Release Date: November 19th, 1938
Series: Merrie Melodies
Director: Chuck Jones
Story: Tedd Pierce
Animation: Ken Harris
Musical Direction: Carl Stalling
Starring: Mel Blanc (Thomas Cat, Gangster Rat, Chef, Rats, Tommy screaming), Margaret Hill-Talbot (Tommy Cat), The Sportsman Quartet (Singing Mice)
At long last, after 5 years of working at the studio, 4 of them spent as a fully-fledged animator, Charles M. Jones graces the directors chair, holding that position for 24 consecutive years.
A common observation of Jones' early works is that they are incredibly Disney-esque, with whole, lush, meticulous animation and painterly, atmospheric backgrounds, their pacing and execution comparatively slower and softer than the reigning brash attitude of the other Warner cartoons. The establishing shot of a rainy night outside a cozy house swiftly asserts as such. Gorgeously vibrant in its coloring, illuminated windows turn dark as the unseen family turns in for the night, lights going out with appropriate string plucks from Carl Stalling.
With a light still on in the garage, the camera performs a shaky truck-in and dissolve, melting to the interior as a moody, forlorn saxophone score drowns out the ambience of the rain. Inside, we find one Thos. Cat: Night Watchman, indicated as such by a crate-turned-cat house.
Dissolve to father and son, little Tommy observing as his father sneezes into a handkerchief. Bottles of cold medicine and the cold compress on his head swiftly establish the context.
Thomas explains through nasally garbles that Tommy's in charge of watching the kitchen for the night. Bob McKimson's animation is undoubtedly a powerhouse in this cartoon--his solid, firm construction of the characters and meticulous acting, with subtle head tilts and hand gestures, certainly make a case for his role as the studio's head animator.
He was initially offered the vacant director's role after Frank Tashlin left the studio, but declined, offering it to Chuck instead. In any case, McKimson would eventually take over for Frank Tashlin; upon Tashlin's final departure in 1944, McKimson inherited the unit as a director. Here, McKimson's solid handle on such diligent acting bridges the connection to Jones' Disney-esque aspirations.
Having appointed Tommy as the temp, Thomas hands over his hat and badge, to which Tommy wears proudly (but not after pushing the oversized hat brim out of his eyes.)
Phil Monroe animates Tommy's dutiful--albeit overzealous--salute, knocking himself down to the ground in the process. Monroe would float around from unit to unit, animating for Friz Freleng and Bob Clampett, but remained a Jones mainstay and very close after he rejoined the Jones unit in 1946. Even in his work for Freleng and Clampett, his animation was certainly strong with Jones' sensibilities and softer, cuter looks.
According to Monroe, former Warner director Jack King taught him how to do effects animation, things like "how to do water, to make it look wet, rather than like a string of beads." That training weasels its way slightly into the animation here, full of impact lines, smears, and little trails. When Tommy salutes a second time, his hand causing his giant hat to spin around on his head a few times, there's a little impact mark from his hand hitting his head, along with the trails from the hat's rotation.
"Be very careful, sonny..." Tommy nods off his father's nasally warnings as he marches along to duty. Flyers in the background advertising a yowling contest and semi-monthly backyard jamboree (and ball!) are a nice detail and give their little crate/shack a lived in feel.
Tommy asserts his carefulness by walking directly into the open doorframe and flopping on the floor. Characters showing small acts of vulnerability such as those, falling over or getting stuck (very reminiscent of Norm Ferguson's Pluto cartoons), were a Jones trademark in the early days.
A frantic dash outside of the door with a grin reassure pops that Tommy is a-okay.
That is, until we hear an earsplitting crash off screen. Concealing the crash and leaving it purely up to the audience's interpretation is a creative and less meticulous move, not to mention a money saver.
A jump cut to Tommy sitting in a pile of broken glass jars and shards adds to the shock and suddenness of the crash rather than a mere cross dissolve. In any case, a shoving of a hat out of the eyes and a grin towards the camera render Tommy unscathed. He weasels himself free of the broken cabinet...
...only to find a jar stuck to his foot in a very Pluto-esque maneuver. Stalling's clip-clop start and stop music score is nice accompaniment for a relatively cloy and outdated (even by 1938) gag setup.
In any case, Jones doesn't make this a cartoon about a cat struggling to get a jar off of his foot for seven minutes. With a firm stomp, Tommy breaks the jar loose from his shoe and continues onward with his nightly duties.
Gorgeous lighting and coloring on the kitchen as Tommy furtively makes an entrance, animated by Jones mainstay Benny Washam. Washam (who also designed the original Bob's Big Boy in 1936) remained by Jones' side for 30 years, even heading off to M-G-M with Jones to animate for his Tom and Jerry cartoons. Chuck Jones described him as a sensitive and sublte animator, "kind and gentle as well as talented beyond belief."
Washam was only just starting out as an animator here, marking this as his only scene in the cartoon. Accompanied only by Stalling's string plucks to indicate footsteps, Tommy tiptoes through the dark kitchen, his flashlight replacing the light shone pouring in from the garage.
Bob McKimson takes the reigns in the close-up of Tommy walking, his footsteps full of weight and the features on his head wrapping perfectly around. The bit where he looks over his shoulders, a small burst of energy as he tinkers past some invisible force, is certainly a highlight. With the double exposure effect on the flashlight to make it glow, the inking and exposure on Tommy's scleras sometimes get misaligned. It's certainly not a nitpick so much as it is a fascinating reminder of the technology of the time--remember, these cameras were hand operated and cranked.
Transparent effects, such as the shadows on the floor or the glow of the flashlight, were achieved by shooting the scene twice. Shadows would be black opaque paint, lights white opaque paint, and they would be exposed twice at different percentages (say the first exposure is shot at 30% with the shadows--the film is then rewound and shot at 70% exposure without the shadow) to make a transparent or glowing effect. Blurriness could sometimes read as a side-effect, but certainly not anything major.
Suddenly, a click of the light switch puts Tommy's trek to an end.
Some nice smear animation from McKimson as the camera pans right with a deafening piano glissando.
Who else should be waiting for Tommy but a tough, lanky rat (proportions of the characters in relation to their environments irrelevant), the chain from the off-screen light still swinging as the rat remains static. McKimson's animation is very accurate and true to Chuck's layout drawings, while still refined enough to match McKimson's style. Lovely wrinkles on the baggy clothing, each wrinkle following a solid form.
Nonchalant waves of his fingers and slow chewing of a toothpick genuinely read as intimidating, as does Mel Blanc's gravelly growl of "Hey, bud. C'mere."
Margaret Talbot-Hill (not to be confused with Marjorie Tarlton, fellow Sniffles voice actress) makes her vocal debut as Tommy Cat. Hill would soon go on to voice Sniffles, Jones' first major character who frequented his late '30s and early '40s cartoons. One could easily see Berneice Hansell in the role as Tommy (or Sniffles), but Hill, who still remains squeaky and childlike, has a much more softspoken and earnest delivery in her characters, whereas Hansell at this time was primarily played for laughs.
Tommy addresses the rat's beckoning with "Who?"
"You!" Tommy cowers at the snarl from offscreen. McKimson's drawings are full of life and appeal as Tommy asks "Me?"
"Yeah!" Another take.
"Ohhh..."
For some peculiar reason, Tex Avery would use the same dialogue and cadence for a scene in his spot gag cartoon A Day at the Zoo. Jones and Avery were polar opposites in directing style at the time, and it's certainly interesting to see Avery borrow from Jones and not the other way around.
In any case, Tommy prepares to head over to the rat, lifting a leg and pausing...
...and turning the other way.
"C'MERE!" The jump cut and close-up of the rat's snarling face commands a strong sense of authority. Tommy agrees, for he hobbles over to the rat while clutching his oversized hat, making him appear much more vulnerable and naïve than he already is.
"Ye-ye-ye-yessir!" Hill's vocals again scratch that endearing, natural itch that may have come off as purposefully coy had Hansell been cast; the voice crack in Tommy's voice oozes with charm.
More nonchalant finger drumming as the rat asks if he's the night watchman. Tommy's hat slips into his face yet again, ruining any credibility and authority he could possibly carry.
"Yes--uh, uh..." McKimson's animation of Tommy physically fumbling with his words, putting his hands in front of his face, is wonderfully executed and realistic. "No sir! But my dad is, an' he's sick, an' I... I'm s'posed to--"
Enter a crocodile tears violin score from Stalling, the warbly, shrill strings representing the rat's feigned sympathy as he shakes and tuts his head. "Ain't 'dat a shame." Again, McKimson's animation is a powerhouse. The audience doesn't know what this rat stands for or does, but the animation and his mannerisms, as well as Blanc's excellent voice acting, already indicate that he's bad business. The rat hardly moving nor blinking reads as an intimidation tactic and works wonderfully--especially juxtaposed with all of the extraneous and nervous fidgeting from Tommy.
"Hey, fellas!" Great momentary close of the eyes as the rat leans against the wall, peering towards his off-screen herd. "Da watchman's sick."
A quick pan to the "fellas", a clad of identical rats who shake their heads in unison. Directors such as Frank Tashlin and Tex Avery have lately been inking characters in the back with lighter colors to convey depth--here, Jones doesn't do that. While it may read as more cluttered, that seems to be the point. Here, they appear like one solid army of rats, ready to gang up on Tommy (as opposed to "here are some rats, and some more rats behind them, and some more behind them.")
McKimson's animation doesn't suffer once for animating such a tight crowd. Their collective coos of "Now ain't that just too bad!" successfully read as mocking from both the animation and Blanc's deliveries, rather than one carrying the other. Having them all strike their poses in different directions while remaining so clear is hardly an easy feat.
Pan back to Tommy, peering past the corner to get a look. Excellent foreshortening and perspective on Tommy at a rather difficult angle, especially on the head. To have the construction so solid is one thing. To have it drawn in accurate perspective is another. To have both is amazing--it's understandable why McKimson animates this entire sequence for over a minute straight.
Of course, to halt the intimidation there would be futile. The rat places a finger on Tommy's badge, who stares at it apprehensively.
WHAP! A flick right in the face as the rat hardly breaks his expression. He plucks a button off of Tommy's overalls, rendering him even more defenseless as he hikes up his sagging pants. Flipping the button in his hand, the rat snakes off-screen, encouraging his "slugs" to eat.
Said slugs are happy to oblige, trampling Tommy in the process.
Effects animator A.C. Gamer handles the first scene of the rats tearing into the various food items in the kitchen. As Devon Baxter notes in his breakdown, it's odd to see Gamer credited to a piece of character animation and not effects--his designs for the mice are certainly simplistic and a little crude, but the motion and rhythm to the animation has a nice cadence to it. In a callback to cartoons of the past handful of years, such as Tex Avery's Ain't We Got Fun, the mice gorge themselves on food. Gamer here animates a line of mice devouring a block of cheese and then a watermelon, emerging from a deflated rind rotund and content.
Devon notes that the next piece of animation, credited as Keith on the animator's draft, could possibly be the work of Keith Darling, who was primarily an animator for Bob McKimson and occasionally Chuck Jones in the '50s. There's no way to say that this Keith is indeed Darling, who got his first animation credit in 1955, but there's no way to deny it, either. Devon notes at the possibility of this being a test scene, seeing that then in-betweener Lee Halpern, who was first credited for his animation in the '60s, appeared in the 1939 Termite Terrace gag reel. Perhaps Darling was a Warner mainstay like Halpern. Many unsolved mysteries continue to float around in the world of golden age animation.
Regardless, the next gag is split between Keith and Ken Harris, another Jones mainstay alongside Benny Washam, he too staying with Jones until his firing and later teaming back up at M-G-M in the mid-'60s. A rat peels a banana by using a wine cork to open it, but the force is so strong that he and the banana are sent flying backwards, animated by Harris.
Meanwhile, as the mouse tumbles off, the banana still airborne, we cut to another mouse preparing to indulge in a chicken leg. He prepares to gorge himself...
...and is met with a banana in the gullet instead with some sharp, signature early Harris timing. Short and round rat turns long and thin, a gag rooted in the sensibilities of the early rubber hose cartoons. With the cork still stuffed in the banana, now wedged in the mouse's mouth, the contemptuous yet blank side-eye he gives at the camera is an inkling of Jones' trademarks coming to life, with his love of held pauses and stagnant yet all-knowing reactions.
Back to A.C. Gamer, who animates a mouse eating a pretzel (and thusly turning pretzel shaped), while another rat swallows all of the olives in a jar, poking his head out to blink dubiously at the camera.
Again, even for 1938, the gags come off as very standard and regressive--even when Avery did the same gags in early1937 with Ain't We Got Fun, they felt out of date then. Stalling's plucky score of "The Latin Quarter" make it a bit more engaging, as well as the colorful and vibrant backgrounds (and props), but it does come off as relatively straightforward and obligatory.
A shift in tone as Tommy crawls onto the counters, animated once again by Phil Monroe as he politely asks the rats to end their feast. Passing an overlay of a rat eating some hanging grapes in the foreground, a group of mice sharing corn in the background, "I'm s'posed ta... per-TECT the place!"
His attempts to scold a rat frying a steak are in vain. The chef cuts off his wordless protests and pointing, unable to get the words out, as the rat snaps "Salt!" in the midst of his humming. Tommy absentmindedly hands him the salt.
Another wordless protest is immediately cut off by a request for pepper.
Tommy doesn't even attempt to argue the third time, reaching for a nearby plate as the rat gestures off screen. Again he obliges, tinkering past some rats feasting in a sack in the background.
Another Jones trademark as Tommy stares at the camera; a delayed reaction.
Tinkering back to the chef, he argues that he's supposed to be the night watchman, "Remember?"
He's quick to "GET GOIN'!" per the rat's request, leaving behind some more Monroe speed lines.
McKimson handles the leader of the rat pack once more. Excellent character animation on Tommy, who does an extra anxious skip when hobbling back into frame, just as he did when he was initially scouting out the kitchen. With a brazen, commanding saxophone accompaniment, Tommy serves the rat his dinner, standing with his arms at his sides.
"T'ank you, sonny..." A haphazard salute from the rat. Great timing as he holds his salute for a beat before socking Tommy right in the face, Treg Brown's smacking sound effects punching up the punch. With Tommy knocked offscreen, he picks up his chair, rotating it to face the "table" in another incredibly solid and kinetic piece of animation.
"Bring on da floor show!"
Pan to a rat stuffing a chocolate truffle in his mouth. He obliges with a wordless salute, picking up a pair of matchsticks as he turns to face a stack of tuna cans, chocolate still in his mouth.
Even more fantastic perspective animation from Ken Harris, the "drum sticks" grazing the foreground as the tuna can is turned into a drum. Rhythmic '30s drum pattern ensues, the rat swallowing his chocolate in the process with a grin. Such fantastic and realistic acting from Harris, who was also considered the studio's top animator after McKimson was promoted to director. To have both of these talents in your unit at the same time is a very special thing.
Harris also animates the entire song number sequence that follows, interspersed with A.C. Gamer's animation of Tommy asking them to keep quiet. The song number is decidedly '30s, not even counting the song stylings and harmonies (which are beautifully sung by The Sportsman Quartet.)
Though straightforward song numbers such as these were continuing to taper off, this particular number of "In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree" remains spirited and lighthearted, flourishes added with the shadows and lighting and Harris' synchronous animation. The smears of the rats fingers as they shake them are immediate signs of his work--much of Harris' animation work under Freleng and Tashlin was instantly recognizable by his smears.
Gamer's animation of Tommy politely asking the rats to be quiet fares better than his previous animation of the mice, especially when the show evolves into a brassy instrumental portion, with Tommy growing a little more and more insistent as the number progresses.
And, again, Harris' animation of the mice playing the instruments (pipes, cigarette holders, funnels, etc.) is very solid and looks great in the trios of all the mice. Animating 10 characters in a shot playing 10 instruments and wearing 10 different color combinations certainly wasn't easy nor cheap, even if the motion was mirrored.
The song number closes out with a mouse running in mid-air after his percussive solo, having hit all of the bottles and pans on the shelf. No music, only a suspenseful drumroll as he stumbles through the air.
A hanging lamp provides sanctuary. Jones flaunts more of his special effects by subtly dimming the lights in the background, so that when the rat clings to the chain, inadvertently turning the light on, it makes a noticeable difference, if only for that scene alone.
"QUIET!!!"
A.C. Gamer's animation of Tommy reaching his breaking point, screaming in a distinctive adult Mel Blanc yell, is nicely exaggerated for the time, his fur standing straight on end. Even better is the face he makes when he slaps his hand over his face, skin folds plentiful as they bulge out between his fingers.
Jones gets artsy with the rats turning to glower at a guilty Tommy. One by one, heads turn in time to the commanding music, showing the mice at various angles. On top of the fridge. At their table. By a teapot. One by one, the heads turn, the cuts growing faster and faster as the music progresses.
The zenith of the scene is met with blank color card backgrounds to match the rats turning their heads, with double exposed overlays of the rats on top. Though Jones never got terribly surrealistic or artsy in his '30s films--that comes later--this is certainly a forerunner of the stylistic indulgences he'd tend to later on in his career. It's certainly different, if nothing else.
Our lead rat is the last to shoot a glower at Tommy. Back to Bob McKimson's solid animation, the camera zooms out to reveal his full body as he marches across the kitchen, the weight in the animation as commanding as the musical accompaniment. So far, he's hardly shown any emotion. Joy and annoyance are both conveyed with half-lidded eyes and a sneer. As such, having him touting a real, true scowl makes him seem much more threatening than he already is. Stalling accentuates that with a loud, discordant orchestration, accompanying every heavy footstep as the rat approaches Tommy.
"So!" Tommy begins to sink into himself, not moving from his clamped down pose. "A heckler, heh?"
Hardly a beat is spared as the rat socks Tommy once more, a tremendous smacking sound amplifying his injury as he tumbles backwards. Note the drybrush trails on the rat's hit--drybrush would soon replace opaque speed or impact lines to convey motion, a popular method in the '40s cartoons. To find it pop up in a '30s cartoon is relatively rare. It blurs the motion just a bit more and makes it feel less artificial, less comic like.
To apply more pathos to the down-n-out pussycat (tears and sniveling aside), Tommy's bowtie has now come undone in the process of his beatdown. With his sagging pants and askew bowtie, he hits all of the earmarks for the cute underdog that Jones was so fond of.
In the midst of Tommy's tearful promises that he'll tell his big brother on the rats, a double-exposed Tommy--his conscience--follows behind with a glower. McKimson is, again, the perfect person to handle such a sequence. Solid construction and intricate, gentle acting is what such a scene requires. Had a lesser animator been in charge, it could come off as incredibly cloying.
"So!" Tommy's conscience marches in front of him. Fantastic contrast on the bold, dynamic poses on his conscience juxtaposed with Tommy's own sad, unconfident demeanor. "Aren't you ashamed of yourself!"
Wonderful gestures as Tommy's conscience reminds him that his dad trusted him the job--gentle hand sweeps, head shakes and gesticulations. Slowly, Tommy grows more confident, puffing his chest out. "You're not gonna let him down, are you?"
His furious, childish headshakes are great.
"Are you a cat or are you a mouse?" Both Tommy and his conscience bear impassioned scowls.
"I'm a cat!" Tommy's conscience seems pleased at the rebuttal, marked with a gentle head tilt, smile and raising of the hands.
Nice flick of the hat brim out of his face as Tommy's conscience orders "Well, alright then! Get back in there and act like one!" Marjorie Talbot-Hill's genuine, childlike deliveries paired with McKimson's expert animation make for a wonderful scene. Both Tommy and his conscience are visually engaging to look at--almost to the point that it becomes a distraction, trying to figure out who to pay attention to.
From one solid animator to another, Ken Harris animates Tommy's comeuppance. Marching to a childlike yet determined fife score of "Yankee Doodle", Tommy approaches the leader of the gang with his firsts at the ready. Just as soon as the rat prepares to take a swing, Tommy winds up and heads in for the smack.
Harris' style is instantly recognizable by the smears and his snappy timing. The blow works--with a smack, the rat is sent spinning around himself, a blur of gray, tan and red as Tommy observes with a scowl.
As soon as the rat's spinning comes to a close, Tommy winds up and socks him again, prompting him to spin in the opposite direction.
SMACK! Tommy smacks the rat straight out of his overalls. With Tommy animated on twos and the rat on ones, the motion has a nice, natural rhythm and disparity in it, stressing the rat's elasticity as he's sent rocketing off screen. His shoes and legs, despite not having anything in them, try and fail to stay on the ground, slowly zipping out of shot with an electric guitar twang.
Mission accomplished. Tommy moves onto his next victim with the same fife score and same determined pose. More incredibly elastic and smooth animation as the rat's neck extends, his head smacking against the kitchen shelf before being sent flying off-screen. Harris' elastic animation is enough to read as convincing and painful, but playfully so--McKimson's solid, realistic animation in this case may have come off as a little too realistic and unpleasant. Harris' timing is snappy and loose enough to make the impacts of the punches still wholly felt, but in one that is exhilarating rather than uncomfortable.
All of Tommy's beatings are executed in one long pan, which make his determination and courage even more solid. Frequent cuts and dissolves inadvertently indicate a lack of confidence through a lack of cohesion. Here, the action flows together smoothly with very little breaks or cuts, making for a much stronger and determined presentation. That strength and determination is duly noted as Tommy smacks a line of mice, the punches growing quicker and quicker with the music speeding up and growing brasher. Excellent timing, excellent animation, and excellent feel.
Our next shot is attributed to Rod Scribner. Scribner would animate on a few of Jones' cartoons--he floated around in the Hardaway and Dalton units before heading over to Tex Avery's unit. He would later be picked up by Bob Clampett after Tex's departure, where much of his most notorious animation thrives.
Here, he animates his lone piece of the picture, with Tommy threatening the rats through his general demeanor. Musical timing takes the forefront as a backing track is absent, the only music provided through Tommy and the rat's footsteps. A step forward from Tommy, a step back from the rats.
Two steps forward. Two steps back.
Three and three, the brass chord accompaniments a brassy staccato.
A drumroll as both groups halt...
"Boo!"
The herd disappears in a cloud of dust, the camera panning right to reveal that they've all scurried back into their hole. Tommy has achieved his duties as the night watchman.
With that, Bob McKimson closes out the cartoon, with a very satisfied Tommy bobbing his head as he dusts himself off.
Tommy stopping in his tracks is marked by a brazen trombone slide. More excellent posing from McKimson...
His childlike motif of "Yankee Doodle" returns in all of its xylophone fervor as Tommy charges once more, tending to some unfinished business. Speed lines are plentiful as he zooms right past a nearby plunger.
Rather than having Tommy stop, jog back on-screen, grab the plunger, and dash offscreen again, Jones allows most of the action to unfold offscreen so as not to disturb the momentum of the screen. Brake squealing sound effects clue the audience that Tommy has halted, and all we see is a hand as he reaches in and plucks the plunger offscreen, smears a-plenty.
With that, the camera catches back up to Tommy, now charging with the plunger in hand.
Skidding to a halt, Tommy slams the plunger right over the opening of the mousehole and works his magic. Astoundingly solid and tactile drawings from McKimson on the plunger. Again, something that could potentially be seen as trite or cloying is elevated by such masterful draftsmanship.
His target is a sniveling, whimpering leader rat, garbling incomprehensible whines. With his knees together and his shoulders hunched, McKimson effectively renders the rat useless and craven. Tommy points to the button on his overalls.
SLAP! Tommy's toothy, twisted grin of delight is priceless as he avenges his earlier abuse.
His overall button is thusly confiscated too.
Cue the most humiliating punishment a cartoon rat can bear. Tommy grins as he flips the button like a coin, observing as the rat desperately tries to preserve his modesty. Iris out on some wonderful drawings of the rat as he tries to cover himself up, his hat plunking back on his head after a wild take. All is fair in love and war.
While it may not seem like it at first glance to those more accustomed to Jones' later style, The Night Watchman is definitely a Chuck Jones cartoon in that it possesses both his strong and weak points. Overwhelmingly, the cartoon is more strong than weak; Bob McKimson and Ken Harris are the unsung heroes of the cartoon, especially McKimson. As mentioned previously, many of the scenes, had they not been tackled by such a stellar and visually engaging draftsman, could teeter dangerously on trite and cloying territory. Harris' own snappy, elastic timing and momentum brings many much needed bursts and snaps of energy to the table. That, paired with directorial quirks such as the double-exposed cuts of the mice turning their heads, make for a unique and enjoyable product.
On the other hand, Watchman does suffer a bit from the saccharinity that would put Jones in a chokehold for the next few years. Particularly in the beginning or during the entire "Latin Quarter" feasting sequence, the cartoon dates itself with gags that are retroactive and would have been amusing about 3 years earlier. Tommy's foot getting stuck in the jar seems straight out of a Pluto cartoon (but hardly lasts long enough to really get nitpicky), and the mice gorging themselves is uninspired and dated, feeling more akin to a '36 Freleng cartoon or synonymous to Tex Avery's Ain't We Got Fun. The first scene with Tommy's father, appealing as it is visually, feels particularly slow and bloated.
Regardless, Watchman is a fine debut for Jones and comparatively stronger than some other cartoons he would soon put out. Appealing character designs and animation make for a visual treat, as well as the vibrant, lush hues in the background. Marjorie Hill-Talbot oozes with charm, and Mel Blanc--being Mel Blanc--continues to work his magic. Even if Watchman weren't up to the standard that it is, it would still be worth viewing just to see where Jones began, which is exactly my case for any and all recommendation. To see where it all began and knowing what the future holds makes for a very humbling watching experience.
Enjoy! It's also available on HBO Max.
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