The operetta-like melodrama structured (already very old-fashioned in the 30s) Mighty Mouse cartoons are pleasant enough diversions, and to be seen for primarily the animation, music and supporting characters. They also tend to be far too formulaic, variable in writing and Mighty Mouse is underused and almost unnecessary in almost all of them. Those all were common in all the 1948 cartoons of the series to adopt this structure and were common in previous and succeeding years too.
Despite its flaws and being nothing special story-wise, one of the better Mighty Mouse cartoons to have this structure, and for me the best of the 1948 Mighty Mouse cartoons to be structured as an operetta-like melodrama, is this cartoon 'Triple Trouble'. It is not quite one of Terrytoons' best or one of the high points of their 1948 batch, but 'Triple Trouble' is light years away from being one of the worst on both those counts and is worth tracking down for more than just completest sake. Whether one enjoys it though is dependent on what your thoughts on Mighty Mouse himself, am a bit take and leave with him personally.
Is 'Triple Trouble' perfect? No, far from it. The Mighty Mouse cartoons are not really to be seen for their stories, and certainly the more melodramatic ones. Once again the story is very samey and if you've seen one of the melodramatic cartoons in the series and then see a couple more you've pretty much seen them all, there is a sense to me that the writers were starting to struggle thinking of new ideas at this point and were recycling old ones.
Mighty Mouse is very underused apart from in the last two minutes, but once he appears quite conveniently it's quite more of the same schtick. And while it is undoubtedly energetic the last two minutes feel like it was lifted from another cartoon and tacked on. Some of the writing has a habit of over-explaining what is going on when it is not hard what is actually going on, it is great to have a storybook-like approach and the odd reminder but it was a bit overkill here.
Pearl Pureheart and Oil Can Harry on the other hand come over much better as characters. Pearl is alluring and charming, while also showing a feisty side to her. Oil Can Harry makes even more of an impression, he is so much fun to watch and has menace. The cartoon has more jeopardy than usual, one is really on the edge of their seat wondering as to whether the characters would survive their predicaments.
What immediately stands out about 'Triple Trouble' is the music, in a very music-heavy cartoon it was important for that component to be nailed and it was. The animation is colourful and neat and it is great that the backgrounds increasingly became more ambitious and more detailed. Other than Oil Can Harry, the star though is the music. Like an essential character of its own and so infectious and cleverly constructed, some smile-inducing lyric writing too. It is well sung too, especially Pearl.
Concluding, worth tracking down. 7/10.
