Biscuit 1, Axis 0

Walter Lantz had the perfect aggressive cartoon character to take on Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo. For some reason, the Lantz studio never pitted Woody Woodpecker against the leaders of the Allies’ enemies. Instead, it was left to hillbillies in the Swing Symphony Pass the Biscuits, Mirandy (1943).

The first two-thirds of the cartoons involve the cliché of a feud amongst mountaineers set to the title song, with Darrell Calker’s brass and boogie-woogie piano arrangement in the background. The biscuits in question are as hard as rocks. The short takes a turn, a la the Gary Cooper film Sergeant York (1941) where the hillbilly menfolk are told to sign up for war. Mirandy does, too.

Look who shows up in a tank.



The uncredited director cuts to re-used footage of Mirandy being grazed in the butt and using a garter as a slingshot to launch one of her boulder biscuits.



Mirandy’s a crack shot. With one biscuit, she blows up the Axis tank.



An old animation trick of flashing colour cards to emphasize the explosion.



Bugs Hardaway and/or Milt Schaffer pull a switch on the food gag where Popeye punches a steer and beef products fall from the sky, or when a car hits a pig and a chicken and hams and eggs on a plate drop from above. Let’s see. We have a German, an Italian and a Japanese guy.



The title song irises out to make a familiar wartime push.



There’s more about the song and the cartoon in this post.