Tale of Two Mice

Template:Infobox Shorts wTabs Tale of Two Mice, reissued as A Tale of Two Mice, is a 1945 Looney Tunes cartoon directed by an uncredited Frank Tashlin.

Plot

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Babbit and Catstello from "A Tale of Two Kitties" return, but this time they're mice.

The cartoon begins with Catstello being chased by a cat rapidly at high speed around the house, yelling "Hey Babbit!", Catstello narrowly escapes into the mousehole, while the cat crashes into a wall. Babbit notices this and asks Catstello for the cheese, which he replied that he hasn't got any because he is scared of the cat. Babbit then chastises Catstello for his cowardice, but when this doesn't get into Catstello's head. Babbit continuously slaps him on the head.

Next, for most of the cartoon, they attempt to steal cheese that is being guarded by a cat, all which end in failure; their schemes include past a sleeping cat, which doesn't go so well as Catstello runs off at first time, a small airplane and a rope and pull system. Finally, Catstello manages to escape the cat with a wedge of Swiss cheese, which unfortunately Babbit doesn't like. Fed-up with Babbit constantly ordering him around, repetitively slapping him as well as his ungratefulness for his efforts, Catstello continuously slaps him and force-feeds Catstello chunks of Swiss cheese. In the course of the iris-out, Catstello remarks "Ooohhh, I'm a baaaaaaad boy!".

Availability

• DVD - San Antonio (USA 1995 Turner print added as a bonus)
• DVD - TCM Spotlight: Errol Flynn Adventures (USA 1995 Turner print added as a bonus)

Censorship

• On the now-defunct WB channel, the sequence in which Babbit's states, "If this don't work, then I'll be a jack-ass," followed by Catstello in a crashed toy airplane (that, to prove Babbit correct in his unflattering self-description, has not been effective in doing what Babbit had wanted), yelling, "Jack-ass! A jack-ass!" and braying like a donkey was cut.
  • Surprisingly, given that these channels edited Rebel Without Claws and I Was a Teenage Thumb to remove profanity ("damn" in the former cartoon short and "ass" in the latter), Cartoon Network and Boomerang have aired this cartoon uncensored.

Notes

• This is the first cartoon where Babbit and Catstello are recast as mice instead of cats as in their debut cartoon "A Tale of Two Kitties" (1942), as well as as the protagonists rather than as antagonists to Tweety. They would later be recast as mice again in "The Mouse-Merized Cat" (1946)
  • This is also the first cartoon where Catstello turns against Babbit in the end due to the former fed-up of the latter's constant abuse.
• The unnamed cat in this cartoon physically resembles Babbit from A Tale of Two Kitties. It is possible that director Frank Tashlin and the animators of this short designed the cat based on the said character.
• This cartoon was re-released into the Blue Ribbon Merrie Melodies program on January 10, 1953. Because the cartoon was re-released in the 1952-53 animation season, the Lydian "THE END" ending card is present in place of the original ending title card.
  • Despite the re-release, the original opening and ending titles, as well as the title card and credits, are known to exist.

Gallery