One Meat Brawl

It's Groundhog Day and Grover Groundhog is preparing in his home for his big appearance in front of the cameras. However when he emerges he is turned on by hunters due to the meat shortage. Porky Pig and his hound dog go out to hunt the groundhog down and cook him up. However the groundhog proves to be a more difficult (and manipulative) prey that they first thought.

A little slow to start, this cartoon soon becomes a little like the usual Bugs/Elmer cartoons but with the groundhog playing Bugs and Porky playing Elmer's character. Keeping the same sense of humour (e.g. the groundhog outsmarting the hunters) the cartoon works out pretty good and is quite funny at turns.

Porky is an OK character and the groundhog is a good despite being a little too cute for it's own good. The downside of this is that I couldn't help but compare him to Bugs, a comparison that will leave even a strong character standing in the shadows. Of the three, the dog is pretty good and he covers for the weaknesses in Porky.

Overall this is a good little short that takes the usual Bugs jokes and puts them onto new characters. Despite a little bit of a faltering start with the groundhog singing the short is a mix of witty game playing.

While most Warner Bros. cartoons featured animals, I assume that Robert McKimson's "One Meat Brawl" marked the only appearance by a groundhog. In this case, Grover Groundhog has to leave his den to see whether or not he has a shadow, and the hunters are waiting for him, sending him into hiding. Meanwhile, Porky Pig and his dog Mandrake (Barnyard Dawg from the Foghorn Leghorn cartoons) are hunting groundhogs, but Grover knows how to get Mandrake on his side. Are hunts always doomed to go like this?! I guess that we could be cynical and say that this cartoon is no different from the average Bugs Bunny-Elmer Fudd cartoon, but I think that as long as cartoons make us laugh, they're good. I recommend this one. After all, who doesn't like hand shadows?