7/10
The parts are better than the sum, but there are some nice bits here
8 October 2006
This short is worth watching for some nice parts, though the cartoon as a whole is just okay, for reasons I will go into below. Consider this a spoiler warning:

The beginning basically makes it fairly clear that much of what follows is a dream sequence, as Bosko is in a rocking chair reading tales of yore about when knighthood was in flower and then falls asleep to a song on the radio and we see him in armor (armor which turns out to have more personality and energy than Bosko himself does) coming up to King Arthur's castle. There's a nice bit that may or may not be an allusion to Joe E. Brown (big mouth and all) and Bosko does a riff on Cab Calloway when greeting the Knights of the Round Table, who include, interestingly enough, caricatures of the Four Marx Brothers! There's a song, of course, and Bosko tap dances (along with several suits of armor) and this allows for some very good bits.

The short may have been better had they stuck to this "plot", but they chose instead to have the requisite bad guy fancy Honey and make off with her (why so many bad guys try to do this is a mystery, as Honey's "appeal" is on a par with Olive Oyl's) which sets up the chase and action sequences, the best part of which is Bosko's armor, with two wonderful gags I won't spoil here.

The fight to rescue Honey doesn't go well for Bosko, who is fortunate that it's all been a dream. The real ending has Bosko destroy a suit of armor, sing a few lines of a song, jump into bed, pull the sheets up and the bed lifts back up into the wall, where the audience sees a chamberpot which was under the bed.

I hope this makes it onto a future Looney Tunes Golden Collection, as there aren't too many shorts which feature caricatures of the Four Marx Brothers. Well worth watching.
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