User Reviews

Bluto shows up unannounced looking for a date with Olive Oyl. She tells him that she already has a picnic date with Popeye and his nephew. On that date, Popeye recounts his childhood with Olive and Bluto to his nephews.

I don't always like the nephews but this one is pretty good. The young Popeye flashbacks are good. It's great to have his girly hair which is begging for Bluto to bully. As far as Famous Studios, this is as good as it gets.

In "Lunch with a Punch" (1952), Popeye goes on a picnic with Olive, who insists that they take along his three nephews, whom Popeye insists on trying to feed spinach to. At the picnic site, he also undergoes harassment by a jealous Bluto. The unusual aspect of this cartoon is the flashback to the childhood days of Popeye, Bluto and Olive and their stint in an ancient one-room schoolhouse. (Just how OLD are these characters supposed to be?) Bluto, a brute even in childhood, pulls pranks on Popeye and vies with him for little Olive's affection. Little Popeye has a full head of long red hair and wears a typical "sissy" school outfit including a big red bow-tie and shorts. Back at the present- day picnic, Bluto prevents Popeye from getting his spinach, so a solution is required that makes this a rare Popeye cartoon where someone other than Popeye ingests the spinach to perform a rescue.

Reading the synopsis of 'Lunch with a Punch' on first watch, a large part of me was very conflicted. Despite really liking both Popeye and Bluto as characters and having nearly always been entertained by the chemistry between them, the nephews were more variable depending on how strong or weak their material was. The setting is a good one but there was conceptually nothing special about the story whatsoever. Decided to rewatch 'Lunch with a Punch' on rewatch as someone who likes the series on the whole.

'Lunch with a Punch' didn't do much for me on first watch and still didn't on rewatch. It is far from a terrible cartoon and has its moments and good things, but there is next to nothing new or inspired here and all the characters have been a lot stronger in other cartoons. And it was a good example of how hit and miss the Popeye series and Famous Studios' output in general had become by this relatively late stage or at least was starting to, which does sadden me a good deal.

There are good things. The animation still looks like effort and care was being made, there may have been more budget and time limitations at this point but unlike the late-50s that is not as obvious here. There are rough moments in the drawing but the backgrounds have a lot of vibrant colour and meticulous detail. The music is one of the consistent high points of the 50s Famous Studios output (Popeye and overall), and it is one of the best things here. The lively character of it is just infectious and it has an energy that the rest of the cartoon lacks, while the orchestration is as beautiful as ever.

Furthermore, the voice acting is very good. Especially from the definitive voice actor for Popeye Jack Mercer. Who is an engaging character here and Bluto is a fun, formidable antagonist. Although the conflict is very seen it all before it has moments where it is fun and tense. The final third is amusing and energetic and it was nice for the spinach to be used by somebody else other than Popeye.

Which unfortunately cannot be said for the rest of 'Lunch with a Punch'. The story is far too formulaic and has a very tired feel. Popeye does not have much material of note, all the best moments come from Bluto. While there are moments of amusement, they are infrequent in a cartoon that really lacks freshness and imagination. Rather by the numbers and one can tell that the series was running out of ideas.

Excepting the final third, the energy just isn't there and the fairly still primitively animated nephews are annoying and don't have much to do. The chemistry between them and Popeye is not always there and the chemistry is not there at all between Popeye and Olive, whose presence is completely pointless.

Another Popeye cartoon that didn't do much for me on the whole. 5/10.

When his nephews refuse top eat spinach because it's disgusting -- which, in its cooked form it is -- Popeye tells them about when he, Olive Oyl and Bluto were all children together.

That's exactly the load of malarkey our parents told us, and we told our children; my brother was very fond of explaining to his growing children what a well-behaved child he was, even in my presence, despite my shaking head. Anyway, that's the gimmick here for exactly the same sort of cartoon that almost all the Famous Studio Popeyes were.