Post War Inventions

Terrytoons Studios' output was seldom awful, apart from some of the very early cartoons and later ones coming close. Not often was it great either, the closest it got to that being the Heckle and Jeckle series at its best. The highest most of their output reached was pretty good, but their output mostly was watchable, the general standard being hit and miss with most falling in between of those. Individual years were variable for the studio.

1945's previous cartoons saw that watchable but nothing special standard. Excepting the disappointing and rather lacklustre 'Raiding the Raiders', considering the other previous cartoons felt a little like a step in the right direction. Was hugely impressed though by 'Post War Inventions'. One of the best Gandy and Sourpuss cartoons (a strong contender for the best), one of the best 1945 Terrytoons (again a contender for the best) and one of Terrytoons' overall best (their best in a long time and couldn't believe actually it was a Terrytoons cartoon).

Structurally, 'Post War Inventions' is not an awful lot different from other dream sequences cartoons from the Gandy and Gandy and Sourpuss cartoons, though it is not repetitive really and when it comes to the series' dream cartoons it is one of the best.

It ends a little on the patly side and it is not hard to figure out how it ends.

'Post War Inventions' works everywhere else though and the numerous good things are more than good. Really love Gandy and Sourpuss' chemistry, it sounds odd on paper but somehow their cartoons sees the relationship just about make sense because their personalities work very well with each other. Of the more prolific Terrytoons character, Gandy is perhaps the most improved. Didn't care for him when he was first introduced in the late 30s, but from the early 40s onwards when partnered with Sourpuss his personality compelled more and became much more appealing. Have always liked Sourpuss, who has always been to me the funnier and more interesting character and 'Post War Inventions' is no exceptions.

As always, the music cannot be faulted, love its lushness, character and how it merges so well with the action. The animation became more ambitious, more elaborately detailed and smoother over-time and that is obvious here.

Here, the post-war world setting is put to very clever and remarkably inventive use, seeing in older cartoons how character perceive the future is always interesting and it is here. The gags are numerous and very funny, easily one of the series' funniest, with some inspired encounters with the highly imaginative (Terrytoons were not always this imaginative) inventions. Sourpuss getting the best of them, like the television/lovely lady gag. There is a lot of charm too and a wonderful strangeness at times. The pace is suitably lively.

Summing up, very good and one of Terrytoons' best. 8/10

This is another wonderful cartoon from the Paul Terry Studio. I always find it fascinating how people perceived how the future (our present time)would be from decades ago...even in cartoons/comic strips. So many times, what was given as absolute fantasy has turned out to be, nowadays, commonplace and just plain ordinary.

Wouldn't it be great if a compilation of excellent video quality Terrytoons cartoons were released on DVD?!!! The incredible Mighty Mouse cartoons, with that wild accompanying music, would be a good start for DVD release. One can only hope that whoever has the copyright for Terrytoons would see fit to have them set for disc. Paul Terry and his Terrytoons definitely deserve to be seen nowadays...in the days of "Post-War Inventions"!!!

This is a fantastic although sadly forgotten cartoon. Sourpuss's encounters with various new inventions, such as dehydrated food and a very large television which features a lovely lady greatly resembling Jessica Rabbit are hilarious. There's something fascinating about 1940's images of the "future," and this one isn't terribly far off (although I'm still waiting for that robot butler). This film also has a great and very catchy score by Philip Scheib.