Slap Happy Lion

The old circus lion is a mess. He's scared of a mouse. The mouse recounts how he used to be the king of the jungle until the day he met a fearless mouse.

This is a Tex Avery MGM cartoon. It's billed as a Tom and Jerry Cartoon although I don't think the mouse is supposed to be Jerry. Maybe it's a deconstruction of the Tom and Jerry cartoon. I would change the mouse narrator in the circus into another circus animal. It makes no sense that a mouse is scared of another mouse. You know what. It should Tom the cat and the mouse should be Jerry. There you go.

This cartoon is a prime example of Tex Avery's brilliance and how producer Fred Quimby could pick'em. Slap Happy Lion show's us how too much confidence can run short to the unlikeliest of foes. Avery delivers gag after gag with the goofiest lion flexing his king of the jungle muscles with roaring laughter. This is truly one of the reasons why I've always been a fan of vintage cartoons from the MGM studios in a time when shorts such as these were seen only at the theater. A true hidden treasure of the Avery archives...8 out of 10.

Slap Happy Lion can also be found appropriately as a special feature on the classic Thin Man series finale "Song of the Thin Man" on DVD.

Just watched this Tex Avery cartoon on YouTube in which we see a lion in a wheelchair seeming a little docile. When he and the one pushing him pass a mouse, that mouse tells his story in flashback of when that lion used to roar real loud in the jungle and scare every animal. Then this same mouse came along...Boy, the way Avery milks all those scare gags, one after another, with constant visual expressions that go in places that made him one of the wildest of the animators during the wildest of cartoon decades: the '40s. Describing it truly won't do it justice, you just have to watch this thing like you would any Tex Avery of this period. So on that note, I highly recommend Slap Happy Lion.

A mouse tells the tale of how he drove a lion insane with terror in this Tex Avery cartoon.

It's a fine cartoon, and had anyone but Avery directed this, it would have been a classic. Avery's MGM cartoons, however, were so continually brilliant, that they have to be considered by the standards of his work, and so this one is just standard brilliant. It's one comic cartoon bit after another, in seemingly endless parade, until he's filled up the time limit, and it ends quickly. That's a standard feature of Avery's cartoons: it's series of gags linked by a situation, less than the story-telling techniques that almost every other cartoon maker used. True, there is a story of sorts, but that disappears under the constant barrage of jokes, leaving the capping joke at the end fairly weak.

Still, even standard Avery is among the best. If you don't know this one, it's tremendous fun.

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. 'Slap Happy Lion' is another example of an animated masterpiece and one of his all time best. Like the best of Tex Avery, 'Slap Happy Lion' is a cartoon of amazing quality, is very creative and hilarious as one would expect from Avery on top form like he is here. Even when he wasn't at his best, he still delivered, have yet to see a "bad" effort from him.

The lion (the king of the jungle) is a very funny and well established and the conflict with the mouse, cute but with a strong personality, is very strong.

The voice work as to be expected is marvellous.

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.

Once again there is nothing sadistic or repetitious, instead it's imaginative, wonderfully wild and hilarious throughout from start to finish. The sight gags throughout are an absolute joy and are immaculate in timing.

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.

Summing up, another Avery masterpiece. 10/10 Bethany Cox