Landing Stripling

Is it possible for one of Gene Deitch's 13 T&J shorts to be so awful that it actually can be considered worse than the other 12? If so, "Landing Stripling" just might take the cake, with honorable mention going to "Switchin' Kitten." Where can I begin? The storyline is weak, assuming there is one at all. The bird is stupid looking and the sound effects, just like all the Gene Deitch shorts, are tinny and irritating.

These shorts can be seen on Boomerang, and when they play them, they usually play all 13 consecutively. When I see one, I know not to watch for a couple of days. After that, they play about 3 days worth of the Chuck Jones - Abe Levitow group, which are much better. Personally, I wish they'd scrap the Deitch shorts and show some of the Hanna-Barbera ones from the 70's; the ones with no titles where Tom & Jerry are usually friends. Thankfully, they do show plenty of the Hanna-Barbera classics from the 40's and 50's, which any T&J fan will tell you are the best of all.

While not the worst of the Tom and Jerry cartoons, Landing Stripling is in the bottom 5, at least to me. It is awful and just stomach-churning, and it does not work on any level.

The animation is appalling, not just in the backgrounds and colours which are all over the place but also in the character designs, the bird is not cute in fact he is annoying and ugly looking.

The music is creepy and really unsettling, and are further marred by some of the most horrendous sound effects I have ever heard that are also not placed very well at all.

The story is very weak too, so much so you have to pay close attention as to whether there is a story or not. And the cartoon just isn't funny, it is actually more sadistic than funny as almost all the sight gags are mean-spirited.

I disliked the characters. The less said about the bird the better, while both Tom and Jerry seem to be going through the motions.

Overall, a big mess and two thumbs way, way down! 1/10 Bethany Cox

Bad backgrounds,bad music, bad sound effects but at least it doesn't have the d*** abusing cat owner

High Steaks and Down and Outing until now were the only shorts that reached the edge of Cruel and unpleasant and unfortunately here they returned to the same plot but with another Character.

The new character is completely Forgettable, he is a simple French Woodpecker that horrendously draws and produces annoying and poorly synthesized sounds, just like Jerry they are complete Evils since they Torture Tom in an Unpretty (without saying disgusting).

The story, besides being simple, is too forgettable since it is only about Tom trying to catch Jerry and the Bird, but these 2 take revenge on him in horrible and unfunny ways.

The Animation is still Terrible, choppy movements and scenes, the designs are constantly deformed among many more problems, the Backgrounds are just as empty as in High Steaks and are Boringly colored, the colors are not very conspicuous as well as the design of the Backgrounds. Which are completely simple and bad.

The music is an improvement over Mouse Into Space but still just as bizarre and creepy as Down and Outing, Its Greek To Meow and Switchin Kitten, most of these shorts always have the same swing and have as always the same unpleasant and bizarre tone (in fact in Its Greek To Meow there was a part with a scene with a musical theme almost the same as one of this Short).

The Sound Effects are Awful as is the Voice acting, the effects (especially Tom's Screams and Horrendous Bird Sounds) are horribly bad and are a complete aural disgust, Tom's screams are already nauseating and too Cruel and Forced, although there are times when the acting is unintentionally funny but that doesn't take away from how lousy it is, the sounds are simple and too strange to listen to due to how inconsistent they are and how badly placed they are.

Tom's tortures range from throwing him into a cauldron full of burning water ending with Tom crying and leaving the place screaming and arriving with the lower part of his body literally burned, causing a Hose to explode and ending up injured and with his body tied to the hose for some reason and also the absurd ending where he gets hit by a plane and falls from a height just to put an Airmail sign on it before a surrendered Tom makes a Hand Sign.

As you must already realize, Landing Stripling is of a lousy quality with nauseating effects and animation, Horrible voice acting and boring Backgrounds and too empty to look at and be a complete Audiovisual disgust but you will wonder why I qualify it like that?, no I find it as bad as High Steaks or Sorry Safari but together with Down and Outing and Calypso Cat it falls into the Mediocre category, it shares the same mistakes as High Steaks and Down and Outing but it is not as badly done as High Steaks, the stages are not as meager as High Steaks and the cruelty is slightly less.

In itself, a mediocre short on a par with Down and Outing and Calypso Cat that isn't as bad as High Steaks and Sorry Safari but isn't Deitch's best, those would be Buddies Thicker Than Water, The Tom and Jerry Cartoon Kit and Carmen Get It, but those will already have their review apart, the animation and everything else is still devastating and lousy for its time and even worse today and this did not age well like Puss Gets The Boot, this aged just as badly as most short of this era because of how lousy they are.

For everything I said above Landing Stripling I rate it a 5.

Tom and Jerry are sleeping peacefully when a little yellow bird flies overhead making some really weird bleeping noises that attract the cat's attention. Realising that Tom will try and eat the bird, Jerry decides to lend the feathered fellow a hand.

Another Deitch cartoon, another new low for the Tom and Jerry series: this one is the absolute pits, with shockingly poor animation, terrible gags, and possibly the most horrible sidekick for Jerry ever (and this coming from one who doesn't like Nibbles or Quackers). The violence in this cartoon also seems more sadistic than usual, with Jerry and the badly drawn bird cooking up some nasty incidents for Tom, including giving him a bath in boiling water!

Oh well… only seven more Deitch episodes to go; surely they can't get any worse than this.