Whoops! I'm a Cowboy

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.

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

'Whoops! I'm a Cowboy' has some amusing moments, is paced securely and a few parts are cute. The voice work is good enough.

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 here.

Apart from the odd mildly amusing moment, 'Whoops! I'm a Cowboy' is not a particularly funny cartoon, nor is it an entirely imaginative or informative one. Wiffle Piffle is not as compelling a character as Betty and the cartoon ends on somewhat of an abrupt note.

In conclusion, average Betty Boop. 5/10 Bethany Cox

"Whoops! I'm a Cowboy" is more of a short animation on dreaming clerk Wiffle Piffle than a story focuses on Betty Boop. In it, Wiffle wants to marry Betty but she turns him down, with a song quoting that she prefers cowboys. Wiffle decides to become a cowboy, shopping cowboy's boots and accessories and training to be exactly like one, reading a guide with unusual instructions that led him to comical and amusing situations such as bronco-busting, a sharp shooting where he fires a gun on everything except in the target and others.

It is a charming animation, has its qualities but doesn't have an ending. After all the mess Wiffle's been through he ends up quitting the cowboy business, hitchhikes with a Indian and his son, and the film ends without him trying to talk to Betty again. It's just a tease, very very short but it's nice to watch and has great qualities. 6/10

When this short begins, a very wimpy man, Wiffle Piffle, asks Betty to marry him. Considering they've never dated, this is a bit odd--as is Beety's response--that she wants to marry a cowboy. So, Mr. Wiffle Piffle travels west to a dude ranch where he can learn to be a man. Instead, pretty much everything he does, he does wrong. Unfortunately, there really isn't a whole lot more plot to it than this and most of the gags just weren't that funny.

The one saving grace with this film and any Betty Boop film is the terrific animation. As usual, the Fleischers did a lovely job animation- wife--but without any significant plot, it really isn't much of a cartoon.