Who Killed Who?

This was brilliant animated short filled with classic Tex Avery jokes. The story has a detective investigating a murder in an old house. But the detective finds everything from ghosts to Santa Clause in the house. This was pure genius and exactly what I expected from Tex Avery.

This is the fifth winning card of Tex Avery's first streak at the MGM. "Who Killed Who", a clever (and hilarious) whodunit (but who cares as long as it's funny) centering on a mysterious murder. It's not the first Avery cartoon to deal with death, so it doesn't even come as a shocker.

The film sets the tone immediately, after a dark and ominous intro showing a pistol gun, a live-action narrator (somewhat a precursor Hitchcock in his TV series?) announces in a very serious and no-nonsense tone that the case is meant to prove "beyond a shadow of a doubt that crime doesn't pay" then the story begins... the actor is played by Robert Emmet O'Connor and if the sight of live action is incongruous by Avery's standards, it's only the tip of an iceberg.

As I mention in my previous analyses, the first years at MGM allowed him to establish his personal brand of humor, that elevated parody to the highest levels of hilarity. He used madness, violence and sex in most of his first cartoons, but the notability of his talent also relied on his continuous fourth-wall breaking. But it's not until "Who Killed Who" that he really outdid himself on that level, literally pulverizing the wall.

It starts with the narrator addressing the audience but it goes further. The film opens on a dark and gloomy house, where you can hear female screams and devilish laughs in the background, they're so overplayed they're ridiculously funny. And then after a long silence, a sign says "gloomy, isn't it?", rather predictable but it's immediately followed by the back of a chair where the word "The Victim" is written. So much for the suspense. It is even spoiled for the primal concerned, the victim reads "Who Killed Who" (from the cartoon of the same name) and realizes he's going to be killed and then..

... well, forget it, if I'm going to reveal the whole crime, I better stop here. Let's say this is perhaps one of the Tex Avery shorts with the highest average of laughs per twenty seconds (which is saying a lot), it's one gag after another, and it never really stops until the final twist on the murder that I won't dare to spoil, but there's one little gag I will spoil, and pardon me if I do. it's just a darling of Tex Avery and it deserves a mention.

When the crime is committed and the policeman comes (he's voiced by Billy Bletcher who did the Big Bad wolf and Pete in Disney studios) he orders everybody to stay still, but then you see the shadow of a man, visibly a theater spectator trying to reach his seat. The policeman hits him on the head and the poor guy falls. That's classic Avery and it says a lot about his genius, why he was above them all. He thought in three dimension, he had the story and the characters, the audience and himself in the God-like position.

Basically, the policeman hitting the spectator, is like Avery deciding that there's no frontier between the characters and the viewers, and various gags in the film are all meant as nods to the audience, some come from the characters, some from Avery himself. When the policeman takes off a painting, he reads a sign" What did you expect to see back here?", the film is just a hilarious succession of situation involving the three parties. He used these gags a lot in his Warner Bros period, "Who Killed Who" might be the only one to do so and by that, he's one of the most memorable, the closest to this gag might be the hair pulled out in "Magical Maestro".

This is certainly the cartoon with the greatest symbiosis between the world of animation and live action, proving that everything is possible when it comes to make people laugh, it's certainly one of his best... and ironically, one of his least known. I couldn't tell why. Maybe it has a sophistication and wit that put it off the radar, but it's one of these underrated Avery masterpieces (like "What's Buzzin' Buzzard?") that deserves more publicity.

Here's one of Tex Avery's masterpieces for MGM. He starts out by burlesquing Metro's CRIME DOES NOT PAY series openers, then continues with every Old Dark House cliche, complete with organ music and his habit of breaking through the screen, both to comment on the goings on, and to make sure no one leaves the scene of the crime, even an audience member headed to other places.

With both Heck Allen and Rich Hogan providing gags, how could it not be a classic? Although the risque jokes are rarer here, Avery makes it clear that these are not cartoons meant for the well-behaved children that bedeviled the early years of the Production Code. I sometimes wonder how he got away with them, but probably the Hays Office didn't think cartoons were worth keeping an eye on.

This is an animated recreation of a crime. It happened in a dark and stormy night. An old dog gets murdered and the bulldog detective arrives to investigate.

This is a spoof of a whodunnit murder mystery. It does everything with a nudge and a wink. It's a Tex Avery MGM cartoon. When the ghost shows up, I was hoping for a Scooby Doo ending. The only issue with that is I don't know the guy at the reveal. If only they could get Red Skelton, he could reconnect with that other joke. This short is stuffed with one joke after another. Most of them are pretty good. I don't know this detective character. I imagine Droopy would be more perfect in the role.

Love animation, it was a big part of my life as a child, particularly Disney, Looney Tunes and Tom and Jerry, and still love it whether it's film, television or cartoons.

Also have much admiration for Tex Avery, an animation genius whose best cartoons are animated masterpieces and some of the best he ever did. Tex Avery's 'Who Killed Who' may sound like another one of the many murder mystery in a creepy house endeavours in animation or in film in general, but manages to be much more than that. It has all the murder mystery tropes, the creepy setting, the horror feel, the suspense, the mystery, the suspicious-inducing suspects, but explores it in a way that's imaginative and hilarious at the same time.

Not many cartoon cartoons manage to be hilarious, creepy and imaginative, 'Who Killed Who' does and is one of the greatest ever examples. To me, it's one of Avery's greatest too, though he was a master director who was responsible for so many very good to classic cartoons and even his weaker efforts would induce the envy of any animation directors at their worst.

All the characters are entertaining and induce the right amount of suspicion. The voice acting is in true bravura-style particularly from Billy Bletcher. The narration sets up the ominous tone to perfection, and the live action is blended ingeniously, the two being blended several times in film/cartoon history to variable effect. For every 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit?' there's also the likes of 'Rock a Doodle'.

Avery does a wonderful job directing, with his unique, unlike-any-other visual and characteristic and incredibly distinctive wacky humour style all over it as can be expected.

On top of the creepy tone and murder mystery story, there are still the classic Avery jokes and sight gags with witty dialogue and the characteristic wildness. Everything is timed immaculately and the ending is a knockout.

It is no surprise either that the animation is superb, being rich in colour and detail. The character designs are unique, Avery always did have creative character designs, and suitably fluid. The music, courtesy of Scott Bradley, is lushly and cleverly orchestrated, with lively and energetic rhythms and fits very well indeed.

Altogether, an animated who-dunnit that is an example to all. 10/10 Bethany Cox