Jubilee tape or anywhere else on Home Video, this is a classic! Maybe WB was uneasy about a Mexican mouse with the munchies who sings the true lyrics to "La Cucaracha", but the cartoon is a classic anyway...I wish they had done more with Slow Poke.
"Mexican Cat Dance"
This one's okay. It was really more of a nostalgia piece for me rather than a good 'toon. It's very good, though, what makes it lose points is that clip of "Bully For Bugs" used as the intro, with no credit given to Chuck Jones or the title it is taken from. I always thought the concept was enough to make this funny...Sylvester as a bull...hilarious! They just should have done this about 5 years ealier.
"Chili Weather"
I can see how someone would complain that this is too much of a rehash of all the WB factory/assembly line/cannery toons, but it's still funny. The ending is hilarious....Sylvester is dehydratedand shrinks as small as Speedy, a REAL giant mouse! I also like Speedy on a conveyor belt: "This ees the ooonly way to run!"
"A Message to Gracias"
Hmmm...I don't think CN will show this any time soon. This is an okay cartoon, but the stereotypes are kind of over the top, and it's from that time period where Robert McKimson really got into a slump...I really don't like many of the 1962-64 McKimson efforts. And how the heck does Sylvester snare a spotted bulldog with a trap in the jungles of Acapulco?
"Nuts and Volts"
This is sort of one of a theme Friz Freleng did...the robot. I think it's the same plot as "Tweet and Lovely", and the robot is from "Robot Rabbit'. Still, this manages to be a very funny cartoon.Friz Freleng's Speedy is my favorite version.
"Road to Andalay"
This one has some pretty cheap animation, didn't we see that pose where Sylvester is falling in "Jet Cage"? This one is funny, Sylvester tries falconry to catch Speedy Gonzales. This would be great, if it were not so cheap-looking. Poor Sylvester...he's seen better days.
"It's Nice to Have a Mouse Around the House"
I like this cartoon, it's the (I believe) first Daffy/Speedy, and actually very entertaining. So THAT's why Sylvester disappeared...he had a nervous breakdown! I especially like Speedy slipping a "Daffy Duck Comics" magazing into the duck's robot to make it chase him.
"Moby Duck"
You're stranded on a desert island. You have a huge ego, a mouse with a can opener, and a box of canned goods. Let's say you are hungry, and the mouse is your meal ticket, on the condition that you must give him some food for the loan of the can opener. Let's have you say no, wanting all the food for yourself. Very well-done cartoon, it's sort of "Rabbitson Crusoe" meets "Canned Feud".
"Assault and Peppered"
This one isn't memorable, simply because Daffy is TOO mean, and the animation is obviously being cheapened. It's a fun premise, much like "Bunker Hill Bunny", but the opening, in which Ranchero Daffy or Rancho Rio Daffy declares "war on poverty", and tells the mice that "starving all over my property lowers the value". Ooh...he woke up on the wrong side of the bed!
"Well Worn Daffy"
Another one of those "why-is-he-so-mean?" cartoons. The backgrounds are good, so is the animation, but that Daffy Duck is just too mean...there's a fine line between self-preservationism and active malice...this seems to be the latter.
"Muchos Locos"
This is just bad. Sucks. Awful. They use what appear to be redrawn clips from old Jones Daffy and Freleng Speedy cartoons, and to top it all off we don't even see Speedy win. He gets malleted by Daffy Duck!
"A Haunting We Will Go"
The nephew and the reused Jones poses sort of lower its quality, but this is a fun cartoon. I like this one, always have. Cartoon Network could play this on Halloween, if they wanted, since Speedy doesn't really do much.
"A Squeak in the Deep"
I don't think anyone will agree, but if you could have Daffy/Speedy classics, this is one of them. I like this cartoon, the basic idea is Daffy Duck and Speedy Gonzales in a boat race from the Gulf of Mexico to Hawaii, with Daffy wrecking Speedy's boat and Speedy forced to sail WITH the duck. Daffy refuses to team up, Speedy forces him to. Good use of both characters.
"A Taste of Catnip"
The explanation of why black ducks chase Mexican mice. Can catnip smog REALLLLY do that? Plus, Sylvester reappears briefly, in a silent yet painful (to Daffy) cameo. This would be a better cartoon if they added more gags to it, but it's really not funny as-is.
"Daffy's Diner"
One of the best Daffy/Speedy's, I think this is just as good as anything produced in the late 1950's, it's reminescent of that time period. Daffy is the waiter at a diner, and El Supremo the bandito cat orders a mouseburger. Daffy uses a rubber mouse, the cat gets mad, and forces Daffy to find a real mouse, Speedy. Good gags, including Daffy's "garnish" (a pepper/onion sombrero) and the trash man: "I theenk I go back home to Guadelajara where the garbage e-cans no e-talk."!
"Quacker Tracker"
Rudy Larriva's Hendricks Daffy/Speedy cartoons are funny,they're great in that respect, but they're even cheaper than DePatie/Freleng's, making them very funny but badly drawn, as opposed to some of the DePatie/Freleng ones, which were well drawn but not very funny. The problem is the obvious use of limited animation, and I don't like the way they use such dark colors and make Speedy look fat.
"The Music Mice-tro"
same critique as the above. This is a really entertaining cartoon, but it's dark, ugly, and the backgrounds look like crayon doodles. Only for the completist collector, like myself.
"Spy Swatter"
Good use of Daffy, but the backgrounds are just bad. This is neither character's finest hour, although the plot and gags are great.
Buddy:
"Buddy's Day Out"
Buddy can go out, I'll stay inside. We don't get to watch the budding romance of Buddy and Cookie, only Cookie's baby brotther and his animal torture. This one is impressively drawn, but it will put you to sleep.
"Buddy the Gob"
I suppose this is okay. There have been better Buddy cartoons, though.
"Buddy and Towser"
A really good fox-and-chicken cartoon. This is good, it has a style of humor really indicative of its director, Friz Freleng.
'Buddy's Garage"
Haha. I liked this one. It's so corny, but I like it.
"Buddy's Trolley Troubles"
let's call this "Snoozerville Trolley".
"Buddy of the Apes"
The premise is good, Buddy is great, but the ape-like Zulu natives are a little much...don't expect this cartoon, although funny, to be on LN B/W anytime soon.
"Buddy's Bearcats"
I love baseball cartoons, this is one of the best I have ever seen. A really great cartoon! But...when did Cookie dye her hair blonde and get an inch shorter in height?
"Buddy's Circus"
Buddy makes a good circus ringmaster...but the gags are boring.
"Buddy the Woodsman"
In terms of cartoon gentle comedy, and lumberjack gags, this is classic. That bear scene...it brought back memories of Nickelodeon...I like this cartoon a lot...I wish that the TV channels would not withhold such good cartoons...if they want to withold a boring Buddy, they can, but this is too good to stay in a vault.
"Buddy the Detective"
Oh, so now they decide to make a more sophisticated plot. It works, this is a good cartoon. They seem to focus more on the mad scientist/villain than Buddy, Cookie, or the dog.
"Buddy's Adventures"
Buddy and Cookie end up in "Sourtown", where happiness and dancing are not legal...needless to say Buddy doesn't last very long as a law-abiding citizen. What do you do if the law is unjust? get it changed! VERY clever, there's almost a Rankin/Bass feel to it. Who says your character needs a sophisticated personality? A little heart is all Buddy needs, and he's got it.
"Buddy the Dentist"
The ending is funny, the rest is sort of ho-hum. The dog (not Towser, someone else, did he say "Bobo"?) eats the fudge Buddy bakes for Cookie, and gets a toothache, and Buddy spends a whole 4 minutes trying to remove it. It ends up with both Buddy and the dog losing teeth over this. Buddy, have you ever heard of a veterinarian?
"Buddy of the Legion"
Weird, but cool. Buddy actually works quite well in adventure stories, when he's not trying to be necessarily funny. This reveals his imaginative side, as Buddy gets a job as a library janitor and he falls asleep to a wildly imaginative dream of the foreign legion. Once again, great.
"Buddy's Theatre"
Movie theater gags. Buddy is a theater projectionist, in love with moviestar and girlfriend Cookie. Imaginative, but this doesn't really go anywhere...it's well animated, but it's not memorable.
"Buddy's Pony Express"
Buddy finds himself as a pony express rider in the land of humanoid dogs. He enters a race and has to compete with a huge, Pete-like cat (similar to the one from the "Alpine Antics" Beans cartoon). This is fun. By the way, the pig at the bar...is he not a dead ringer for Porky Pig? Could it be his design predates his character?
"Buddy in Africa"
This one is very, very funny, but if a black activist saw this he wouldn't think so. I feel guilty being amused at Buddy literally spanking a monkey, and natives singing a song called "I'm marching for to Georgia with a love song in my heart", but this is still a funny cartoon, Buddy shines here.
"Buddy's Lost World"
Imaginative adventure cartoon, but it leaves me cold. Not really boring, but it has nothing memorable going for it.
"Buddy Steps Out"
Imaginative, but not funny. I like the idea, a picture of Buddy comes to life as the real Buddy and Cookie go on a date, and getting into all kinds of trouble in Cookie's house, but they needed to tone it down on the gags. It could have been a Happy Harmony-like cartoon, but better than anything in that series, if it had been, I don't know, better.
-Matthew
Speedy Gonzales:
"Mexican Boarders"
I am surprised this was never on that Golden Jubilee tape or anywhere else on Home Video, this is a classic! Maybe WB was uneasy about a Mexican mouse with the munchies who sings the true lyrics to "La Cucaracha", but the cartoon is a classic anyway...I wish they had done more with Slow Poke.
"Mexican Cat Dance"
This one's okay. It was really more of a nostalgia piece for me rather than a good 'toon. It's very good, though, what makes it lose points is that clip of "Bully For Bugs" used as the intro, with no credit given to Chuck Jones or the title it is taken from. I always thought the concept was enough to make this funny...Sylvester as a bull...hilarious! They just should have done this about 5 years ealier.
"Chili Weather"
I can see how someone would complain that this is too much of a rehash of all the WB factory/assembly line/cannery toons, but it's still funny. The ending is hilarious....Sylvester is dehydratedand shrinks as small as Speedy, a REAL giant mouse! I also like Speedy on a conveyor belt: "This ees the ooonly way to run!"
"A Message to Gracias"
Hmmm...I don't think CN will show this any time soon. This is an okay cartoon, but the stereotypes are kind of over the top, and it's from that time period where Robert McKimson really got into a slump...I really don't like many of the 1962-64 McKimson efforts. And how the heck does Sylvester snare a spotted bulldog with a trap in the jungles of Acapulco?
"Nuts and Volts"
This is sort of one of a theme Friz Freleng did...the robot. I think it's the same plot as "Tweet and Lovely", and the robot is from "Robot Rabbit'. Still, this manages to be a very funny cartoon.Friz Freleng's Speedy is my favorite version.
"Road to Andalay"
This one has some pretty cheap animation, didn't we see that pose where Sylvester is falling in "Jet Cage"? This one is funny, Sylvester tries falconry to catch Speedy Gonzales. This would be great, if it were not so cheap-looking. Poor Sylvester...he's seen better days.
"It's Nice to Have a Mouse Around the House"
I like this cartoon, it's the (I believe) first Daffy/Speedy, and actually very entertaining. So THAT's why Sylvester disappeared...he had a nervous breakdown! I especially like Speedy slipping a "Daffy Duck Comics" magazing into the duck's robot to make it chase him.
"Moby Duck"
You're stranded on a desert island. You have a huge ego, a mouse with a can opener, and a box of canned goods. Let's say you are hungry, and the mouse is your meal ticket, on the condition that you must give him some food for the loan of the can opener. Let's have you say no, wanting all the food for yourself. Very well-done cartoon, it's sort of "Rabbitson Crusoe" meets "Canned Feud".
"Assault and Peppered"
This one isn't memorable, simply because Daffy is TOO mean, and the animation is obviously being cheapened. It's a fun premise, much like "Bunker Hill Bunny", but the opening, in which Ranchero Daffy or Rancho Rio Daffy declares "war on poverty", and tells the mice that "starving all over my property lowers the value". Ooh...he woke up on the wrong side of the bed!
"Well Worn Daffy"
Another one of those "why-is-he-so-mean?" cartoons. The backgrounds are good, so is the animation, but that Daffy Duck is just too mean...there's a fine line between self-preservationism and active malice...this seems to be the latter.
"Muchos Locos"
This is just bad. Sucks. Awful. They use what appear to be redrawn clips from old Jones Daffy and Freleng Speedy cartoons, and to top it all off we don't even see Speedy win. He gets malleted by Daffy Duck!
"A Haunting We Will Go"
The nephew and the reused Jones poses sort of lower its quality, but this is a fun cartoon. I like this one, always have. Cartoon Network could play this on Halloween, if they wanted, since Speedy doesn't really do much.
"A Squeak in the Deep"
I don't think anyone will agree, but if you could have Daffy/Speedy classics, this is one of them. I like this cartoon, the basic idea is Daffy Duck and Speedy Gonzales in a boat race from the Gulf of Mexico to Hawaii, with Daffy wrecking Speedy's boat and Speedy forced to sail WITH the duck. Daffy refuses to team up, Speedy forces him to. Good use of both characters.
"A Taste of Catnip"
The explanation of why black ducks chase Mexican mice. Can catnip smog REALLLLY do that? Plus, Sylvester reappears briefly, in a silent yet painful (to Daffy) cameo. This would be a better cartoon if they added more gags to it, but it's really not funny as-is.
"Daffy's Diner"
One of the best Daffy/Speedy's, I think this is just as good as anything produced in the late 1950's, it's reminescent of that time period. Daffy is the waiter at a diner, and El Supremo the bandito cat orders a mouseburger. Daffy uses a rubber mouse, the cat gets mad, and forces Daffy to find a real mouse, Speedy. Good gags, including Daffy's "garnish" (a pepper/onion sombrero) and the trash man: "I theenk I go back home to Guadelajara where the garbage e-cans no e-talk."!
"Quacker Tracker"
Rudy Larriva's Hendricks Daffy/Speedy cartoons are funny,they're great in that respect, but they're even cheaper than DePatie/Freleng's, making them very funny but badly drawn, as opposed to some of the DePatie/Freleng ones, which were well drawn but not very funny. The problem is the obvious use of limited animation, and I don't like the way they use such dark colors and make Speedy look fat.
"The Music Mice-tro"
same critique as the above. This is a really entertaining cartoon, but it's dark, ugly, and the backgrounds look like crayon doodles. Only for the completist collector, like myself.
"Spy Swatter"
Good use of Daffy, but the backgrounds are just bad. This is neither character's finest hour, although the plot and gags are great.
Buddy:
"Buddy's Day Out"
Buddy can go out, I'll stay inside. We don't get to watch the budding romance of Buddy and Cookie, only Cookie's baby brotther and his animal torture. This one is impressively drawn, but it will put you to sleep.
"Buddy the Gob"
I suppose this is okay. There have been better Buddy cartoons, though.
"Buddy and Towser"
A really good fox-and-chicken cartoon. This is good, it has a style of humor really indicative of its director, Friz Freleng.
'Buddy's Garage"
Haha. I liked this one. It's so corny, but I like it.
"Buddy's Trolley Troubles"
let's call this "Snoozerville Trolley".
"Buddy of the Apes"
The premise is good, Buddy is great, but the ape-like Zulu natives are a little much...don't expect this cartoon, although funny, to be on LN B/W anytime soon.
"Buddy's Bearcats"
I love baseball cartoons, this is one of the best I have ever seen. A really great cartoon! But...when did Cookie dye her hair blonde and get an inch shorter in height?
"Buddy's Circus"
Buddy makes a good circus ringmaster...but the gags are boring.
"Buddy the Woodsman"
In terms of cartoon gentle comedy, and lumberjack gags, this is classic. That bear scene...it brought back memories of Nickelodeon...I like this cartoon a lot...I wish that the TV channels would not withhold such good cartoons...if they want to withold a boring Buddy, they can, but this is too good to stay in a vault.
"Buddy the Detective"
Oh, so now they decide to make a more sophisticated plot. It works, this is a good cartoon. They seem to focus more on the mad scientist/villain than Buddy, Cookie, or the dog.
"Buddy's Adventures"
Buddy and Cookie end up in "Sourtown", where happiness and dancing are not legal...needless to say Buddy doesn't last very long as a law-abiding citizen. What do you do if the law is unjust? get it changed! VERY clever, there's almost a Rankin/Bass feel to it. Who says your character needs a sophisticated personality? A little heart is all Buddy needs, and he's got it.
"Buddy the Dentist"
The ending is funny, the rest is sort of ho-hum. The dog (not Towser, someone else, did he say "Bobo"?) eats the fudge Buddy bakes for Cookie, and gets a toothache, and Buddy spends a whole 4 minutes trying to remove it. It ends up with both Buddy and the dog losing teeth over this. Buddy, have you ever heard of a veterinarian?
"Buddy of the Legion"
Weird, but cool. Buddy actually works quite well in adventure stories, when he's not trying to be necessarily funny. This reveals his imaginative side, as Buddy gets a job as a library janitor and he falls asleep to a wildly imaginative dream of the foreign legion. Once again, great.
"Buddy's Theatre"
Movie theater gags. Buddy is a theater projectionist, in love with moviestar and girlfriend Cookie. Imaginative, but this doesn't really go anywhere...it's well animated, but it's not memorable.
"Buddy's Pony Express"
Buddy finds himself as a pony express rider in the land of humanoid dogs. He enters a race and has to compete with a huge, Pete-like cat (similar to the one from the "Alpine Antics" Beans cartoon). This is fun. By the way, the pig at the bar...is he not a dead ringer for Porky Pig? Could it be his design predates his character?
"Buddy in Africa"
This one is very, very funny, but if a black activist saw this he wouldn't think so. I feel guilty being amused at Buddy literally spanking a monkey, and natives singing a song called "I'm marching for to Georgia with a love song in my heart", but this is still a funny cartoon, Buddy shines here.
"Buddy's Lost World"
Imaginative adventure cartoon, but it leaves me cold. Not really boring, but it has nothing memorable going for it.
"Buddy Steps Out"
Imaginative, but not funny. I like the idea, a picture of Buddy comes to life as the real Buddy and Cookie go on a date, and getting into all kinds of trouble in Cookie's house, but they needed to tone it down on the gags. It could have been a Happy Harmony-like cartoon, but better than anything in that series, if it had been, I don't know, better.
-Matthew