The more that is seen of the "Beary Family" cartoons, where a few are decent (especially the first two cartoons directed by Jack Hannah) but even more of them are horrible, the more my initial statement of saying in my reviews for the first two cartoons that they weren't bad for the Lantz studio's final series (based on memory admittedly) becomes less true.
'Window Pains' is down there as among the series' worst to me. It is not quite as bad as 'Charlie's Mother-in-Law', but like the worst "Beary Family" cartoons it is indicative of when the studio and Paul J. Smith were at their worst the cartoons were very weak at best, coming from a big lifelong animation fan who tries to be quite lenient when watching and reviewing it. Even the weakest Chilly Willy and Woody Woodpecker cartoons were as bad as the worst cartoons from this series, and some of the later Woody Woodpecker cartoons in particular were not good.
Saving graces are only a couple but they are there. One is the music, which is energetic and lushly orchestrated, succeeding in single-handedly giving the little energy the cartoon has. The other is Paul Frees' voice work, much more subtle here and he shows his ability to create a likable character with good comic timing, despite his lacking material and less than inspired situations there's something about Charlie that makes him easy to like and relate to when the series makes an effort to.
However, the animation is not good. Time and budget constraints shows in a lot of the animation, which is very rushed looking in the drawing and detail wise it's on the simplistic and careless side with colours that lack vibrancy and a fair share of goofs. The story is not much of one at all and what there is is sloppily timed and without anything surprising or imaginative, predictability is non-stop and the cartoon's use of the pool is overused and annoyingly heavy in repetition. None of the rest of the characters engage.
Again 'Window Pains' is not funny, unlike the first two cartoons in the series directed by Jack Hannah and the series' other watchable efforts. There are a lot of gags, but here they are far too noisy, clumsily and lazily timed and chaotic, irritating for the sake of it, and are memorable for their lack of taste than their wit. Hannah's efforts had none of those faults when it came to the humour. Charlie's dialogue has been funnier elsewhere.
On the whole, pretty painful. 2/10 Bethany Cox
