User Reviews

Jack Hannah, still relaxing and on the run from Disney -- he was one of the union sympathizers exiled to the Disney shorts department following the strike, where he directed the best of the Goofy shorts in the '40s and 50s -- turns out a Woody Woodpecker that, despite its minimalistic line work and animation, still manages to replicate the manic air of the best of Seamus Culhane's Woodies from the 1940s. Strong use of background color and some good wash work in the outdoor, rainy scenes do much towards compensating for the reduction in quality, and both Homer Brightman's usual good scripting and Daws Butler's deliberately bad Peter Lorre imitation add to the fun.

Was very fond of Woody Woodpecker and his cartoons as a child. Still get much enjoyment out of them now as a young adult, even if there are more interesting in personality cartoon characters and better overall cartoons.

That is in no way knocking Woody, because many of his cartoons (primarily the earlier ones of the 40s to the early 50s, once Paul J. Smith took over in the late 50s onwards the cartoons became very hit and miss) are a lot of fun to watch and more and also still like him a lot as a character. 'Franken-Stymied' is one of his best early 60s cartoons and one of the best of his later output overall. As well as having a fun and creepy atmosphere when necessary, it's the closest in a while to capturing the manic energy of the early/original Woody Woodpecker cartoons from the 40s-mid-50s.

As for Woody himself, he is manic and very funny and while he is a pest he's not an unbearably obnoxious or overplayed one. He is supported well by the scientist and especially the robot.

Jack Hannah's involvement has something to do with it perhaps. He does such a great job with making the characters as strong as possible, while providing some of the funniest and most imaginatively gags of any Woody Woodpecker cartoons in a long time. While the animation is still a bit simple and rushed-looking in the drawings (low budgets and time constraints being the reasons), the colours and attention to detail are vastly improved from most Woody Woodpecker cartoons from this period being much more vibrant and meticulous.

The story is very predictable and could have done with a little more variety but the energetic pacing helps make it involving. The music is bouncy, energetic and very lushly orchestrated, not only synchronising and fitting with the action very well but enhancing it.

Grace Stafford does a great job as always, and although Daws Butler's imitation of Peter Lorre is not great he is still very entertaining.

Overall, one of the better later Woody Woodpecker cartoons. 8/10 Bethany Cox

. . . when his FRANKENSTEIN picture house released STYMIED to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of that aforementioned iconic classic. Universal commissioned the Good Walt to animate a six-minute tribute, which became STYMIED. Woody Woodpecker becomes one of the few heroic figures in this horror franchise, giving the mad doctor a taste of his own lunacy. As it turns out, any well-versed ornithologist will tell you that chickens and woodpeckers actually are ninth cousins, thrice removed. Therefore, when the madman is siccing his mechanical monster to unfetter Woody, it's not as far-fetched as some viewers may think. After all, birds of a fetter unlock together.