I posted the funniest of the Goofy “How to” ripoffs featuring Terrytoons’ Dimwit, How to Relax, ages ago, so here is the third and final of them: Daddy’s Little Darling. (Obviously a riff of those George Geef ‘father and son’ pictures by Jack Kinney.)
This short joins the immortal Cat Happy as one that also features an incredibly insanely animated sneeze by Jim Tyer. (I’m sure Tyer used some footage of somebody snorting cocaine as reference for this scene.)
Man, Dimwit’s son is on freaky-looking little dude. He looks kind of like a Carl Barks supporting character, only more disturbing.
Back in the day they used to show Terrytoons every morning before I left for school.I’ve seen this one many times and it’s one of my favorites.
This cartoon was actually ahead of its time. The thought of a father actually taking care of a baby must have seemed a little foreign (and therefore ripe with comic possibilities)
This is a good case of plagiarism taking the original concept into areas that were definitely “off Limits” to a character like Disney’s Goofy. You couldn’t end a cartoon with Goofy flipping out and going on a stork-killing spree. Thank-you Terrytoons.
This is also one of Gene Deitch’s “transition cartoons”, where we still have the relatively old-style Terrytoons character animation and Tyer’s 1947-57 work mixed in with the very non-Terrytoons backgrounds. Which makes it less hidebound and backwards-looking than the previous studio shorts, but at the same time not as static and talky as the cartoons Deitch would start putting out a short time later.
Also, it’s nice to know the CBS-era Mighty Mouse apparently works as physician’s aide in the maternity ward of a big-city hospital when he’s not fighting crime or selling Colgate toothpaste.
Some great Tyer animation, as usual. The ending is pretty messed up. Shooting at his would be children. So that’s two Dimwit cartoons that end with him shooting as someone. Nice!