Watch Bosko the Doughboy For Free

Redundant and unnecessary.

Powerful

Overrated

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

. . . over how a major American movie studio such as Warner Bros. could have released an animated short in such poor taste as BOSKO THE DOUGHBOY. The 21st Century audience of Today no doubt would reach a solid consensus that DOUGHBOY is Racist (the final "Mammy" Al Jolson-style Blackface "joke"), Misogynistic (when Bosko's gal gets beheaded by a mortar shell), Simplistic (DOUGHBOY's answer to guns is always MORE guns), and Infuriating (while our Brave Allies are fighting the Battle of Benghazi or something, Bosko and his hippo buddy Dell are playing MUSICAL APPRENTICE in the safety of the Trenches on a Tom Hanks BIG-style walk-on keyboard), just like Donald J. Trump. That's right, the always prophetic Looney Tuners carefully crafted DOUGHBOY to speak specifics for the first Major U.S. Presidential Candidate consistently refusing to speak them for himself, our Beloved Trumplestiltskin. With DOUGHBOY, Warner is warning Military Veterans in particular of what the ONLY American Game Show Host personally beholden to BOTH Russia and China for billions in secret "loans" has in store for the American Heroes of the Homeland: Oblivion. Just as Trump has gone on record for hating our Stalwart P.O.W.s because the U.S. Taxpayers (a group which apparently that does NOT include Donald J.) pay them for "featherbedding" while they are being detained by the Enemy, he's sure to hate our Purple Hearters with an even greater loathing, since there are so many MORE of them than ex-P.O.W.s eating up tax revenue through their Veterans Hospitals that Trumpenstein would rather divert to build Trump Towers in EVERY major U.S. city on the government dime. Therefore, the minute that Leader Trump evicts the Obamas, he plans on showing DOUGHBOY to ALL U.S. Veterans in an effort to raise their suicide rate to AT LEAST 90%. Just remember: Every vote for Bosko is a vote for Trump (and Vice Versa). As Donnie is always saying, What do you have to lose?

Believe it or not, there were a few American cartoons from both the silent and early sound periods which used the Great War as fodder for comedy! Given the destructiveness of that particular conflict, it seems tasteless that these cartoons should treat the subject matter so lightly.But heck, I have to admit I thought Bokso the Doughboy (1931) was pretty amusing.I'm not a big fan of the early Looney Tunes; indeed, Disney and the Fleischers easily overshadowed them in the early 1930s. By no means is this Bosko short bucking that trend of mediocrity, but it is a lot of fun with its dark humor and mildly imaginative gags. Bosko himself is still a largely uninteresting character, but that is less noticeable than usual here.

Bosko, in case you've never heard of him, was the original Warner Bros. cartoon star (before Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, etc). A feisty, black and white character of no discernible species - although he looks like a minstrel character - the Looney Tunes series would have him go through a litany of adventures representing common daily aspects of life.One entry was 1931's "Bosko the Doughboy". Hugh Harman's short casts Bosko as a soldier, presumably in World War I. Which brings up a discussion topic. You see, in Warner's WWII-themed cartoons, it was always very clear that it was WWII, and that Bugs or Daffy or whoever were fighting Nazis. Here, not only is the war never specifically identified, the enemy is never specifically identified. So how do we know who the enemy really is? One thing that we learned in "Catch-22" is that "...anyone with a gun is the enemy." Of course, I'm sure that the people behind the cartoon never intended for the cartoon to merit such a complex interpretation. I have no doubt that they envisioned it as pure entertainment. Not that it contains much in the way of entertainment. I believe that I speak for most Looney Tunes fans when I say that the Looney Tunes' golden age began with Porky Pig's debut in Friz Freleng's "I Haven't Got a Hat" in 1935.

Bosko shorts generally have very good animation and there are some very nice visual sequences. I want to talk about some specifics here, so there are spoilers: This is the second war-oriented Bosko (after the earlier Dumb Patrol), both using World War I as the setting. While Bosko was an aviator in the first one and it was a good deal lighter in tone and mood, Bosko is an infantryman in the trenches in this one and some of the gags are actually a bit like "gallows" humor-characters get shot and collapse in comically exaggerated manners, weapons are hit and "die" just like the other characters. This being a Bosko short, he and other characters play music at odd times and in unusual ways.There are some very dark and somewhat serious animated bits here, mixed in with the comedic absurdities throughout the short. Bosko has a running bit with his helmet whenever he tries to get out of a trench. Some of the typical gags found regularly in Bosko shorts are here, of course-Bosko is eating from a can when we first see him, in the same exaggerated style the animators tended to use, for instance. There's also a gag involving a pair of long johns and the back flap in this one. That said, there are some stylistic flourishes here that aren't standard in a Bosko and this is a fairly good short which holds up well after roughly 75 years. Well worth seeing. Recommended.