User Reviews

Popeye proposes marriage to Olive Oyl. Bluto rushes to proposes as well. Olive does an Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe and lands on Popeye. Bluto works to sabotage their wedding.

Olive is the worst. Sure, she chooses Popeye but she has to twist the knife. She has to accentuate that the choice is a random one. I don't know why Olive is written this way so many times. The rest is the standard Popeye trio story with some fun but even the climax has to twist the knife. Olive is willing to switch the wedding for essentially a suit. It is the least romantic portrayal of the concept of marriage. I just don't understand why Olive Oyl is written this way so often. If people want to defend marriage, they would cancel this short.

Really like to love a good deal of Popeye cartoons and like the character of Popeye. Love Bluto more and his chemistry with Popeye has always driven their cartoons. Will admit though to preferring the Popeye cartoons from the Dave Fleischer era, the cartoons tend to be funnier and there is more originality and more risk taking in some of them.

'Nearlyweds' is a late Popeye cartoon and made in Famous Studios' roughest and most variable period where budgets were much smaller in particularly the animation and deadlines and time constraints were shorter and tighter. All things considered, while there are infinitely better Popeye cartoons (especially during the Fleischer era) and there are signs of what made this period an inferior one for Famous Studios, 'Nearlyweds' is not a bad late Popeye cartoon at all and one of the better cartoons in Famous Studios' late output.

As to be expected, the story is standard and formulaic, all it is basically is Popeye and Bluto battling for Olive Oyl's affections with not as much variety as many other Popeye cartoons. There could have been more gags too, the ones here are amusing and timed reasonably well, thankfully not being repetitive either, but they are never hilarious and it's not laugh-a-minute.

Similarly the animation quality is uneven, never terrible but never fantastic. The colours are fine and there is smoothness and nice detail but there are many moments where the backgrounds are sparse and the drawing rough.

What is fantastic about 'Nearlyweds' is the music score, the best thing for me. It's beautifully orchestrated, rhythmically it's full of energy and there is so much character and atmosphere, it's also brilliant at adding to the action and enhancing it. The gags are executed well, the interplay between the characters is lively and witty if in need of more variety and the pace is never dull.

The three main characters do a great job carrying the cartoon, Bluto being the funniest and most interesting. Olive Oyl is a good charming character where you can totally see what Popeye sees in her, but it's the entertaining interplay between Popeye and Bluto that really sparkles. Jack Mercer, Mae Questel and Jackson Beck give great vocal characterisations, Beck in particular and Mercer and Questel are the voice actors that spring to mind generally for me for Popeye and Olive's voices.

Concluding, decent if nothing mind-blowing. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Olive accepts Popeye's marriage proposal. Bluto is the odd man out and sets about destroying any chance Popeye had. There is nothing new here, other than the fact that instead of pursuing the skinny wench, she has accepted. Some pretty clever physical stuff and a rather sexist ending.

Olive Oyl consents to marry Popeye if he can show up to her home by 3PM. Bluto, of course, proceeds to do whatever he can to prevent that happening.

The Famous Studios Popeyes approach their end, without Technicolor, without the Famous Studios logo, but still with Popeye and Bluto fighting over Olive Oyl. The background designs continue to grow simpler and simpler under the vanishing budgets, and the Polarcolor Process used is wan. The Famous Studios staff pulls off a couple of good gags, like the way Popeye disrobes before getting into his bath without violating the Production Code -- although I have my doubts about the implications of how he breaks out of the concrete -- but the series is far from its best days in the 1930s.

Olive Oyl continues to amaze me. I never remembered her as fickle as I now find her, watching these cartoons decades after first seeing them. Why Popeye and Bluto put up with her, or even find her worth fighting over all the time, we'll never know. In this cartoon, Popeye is proposing to his longtime girlfriend. She accepts but Bluto enters the house right then and he wants to marry her, too. She does the right thing: she goes "eeenie, meanie, minie, moe (with her nose). Wow, what commitment!

Her nose points to Popeye and she tells him to come back at 3 o'clock and she'll be dressed and ready to be married. Bluto shakes hands and pretends to be a good loser, but you know he has something up his sleeve!

Bluto, through open windows in Popeye's house, sabotages our boy at every turn, from when Popeye is taking a bath (which Bluto converts to cement) to when the sailor man is trying to get into his tuxedo.

The ending is surprise, different from most Popeye cartoons.....and very clever.

Two timing Olive Oyl has to decide who to marry. Popeye or Bluto.

She chooses Popeye with eenie, meanie, minie, moe. They decide to marry at 3pm on the afternoon that day.

Bluto tells Popeye that the best man won and then goes on to sabotage the wedding.

This is a world that if Bluto can stop Popeye to get to the church on time. Then maybe Olive would choose him.

Popeye decides it is not spinach he needs to best Bluto. It is to show Bluto what kind of commitment is needed to marry Olive Oyl.

It is another cartoon where you think a heel like Bluto and Olive are made for each other.

Popeye in not the most pudic situations but fighting - against Bluto, off course- for a noble purpoise. The end is just brilliant plage about marriage.

Nearlyweds (1956)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Both Popeye and Bluto propose to Olive Oyl but she decides to go with the sailor. Bluto accepts that he has been rejected and wishes the happy couple nothing but the best but it doesn't take long for him to try and take Popeye out of the picture.

NEARLYWEDS has a plot that had been seen in several earlier Popeye shorts so the originality factor is missing here and sadly there aren't enough laughs to keep the short running at a smooth pace. I think the highlight of the movie is seeing Popeye flip out and then back into his clothes. Outside of this there are a couple minor fights that will put a smile on your face but there's just not enough here to keep you entertained throughout.