Home
Creators
Search Recent Random
Posts
Search DMs Popular Hash Lookup Tags Random
Importer
Import FAQ
Register Favorites Keys Review DMs Logout
Community
Telegram ThePornDude
Home Creators Posts Import Register Favorites Logout

What A Cartoon! - Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures "Mighty's Benefit Plan" (Patreon)

Published:
2026-08-03 04:00:05
Imported:
2026-08
Tags:

Downloads

Content

In 1987, Ralph Bakshi assembled a ragtag crew of animation visionaries for the sake of rebooting Mighty Mouse: a C-tier cartoon hero mostly absorbed by Baby Boomers through ever-present reruns. Though the pitch seems lackluster, the execution certainly wasn't. Bakshi's team of animation rebels turned what could have been a corny concept into pure brilliance, and then went on to inspire and create all of the animation we enjoyed throughout the 90s and beyond. On this episode of What A Cartoon, join us as we explore how this simple show built to relaunch a lackluster character ended up being one of the most important animated series of all time.

Files

Comments

Deez

Aye lets goooo!!!

martin

There's an episode where MM has to stop a bad comic from doing bad jokes. One of which i still use. "This steak is so thin it has one side."

Jonathon

Great episode! Regarding MeTV Toons, depending on where you live in the US, at least, you don't even need cable to watch. Assuming your TV still has a coaxial antenna connector on it, you can buy a very inexpensive indoor antenna to pick up the over the air broadcast and watch for the price of free! I have been doing this lately and even recording like the VCR days of old. Highly recommended if you want to watch classic Warner Bros. and Terry Toons stuff.

mavrick

I know you dont care for Terrytoons but I implore you to watch The Talking Magpies (1946) where two Magpies, later called Heckle & Jeckle, try to buy their first nest as a couple and then later harass a farmer and his dog. The slapstick is hilarious and something sorely lacking in todays toons. Its full of mayhem and is just all gas and no brakes for the last half of the short. My Make-A-Wish would be for you guys to cover this one.

PurpleComet

Watching this episode I thought of the rule on the Sonic cartoon that if you can tell who the character is, it's on model. Then you mentioned Kent Butterworth worked on both and it all clicked

Echo Cimarron

I really didn't have much exposure to the Terrytoons before MeTV Toons started showing "Mighty Mouse and Friends", but now I love Heckle & Jeckle. The later Mighty Mouse cartoons where they're parodying old melodrama serials are pretty fun, but yeah, a lot of early Mighty Mouse is kind of dull. The Terry Bears just suck. (Seriously though, why did almost every cartoon studio do a series about a crappy bear dad who hates his family?) They also mix in The Mighty Heroes series from Bakshi, if you ever wanted context for what that one Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures episode with the washed up old heroes was about.

Thad Komorowski

I’m definitely not offended. More than half of the Terrytoons probably suck and it’s painfully obvious by about 1937, this was as good as this studio’s production system was going to allow. The work of Jim Tyer, however, cannot be understated - his influence is all over this revival, and anyone who has ever tried to seriously animate “funny”. But I think you’re being a little too hard on these dinosaurs (which had a whopping two weeks in every department during production). It gets lost because everything had to meet the “all ages” production code requirements and the cartoons all ended up as TV babysitters, but there were different kinds of theatrical cartoons just like there are different kinds of movies. Most of the Looney Tunes and MGM Tex Avery were inarguably made for adults, but most of the Disney, UPA, and post-production code New York studio cartoons were definitely made for younger audiences; Mighty Mouse, like late Popeye, most emphatically filled the western/serial adventure blocks for the matinee crowds. Within that context, they’re mostly OK. As a couple of your commenters have said, Heckle & Jeckle was their one true comedy success and have moments of surprising brilliance. They really get into their “roles” as cartoon actors like no others, and even have whole shorts about that concept. The FrndlyTV app is the best way to get the MeTV Toons channel. The basic package allows you to DVR as much as you want for like 3 months, so you can basically create your own classic cartoon streaming app. I guarantee only societal classism/elitism is keeping it low-key. If any streamer had HALF the content as this over the air channel, no one would shut up about it.

MENDOZABLE

Remember the meme “Somebody Toucha my Spaghett!!” Was the last moment of relevance that TerryToons had, It’s a fine meme but it ain’t no “Dover Boys” or any Tom and Jerry meme

Thad Komorowski

I felt like I may have been too hard on the show—I accept it may be one of the most important American TV cartoons, and what you didn't mention was its production schedule: greenlit in April 1987, had to be on the air by September (JK would check out midweek usually to consume massive amounts of alcohol while Lynne Naylor, Bob Jaques, Jim Gomez, Bruce Timm, etc. covered for him). But then I watched it again on MeTV Toons, and realized I was getting more laughs out of the Taz-Mania reruns also airing (and that show isn't good, either). Pretty incoherent stuff, and I think there's at least one shooting error in every scene. There's at least one that gets a little closer to R&S, "The Ice Goose Cometh", which explores the homoeroticism of Terrytoon favorites Gandy Goose and Sourpuss (there's a cartoon in the second season where they're showering together). Henry should probably cover it with Drew for Gayest Episode Ever. The “Ohoorids” (Oh! Horrid!) thing is from JK's days work at a Canadian TV studio. They had to change a Cheerios box to avoid legal issues and it became "Ohorrids", and it stuck in his brain as the funniest thing. Tiger Lily allegedly committed suicide by running into the road in a fit of jealousy after the Bagdasarians had a baby. That's how it was told to me, anyway. Fun fact: longtime JK enabler/sycophant Steve Worth worked for the Bagdasarians at the time and HATED John K. for making this cartoon for years. Oh and Henry, Doug Moench was reviled by JK and he would trash him constantly. At least he was in good company... JK called Timm's drawings "Mighty Man" all the time.

Yannick Belzil

First time I'm watching something previously unseen for the pod. I have vague memories of hearing about this version of Mighty Mouse in Bruce Timm longform magazine interviews but getting the deep dive into that period was really great!

Thad Komorowski

And....the best episode is emphatically "Don't Touch That Dial", from the truncated second season (without JK) that definitely showed improvement. You guys say they were too mean, but frankly, seeing where animation has gone, I don't think they were mean enough, or that we listened.

Dennis K

My antennae won't pick it up. :( Maybe I need to buy a more expensive one.

Mike Kachur

After listening to the "Why don't we take a break, Sandy?" line back-to-back with clips of Andrew Stanton's TED Talk "The clues to a great story", I absolutely agree with Henry that it is his voice and would be shocked if it wasn't!

Gerardo Peralta

Thank you Thad I wanted to post the app so they had access to metv toons aswell

MENDOZABLE

Stand up and Fight! You Coward,Bully,Cad and Thief!!

Blake R.

I have a personal axe to grind against the forced pathos of the Chipmunks series, particularly the episode where the trio take in a stray cat. The siblings give it an adorable name, Cookie Chomper III and all bond with their new family member. So of course, the cat chases a moth out of a window and into the road where it gets hit by a car to teach everyone a lesson about grief and accepting death. As a lifelong cat owner, it traumatized AND angered me. I know my pet is going to die. I don’t need the talking chipmunks to remind me!

Thad Komorowski

The Terry Bears do suck, but it had the distinction of using camerman Doug Moye for Papa Bear, making it maybe the first time ever a black actor regularly voiced a lead character (and not one “coded” black). Moye is in a ton of Terrytoons and was the first/best Clint Clobber (before progressive Gene Deitch replaced him with Allen Swift, a white actor who you heard about six times a week in other things in the ‘50s).

Joe Hodgson

I was the weird kid who hated this show when it premiered because I loved classic Mighty Mouse. To me, this was the ugly Mighty Mouse who didn't do anything. As for the old shorts, I think they appealed to me because I, like Reducto of Harvey Birdman fame, just had an affinity for miniature things as a kid and Mighty Mouse was basically a tiny Superman. Every word of his theme is still etched in my brain even though I probably went over 30 years in between hearing it. When MeTV added Terrytoons this year it was my first time seeing Mighty Mouse since the 80s and, yeah, kid me had some pretty bad taste. I still don't like this show, but I acknowledge its importance and I'd rather watch it than the old Terrytoons at this point.

Nick Mould

I'm pretty certain it's Patrick Pinney doing the voice of Elwy, not Stanton, though I can hear the likeness. It's a similar voice to Mighty Mouse's guise as Mike Mouse.

Nick Mould

Don't recall where he said this but Wes Archer did unsuccessfully apply to work on Mighty Mouse. Presumably this would have been while he was at Klasky Csupo, I'm not sure of the exact chronology of the production of the Simpsons shorts but there was definitely overlap with Bakshi's show. As Thad noted, the production schedule for Mighty Mouse was ridiculously short. Years ago there was an online copy of Jim Reardon's final script for Mighty's Benefit Plan which was dated only a few months before the episode aired. In retrospect it seems miraculous that they met all their airdates on time and on budget (an anomaly for a John Kricfalusi show, though he wasn't calling the shots). That and the crew's inexperience in creating cartoons the way they wanted, goes some way to explain why the show is largely incoherent and slipshod. The second season is indeed better overall. Mike Kazaleh noted that the network told them in advance that six more episodes was all they were going to get, which just made them double down on the insanity.

IanLightsOut

Long time listener first time subscriber… when will we get a liquid TV/aeon flux (all the LTV shorts together plz) episode of WAC??? 🙏🔥❤️

Thad Komorowski

It made its deadlines because JK was not in charge. Simple as that.