Taking the Blame

As has been said in my previous later Betty Boop cartoons reviews, a good deal of the pre-Production Code Betty Boop cartoons are daring and creative, with content that makes one amazed at what's gotten away with. While the later Betty Boop cartoons made after the Code was enforced are still watchable and exceptionally well-made, they are so toned down that they feel bland.

Fleischer were responsible for some brilliant cartoons, some of them still among my favourites. Their visual style was often stunning and some of the most imaginative and ahead of its time in animation. The character of Betty Boop, one of their most famous and prolific characters, may not be for all tastes and sadly not as popular now, but her sex appeal was quite daring for the time and to me there is an adorable sensual charm about her. The good news is that she has not lost her charm, she is still cute and her comic timing is good.

Less good is that, thanks to the production code her sensuality is heavily muted, and it was like she had lost a large part of what made her such a unique character back then and what made her popular. Here, she is a more moralistic character, but does it very well admittedly.

The animation is still very good, as ever being rich in detail and beautifully drawn. The music is infectious and beautifully and cleverly orchestrated, putting one in a good mood and enhances the action wonderfully.

Pudgy is adorable and the cat is a good antagonist, though one can't help missing Bimbo and Koko. The voice acting is good.

However, if anybody enjoyed the pre-code Betty Boop cartoons for being wonderfully surreal and for its daring risqué content that was ahead of the time back in the 30s and wouldn't be seen a lot now in cartoons, they will be disappointed here. Both are missing which gives a rather tame and bland feel.

There is very little creative or funny in 'Taking the Blame', and there is a sense that the cartoon was trying too hard to be cute, an approach that was the complete anti-thesis of Betty Boop and her cartoons pre-Production Code.

In summary, okay cartoon but considering how good a good deal of Betty Boop cartoons okay is not enough. 6/10 Bethany Cox

I don't think any cartoon makers liked cats. Even though almost every studio turned out a version of the Three Little Kittens Who Lost Their Mittens, the prevalence of cartoon mice from long before Disney came up with Mickey meant that cats were the enemy. Add in the occasional dog in cartoons and it meant that cartoons took on an ailurophobic air that extended to newspaper cartoons. Surely not even Jim Davis likes Garfield.

So this cartoon about how Betty Boop brings home an enormous black cat who terrorizes Pudgy is fairly standard. Of course, Pudgy takes all the blame until Betty chains him outside and the cat opens the ice box to steal a turkey is a natural. Too bad that Betty had been destroyed by the Production Code. The Fleischers could no longer do anything interesting with her, so they saddled her with cute sidekicks like Pudgy and Grampy. Unfortunately the Fleischers didn't do cute so well. They did funny, and this one isn't because everyone is trying to be cute.

This has been done so many times before. Betty loves her little dog, Pudgy. He adores her. One day she comes home with a basket. In it is a black cat. She welcomes it into her home and lectures the dog on how they are to get along. Well, the cat, which is about five times the size of the dog, immediately asserts its authority. It breaks things and the gets conveniently out of the way so the little dog gets blamed. We are wanting so badly for her to find out. Not a whole lot new here. The animation is excellent.