Popeye The Sailor: "Patriotic Popeye"

Premiered May 10, 1957.

"Fireworks is  too dangerous!  I'm gonna see that you haves a safe and sane 4th of July!"
-Popeye

On Independence Day, Popeye the sailor (Jack Mercer) is tending his garden.  His nephews (also voiced by Mercer) are excited about celebrating the occasion by setting off firecrackers.

Popeye forbids this says it's too dangerous and locks the fireworks up in a shed.  The nephews accuse their uncle of spoiling their 4th of July.

Popeye is determined that they have a "safe and sane" 4th of July and suggests some alternate ways for the boys to celebrate, like playing baseball, grilling hot dogs and going for a drive in the country.  However, every time Popeye turns his back, the nephews attempt to get the fireworks out of the shed.

The boys eventually get the fireworks and predictable pyrotechnic chaos ensues.   The nephews' actions place them and their surroundings in danger.  Can Popeye save his nephews?

J.A. Morris says:
As we've said here before, there isn't a lot of 4th of July-themed programming out there, so it's always nice to find stuff like "Patriotic Popeye."

Popeye says he wants the boys to have a "safe and sane 4th of July."  This is a reference to a movement that started in Cleveland in 1908 in the wake of several fireworks-related accidents that caused injuries and deaths.  Cleveland passed laws that made it a "safe and sane" city  which prohibited firework use and their ordinances served as a model for other cities.  So you might say "Patriotic Popeye" is PSA about fireworks safety.

Popeye certainly comes off as a killjoy here, but the nephews' antics ultimately prove him right.  This short contains some nice animation, such as this bit where a swarm of hornets forms an eye:

Like most Popeye cartoons, "Patriotic Popeye" does feature (SPOILER ALERT!) some spinach-enhanced heroics from the sailor man.

A note about the nephews:
Popeye's four nephews first appeared in a 1942 cartoon called "Pip-eye, Pup-eye, Poop-eye an' Peep-eye," which were the nephews names.  "Patriotic Popeye" only features two of these four and doesn't name them.  I'm not sure what happened to the other two.

"Patriotic Popeye" isn't the best Popeye short ever but it's fun and filled with fireworks, roman candles and hot dogs, it's full of 4th of July imagery.  It's worth watching, especially recommended for hardcore fans of Popeye the sailor.

J.A. Morris' rating:

.5

2 and a half American Flag.

RigbyMel says: 

"Patriotic Popeye" is an amusing, if not a "classic" animated short.   I appreciated the safety message about fireworks,  even if the humorous action of the short kind of undercuts it a little bit.

I find it interesting that since this is a short made during the 1950s,  we see a large bottle rocket labeled the "Atomic Sky Rocket" -- a reference very much of the time and of the "space race" period of U.S. history.

Popeye's troublemaking nephews strike me as perhaps owing more than a little bit to some similar tropes employed by other animation studios and it's odd that neither Olive Oyl nor Bluto make an appearance in this cartoon.   However, there's plenty of holiday-themed action, so maybe they aren't needed? 

This is a short worth watching even if it's not precisely a classic.

RigbyMel's rating: 

2 American Flags.

Popeye: "Fright To The Finish"

Premiered August 27, 1954.

"So beware this Halloween Eve, when the Earth will be haunted by spooks, ghosts, and hobgoblins."
-Olive Oyl

It's Halloween night and Olive Oyl (Mae Questel) is reading a book of spooky stories.  This sets Olive on edge and she is afraid that ghosts and hobgoblins will haunt her.

Popeye the sailor (Jack Mercer) and Bluto (Jackson Beck), Popeye's rival for Olive's affections, are bored by Olive's frightful tales.  Bluto wishes Popeye would leave so he can be alone with Olive, Popeye wonders why Bluto hasn't gone home already.

Bluto gets a fiendish idea.  He will scare Olive Oyl out of her wits and blame Popeye, which will send her into his arms.  Bluto perpetrates several Halloween tricks to further his plan.

Will Bluto succeed?

J.A. Morris says:
I grew up watching various Popeye cartoons and I've long been a fan of the spinach-eating sailor. Fright To The Finish was produced by Famous Studios.  Hardcore Popeye fans prefer the Fleischer Brothers shorts, but this Halloween toon is pretty good.  Fright To The Finish has great animation and is packed with sight-gags from start to finish.

It's full of great Halloween imagery like skeletons and jack o'lanterns.  The voice cast is also excellent.  Jack Mercer (who is also credited with writing Fright To The Finish) voiced Popeye for nearly five decades and he does a great job here.  Mae Questel (the definitive Olive Oyl voice actress) and Jackson Beck are also very good.

(A mild SPOILER below)

Fright To The Finish is a rare Popeye cartoon where the sailor man does not save the day by eating spinach.  I watched it several times before I noticed this departure from the formula.

This short can be found on a dvd called Popeye:The Sailor Man (75th Anniversary Collection) and it can also be streamed on Amazon.

Fright To The Finish is a very enjoyable Halloween cartoon and is highly recommended.

J.A. Morris' rating:

4 Jack O'Lanterns!

RigbyMel says:

This is quite an enjoyable animated short.  

There is definitely an emphasis on the "trick" aspect of "trick or treat" on full display here,  as well as some rather wonderful sight gags -- particularly involving poor Olive Oyl's reactions to the appearance of various Bluto-created ghosties and beasties.    One almost has to admire Bluto's Halloween prank ingenuity.  

There were several bits of this short that reminded me a bit of the Brom Bones/Ichabod Crane rivalry as depicted in the 1949 Disney incarnation of the "Legend of Sleepy Hollow", but the dynamic is different enough not to detract from the fun.  

Popeye plans to get his own back with a little help from some of Olive's vanishing cream

I also love that we get a series of "vanishing cream" gags in this. I've always enjoyed the way cartoons will play with this notion since it's totally what little kids think of when they hear the term "vanishing cream."  

I  find it interesting to see the way that different signs and signifiers of the spooky season are deployed in this short -- we don't see children trick or treating, but we do get ghost story telling, pranks, skeletons, jack o'lanterns and even ghostly manifestations, after a fashion.   Halloween is not quite as strictly codified as other holidays and this makes for intriguingly varied pop cultural takes on the spooky season.

RigbyMel's rating:

4 Jack O'Lanterns!