User Reviews

Buckwheat gets a dog from another kid and names it Smallpox with the result is everyone thinks that Buckwheat has the terrible disease.

Final Our Gang film has a killer opening of Buckwheat talking to another kid and it shows both how the series might have been able to continue on and what a great actor Billie 'Buckwheat' Thomas was. Its a beautiful opening bit that made me sit up and take notice. After that the film settles down into typical Our Gang craziness. Better than several of the films that preceded it, this is an enjoyable, if unremarkable little film. There are a few little bits I like (like why is Buckwheat cold) that give sense that with care the series might have continued on. Unfortunately that was not to be and the series was over and done with at this point. This film is worth a look more for the pieces than as a whole, but its still worth seeing

This M-G-M comedy short, Tale of a Dog, is the two hundred twenty-first entry in the "Our Gang" series and the one hundred thirty-third talkie. It's also the final one to go into pre-production as the previous one, Dancing Romeo, was the actual final filmed and released one though this one was actually sold to exhibitors as part of the M-G-M Miniature series, not Our Gang, thereby turning a profit as the preceding OG's had sustained losses for the previous season. Subsequent production of Home Front Commandos was cancelled mid-filming. Buckwheat's friend Big Shot (Cordell Hickman) is going to send his dog away since his father told him to get rid of that animal but his friend tells him to give it to him and the gang. He then names it Smallpox which Mickey, Froggy, and Janet overhear about and jump to conclusions about them spreading the disease with the same name. Yes, this was another lesson-teaching ep of the series but there's quite some funny scenes and lines attached that by the time the mayor lectures them about spreading rumors, the short is almost over. And the animation of the dog suddenly talking (his mouth movements being animated, of course) was a funny enough way to end the series overall, bringing it full circle of the original kids-and-pets formula created by Hal Roach twenty-two years previous. So on that note, Tale of a Dog is worthy to watch for Our Gang completists everywhere. P.S. This was the third and last series entry directed by Cyril Endfield. He'd go on to make various features of which one of them, Zulu starring Michael Caine, I have somewhere and may watch soon. He died on April 16, 1995.

Series writers Hal Law and Robert A. McGowan didn't do much else after the series' end. Hal Law died on November 14, 1980. Robert A., the nephew of frequent series director, Robert F. McGowan, was also the series director of the late silent and early talkies as "Anthony Mack" and would also write a Gas House Kids feature entry that starred former OG kids Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer and Tommy "Butch" Bond. He'd die not long after his uncle did on June 20, 1955.

Billy "Froggy" Laughlin did appear in one more movie before deciding to go back to a normal life. Unfortunately, at 16, he was killed in a hit-and-run accident making him the OG regular to die the youngest when he did on August 31, 1948.

"We have no doubt that Janet Burston saved moviegoers many headaches when she left acting and ultimately became a housewife" as Leonard Maltin & Richard W. Bann summed her post-Our Gang life. She died on March 3, 1998.

Only remaining Hal Roach member to last to the series end, Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas, did reunite with Bobby Blake in a Red Ryder entry called Colorado Pioneers (They previously appeared in the feature Mokey while still in the gang) before leaving show business and eventually becoming a film technician at Technicolor in Hollywood. He died on October 10, 1980, exactly forty-six years after being picked to appear in the series. Exactly a year later, in perhaps a remarkable coincidence, Eddie Murphy on "Saturday Night Live" debuted his version of an adult Buckwheat-still speaking in malapropisms like as a small child-singing a live "commercial" spot for his mail-order record album "Buckwheat Sings" warbling such popular hits like "Three Times a Lady" ("Fee Times a Mady"), "Looking for Love" ("Wookin' Po Nub"), and "Bette Davis Eyes" ("??????"), as well as his tribute to Alfalfa, "Barber of Seville" ("Barber of Debil"). Buckwheat's son didn't like it and wrote to Murphy to that effect. Murphy later told an interviewer "Shoot! I knew he was doing a character" after being criticized by that son for making his father seem ignorant on TV. Eventually, then-"SNL" exec producer Dick Ebersol apologized to that son to his satisfaction.

Well, Robert Blake, the only one of these latter-day Rascals to survive to the present day, had quite a career after the series' end. Playing Little Beaver in the Red Ryder series then appearing with such stars as Laurel & Hardy, Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, and Jack Benny in various features. Then his quite critically acclaimed role as an adult in In Cold Blood leading him to Tell Them Willie Boy is Here, and Electra Glide in Blue and then leading to his TV series "Baretta". Both his childhood past and that last series I mentioned led him to a memorable spot on "SNL" which he hosted on November 13, 1982: In the "Little Rascals Reunion" sketch, after mentioning he was little Mickey, Blake then presents the rest of the gang-Spanky (played by a heavyset extra) goes immediately to the table to get some food. Alfalfa (Mary Gross) claims to have performed with Lola Falana and then sings a few lines of "I'm in the Mood for Love". Froggy (Joe Piscopo) arrives in convict outfit with hand cuffs and says he finally got the guy who did this to his voice before ad-libbing "Don't I sound like Wolfman Jack?" (He did!) Darla (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) comes in a streetwalker outfit and says she's been "turning tricks". Blake asks about Pete the Pup, who never appeared when Mickey was around but never mind, which Darla reveals is now stuffed on her neck! And then there's, well, here's Robert's intro of him: "Mr. Buckwheat Thomas! Bucky, Bucky, you're still the king, King Bucky!" And with that, Eddie Murphy does his version of the "Baretta" song ("Keep you're eyyyyyyyee on the 'barrow..."). The reunited gang then ends the sketch with "Auld Lang Syne". After that, things got rougher with Blake whose last public appearance was in connection with his alleged murder of wife Bonnie Lee Bakley. Whatever demons he's battling now, I hope he "keeps punching" as he said at the end of his "SNL" appearance. Once again, cue LeRoy Shield's OG theme song, "Good Old Days"...

When I first saw "Tale of a Dog" back in the 70's on television, I had no idea this was the very last "Our Gang" comedy made until I read about it in Leonard Maltin and Richard Bann's "Little Rascals" book when it was first published in 1977. There was a possible reference to this fact when, in the opening scene, Big Shot tells Smallpox while sniveling, "There comes a time when even the best of friends must part."

As for the short itself, it was rather funny, especially the scenes where the other kids run from Buckwheat and Big Shot while a radio announcer's voice warns listeners of the "epidemic," and when the kids hog the phone booth in a drug store while other people wanting to use the phone line up behind them (they hang up a sign that says "Line is bizzy").

Even funnier were the scenes in which Dr. Parkson (Emmett Vogan) advises Buckwheat's mother (Willa Pearl Curtis) to isolate Buckwheat from everybody. When Dr. Parkson returns later to check up on Buckwheat, he finds Buckwheat in bed, covered in ice, shivering. "Jumping catfish!," exclaims Parkson, "What's all the ice for?" To which Buckwheat's mother replies, "Why, doctor! You told me to isolate him!"

While "Tale of a Dog" was the last short produced, "Dancing Romeo," the film made before this one, was the last "Our Gang" comedy to be released (apparently the MGM brass wanted everyone to believe Froggy and Marilyn lived happily ever after). "Tale of a Dog," according to Maltin and Bann's revised 1992 "Little Rascals" book, came out on Saturday, April 15 (Tax Day), 1944, while "Dancing Romeo" was released exactly two weeks later, Saturday, April 29, 1944 (April 29, 1962 was my birthday!).

Also according to Maltin and Bann's book, MGM was planning another "Our Gang" short to have been called "Homefront Commandos," but decided to cancel production midway through filming (most likely after discovering how much money "Dancing Romeo" lost). I can only imagine how funny that might have been, considering the title, the fact that World War II was still going on, and that since there were 221 total films made in the entire "Our Gang" series what the film to make it an even 222 would have been like had it been completed. It also seems tantalizing to imagine if MGM decided to stick out "Our Gang" for one more year, until after World War II ended, I'll bet there would have been a patriotic-themed musical episode, like "Calling All Kids!" Don't you think so?