Thanksgiving Special Showcase: Popeye in Pilgrim Popeye

In this amusing special, the famous sailor has adopted a pet turkey, which his nephews, unfortunately, want to have for Thanksgiving dinner!(GLEEP! :-O) Hoping to convince the kids to spare his feathered friend's life, Popeye tells them the tale of how a turkey saved his life one Thanksgiving day. Please enjoy!

Classic Cartoon Showcase: Popeye in Puttin' on the Act

In this humorous classic, Olive shows Popeye a newspaper headline declaring that vaudeville is coming back, upon which they decide to rekindle their(somewhat ridiculous) vaudeville act...but how will they fare with it? Please enjoy! (Watch for a couple of cute moments where Swee' Pea switches the cue card, and an amusing moment where Popeye impersonates such comics of the time as Jimmy Durante, Stan Laurel, and Groucho Marx.)

Little did we know that Popeye and Olive had an old vaudeville act, incidentally.

Classic Cartoon Showcase: Popeye in Shakespearian Spinach

In this humorous classic, Popeye and Olive have the lead roles in a production of Romeo and Juliet...but Bluto may have his own idea of who should play Romeo! Please enjoy!

Classic Cartoon Showcase: Popeye in We're on Our Way to Rio

In this nifty little classic, Popeye and Bluto take a vacation to Rio, where they both end up falling for samba dancer Olive. Hoping to ruin Popeye's chances with her, Bluto tells Olive that Popeye is a champion samba dancer.Can Popeye make good his dancing skills in time to stop Bluto? Please enjoy!(Fun Fact: This was the last Popeye cartoon made by Fleischer Studios.)

 

Say, Popeye and Olive are pretty good. Wouldn't they be great on Dancing With the Stars?(Honestly, they'd sure have my vote! :-D)

Classic Cartoon Showcase:Popeye in Me Musical Nephews

(I've always loved the title of this one!) In this humorous classic, the famous sailor invites his nephews to sleep over at his house...and they end up keeping him awake all night by playing music! Please enjoy!

Regarding the bedtime story Popeye tells, as Full House's ever-quotable D.J. Tanner once said, "No monsters, no witches...but that story was still very scary!" :-D

Book Review:The Magic Finger by Roald Dahl

Another review of another classic by the great Roald Dahl.

This story is told from the perspective of a little girl whose neighbors, the Greggs(Mr. and Mrs. Gregg and their sons Philip and William*) are very avid hunters; every Saturday, they go into the woods seeking out various animals(mostly ducks and deer) for the pleasure of shooting them. Naturally, the little girl doesn't appreciate this, and she tries to tell the Greggs to stop, but they rudely give her the brush-off. Well, this turns out to be a very unwise move on their part, because something they don't realize about this particular little girl is that she has...a MAGIC FINGER!

All this little girl has to do is point her magic finger at someone, and fantastic things happen to them. Proof positive comes the next morning when the Greggs wake up to discover that they've shrunken down to duck size and grown wings!!

And, on top of this, a family of ducks end up growing to human size, gaining human arms, and taking up residence in the Greggs' house!

The Greggs have to adjust to life despite this...but will they ever learn their lesson?




My thoughts:This is a very cute, clever, well-written book; the illustrations by Tony Ross(who also illustrated, among other things, the Little Wolf book series) are excellent.** The story, interestingly enough, has two morals. The first, more obvious one is, as the ever-quotable Popeye once said, "Be kind to aminals", which is, in fact, a pretty good idea. :-D  The second, slightly more vague moral is presented by the little girl herself, in that she tends to zap people, in anger, with her magic finger, and ends up appalled by the end results, the implicit moral being, "It's best if people control their tempers, otherwise they never know what can of worms  they might open," which is also a pretty good idea.

My only beefs about this book are:

-It's kind of short, especially compared with Dahl's other books.

-We never do find out what the little girl's name is.

All things said, this is a good, high-quality, and very enjoyable Roald Dahl classic.


*On an interesting note, the sons' names could be abbreviated as, "Phil and Will"(or possibly "Phil and Bill), which sounds similar to the names of another certain famous pair of siblings.

**There's another version of this book with illustrations by Quentin Blake(who's illustrated most of Dahl's other books); the illustrations of which are also very good.

Buy it on Amazon!

Classic Cartoon Showcase:Popeye in King of the Mardi Gras

In this classic Popeye cartoon, Bluto and Popeye both have acts at the annual Mardi Gras carnival. Bluto, declaring himself "King of the Mardi Gras", brags about his many amazing skills; Popeye becomes highly annoyed at all this and challenges him to prove once and for all who's more worthy of the title of "King". When Olive Oyl lands herself in danger, it's up to one of them to rescue her. Who will save the day? Please enjoy! (Fun Fact:This cartoon was made in September, which definetly isn't Mardi Gras season.)