Monday, April 20, 2020

From Burbank With Love / Anchors A-Warners / When You're Traveling from Nantucket - (Animaniacs Vol 4 Part 12) - 'Toon Reviews 39



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Episode 87
From Burbank with Love
Despite this cartoon being a take on a film franchise I know by name but have never actually watched, it’s one I find to be perfectly fun and entertaining.  A major cause of that is the spoofed material being a mere backdrop for the Warners to do what they do best when it comes to insanity.  

Here, they’re called in for a parody of James Bond films, and the cartoon’s aesthetic makes the mission very authentic.  The feel gets off to a strong start with an elaborate sequence modeled after the opening credits of films in the actual franchise.  I’m going to guess the particular film the sequence is modeled after is Goldfinger given the emphasis on big fat bars of gold, but I could be wrong.  For the actual plot, I imagine the featured characters the Warners get teamed up with are solid representations of actual James Bond characters.  There’s the featured agent in question 0007 (with a zero added to the well-known code name 007) and his boss P.  The Warners come in as American agents to support 0007 as the featured scheme is in the American location of Fort Knox.  It’s in danger of being blasted by a space cannon set up by the agency’s biggest villain, Blowfinger.  

All throughout is the great appeal of Warners cartoons that’s defined their brand of entertainment since the beginning.  They’re placed in a situation where a lot of seriousness is brought to the task at hand.  While the likes of 0007 and P face the mission with the utmost focus, the Warners rapidly fire out one hilarious joke and one-liner after another.  Standout ones include making fun of how P only has one letter to his name, thinking Blowfinger’s a cat based on what he’s holding in a video phone, and messing with the gadgets.  It’s all funny stuff that average people would think means they have absolutely no idea what they’re doing, but that notion makes what unfolds surprising.  

The actual mission the Warners set off on with 0007 is also majorly fueled by clever comedy.  Their plane keeps going from flying fast to flying slow because Wakko filled the tank with kangaroo gas.  Blowfinger’s layer is held in a simple outhouse which the Warners take amazement in how much he fit into a little potty.  After they’re caught and 0007 calls themselves the cable guys, they immediately cut to everyone being lowered into a pool of acid.  Yakko suggests they’re here because Blowfinger saw the Cable Guy movie with Jim Carrey.  

During this moment of peril, the Warners think nothing of the dangers and effortlessly break out of the ropes.  Through their antics, Dot acts overdramatic as she plays to her mace class on the enemies in accordance with weakness.  Then Wakko suddenly ends up in space to redirect the space cannon at Blowfinger (who amusingly has a really small head).  This is an effective trick to blow up his lair and ruin his plan.  It’s here where the Warners show off their greatness as cartoon characters where for all their antics, they really know what they’re doing.  All the same, the antics are enough for 0007 to send them on another mission in a parody of McCloud.  I could predict that they pull off the mission in a similar manner, but I’m not familiar with that show either.  

This is easily one of the cartoons of this era that plays to the Warners’ strengths making everything fun and hilarious, even if you’re not a fan of the parodied material.
A+

Anchors A-Warners
Very rarely does this show fail to get how the Warners operate.  Their style may be doing their antics with the intent of annoying others, but care is taken to make sure their targets deserve what they get.  For that, it saddens me to say that this is not the case with this cartoon. The Warners go after someone who’s done nothing to warrant their leisure getting sabotaged.  Yes, it’s nothing new that they end up annoying to their psychiatrist, Dr. Scratchansniff, but their antics with him have always been their comedic ways of simply interacting.  You really can’t call their past interactions maliciously intended.  Here, in several spots, this does seem to be the case. You get the impression that they and, the world around Dr. Scratchansniff, seem determined to make things difficult when all he wants to do is enjoy a cruise.  

The opening sequence of him getting on the ship in disguise and searching every little spot for the Warners to show up doesn’t seem too bad at first.  In fact, it works in a humorous way to build up to their potential reveal.  Speaking of which, just when Dr. Scratchansniff is convinced that they aren’t on the ship at all, them showing up works as an effective surprise.  Once their presence is revealed though, the cartoon takes a turn for the worse.  Throughout the cruise, there’s a feeling that the Warners are making things difficult for Dr. Scratchansniff deliberately and for no understandable reason.  The worst offense is when he tries to flirt with a woman on the ship, and Yakko and Dot appear asking about their ‘mommy’ and then cry about how they want her.  No matter how much he tells them to stop, the woman sees him as an uncaring father and beats him.  What is even up with that?  What was even Yakko and Dot’s motivation to cry over a nonexistent mother for Dr. Scratchansniff to get beaten?  

Other moments aren’t nearly as cruel, but they still leave a poor impression.  There’s a callback to the cartoon where Wakko played bingo without understanding, but here it’s worse.  I’m fine with Wakko calling bingo when he doesn’t have it, but why would Yakko and Dot, who are more in tune with things, do the same?  Yet, everyone’s mad at Dr. Scratchansniff even though he’s not the one making the scene.  At least when he calls bingo himself, it is a good cause for a woman to clog dance on him which is fun to watch.  Humor also picks up in a scene where Dr. Scratchansniff goes to a fancy dinner, finds the dining room empty, and returns to his quarters to find a party with the entire ship.  I also find it nice that the Warners genuinely want him to join in.  Then anything nice is dashed when Dr. Scratchansniff is charged a huge room service bill for the party, he swims away, and the Warners plan on following him to mess with him some more.  

I’m sorry to say this, but for the most part, this is the Warners at their most unpleasant.  There’s no fun in their interactions with Dr. Scratchansniff like there usually is.  They show up to make life difficult for him when all he’s trying to do is go on a cruise, and no good comes from their antics like what's usually the case.  It also doesn’t help that nothing is shaken off with Dr. Scratchansniff ending up in more casts as the cartoon goes on, making his injuries feel too real.  If he actually wronged the Warners if they acted like they wanted to go on the cruise too or if he was replaced with a target who was actually a jerk, this cartoon would be a lot better.  As it stands, in spite of a few solid laughs preventing it from being a total flop, making the Warners ruin someone’s life for the sake of it really brings it down.
D

When You’re Traveling from Nantucket
There’s nothing to make up for a majorly disappointing Warners cartoon like a song taking an educational topic and making it fun.  This one isn’t as well-known as other songs in the show, but I still find a lot to admire about it.  

It takes the complexities of time zones and turns them into a short musical interlude built on wholesomely fun ways of getting all information across.  While the whole song isn’t as fast as other songs when putting the information together, it’s clear that there’d be a lot of confusion if you were to speak everything.  The tune lays all the time zone information out concisely to let everything easily sink in.  

It starts with Yakko nicely offering something to ponder in regard to different clocks for cities all over the world.  Then rhymes are worked in to give examples of how the reason for this is because different countries have different times.  Humor is worked in to add in funny scenarios to what would happen if time went faster than it does, like a day being an hour long and school lasting a minute.  Following a verse about what can be done with time, including wasting it, comes one of the more substantial verses.  A talk about the international dateline is a necessary thing to bring up when it comes to the idea of time. This especially applies to the idea of how crossing it means you arrive the day before you left.  Whether this also means someone on one side is older or not is followed with endearment.  No matter how different people’s births may be, it’s just how time works and it’s a part of the very nature of our world.  Our backgrounds and times are different, but we’re all part of the same plan.  

Again, all this can get confusing, as the song even ends with a line about that, and arguably there’s little transition from topic to topic.  When all is said and done though, it’s surprising that the song is as substantial as it is.  When teaching a complex subject, beneficial facts, funny concepts, and endearing reassurance to the differences of people in the world are hard not to notice.  That’s just one of many things to love about this show’s use of music and songs.
A
Cartoon Ranking
1.      This Pun for Hire
2.      Wakko’s 2-Note Song
3.      Go Fish
4.      From Burbank with Love
5.      A Very, Very, Very, Very Special Show
6.      Valuable Lesson
7.      The Sound of Warners
8.      Night of the Living Buttons
9.      Dot’s Entertainment
10.  Boo Happens
11.  Buttons in Ows
12.  Cutie and the Beast
13.  Star Truck
14.  Boids on the Hood
15.  Our Final Space Cartoon We Promise
16.  Yabba Dabba Boo
17.  The Party
18.  The Girl with the Googily Goop
19.  Jokahontas
20.  Gimme the Works
21.  My Mother the Squirrel
22.  One Flew Over the Cuckoo Clock
23.  Soda Jerk
24.  Hercules Unwound
25.  Belly Button Blues
26.  Oh Say Can You See
27.  Soccer Coach Slappy
28.  Anchors A-Warners
Song Ranking
1.      The Ballad of Magellan
2.      Hello Nurse
3.      Noel
4.      The Big Wrap Party Tonight
5.      When You’re Traveling from Nantucket
6.      Panama Canal
7.      Multiplication
Miscellaneous Ranking
1.      Gunga Dot
2.      Mighty Wakko at the Bat
3.      End Credits
4.      Rugrats Parody
5.      The 12 Days of Christmas

6.      The Return of the Great Wakkorotti
Be sure to stay tuned for a review of the next episode with the Warners interacting with Earnest Hemmingway, the Hip Hippos on a game show, Pinky and Ralph the guard getting a spinoff, and a whole lot of Flavio commercials.
If you would like to check out other Animaniacs reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.

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