How's It Hold Up?: Recent Episodes
Danika Juarez
A podcast where a lesbian trans woman who's an animation enthusiast, her mother who's a teacher and has written a thesis on her love of videogames, and her Scooby-Doo-loving wife watch (mostly) animated movies and ask the eternal question: "how's it hold up?" Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/howsitholdup/support
Some pieces of media — be they cartoon shorts, feature length films, or even whole seasons of television — are worth watching a particular moment. That moment could be as short as a single seconds-long scene or as long as an entire episode, but something about it manages to massively exceed the quality level of the media it's a part of. Today, we have a cartoon that fits this bill... but is the scene in question really good enough to warrant watching the rest of the short? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 16min 35sec)
Some movies are known for being massively successful, massively influential, and pillars of their respective genre... and yet also get watched less and less as the years go by, as though knowledge of their reputation is enough and watching the actual film is no longer needed. In many ways, it feels like Akira is one of these movies - frequently mentioned when talking about 'greatest anime movies', but how many fans who started watching anime in the 2000s or 2010s can say they've bothered to go back and watch this film from the late 80s? One might even start wondering if it's worth all the hype. Well, is it? Listen to find out.
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Though Tex Avery tends to be known for his more violent, slapstick and sometimes horny cartoons, the man was also capable of making cartoons that were strangely sweet. This is perhaps the most well-known example, though don't let the 'sweet' description fool you into thinking the short is devoid of laughs. Featuring a jazz-singing owl, disappointed parents, and a talent competition, this short has it all... but is it good? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 12min 34sec)
Like Ranma 1/2 before, this time we're covering another animated film that's tied to a long-running animated series! Unlike that movie, which was fairly standalone, this film is actually a direct continuation of Steven Universe, taking place after that series' finale. Like the show that spawned it, there's lots of fighting, lots of singing, and lots of queerness. But do they all come together well to create a feature film? Listen to find out!
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Popeye is back, and he's got a baby this time! Trying to be a pal to Olive Oyl, Popeye takes little Swee'Pea to the zoo, but this baby has a habit of running loose and causing problems that it's up to Popeye to fix. This is one of those cartoons that's alright overall but has one particular moment that makes you laugh out loud. Does that moment make the cartoon worth watching? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 3min 24sec)
We've watched several half-hour shorts for Mickey and his friends before, but we've never seen the mouse feature in a full-length film... until today! That's right, Mickey and his pals are Musketeers, on a feature-length adventure of daring-do and classical music. The gang's all here - Mickey, Donald, Goofy, Minnie, Daisy, Pete, Pluto, the Beagle Boys, Clarabelle... okay well Horace didn't make the cut. But we did get a French turtle? Does it ultimately all come together, or is Mickey's first film a dud? Listen to find out!
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Mickey's pals Donald and Goofy might be swiftly gaining in popularity, but at least in 1936, Mickey himself wasn't down for the count yet! This time we have a Through the Looking Glass inspired romp in store for Disney's favorite mouse, with Mickey dancing, playing and fighting over the course of the short. It's all a dream and Mickey knows it, so he might as well have some fun while it's happening, even if it makes the King of Hearts mad. Is this Mickey Mouse misadventure any good? Listen to find out!
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Yep, we've still got more Jungle Book! But this particular version came out the same year as the original Disney movie... or at least the first part of it did. That's right, this is actually a series of shorts that can be viewed together for a movie experience, and in some cases is actually edited together that way. This is a wildly different take on the world and characters than what we're used to, but ultimately, is it any good? Listen to find out!
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The Happy Harmonies series is an oft-forgotten series of shorts that largely serve as a vehicle for the increasingly racist depictions of former Looney Tunes star Bosko, and also a bunch of cartoons that ape the sensibilities of Disney's Silly Symphonies series. Which is to say, it's oft-forgotten because there is not much there of quality to remember. That said, the series did, through this cartoon, harbor the directorial beginnings of a man who would go on to immeasurably affect the animation industry, and thus, we turn our eyes upon To Spring, and ask: were William Hanna's talents obvious, even from the beginning? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 22min 50sec)
Mamoru Hosoda is back, and this time, like his previous Digimon films, he's working on a previously existing series, rather than his own original work. One Piece is a long-running series with many, many movies under its belt, both before and after this, and a legacy stretching over 25 years. Its creator is of course the inimitable Eiichiro Oda, whose sense of whimsy, adventure and iconic art style has won hearts and minds the world over. Hosoda, meanwhile, has also built a reputation upon strong storytelling and an immediately recognizable visual style. When two titans meet, what is the result, and ultimately, is it any good?
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Tex Avery is at it again over at Warner Bros, and this time Porky Pig isn't just a side character, but the star! This little pig just wants some soda, but also there's a serial bomber on the loose, and of course the two end up meeting. Does this reach the heights of Avery's last Looney Tune, and perhaps more importantly, does it avoid the racist lows? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 5min 6sec)
Can a pig and a spider be friends? And can a pig and a goose be brothers? Can a little girl understand what animals are saying when they talk to each other? All these questions and more have answers in this classic movie that all three of our hosts have great nostalgia for. But nostalgia can be dangerous... not everything holds up when you go back to it. Does this? Listen to find out!
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Popeye starts off our look at cartoon shorts in the year 1936, with him, Bluto and Olive Oyl heading up to the snowy mountains for shenanigans! The Popeye shorts are increasingly becoming the Fleischer Brother's premier series, eclipsing the still-ongoing Betty Boop series by this point. Does this short show why the series gained such dominance, or does it make Popeye's success all the more baffling? Listen to find out!
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We reach the end of our Disney Jungle Book journey, and who better to join us for that end, but the person who was there at the beginning? Marie is back! Unlike the 90s films, this one is part of the current slew of Disney 'live action' remakes, though like The Lion King's remake, this one is often more animated than not. The main live action performance to be had is Mowgli, while almost everything around him is CGI animation, made to look as realistic as possible. Does it work? Does the film itself work, both as an inheritor of the Disney Jungle Book legacy, and as a film in its own right? Listen to find out!
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The Jungle Book train rolls on! This time we take a look at the two live-action 90's efforts, both of which seem to be largely forgotten nowadays. While one was released in theaters and with a big budget, not unlike the more recent 2016 remake, the other was a direct-to-video endeavor, closer to a Disney channel original movie in terms of money spent. The vibes of the two films could not be more different, and yet both languish in relative obscurity. Do they deserve it? Or should we remember some of Disney's earliest live-action remake efforts? Listen to find out!
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Betty Boop's future boyfriend Bimbo has committed a crime: chicken theft. For this, a singing band of ghost and ghouls will force him to repent, or kill him trying. This is a wild cartoon from 1930 that was missed before, but felt worth going back to, in order to see the genesis of shorts like Minnie the Moocher. Is this ancient cartoon still any good, though? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 6min 2sec)
Oh, low-budget Disney animated sequels, we meet again! To say the Disney sequel craze of the mid-90s to mid-2000s was a mixed bag is... actually surprisingly controversial. Most people seem to just think they're all trash. But we here at "How's It Hold Up?" know better than that. Return of Jafar slaps. So with every single one of these sequels, there is always at least the potential for a decent or even good time. Does Jungle Book 2 manage to reach that potential? Listen to find out!
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It's time for Mickey Mouse and all his friends to have some fun on the ice! Everyone's here: Minnie, Pluto, Donald and Goofy (and even Clarabelle and Horace, in a cameo), and almost all of them are up to their own thing. The short is somewhat divided up into multiple smaller parts, including Mickey teaching Minnie to skate, Goofy trying to fish and Donald harassing Pluto. While the short is known for the novelty of having all these characters in the same cartoon, that's not exactly a rare occurrence in the modern day. So does this short still hold up, all this time later? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 6min 2sec)
Our friend Marie joins us for a movie for which we've all got nostalgia! Featuring a jazzy soundtrack, xerox animation and a Kipling-penned story, this movie has all the makings of a classic. But do all these things come together to form a quality whole, or has our nostalgia let us down again? Listen to find out!
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We talk a lot about directors, when it comes to cartoon shorts. But they're far from the only important aspects that shape a cartoon. The studio, the budget, the time, the writers, the animators - all of it and more adds up to the finished product that we see on our screens. So what happens, then, if we take two shorts, both directed by the same man, but at different studios and with different creative teams? How wildly do the two shorts vary in quality, if they vary at all? Listen to find out!
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Sequels to animated films have a generally bad reputation, which is probably mostly due to the wealth of cheap sequels made in the 90s and early 2000s, both for Disney and non-Disney properties. And while it's true that few if any of these sequels ever manage to surpass the original, certainly some of them prove to be worthwhile in their own right. Is this movie, made a decade-and-a-half after the original, by a completely different team and with almost none of the original voice cast, one of those worthwhile sequels? Listen to find out!
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Sometimes a simple story with a fun execution is really all it takes to make something fun. That is, at least, what this short seems to be going for, with a standard Romeo/Juliet story of warring kingdoms and star-crossed lovers, but with an execution involving anthropomorphic instruments and artillery that shoots music notes. Does this all come together admirably, or does it end up falling apart? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 6min 44sec)
We start our movies this year with one directed by Isao Takahata! This one's a comedic slice-of-life involving a young girl and her weird life of fighting cats, yakuza, and separated parents. It's a weird one to be sure, but in the end, is it any good?
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We're back for 2024, starting off strong with a cartoon that a certain co-host watched SO MUCH as a child. It's a Mickey Mouse cartoon where he goes on a pesticide-fueled drug trip and gets terrorized (along with Pluto) by bugs. So many parts of it are stuck forever in Danika's head, but does that make it good? Does this cartoon from her youth hold up so many years later? Listen to find out!
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We end our 2024 Holliganza with another nostalgic classic - a 1980's claymation christmas special starring talking dinosaurs and The California Raisins. Due to the latter, one could uncharitably call the special a glorified commercial, but given the relatively small amount of screentime they receive, we would hesitate to agree. Also their version of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" is one of the best, so who can complain. But that song aside, how are the others, and how is the animation, and how are our hosts between the anthology segments? Listen to find out!
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Sometimes when you dive into your nostalgic past, you find horrors lying in the deep. Media that you know you enjoyed and watched repeatedly, yet looking at it now you wonder how. Sometimes those piece of media are so bad that youtubers who make a career out of reviewing bad pieces of media cover it. Today, we watch The Christmas Tree.
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It's time for Holliganza 2023! We're starting off strong... in that this is a movie that one of our cohosts has very strong feelings toward. Are they good feelings? Is this Adam Sandler comedy combined with a Hannukah holiday tale enjoyable? Listen to find out!
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Popeye is back and he's leading his own band now! Unfortunately for him, so is Bluto... right in the neighboring room. This is another music-focused Popeye short, though it's not a musical like last time. Does it hold its own among the shorts we've watched from 1935? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 16min 34sec)
Sometimes there's a movie from your childhood that you really loved, but you're worried about rewatching, because you know the general consensus on the film is that it's no good. And then you watch the film, and you find that the critics aren't exactly wrong, but you still like the messy movie anyway. And then you have to really examine that, figure out if it's just nostalgia talking, or if there truly are positives within the film, despite its flaws. Join us as we go on that journey and ultimately figure out: does Rock-A-Doodle hold up?
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One thing that hasn't been brought up much when we discuss old cartoon shorts is the music, especially by way of theme songs. They've existed, but we have yet to truly hear some of the most iconic, such as the Looney Tunes or Merrie Melodies themes. Well today marks the first time we get to hear one of them, though not serving as a theme song yet. Instead it's sung by characters in the short, and if you've ever watched classic Warner cartoons, hearing it will bring a smile to your face. But is the actual cartoon fun to watch, too? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 3min 30sec)
Here we have another movie by Nelvana, and also another movie based on a licensed property. Said property is perhaps a little less well known than the Care Bears, but it has a more storied legacy, too. Babar the Movie is actually part of the Babar animated series that aired in the late 80s, but fortunately knowledge of the series is mostly not required to understand the film. Did we have a good time with this one, or did it leave us as cold as the Care Bears? Listen to find out!
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Disney cartoons generally stay within a certain range of tones, and 'dark comedy' does not fit within that range. And yet, this is what we are presented with in this cartoon - a dark comedy about a bird getting murdered and the farce of a trial that happens as a result. With celebrity bird caricatures, jokes about police brutality and maybe Disney's true First Gay Character, there's a lot going on in this cartoon... but is it actually any good? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 1min 38sec)
We've watched Ghoul School, but what about the movie that began this loose trilogy of Scooby, Scrappy and Shaggy traveling around an encountering real monsters? Are the titular Boo Brothers as much of a treat to be around as the girls from Ghoul School? Does the plot flow any better? It it any good at all? Listen to find out!
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By 1935 even Disney's Mickey Mouse cartoons transitioned away from black and white and into full color - but one of the last few black and white cartoons was fundamental in building a dynamic that is explored over the course of both of these shorts, and many more in the future. Specifically, the dynamic between the three pals known and Mickey, Donald and Goofy.
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(Spoiler Section Length - 6min 29sec)
Some movies attain near mythological status, whether because of their quality or because of the effect they had on people who saw them at a young age. This particular movie is often touted as being one of the best that animation has to offer, while also being held up as a 'that movie scarred me as a child' type of film by adults who vaguely remember it. Does it deserve that sort of hype? Is it good, regardless? Listen to find out!
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For the year of 1935, this podcast has put a lot of focus on Disney cartoons, but what about its competitors? What about the Fleischers, in particular? They've got two cartoon stars in this era - Betty Boop and Popeye. But one of those two characters was hit particularly hard by the Hays Code. How's that affecting the focus of Boop cartoons by 1935? This short is a prime example. Is it a good cartoon, though? Let's find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 4min 23sec)
There are lots of franchises that are synonymous with the 1980s era of toy-commercial-turned-show-or-movie. Transformers, GI Joe, My Little Pony, to name a few. But what about Hallmark's attempt: the Care Bears? Though they're less often remembered, they were actually the first ones to get in on the movie craze for these merchandise machines, and their success paved the way for later films like Transformers the Movie. But though they were successful then, does that success actually translate to a good film, especially so many years later? Listen to find out!
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Long ago we met Warner Bros first cartoon star, Bosko. But his star faded fast, and has aged particularly poorly, resulting in him being hardly remembered nowadays. Today we meet the first lasting Looney Tunes star, who still appears in media to this very day: Porky Pig. That's right, Looney Tunes as we know it today didn't start with Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck or even Egghead (the proto-Elmer Fudd)! No, it started in 1935, with a stuttering pig named Porky, only one of several new characters being thrown at the proverbial wall in this cartoon, and the only one of the group that ultimately stuck, even if it took a few more cartoons for that to happen. But how does this very first outing hold up almost a century later? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 9min 35sec)
Sometimes the story behind the making of a movie is more interesting than the movie itself. this particular film's production story involves many famous names, from the likes of Hayao Miyazaki all the way to George Lucas. Yet the film itself has also managed to garner a cult following in the years since its release, and a fuzzy spot in the memory of many a millennial who watched it as a child. Is this film only worth remembering for how it was made, or does it soar through they sky on a magic bed of its own? Listen to find out!
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The classic fable, retold by Disney! This short ended up serving as inspiration to a great many people in the animation industry, and was successful enough to eventually get a sequel. But it's also a tale that's been told many a time before and since. Does this near-century old version hold up? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 6min 6sec)
A lot of animated movies copy Disney and Pixar. Those two studios have had a massive influence on the animation medium and in particular what commercial films released in the US look and feel like. But every now and then you get a movie that tries something new, tries to break the mold in interesting ways, and sometimes, as in the case of Into the Spider-Verse, that experimentation results in both critical and financial success. Other times, like with this film, it does not. Cats Don't Dance swings hard with stylistic influence ranging from classic hollywood, Looney Tunes and even Gene Kelly, but it was ultimately a flop in theatres. That said, does it hold up as an entertaining film anyway? Listen to find out!
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A new year, but the same mouse! But he's in color this time! There's also a certain duck and a concert with cameos from a certain dog, a certain cow and a certain horse. Considered by some to be one of the best cartoons ever made, this band concert was a smash hit back in the day, but is it still a fun listen (and watch) today? Listen to find out!
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Time for another patented Disney remake! Except, does it really count as that if the setting is completely different, the tone is completely different, the story is completely different, and all the characters are completely different? Does it really count as a remake if the only similar thing between it and the original is an orphan boy named Pete and an animated dragon named Elliot? And perhaps more importantly, do these changes help or hinder the movie? Is it able to stand as an interesting film in its own right? Listen to find out!
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Our final short of 1934, and the last hurrah for the classic Mickey & Minnie vs. Pete cartoons that began with the likes of The Gallopin' Gaucho all the way back in 1928. Unlike those previous shorts, in this one, Minnie has a gun. It's a fun Western romp, but like most Westerns, it's not without its negative racial stereotypes. Does this short manage to overall stay enjoyable despite that, or does it crumble under the weight of bad genre conventions? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 15min 2sec)
We take a trip down memory lane today, with a movie some of our hosts vaguely remember from childhood, and a certain one of our hosts literally cried watching. It's a movie from back when colorful live-action musicals were still at least a little in vogue, and a from back when Don Bluth still worked for Disney. It's a movie about a boy and his cartoon dragon friend who is NOT an imaginary friend. It's a lot of things, but in the end... is it good?
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What happens to old cartoon stars once they leave the studio that they became famous at? Mostly they become forgotten, shadows of their former selves. Oswald the Lucky Rabbit faded into obscurity once he left Disney's hands, and Warner Bros' old star Bosko didn't do much better. Over at a new studio producing cartoons for MGM, Bosko starred in this short, which rather than doing much new, mostly looks back at Bosko's glory days. Is the reminiscing fun, or a waste of time? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 4min 19sec)
This is one of those ephemeral 'oh yeah i think i might've rented that from blockbuster once' movies, the kind that vaguely sticks in your mind but that you never actively recall until it is specifically brought up. It's a movie that released in a decade of animated excellence that does not exhibit the animated quality of its contemporaries (even excluding Disney from the equation), and that exhibits storytelling inspired by centuries-old tales, but without a modern storytelling spin. In many ways it is a movie out of time and out of place... but that isn't necessarily bad, just very different. Does it all work, or is this movie best left forgotten? Listen to find out!
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Two cartoons with some threadbare connections, featuring a playful pup and a vocal villain. One's in black and white and the other in color, and yet both are important. For what reason? And perhaps more importantly, are they actually enjoyable to watch? Listen to find out!
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(Spoiler Section Length - 2min 47sec)
It's time for another 80s animated movie made for the purpose of selling a brand of toy. Yes, just like Transformers the Movie, Rainbow Brite is made to sell, well, Rainbow Brite toys! And also like Transformers, this movie involves a large cast, is mostly set in space, and has lots of fighting and monsters. But this time battles are fought with rainbows! Also there's a character named Twink and that's important to note. Is this movie as good as its toy-selling brethren, or maybe better? Hopefully not worse? Let's find out!
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Today's Betty Boop is the first Boop in color (and the last, at least by the Fleischers), and is also technically not a Betty Boop but the start of the Color Classics series. It sees Betty in a retelling of Cinderella, complete with musical numbers, pretty dresses, a prince, and a fairy godmother. This short is also another example of the sorts of color cartoons that studios other than Disney were putting out during the period where Disney had sole claim to the 3-Strip Technicolor process, and an early example of the Fleischer technique of 3D-sculpted backgrounds. With all that going on in this short... is it actually any good? Listen to find out!
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Back to the 80s we go, with a movie based on a franchise that got its start in the 50s. That's right, it's Alvin and the Chipmunks (and importantly: the Chipettes), off on a hot-air balloon adventure around the world. There's diamond smugglers, bad guys with gold teeth, and baby penguins to be found on this adventure, but does this globe-trotting adventure featuring different cultures as written by white people still hold up? Listen to find out!
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Today we take a jaunt over to Walter Lantz and the "cartunes" he's was churning out for Universal. This is one of his earliest color shorts, and is a retelling of "The Elves and the Shoemaker." Does it look good? Does it sound good? Is it any fun to watch? Listen to find out!
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Which pets are blessed with the fairest forms and faces? Which pets know best all the gentle social graces? Which pets live on cream and loving pats? Naturellement! The Aristocats! This 1971 classic was on constant repeat on the VHS players of many a kid in the 90s and early 2000s, and is fondly remembered by everyone on this episode of the podcast. But it's also been quite a while since any of us have seen it. Watching it anew in 2023, do we still end up enjoying ourselves? Listen to find out!
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It's time: Donald Duck is here! Over the course of two cartoons, we chart the famous duck's debut and different facets of the character that are introduced in each short. What made Donald such a hit among audiences? And does whatever magic worked back then still work today? Listen to find out!
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After over a decade of searching, an ebay purchase, and the borrowing of a VHS player, we can finally watch this obscure movie from Danika's childhood, involving woodland critters and aliens and a hawk named Gracko. This is a sequel to a film we haven't watched, and the English dub rather than original language version. Was this movie worth the effort, or did it deserve to be forgotten? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another Popeye cartoon - and one that's part of his actual series, instead of technically a Betty Boop cartoon! This one's a bit of a musical, set to the song of the same name as the short, and features a much more expressive version of Popeye, along with an Olive Oyl who sounds more like what she's known for. Do we end up enjoying it? Listen to find out!
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Now we're getting really obscure, with a movie that one of our lovely hosts watched on Sci Fi channel late at night many years ago. She only really remembered the end, and what an end it is. The rest of the movie is certainly a trip, too. For the right reasons? The wrong reasons? The answer lies within.
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Mickey's back, and bigger than ever! ...At least, in his imagination. To entertain a group of children, Mickey tells a story based on Gulliver's Travels, with a couple of embellishments on his part, too. Given our history with Gulliver's Travels and its not-so-good adaptations, how does this short film fare? Listen to find out!
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It's time to watch a film from Don Bluth's dark period - that series of movies stretching from post-All Dogs up until Anastasia, and encompassing four little-loved films. While our hosts do not remember the film particularly fondly, our guest has fond memories, so we've got a good range of opinions going into this one. What did we end up thinking of it, in the end? Listen to find out!
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Hello, Warner Bros, haven't checked in on you in a while. Bosko's gone now, so what have you been up to? Still mimicking Disney? Or have you figured out your own thing yet? Listen to find out!
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It's time for Disney's take on The Once and Future King, a classic movie that left an indelible mark on many generations... but was it for the right reasons?
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Betty is back, on this time she's on stage, with a moustache-twirling villain and a hunky boyfriend! The Betty cartoons are in general spoofs, but this one is even more on the nose about it than usual. Is that to its benefit? Listen to find out!
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We finally reach the end of our long Pinocchio journey, with this, the final Pinocchio movie released in 2022. Directed by a man who personally adores the original Disney movie, and has been working on this film as a passion project for over a decade, Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio was the Pinocchio movie we most anticipated watching by a country mile. But was it worth the build-up? And how does it compare to the 4 other versions of this story that we watched? Listen to find out!
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Mickey is back, along with Minnie and their friends Clarabelle Cow and Horace Horsecollar! This short functions as a sort of swan song for the latter two, who shortly after this would be phased out into background characters, corresponding with the rise in prominence of Goofy and the creation of Donald. Is this a worthy send-off for the two characters, or does it leave something to be desired? Listen to find out!
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It's time for the Pinocchio we were all looking forward to the least. It's part of Disney's recent slew of remakes, and also one of at least three Pinocchio films to come out in the year 2022. Was our trepidation well-founded, or did this movie end up being a surprise gem? Listen to find out!
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And now for something completely different! Well... sort of. We've seen Ub Iwerks' work before, back when he helped Mickey Mouse get his start. But Ub parted ways with Disney a few years after that, and went off to do his own thing! The most famous thing he did with his solo work was his Flip the Frog series, but today we're watching a short from the follow-up series, which he made for MGM! Come meet Willie Whopper, a child who tells tall tales. Is his tale good? Listen to find out!
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We're back on track with direct adaptations of Carlo Collodi's work, though this version ends up sharing quite a few threads that we saw in the Russian film but not in Disney's. This film is bright and colorful and jam packed with events, but how does it compare to the other two, and how does it hold up on its own?
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Our third Betty Boop in a row! I may or may not have been struggling to figure out what shorts to watch! Anyway, the interesting thing with this one is the music style of the short, that's different from the straight-up jazz of most Boops. How's it work out? Listen to find out!
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Another week another Pinocchio! Except... is is, really? This Russian adaptation is actually an adaptation of an adaptation! What does that mean, and what does this movie hold in store? What does a frog in a speedo who's also an olympic gymnast wannabe have to do with the story of a little wooden puppet boy? Listen to find out!
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It's time for more Betty Boop, and importantly, more Cab Calloway! This is the final collaboration between the Fleischer Bros and Calloway, and unlike the first two, this one's got Calloway's music throughout its entire runtime. Is this last hurrah one for the ages, or does it pale in comparison to its predecessors? Listen to find out!
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And now for a series of Pinocchio movies, starting with the 1940 Disney classic that influences how most Americans think of the story. Historically, this has not been a favorite film of any of this podcast's hosts, but we all did our best to watch it with open minds and hearts. Acknowledging that animation fans often consider this to be one of the greatest animated works of all time, what did we ultimately make of it? Is this one a dud, or a certified classic? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another big cartoon star to enter the stage: Popeye the Sailor Man! But rather than debuting in his own series, ol' Popeye, Olive Oyl and Bluto first appear in a Betty Boop cartoon! Boop herself is indeed in the cartoon, though she's hardly the main character of it. How does this first outing of the iconic spinach-eating strongman hold up so many years later? And, perhaps related... how much do you know about old carnival games?
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We start the new year off with a Japanese film from Toei Animation! This one is about a boy named Susanoo and the quest he goes on to find his mother, which culminates in the titular battle against the Orochi! And to score the film, including that final battle, they employ Akira Ifukube, known for his work on the Godzilla franchise. Does all this add up to an engaging film, or a historical footnote? Listen to find out!
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We start off the new year with the most well-known Disney Silly Symphony! The song in this one was a smash hit back in the 30s and even in the 40s, and both the pigs and the Big Bad Wolf still cameo in Disney material to this day! It's a well-loved work, but is it good, and does it hold up?
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It's time for another Russian movie! This one proves to be our greatest challenge yet when it comes to understanding what's going on. Do we manage to make it through? Was our experience enjoyable? Or does our year end in disappointment? Listen to find out!
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We've seen Disney's take on Snow-White... but what about the Fleischer Brothers? Years before Disney's original animated feature, and also before the Fleischer's own unfortunate attempt to compete with Disney, we had this, a short rendition of the tale that features Betty Boop and her friends Bimbo and Koko. Also, Cab Calloway is back with music! How does this version fare? Listen to find out!
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We watched two Pooh movies for Halloween, now it's time to watch two more for the winter holidays! These movies are much closer the the Halloween Heffalump movie in construction, in that both films are comprised of one or more segments from other Winnie the Pooh media. How do the segments fare, but more importantly, how do the overall films? Listen to find out!
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Another Mickey short so soon? Yes! This one features Pluto being kidnapped by the titular mad doctor, and Mickey traveling through a skeleton-ridden castle to save the poor pup. It's a spooky one, for sure, but is it a good one? Listen to find out!
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This time we watch the infamous British film about rabbits, a movie known for scarring the children who watched it. But is the film as scary as all that, and more importantly, is it any good? Listen to find out!
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We finally get to 1933 with our look at classic cartoon shorts, and what do we start with? A remake! That's right, this short is a remake of the 1928's "The Sky Scrapper", previously covered on this podcast! Was a remake warranted, and more than that, does it deliver? Listen to find out!
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In the wake of (another) Miyazaki retirement, some employees of Studio Ghibli decided to found their own studio, and this was their first film. Carrying some Ghibli hallmarks, like the luscious art style, chaotic magic and witches on brooms, Mary is surely evocative of Ghibli work, but can it compete? Listen to find out!
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Betty Boop's exploring culture this week! By which I mostly mean bones. Also, Bimbo is there, briefly! Perhaps more importantly, our old friend Koko the Clown has returned, with a significant scene at the beginning of the short! But does this short hold up to the weirdness and wackiness of past Boop shorts, or does it fall short? Listen to find out!
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The 2022 Halloween Spookaboo has arrived, and with it a spooktacular Scooby-Doo film! This is one that a certain generation no doubt saw a lot as children, and it's also one of a series of Scooby-Doo films where the monsters are real, Scrappy is there, and the rest of the gang outside of Scooby and Shaggy are absent. It's not the most loved era of Scooby-Doo, to be sure, and yet many look back on this film fondly. Does it deserve a rewatch, or is it best left lying in our memories? Listen to find out!
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In this season of ghouls, let's watch a short made for a different season. Yes, we're dropping in on Jolly Saint Nick here, but this is more than a tale of holiday fun... it's also a tale of censorship! What could possibly need to be censored in a short about Santa Claus? Listen to find out!
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It's time to answer a burning question for Kingdom Hearts 3 fans: who's that purple elephant in the Winnie the Pooh world? The answer is "Heffridge Trumpler Brompet Heffalump IV", or Lumpy, for short. He's a child heffalump who was introduced in 2005's "Pooh's Heffalump Movie" and appeared again in "Pooh's Heffalump Halloween Movie" from later that same year. What's his deal, what are these movies, and are they any good? Listen to find out!
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Did you know that we elected our first woman President all the way back in 1932? In a Fleischer cartoon, anyway. Still not in real life yet! But anyway, how do ol' Betty's campaign promises and speeches hold up 90 years later? Listen to find out!
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It's time for the sort of film you don't usually see. Stylistically, it's closer to caricature street art than your typical Disney movie. There's almost no spoken dialogue. And the main hero is an old woman and her old dog. Together, they're on a mission to save their son from the mafia, and they just might need some help along the way. Does this oddball adventure hold up almost 20 years later? Listen to find out!
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A fun night at the Klondike Bar goes awry, first with a stranger being rescued from the cold, then with a mean brute shooting up the place and kidnapping that same stranger! It's up to Mickey and his pal Pluto to rescue this stranger (Minnie) from the brute (Pete), but does this little mouse have what it takes to take on such a large foe? And perhaps more importantly, is this adventure one worth watching? Listen to find out!
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The most expensive animated film created at the time of its release, Metropolis is a movie based partially on a silent film and partially on a manga. It also released in the perfect window for the broadcasting rights to be bought up by Adult Swim, allowing the movie to make its mark on anime-loving American teens of the 2000s. But expensive doesn't always mean good, and neither does nostalgia. Rewatching this film in 2022, does it still hold up? Listen to find out!
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It's time to actually watch a Betty Boop cartoon, instead of a Talkartoon! Yes, Betty has her own series now, having officially taken the reigns as Fleischer Studio's main star. She unfortunately wouldn't actually keep this title for long, but let's enjoy it while it lasts. In this one, Betty and friends are experiencing a certain lack of gravity that's making everything go haywire! Is this wild ride a fun one, or one best forgotten? Listen to find out!
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If you watched television in the 90s, you may recall the live action adventures of Xena and Hercules, both of whom had their own long-running shows. But did you know that the two teamed up in an animated film, too? Does this animated team-up have the charm that the live-action series had, or is it a flop of epic proportions? Listen to find out!
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Disney's first technicolor Silly Symphony wasn't originally designed to be in color, but this one was! Does that make it better than Flowers and Trees, or does this one still come up short? Listen to find out!
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Goofy and Max are at it again, but more "extremely" this time! And what does "extreme" mean in the year 2000? X-Games, of course! Goofy and Max must both play the X-Games while going to college and once again learning to love each other despite their differences. This movie might not be able to bank on the freshness its predecessor has, but is it still fun enough to warrant its existence? Listen to find out!
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Whoopee, another Mickey Mouse cartoon! And this time, Goofy is here and looking like the Goofy we know and love, instead of an old man! Minnie, Horace and Clarabelle are here too, and everyone is having a raucous time. But is it a good time to actually watch? Listen to find out!
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What if Goofy had a son and lived next door to Mickey's main villain Pete (who also had a family)? That is the premise of the TV series Goof Troop, and this movie takes that premise and elevates it to create the most character-defining movie for Goofy that exists, even to this day. But despite many a 90's kid's nostalgia, does this adventure with Goofy and his son Max still hold up so many years later? Listen to find out!
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It's time to check in on Warner Bros again, and more specifically with their Looney Tunes mascot Bosko. Is his very existence still racist? Well, yes. But aside from the racism, how is the cartoon? Is it any less boring than Bosko's previous efforts? Listen to find out!
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It's time to Discover this music album movie extravaganza! This film not only features the entirety of the music from Daft Punk's album "Discovery", but also features no traditional dialogue and animation in the style of Leiji Matsumoto. The album is considered a classic, but does the movie match that level of prestige? Listen to find out!
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Two Silly Symphony shorts in a row? Well, yes! But this one's in black and white again, and rather than the typical musical Silly Symphony fare, it's basically the first solo Pluto short! That's right, Mickey's pal is striking out on his own, or at least without Mickey! Pluto's joined by a bunch of other dogs, with one in particular that just really wants to be his friend. Is this short a good first outing for the Pup, or should you give it a skip? Listen to find out!
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Today it's time for another Mamoru Hosoda film!! The one's we've seen previous have been emotional gut-punches - does this follow in the same track? Or is this something different, for better or worse? Listen to find out!
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Thus far the shorts we've been watching have been almost entirely in black and white. But here comes Disney with vibrant three-strip technicolor, and a story about sentient trees. It's certainly gorgeous to look at, but what of the story and characters? Is this short worth watching on its own merits, or just as a historical footnote? Listen to find out!
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We've got our second movie-based-on-a-television-series in a row! This one was also a financial flop, though two of our hosts remember watching it in theatres back in the day. It's an action-packed movie with heartfelt moments and laughs aplenty, but does it all come together? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another of Mickey Mouse's pals to be introduced! Mickey and company are putting on a show, and in the crowd a character that would eventually come to be named Goofy watches and guffaws. But beyond introducing a legendary character, is this short actually a fun watch? Listen to find out!
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Ducktales, awoooo~! It's time to join Uncle Scrooge and the gang as they go on an Indiana Jones-style adventure, including shenanigans with a genie, an evil sorcerer, and racist stereotypes. Aside from that last thing, is this an adventure worth having, or is DisneyToon studio's first film outing best left in the past? Listen to find out!
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It's time to meet Warner Bros.' last attempt to create a cartoon star for their new Merrie Melodies series! This guy at least looks different from the others, less Mickey Mouse and more Goofy, despite Goofy not coming into existence until later that same year! But really, it's the lanky bodies they have in common, and little else. Ol' Goopy seems way more competent than Goofy ever manages to be, and in this cartoon he's having a grand old time playing piano and singing at a club. Is the cartoon itself also a grand old time, or is it and Goopy best left forgotten? Listen to find out!
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This time we look into another Chinese film, this one an adaptation of the first part of Journey to the West. Given how ubiquitous that story is in Chinese storytelling (and some other Asian storytelling, for that matter), we were eager to check it out. But did it hold our interest? Listen to find out!
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Pluto doesn't want to be bathed, and in his haste to get away he swallows soap. Cue a mad dash through town with people running in terror and dogcatcher Pete trying to put down the "rabid" dog. Is this one a good showing for Mickey, Pluto and Pete, or should it just be skipped? Listen to find out!
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It's time for our first taste of Masaaki Yuasa's work - a family-friendly version of it, at any rate! This is your classic tale of a boy meeting a mermaid, except she's not actually a mermaid, her dad is a shark man and if she bites you'll become like her. So fairly different then. The story is wild in this one, as is the animation, and there's plenty of fun music strewn throughout. But does the overall package form a cohesive whole? Or does it fall apart before reaching the finish line? Listen to find out!
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It's time for the Fleischer Brothers to out-weird everyone else from the time period with another Betty Boop-starring cartoon from before the series was named after her. This one involves Betty running away from home with her boyfriend Bimbo, where they come across a cave with jazz-singing ghosts. It's a spooky time, but more importantly, is it a fun time? Listen to find out!
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After giving Rankin/Bass' take on Tolkien's work a shot, the next logical step was to check out Bakshi's. Given the reputation of the man and his work, we started the movie with some amount of trepidation... but how did we feel by the end? Does this movie easily beat out Rankin/Bass' efforts? Does it compete with Peter Jackson's live action takes? Or is this one best left in the decade that spawned it? Listen to find out!
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This week we watch another Disney cartoon, but no Mickey this time, we're back to the Silly Symphonies! They haven't yet made the leap to color, but this one feels a bit important with its focus on dramatic story beats over gags and the fact that it was eventually remade years later for the very last Silly Symphony. Is this older version worthwhile on its own merits, or is it begging to be replaced? Listen to find out!
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The time has come to view the animated history of JRR Tolkien's seminal works. Today we look at Rankin/Bass' interpretations for the first time, along with a guest, Marie, who has been watching these versions since she was a child. Do both these works do their source material justice, or are you better off seeking out the live-action adaptations? Listen to find out!
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It's time for some fun in the sun with Mickey Mouse and friends! Which still does not include Donald or Goofy - they don't exist at this point! But Pluto, Minnie, Horace and Clarabelle sure do. It's one of the few chances the latter two have to try to shine before they become little more than cameo characters, so does this cartoon make the most of their charms? Listen to find out!
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After the financial and critical failure that was The Black Cauldron, Disney needed a hit in order to prove their animation division was still viable in the current market. Fortunately, this movie proved to be it, even if it was not as big a hit as most of the films in the 90s would prove to be. Yet despite how critical the film is to the Disney Renaissance, it often feels overlooked in favor of its more even more successful offspring. Is that neglect deserved, or is this a movie that deserves more respect than it receives? Listen to find out!
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Another Merrie Melodies short, and another attempt at a starring character. This time it's Piggy, who is NOT a forerunner of Porky. We're unfortunately a long ways away from Porky. But how's this older pig character, and more importantly, how's his cartoon? Does he, in fact, know what he's doing?
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We're going back to Russia for this film, and this time, they've got some life lessons to teach us. Do these lessons hold up, and perhaps more importantly, are the story and characters enjoyable? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another Mickey Mouse cartoon! This time Mickey and his friends (not yet including Donald and Goofy) are putting on a radio broadcast, and everyone's listening, even Pluto! This cartoon isn't necessarily historically important, but is it fun to watch? Listen to find out!
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It's time to check out another Makoto Shinkai film! This isn't one we see talked about, perhaps because it lives in the shadow of the film that came after it, Your Name. The only thing we knew before going into this was that it would be beautiful. But is it good? Listen to find out!
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Though the two series are often just collectively described as "Looney Tunes", there are two series of cartoon shorts that wind up featuring classic characters like Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. The second series is called "Merrie Melodies", and the series' first attempt at a cartoon star was Foxy, who appeared in this and two other shorts. Foxy clearly didn't have what it takes to reach stardom, but does that mean his shorts are devoid of merit, or is there something worthwhile in this old cartoon? Listen to find out!
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Amblimation only ever made three animated films. And while Balto is fondly remembered by 90s kids and American Tail: Fievel Goes West is at least remembered by American Tail fans, the third film, the middle child of the quasi-trilogy, is rarely talked about anymore. Today we ask the question: is We're Back! forgotten to time because it deserves to be, or is this a hidden gem? Listen to find out!
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There are some cartoons that animators love, that inspires wave after wave of creator over the year as each generation rediscovers it. For some, this is one of those cartoons. Featuring Bimbo and a cameo from Betty Boop, this cartoon is considered by many to be one of the Fleischer's best. But in the year 2022, does that still ring true? Is this still a fun short to watch so many years later? Listen to find out!
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Oliver & Company was a safe bet on all fronts. It was loaded with celebrity voice talent, had popular musicians making music for it, and was a talking-dog movie, one of Disney's more common and beloved movie categories. But it didn't do as well as expected, being beat in its opening weekend by The Land Before Time. Disney was not back on top yet. It would take their next film - The Little Mermaid - for that to happen. But why is that? Why did this film not become as big as most of the films that would follow it for the next decade? Is it bad? Or is this a hidden gem just waiting for reappraisal? Listen to find out!
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Pluto is here and he's here to stay! This is technically the 1st cartoon that "Pluto" appears in, though a dog named "Rover" who looks exactly the same and belongs to Minnie debuted a few months earlier in a different cartoon. But that dog was in a pretty small amount of that cartoon, whereas in this one, Pluto is the star of the show. Also Mickey is here, and he's hunting moose. How does this first appearance of Pluto stack up to the character we know today, and how good of a short is this when watching it nearly 100 years later? Listen to find out!
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Our final holiday episode is a strange feature about three homeless people living in Tokyo who encounter a trash baby and go on a wild adventure or self-discovery. It's a messy movie in a lot of respects, and won't be to everyone's tastes, but more importantly... is it to ours? Listen to find out!
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This time we have another short featuring Betty Boop, and this one's got a few twists and turns in it! This is not a facet of most of the cartoons we've seen in this era. Additionally, Betty has a different vocal performance than usual! It's a wild ride full of bandits, trains and not-Mickey Mouse, but is it actually fun to watch? Listen to find out!
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Rankin Bass has produced many animated specials that have gone on to be considered classics. Most of those specials have been stop-motion animation, but one of the most popular - the original Frosty the Snowman - uses traditional animation. The special proved popular enough to spawn multiple sequels, the first of which aired in 1976, and gives Frosty a wife, Crystal. How do either of these frosty specials hold up in 2021? Should they be remembered as classics, or should they be dumped in a bin along with A Christmas Story? Listen to find out!
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In the late 90s and early 2000s, everyone was putting out cheap animated Christmas movies. And that definitely includes Disney, with their multiple Winnie the Pooh holiday-themed releases, and, of course, Mickey Mouse christmas movies. But unlike the much earlier Mickey Christmas Carol and Pauper shorts, these are movies comprised of brand-new shorts, and they are tv-quality animation, rather than theatrical animation quality. We've also got one movie in traditional animation and the other in 3d animation! How does it all hold up? Are these Christmas classics, or forgettable drivel? Listen to find out!
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In today's episode: Mickey goes to prison! We don't know what he did but he sure doesn't seem to feel bad about it. Also, the proto version of a mainline Disney character! Is it your favorite? Maybe, I don't know your life. Will this cartoon be your new favorite? Listen to find out!
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Film restoration is much more a thing now than it was in the 1970s. So in the 70s, when the original treasured Soyuzmultfilm "The Humpbacked Horse" was in a state of disrepair, they didn't have the ability to restore it, so they just remade the whole thing from scratch! Decades later, when the technology to restore the original came along, they did so, and now both films exist as options to experience the same basic story. Do either of them do it better? Do either of them look better? Which is the better experience overall, or should you actually watch two movies that are mostly the same thing? Listen to find out!
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We've seen the Fleischer bros first cartoon star, but it's time to meet their first cartoon superstar. Betty Boop comes in a form and with a prominence that might be surprising to some - she is not human and she is a bit character in a cartoon starring her eventual boyfriend, Bimbo. Yet some of her core attributes are already there - her general body type and look and her voice, in particular. But outside of introducing a character that would go on to be known worldwide, is this short actually entertaining? Is Bimbo an enjoyable protagonist? Listen to find out!
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While the story of The Thief and the Cobbler is an all-around tragedy, the story of The King and the Mockingbird, which suffered some similar production woes, is one of triumph. Originally released in 1952 against the creator's wishes and in a form they were unhappy with, the film was eventually completed and rereleased in 1980. What is this movie, based on the tale of the Shepheress and the Chimneysweep, actually about, though? And more importantly, is it any good? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another Mickey cartoon! In this one, we meet some of Mickey's pals - but that doesn't mean Donald or Goofy, oh no. Those two are still a ways away. Instead, it's Clarabelle Cow's first appearance, and the first time on the podcast that we've seen Horace Horsecollar! These two faded into obscurity after Donald and Goofy came on the scene, but Clarabelle, at least, has had something of a resurgence in appearances in the last few decades. How does this early version of her compare? Listen to find out!
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The 2021 Halloween Spookaboo reaches its end with a movie that was too scary for Jan to watch! This is a short, gory horror action anime film that proved popular enough in Japan to spawn multiple sequels and spin-offs. It certainly proves spooky enough, but in the end, is this flick worth watching? Listen to find out!
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We managed to get a Halloween-appropriate short in before the holiday season is over! This is not the first Silly Symphony short, but it is an early one and is arguably the most famous of the lot. As you might surmise from the title, it mostly involves skeletons dancing. But the question is... is that enough to make it a compelling short nearly 100 years after it was created? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another Scooby-Doo movie! This one has the dubious honor of being the first Scooby movie created after the fan-favorite Zombie Island. Rather than focusing on horror like that one, this returns to the regular Scooby forumla, but with a little Zombie Island-inspired twist. Does it still hold up today among the many, many Scooby-Doo movies? Listen to find out!
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We've seen how Mickey Mouse got his start, and even earlier in the Disney catalogue, too. But there's another major name that comes to mind when thinking of classic cartoon shorts: Warner Bros and their Looney Tunes. How did this series get its start, and who was their first cartoon star to compete against the Disney Mouse? It's not Bugs, or Daffy, or even Porky... no, it's Bosko, the oft-forgotten original Looney Tune. Why is he so often forgotten? And how does his original two appearances (one private, one public) hold up in the modern day? Listen to find out!
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For our first 2021 Halloween Spookaboo episode, we check out the black sheep of the Disney animated film library. This movie is infamous for the scary imagery within, the cuts made to it, and for becoming something of a cult classic. Revisiting it 36 years later, does it deserve that cult classic status, or is this one best left in the Disney Dark Ages? Listen to find out!
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This short is the first Mickey Cartoon made after his public debut! In this one, we see Pete used as a romantic rival rather than a straight-up villain, and a Minnie who doesn't find everything Mickey does charming. Will Mickey win Minnie over? And more importantly, is this short any fun to actually watch? Listen to find out!
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Today we watch the movie that traumatized a generation. It's a movie that's overall very silly and lighthearted in tone but that makes some decisions that bring death to a world previously bereft of it. But in the end, is it any good? Do you have to be a Transformers fan to enjoy it? Listen to find out!
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The Mouse is finally here! And while the world thinks of Steamboat Willie as his first cartoon, the truth is two others were made before it, but not officially released until after! Though Steamboat Willie ended up being Mickey's public debut, it's interesting to consider how the drastically different portrayals in Plane Crazy and The Gallopin' Gaucho would have potentially changed the initial perception of the future Walt Disney company mascot. And how do all three of these hold up as cartoons in the here and now? Are they fun to watch outside of their historical value? Listen to find out!
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Today we cover what is perhaps Dreamworks' most infamous film. This one almost sunk the company before it could give us classics like Shrek 2, Kung Fu Panda, How to Train Your Dragon, or Megamind. It's also one of the death knells for major releases of traditionally animated films. But all that said... how is the movie? Is this tale of pirates and chaos goddesses any good, or is it best left forgotten, the way Jeffery Katzenberg, creator of Quibi, would prefer? Listen to find out!
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Today we look at the final Oswald the Lucky Rabbit cartoon Walt Disney had a hand in, though it would prove to be far from the last short to use the character. Ortensia and Pete are back for this one, but instead of a fantasy setting, this short goes for a then-contemporary construction workplace setting. As the final Disney short before the start of the Mickey Mouse series, does this finale of sorts for the Disney Oswald series still hold up so many years later? Listen to find out!
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Though this live action Steven Spielberg film is not officially a live-action sequel to Disney's Peter Pan, it can be interpreted as one, and it was an indelible part of many a 90's kid's childhood. Considered a failure, the film has recently undergone something of a cultural reevaluation as those who grew up with it analyze it as adults. So now it's time for us to do that! Is this film only good through nostalgia goggles, or does it have something to offer still in the year 2021? Listen to find out!
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After the Alice Comedies, it was time for Walt to create a new star, one that didn't rely on a live actor being inserted into the animation. But this star was not yet Mickey Mouse, but instead Oswald the Lucky Rabbit! Today we look at perhaps the most iconic Oswald short, while talking about the character's origins. The short might be iconic, but is it any good? Listen to find out!
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In the early 2000s, Peter Pan was one of many Disney movies that was given a sequel, and was also far from the first to focus on the child of one of the protagonists from the original film. This one stars Wendy's daughter Jane, who gets to go on her own Neverland adventure. Disney sequels have a bad reputation, but this podcast's opinions on them have been mixed rather than only bad. Is this one of the better ones, or is this sequel best left in the bargain bin? Listen to find out!
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The final Alice Comedy we'll be covering, this one is indicative of the trend with this series of Alice as a character being minimized so the short can focus on the cartoons. Also Pete's here and he's got a hat! Is this the best of the bunch, or was this series ready to be thrown out? Listen to find out!
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This movie is something of a double-edged sword for Disney, in that it's generally considered one of their most iconic and loved works, while also being one of their most infamously racist. Everyone knows the depiction of Native Americans in this movie hasn't held up, but how much does that affect the overall product? And how's the story around that? Is the good in this one worth sitting through the bad, or is this particular film best left to rot inside the Disney vault? Listen to find out!
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Today's Alice Comedy is the very first appearance of a Disney character that's still around and in use today! And I don't mean Mickey Mouse! No, I mean Mickey's eventual main villain - Pete! Yes, it's true, Pete, sometimes known as Peg-Leg Pete and in this cartoon known as Bootleg Pete, is older than Mickey or even Mickey's 'cousin' Oswald the Lucky Rabbit! But sure, the cartoon is noteworthy for that reason, but... is it actually any good? Listen to find out!
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Did you know that Disney's animated Winnie the Pooh adventures are not the only ones? There's at least one other - a very different version based on the same stories and made in Russia by studio Soyuzmulfilm! This episode is actually not reviewing a movie, but three shorts that total around 40 minutes in total. Each is based on one single chapter from Winnie the Pooh, and none involve Christopher Robin. What is this alternate version of Winnie the Pooh like, and more importantly, how does it hold up?
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Another week another Alice Comedies short! This one has a lot of live action in it and a lot of child actors! It was also released in theatres, unlike the first Alice Comedies short we watched. Did it deserve to be? How's this thing hold up?
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This is our first CoMix Wave film, and is also likely the most well-known of the lot. To say this movie is popular in Japan would be an understatement. Needless to say, we were excited to watch it. But does this story of a boy and girl switching bodies with each other hold up five years later? Or is this one not worth the hype? Listen to find out!
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Most people might think of the old black and white Mickey Mouse cartoons as Disney's first main cartoon shorts series, and some might even recall that a certain Lucky Rabbit had a series before Mickey. But Walt's first long-running series of cartoon shorts were actually the Alice Comedies - a series of live-action/animation hybrids featuring a little girl named Alice interacting with an animated world. This is the very first of those, though this particular cartoon was only used to try to sell the series to distributors, rather than to entertain an audience. Should it have been put in front of an audience, though? Or is this one best left for the Disney Vault? Listen to find out!
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A boy who's scared of trees in the night, a dad who refuses to try to understand his son, and an animated adventure through different book genres - The Pagemaster has got a lot going on. And that's before getting to the fact that it's got live action segments, traditionally animated segments, and even a bit of computer animation. And the cast! Ed Begley Jr, Patrick Stewart, and Whoopi Goldberg! There's so much happening with this film, but in the end, does it all come together into a solid whole? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another Out of the Inkwell cartoon, and as you might surmise there's a puzzle in this one! There's also a high-speed makeshift car adventure, a wacky land of mazes and mischief, and a cartoon tunnel big enough for a live-action man to crawl into. Is the short any good? Listen to find out!
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It's time for another Disney live-action remake! Or, perhaps more accurately, a Disney live-action pseudo-franchise-sequel? Christopher Robin is a movie that takes the titular character, always a boy in Winnie the Pooh media, and asks 'what happens when he grows up?' The concept, at least, is more interesting than a straight-up remake... but still, is it any fun to actually watch? Listen to find out!
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It's time to finally watch a Felix the Cat cartoon! This one involves our mischievous feline getting dropped into the ocean and winding up in the far north, where he has various adventures before, well... the title might give you a clue. This is far from Felix's first short, but it's the first all three of us watched together... what did we think of it? Are we looking forward to more Felix shorts in the future, or is this cat best left in the past? Listen to find out!
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This time we go to the original four Winnie the Pooh Disney half-hour shorts, the first three of which are typically packaged together into a film. This is where the long-running Disney franchise begins! But how do these four shorts hold up individually, and how do the first three hold up as a movie? Listen to find out!
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Another 1920's silent short, and another Out of the Inkwell short, Jumping Beans nevertheless comes with some interesting surprises. It's difficult to predict where this short will go, and it's a wild ride the whole way. But is it any good? Listen to find out!
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Sometimes you watch a film when you're a young adult that leaves an impression on you, that feels 'important', that comes back to your mind every now and then. For Valerie and Danika, Persepolis is such a film. It's a film with emotional highs and lows and a salient message to get across. It also came out 14 years ago. How well does its message hold up now? Listen to find out!
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It's another Out of the Inkwell short, and this time the clown's family is coming over! What shenanigans do they get up to, and how's it hold up compared to the clown's other adventures? Listen to find out!
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What happens when you take the inherently absurd premise of 'a woman has kids with a wolf man' and then take it seriously? The answer is you create this Mamoru Hosoda classic from 2012! This is a movie Valerie and Danika have seen more than once, but not for a while... watching it again with Jan and Ryan in tow, what did we all think? Did it hold up almost ten years later? Listen to find out!
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It's the early 1920s and Walt Disney has finally entered the animation scene! While this isn't his first short, it's the first starring animals instead of humans, indicative of the sort of cartoons he would eventually become famous for. But is it any good? Is there a reason to watch Walt's silent era shorts, or should you skip right to Steamboat Willie? Listen to find out!
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Do you remember that movie? You know, that one you saw as a kid, had cartoon animals and they flew a little ship at one point? Maybe there was a scary scene with humans? You're pretty sure there was an environmental theme. Well, this is that movie! But is this film that's lived on the edge of your memories for years any good? Is it worth revisiting so the vague memory can become clear? Listen to find out!
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Another Out of the Inkwell short, this one gets weird, with the still unnamed clown walking on telephone wires, creating a mechanical woman and getting murdered by oil. It's a trip, but is it a good one? Listen to find out!
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Though Treasure Planet isn't the movie that signaled the first death of traditional animation at Disney, its box office failure unfortunately led the company toward that inevitable conclusion. On the other hand, the film is a passion project by a pair of directors that gave Disney multiple movies now considered classics. So while it failed financially it was nevertheless adored by those who created it, and has become a childhood classic for some people. Watching it years later, did it deserve to fail so hard, or was the passionate creative vision behind it right all along and simply not given their due? Listen to find out!
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The first few Out of the Inkwell shorts were produced by Bray Productions, but soon enough the Fleischer Brothers decided to create their own studio, and this short is perhaps the first one they made! And it certainly feels like they're trying to go all-out, with even more interactions between the animation and live action parts, more rotoscoping and even some claymation! There's a lot going on in this short, but ultimately, is any of it enjoyable to watch? Listen to find out!
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It's time for Japan's first feature-length film, along with the shorter film it's a sequel to. And both of them are overt Japanese World War II war propaganda! As such the viewing was, in some ways, harrowing, especially given the shorter film is literally about Pearl Harbor. But still, the second one is historically important to animation in Japan! So do either of them hold up? Are either of them worth watching over half a century after the war they were created for? Listen to find out!
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We've looked at some of the earliest bits of American and European animation - but what about other countries? What about Japan? We look at the oldest surviving bit of Japanese animation, followed by the oldest surviving animated short. Are they enjoyable to watch in 2021 or later? Listen to find out!
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This particular film is this podcast's second Gulliver's Travels, the first animated telling of the story, and the second American feature-length animated film. It's also one of two feature films by the Fleischer Bros, better known for Betty Boop and Popeye. This movie begs direct comparison to Disney's Snow White, since it was made to directly compete within the market Disney's movie had just created. How does it compare? And how does it compare to the Gulliver's Travels from nearly 40 years later? Is this one worth a watch, or is it best left forgotten? Listen to find out!
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It's time to dive into our first series of theatrical cartoon shorts! We're still a long ways from Looney Tunes and Mickey Mouse, but even back in 1919 characters were being created who are still known today! In this particular case, the cartoon stars a clown who would eventually be known as Koko, and would become best known for being a side character in early Betty Boop cartoons. This time it's just him and an obnoxious fly... and also the animator Max Fleischer himself! Is this cartoon from over 100 years ago still funny or enjoyable to watch in the year 2021? Listen to find out!
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The very first Disney movie, and the beginnings of animated feature films in America is Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Its a film many have seen, but when was the last time they actually watched it and paid attention to it? Is it... worth that? Or is this a relic of a bygone era that's inferior to the vast body of work made in its wake? Listen to find out!
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Out of all pre-Disney cartoon shorts, Winsor McCay's Gertie the Dinosaur is perhaps the most well known. Today we take a look at it and its predecessor, Little Nemo, based on the comic series of the same name, to examine McCay's best-known contributions to animation as a medium. But, outside that historical context, how are these two shorts as pieces of entertainment? Are they still enjoyable, over 100 years after they were first conceived? Listen to find out!
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The oldest surviving animated feature film is actually the third one known to have been made, and even still it is over ten years older than Walt Disney's Snow White. It also does not use traditional animation, but instead a cutout and silhouette animation style hybrid. It's also German, while the story itself is based on the 1001 Nights. So all that said... is it any fun to watch? And does something that is nearing 100 years old still hold up all these years later in like ANY regard? Listen to find out!
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Animation has existed for well over 100 years now, yet in the grand scheme of things, it is a relatively young medium. How long ago did it begin, exactly, and who pioneered it? What of the earliest bits of animation still survives today, and perhaps more importantly - is any of it any good? Like, historically, sure, but is there any other reason to watch these things? Watch to find out!
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Our final episode of the year is another Soyuzmultfilm movie! The most well known in the west of the studio's output, actually. This is a film many people might remember from their childhoods, albeit in an English dub form. But how does the original hold up? Do the Russian voices hold up, and does the film itself deserve to be well known? Listen to find out!
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On the second episode of our 2020 Holiganza, we see the final hurrah of the original Animaniacs run, featuring not just the Warner siblings but practically every minor character that ever appeared in the show. It's a wild ride with cartoon antics and zany songs - but in the year 2020 with an Animaniacs reboot already out, how does the finale of the original series hold up? Listen to find out!
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For our first Holiday 2020 episode, we cover two classic half-hour Mickey Mouse shorts from the 80s and early 90s. The first is one of the many, many interpretations of the classic Dickens tale, while the second is a classic 'two people from different walks of life switch places' type of story. How do these compare, and more importantly, how do they hold up so many years later? Listen to find out!
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We've arrived at our first Gulliver's Travels movie, but it certainly won't be the last. This is a strange one from 1977 featuring Richard Harris and cartoon Lilliputians. The budget is clearly low, and the video quality on the Youtube copy we watch is poor, but... does the movie hold up anyway? Is this one of the better versions of this story, or is this one best left to obscurity? Listen to find out!
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The first anthology film this podcast has covered that's more than two shorts, Robot Carnival is a movie created by animators in Japan to showcase their craft. With a unifying theme of "robots", Robot Carnival runs the gamut in tone, length and focus. It's certainly a fascinating film - but is it a good one? Do all of the segments hold up, or is it better to just watch one or two shorts rather than the whole movie? Listen to find out!
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Fifteen years after the original, a second Vampire Hunter D movie was made. What had been learned in those years? Would this sequel follow the original's schlocky mold, or do its own unique thing? Ultimately, is it worth watching, or are the Vampire Hunter D films relegated to the niche? Listen to find out!
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In the early days of anime OVAs, a movie based on one of Hideyuki Kikuchi's novel series released, and 35 years later we watched it. Both anime and OVAs have changed a lot since then - how does this early production, which pushed the violence and sexuality farther than it could if it were made to air on television, hold up in the year 2020? Also, since we're in the midst of our Halloween Spookaloo, how spooky is this thing? And finally, has an ending song ever slapped as hard as the one in this movie? Probably not. For the answers to the other questions, you'll have to give the episode a listen!
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Next up on our 2020 Halloween Spookaloo is an entry that was admittedly shoehorned in, but look this movie kept getting pushed back and needed to be worked in somewhere. Anyway, this sequel to the early-2000's television show was a long time coming, but is it any good? Will Zim fans like it? Will people who've never heard of the show like it? And how's the "lol random" humor holding up in this day and age? All these answers and more in today's episode!
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We're finally touching one of Disney's infamous 1940s package films - the last of them, in fact! This is also the start of our Annual Halloween Spookaloo, even if only half the movie fits the theme! Do either of these half-hour shorts hold up, and more than that, do they hold up together as a complete film? Listen to find out!
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The lesser known of the late-70s-early-80s Rankin-Bass fantasy movies, The Flight of Dragons is also the most intriguing one, mostly due to how little was known going into watching it. The Last Unicorn and Tolkien movies might be beloved, but should this one be too? And besides dragons flying, what even happens in this thing? To find the answers, my friend, you must do the logical thing, and give this episode a listen!
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It's finally here - the latest, at least at the time of this writing, Disney (live-action) remake! It would be a stretch to say most people were looking forward to it, and in fact some people are actively boycotting it, but still it has arrived. Is it any good? And how does it compare to the original, or heck, even the sequel? We've got lots of opinions - some good, some bad, some in-between - but at the end of the day, would we recommend it? Listen to find out!
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It's Disney direct-to-video sequel time again! These are renowned for being universally terrible, but we've found them to be a bit more of a mixed bag so far. Is this one of the better ones, or one of the worse ones? Or perhaps middling? There are easily-accessible scenes that were cut from the movie, too - did those hint at a better movie that could have been, or were they best left on the cutting room floor? How does the film itself hold up, not only as a sequel, but on its own? Listen to find out!
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If you're looking for a trailer to show your friends what this podcast is all about, or you stumbled across us yourself and are wondering what our deal is, then this should clue you in!
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The time has come! The Mulan remake has an official release date, so it's time for us to cover all three films! Let's go back now to 1998, when 98° was more than just a temperature (actually, they're apparently still around but I'm keeping that joke). One of the last movies in the Disney Renaissance, Mulan came after relative disappointments Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Hercules. Did this movie manage to get the magic of the Renaissance back, or was it just another in a series of diminishing returns? Listen to find out!
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The very first Disney sequel, as well as the first Disney sequel to be released theatrically! For a long time after this Disney sequels would only be direct-to-video, until that whole enterprise was stopped in the late 2000s. This is also one of the early Disney Renaissance films, as well as the one most often forgotten when discussing that period. Should it be? Is this one worth revisiting, and how does it stack up against the original? Listen to find out!
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(Warning: The audio for Danika and Valerie in this episode isn't at the usual quality level. Fortunately we fixed the issue before recording the next episode, but in this one we definitely sound a bit off. To the best of my ability, I have made it listenable, but still, I apologize for it not being at our usual quality level.)
The Rescuers is one of Disney's later features in their "Bronze" era (also referred to as their "Dark Age"), and perhaps one of the most well known. Unfortunately, one of the reasons it's so well known is... infamous, and a prime candidate for our segment titled after the name of the podcast. But that issue aside, how does this one hold up? Our answers may surprise you. Listen to find out!
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An 80s cult classic by a new (at the time) studio called Nelvana, Rock & Rule is a film filled with music, rat people, and that 80s aesthetic. But why is it considered a cult classic, and does that reason help it hold up after all these years? Listen to find out!
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One of Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli's best known works, Spirited Away is a movie most people know about even if they haven't seen it. But it came out close to 20 years ago now... Does it still hold up? Is this a shining example of traditional animation that helps prove superiority over 3D animation? Are Chihiro's parents bad at parenting? And how much time passed by the end of the movie? Hear our answers to these questions and more in this week's episode!
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Though Prince of Egypt is not as well known as most Disney films or Dreamworks' later works, its prequel, Joseph: King of Dreams is even less well known. It is, perhaps, the least well known of any of Dreamworks' films. Is it a lost gem, or does this one deserve to be lost to the sands of time? Listen to find out!
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Dreamworks' first animated movie that they produced, even if it ended up releasing second, is not the sort of movie that the name 'Dreamworks' brings to most people's mind nowadays. But before the company shifted direction following Shrek's success, they made several traditionally animated movies - and this was the first. Following the story of Moses, this particular version takes that well-worn tale and focuses in on the relationship between Moses and his brother Ramses, with a dramatic musical touch to boot. But all these years later... how's the movie hold up? Should we lament that Dreamworks no longer makes movies like these, or are they better left forgotten? Listen to find out!
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Known to some as "that live-action Disney musical with an animated part that ISN'T Mary Poppins" and to others as "better than Mary Poppins", Bedknobs and Broomsticks is a film that has a complicated legacy. And that legacy is only further complicated by the fact that there are multiple versions of the film, and that Disney Plus chose the less good version to host on their website, without even putting the cut scenes into the extras.
But, okay, that's a lot - does it matter? Is this film worth watching, in any form? And what's this movie even about? If you haven't seen it, then it's probably not about anything you might expect. Listen to find out all about it!
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After 2011's Winnie the Pooh, traditionally animated films in the United States virtually stopped being made, at least on a theatrical level. But just because the US gave up on them, doesn't mean the rest of the world did. And I don't just mean Japan! A French, Belgian, Canadian co-production, April and the Extraordinary World is a fascinating film - but is it a good one? And more than that, how does it hold up five years later? Listen to find out!
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The first of the movies based on the anime/manga series Ranma 1/2, and also the first movie based on an anime/manga series that we're watching! I have a lot of love for this series, Valerie has a little nostalgia, and my Mom knows nothing about it. Will we all enjoy it? With characters like Happosai at the fore of the movie, will it hold up? Listen to find out!
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The only sequel to his movies that Don Bluth has ever worked on, Bartok the Magnificent is also, perhaps, the least well known. Also, it's technically a prequel, rather than a sequel, though good luck figuring out how the two movies connect. All that said... how's this Anastasia follow-up that has none of that movie's characters besides Bartok hold up? Listen to find out!
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Generally hailed as a return to form for Don Bluth after a string of less-than-well-received movies in the 90s, Anastasia is that one movie that everyone keeps thinking is a Disney Princess movie, even though it's not. Or wasn't? Who knows now with Disney owning so much of Fox's stuff. But though it was loved in its time, it's been over twenty years since it came out - how's this Russian fairy tale hold up for a modern day audience? Listen to find out!
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We're on to the second of the four live-action Disney remakes that were released in 2019. Was this one better than Aladdin? Worse? And how does it compare to the original? Is it a good movie in its own right? And how does this remake manage to essentially double the screentime of the original when that movie had such a simple plot? All those answers await in this week's episode, so give it a listen!
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Dumbo came at an important time for Disney, when the really needed a financial win and this movie was able to provide it. It's no wonder its been celebrated ever since, despite also being infamous for racism. It's been around 80 years, but people still show this movie to their kids - should they? Listen to find out!
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Our second Soyuzmultfilm movie! This one's a straight-up morality play, told for a communist audience rather than a capitalist one, which isn't something we've seen before. But how does the movie actually hold up? Listen to find out!
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The first non-Miyazaki Studio Ghibli movie that any of the three of us have seen, we were excited but nervous about what this film would have in store. Pretty much all I knew about it was that it involved tanuki - but also, I didn't know a lot about tanuki. You might not either, in which case I recommend this informative video! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icyOAc_pAvY
But what is Pom Poko about? What do the tanuki in the movie DO? Is the film any good? And more specifically, how's it hold up? Listen to find out!
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Due to the whole Coronovirus thing as well as personal issues, no new episode this week. But please enjoy this bonus episode we recorded back in October for Coco!
WARNING: This episode is barely edited, and has cursing and no spoiler jump. Might not be appropriate for children.
We should be back next week with a new episode!
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Hey everyone, no regular episode this week, unfortunately. But we didn't want to leave y'all empty-handed!
The links mentioned in the episode: http://bit.ly/animatedpopballadsspotify and http://bit.ly/animatedpopballads
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In the 90s, many studios attempted to copy the success that Disney was having with their films, including Warner Bros, whose efforts were a little all over the place. After Space Jam and Cat's Don't Dance, but before The Iron Giant, there was this film, based on a novel and Arthurian legend, and stuffed to the brim with singing talent, including Eric Idle, Bryan White, The Coors, and Celine Dion. Its one of those films that many 90s kids remember fondly - but is it worthy of being introduced to a new generation? Listen to find out!
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Considered a classic of Chinese animation, Nezha's Triumph Against the Dragon King is a 1979 movie filled with dragons, fighting, and fabulousness. Did we enjoy it? And how does it hold up so many years later? Listen to find out!
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Let's jump back to 1979 with a Toei Animation movie based on an old Japanese folk tale! This is an interesting one, because of how heavily it's based in Japanese mythology and story structure. This movie's got a message to send, but is it good? The answer is complicated. Listen to find out!
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Starting from Zombie Island, this is the third Scooby-Doo movie in what would become a long line of them, and also the final one to be animated with traditional cells. It played on Cartoon Network often, maybe even more often than Zombie Island, so for a certain age demographic, it's considered a classic on principal. But how does it actually hold up, in the year 2020? Listen to find out!
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The Digimon movie isn't just the beginning of the Digimon series, it's the directoral debut of Mamoru Hosoda, who would go on to direct several episodes of the series, a second Digimon movie, and, eventually, many classic movies of his own. How do these first two movie efforts of his hold up? And are they enjoyable even if you're not familiar with the series? Listen to find out!
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One movie, two VERY different versions of it. All three of us, including guest Valerie, watched the Miramax version of this movie many years ago. But since then, a version known as The Recobbled Cut has emerged, and become known as the only true way to watch the film for most people. How do they stand up against each other? And, perhaps more importantly, how does each movie stand up to the march of time? Listen to find out!
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Dipping back into the Disney Renaissance, we rewatch Hercules, an old stand-by from Danika's youth. The soundtrack is definitely still a bop, but how's the rest of the movie hold up? And how embarrassed am I that we forgot who Rip Torn is, then proceeded to mention Men in Black later in the episode? The answer to the latter is 'very', but to the former? You'll have to listen to find out!
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Finally we get to a foreign, non-Japanese animated film that Danika has been curious about for quite some time! After all this time, we now know what Kells is. What is it, you ask? And how well does this 10 year old movie hold up? Listen to find out!
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Most people have heard of Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki. And a decent amount of anime nerds in the west have heard of people like Mamoru Hosoda or Satoshi Kon. But there are plenty of other brilliant people making animated films in Japan, and today we cover a movie by Hiroyuki Okiura - 2011's "A Letter to Momo". We already gave Ghibli masterpiece My Neighbor Totoro a full 5 star rating - how does this lesser known film stack up? Listen to find out!
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Considered by some Bat-fans as the best of all Batman movies, including the live-action ones, this Batman: The Animated Series tie-in movie is nearing 30 years old! Has it aged well? Or is this version of The Bat just not up to snuff?
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There are countless retellings of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", but only one of them has Muppets! When we go back and watch a movie that Jan considers her second favorite out of ALL movies, can we possibly be objective? No, but we try!
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An animated Russian film featuring the devil, a witch, and several men hiding themselves in bags. It's not the story that title might make you think it is, in other words. What did we think of this old film from a culture we're unfamiliar with? Listen to find out!
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When covering 2D/traditionally animated movies, it's rare to see one that's from the U.S. and that bears a date later than 2011. And yet this very year a new movie of this sort came out! A Christmas movie, no less, with a director who worked on Disney Renaissance classics like The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, and Tarzan! Is this the modern western traditionally animated movie we deserve, or is it bogged down in outdated tropes that make it not worth seeing? Listen to find out!
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Aladdin not only had two sequels - Return of Jafar was the FIRST direct-to-video Disney sequel (though not the first actual sequel). It also was basically the pilot for the Aladdin tv series, while Aladdin and the King of Thieves served as the end to both the tv series and the Aladdin series as a whole. Danika watched both of these movies A LOT when she was young, but how do they hold up now, over 20 years later?
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We finally get to our second Disney remake! We actually enjoyed the 2015 Cinderella quite a bit... but will we feel similarly about 2019's Aladdin? Listen to find out, and to hear speeches about what makes certain characters great and why what DIsney has been doing the last few years is not-so-great.
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Revisiting a childhood favorite is always risky business. There's always the possibility that the thing just isn't as good as your nostalgia tells you. And then there's the worry that it will be full of gags that have aged poorly and taint an otherwise great film. So when Danika goes back and watches her absolute favorite Disney film that she watched over and over again as a child 20-something years ago... how's it hold up now? Join her, Jan, and their friend Knox as they find out!
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Time to make our first exploration into foreign animated films that AREN'T from Japan. Danika had heard a lot about this one, and was excited to see it for the first time. Does this Best Animated Feature nominee hold up? And more importantly: is it better than that year's winner, Frozen?
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This week we cover perhaps the most well-known Studio Ghibli film, besides maybe Spirited Away. The movie is over 30 years old now... has time treated it well?
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The second of our two spooooky episodes! Taking a little bit of detour from traditional animation, we visit Laika's early-2010's Coraline follow-up Paranorman! There was a lot of talk about a gay character in this movie back in when it came out... how does both that and the rest of the movie hold up over five years later?
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On the first of our two Halloween spooktacular episodes, we also have our first guest - my wife, Valerie! This particular Scooby-Doo movie is much loved by fans, but over twenty years after it first released, how's it hold up?
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Did you know there are two sequels to All Dogs Go to Heaven? Also an animated series! We're not covering the latter here, but the former? Yes. Danika actually saw All Dogs 2 when she was a kid, but neither her nor Jan have seen the third one. How do they hold up? Listen to find out!
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This week Danika and Jan cover an old favorite, allowing Jan to embarrass Danika for loving Scratchy the dog so much as a kid. He's a good boy, Jan! Oh, also, does anyone remember that this movie's got some overt racism in it?
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On this episode we watch the the first of many Disney remakes that we'll eventually be covering! Danika's seen almost none of those remakes, and this is the one she's most optimistic about. Is that optimism misplaced? Listen to find out!
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This week, on the very first episode of "How's It Hold Up?" we cover Disney's 1950 classic Cinderella. Both Danika and Jan saw this movie when they were young, but what's it like watching it for the first time in years in the year 2019?
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