Robert Reynolds
The Mighty Mouse series is a peculiar series for a number of reasons. It's very hard to differentiate between Mighty Mouse shorts (in most cases) without discussing some details, so this is the spoiler alert:Mighty Mouse shorts are rather unusual in nature and it's almost as difficult to explain why, but I'll make an attempt here to do so. First, Mighty Mouse is probably one of the most recognizable cartoon stars to come out of the "Golden Age", yet he's also the "star" character who has the least amount of on-screen time in the shorts of his own series. The typical Mighty Mouse short is roughly six minutes long and Mighty Mouse is in almost none of the scenes in the first two-thirds of the cartoon. When he is in a scene in the first four minutes or so, he's generally tied up or unconscious and the main focus is elsewhere, setting up the story so that Mighty Mouse can come in and save the day.There are a couple of different types of Mighty Mouse cartoons and the one I'm commenting on here is one of the shorts which is basically a mini-melodrama-with a twist: most of the dialog is sung by all parties. Mighty Mouse basically sings most of his lines, Pearl Pureheart sings all of hers, as do her father and all the supporting characters. Oil Can Harry, a villain in the truest melodramatic sense (right down to his mustache) has a bit more spoken dialog as a rule, but even he sings quite a bit.The melodramas begin with a still image and a narrator setting up a story paused in the middle, saying something like, "When we last saw our heroes..." and then detailing some perilous circumstance which has befallen Mighty Mouse and whichever of his friends is also endangered (typically Pearl). The "Triple Trouble" of the title refers to the fact that Pearl, her father and Mighty Mouse are all in different jams, courtesy of Oil Can Harry. While Harry chases around Pearl for most of the set up, Mighty Mouse is unconscious, tied up and surrounded by vultures and her father is taking the world's longest drop into crocodile-infested waters in animated history.Finally, the appointed time mark having arrived, Mighty Mouse comes to, breaks free and saves everyone (though there are occasions when it may be that he's saving Harry from a very resourceful Pearl defending herself rather effectively). Cue the final song in celebration of victory (yet again) over Oil Can Harry.These shorts do tend to run together after a while and they are usually entertaining, though sometimes it's a challenge to remember specifics about individual shorts even a half an hour after watching them, particularly if you watch three or more in succession. Worth watching if you can find them.
