'The Blue Racer' "Support Your Local Serpent" (1972)
Opening thoughts: 'Support Your Local Serpent' is one of the better Blue Racer (an average at best and mostly not even that series) cartoons, while still not being particularly good. While having the same problems pretty much as 'Hiss and Hers', and that cartoon had plenty of them, it does improve in the animation department. While it is one of the better looking cartoons in the series, 'Support Your Local Serpent' doesn't really improve in any other area that was a problem previously. It is a small step up but only small.
Good things: Best aspects are the music and opening credits. The music has a nice upbeat charm with the main theme tune is still catchy. The opening credits are quite creative. As said, 'Support Your Local Serpent' is one of the best looking Blue Racer cartoons, with it looking as if more time and care had gone into it.
The character animation is particularly well done. Especially in the more physical moments. There are a few amusing moments, those with the fly traps and the climax faring best.
Bad things: Pretty much the same problems are still here. The story is only merely a slight variation of that in 'Hiss and Hers'. As a result it feels repetitive on top of being very thin and predictable. The pacing could have had a lot more energy because there wasn't really very much, pretty routine actually. Bob Holt voices both Blue Racer and the beetle and manages to grate as both characters, the beetle sounds just as outrageously caricaturish as with Tom Holland but with a higher pitched voice.
Furthermore, Blue Racer himself is rather bland and one-note and always did get a sense that in his series he would have fared better in support. Again, the beetle (think Mickey Rooney's character from 'Breakfast at Tiffanys' in insect form) is supremely annoying and offensively stereotypical. There is very little, if any, connection or spark between the two characters, who are also pretty mismatched together. The jokes are too few and most are neither original or funny. The fly traps and climax being the exceptions. The dialogue is again at best perfunctory, with the beetle's being cringe inducing. Shining only in the fly traps exchange.
Concluding thoughts: Concluding, watchable but pretty average.
5/10.
Opening thoughts: 'Support Your Local Serpent' is one of the better Blue Racer (an average at best and mostly not even that series) cartoons, while still not being particularly good. While having the same problems pretty much as 'Hiss and Hers', and that cartoon had plenty of them, it does improve in the animation department. While it is one of the better looking cartoons in the series, 'Support Your Local Serpent' doesn't really improve in any other area that was a problem previously. It is a small step up but only small.
Good things: Best aspects are the music and opening credits. The music has a nice upbeat charm with the main theme tune is still catchy. The opening credits are quite creative. As said, 'Support Your Local Serpent' is one of the best looking Blue Racer cartoons, with it looking as if more time and care had gone into it.
The character animation is particularly well done. Especially in the more physical moments. There are a few amusing moments, those with the fly traps and the climax faring best.
Bad things: Pretty much the same problems are still here. The story is only merely a slight variation of that in 'Hiss and Hers'. As a result it feels repetitive on top of being very thin and predictable. The pacing could have had a lot more energy because there wasn't really very much, pretty routine actually. Bob Holt voices both Blue Racer and the beetle and manages to grate as both characters, the beetle sounds just as outrageously caricaturish as with Tom Holland but with a higher pitched voice.
Furthermore, Blue Racer himself is rather bland and one-note and always did get a sense that in his series he would have fared better in support. Again, the beetle (think Mickey Rooney's character from 'Breakfast at Tiffanys' in insect form) is supremely annoying and offensively stereotypical. There is very little, if any, connection or spark between the two characters, who are also pretty mismatched together. The jokes are too few and most are neither original or funny. The fly traps and climax being the exceptions. The dialogue is again at best perfunctory, with the beetle's being cringe inducing. Shining only in the fly traps exchange.
Concluding thoughts: Concluding, watchable but pretty average.
5/10.