Cartoons of the 1930s: The Golden Thirties
The 1930s are the heart of the collection: sound cartoons in full flower, from rubber-hose surrealism early in the decade to increasingly polished character animation by its end. This is the largest era in our rotation, and the one that defines the channel's personality.
169 films in rotation from this era · 15 with full summaries
Sky Skippers (1930 · 6 min)
Western Whoopee (1930 · 7 min)
Sinkin in the Bathtub (1930 · 8 min)
The very first Looney Tunes cartoon. Bosko takes a musical bath, turning the shower spray into a harp and his bathtub into a dancing partner, before driving his sentient car to visit his girlfriend Honey. After a goat eats the flowers he brought her, Bosko serenades her and the two go for a wild car ride that ends with them splashing into a pond.
Oom Pah Pah (1930 · 7 min)
The Museum (1930 · 7 min)
Farm Foolery (1930 · 8 min)
Circus Capers (1930 · 9 min)
Milton Mouse and Rita attend a circus featuring a parade of dancing animals and various sideshows. The two mouse characters, who closely resembled Mickey and Minnie Mouse, get caught up in the circus acts.
Hold Anything (1930 · 6 min)
Grand Uproar (1930 · 6 min)
Midnight (1930 · 7 min)
The Big Cheese (1930 · 8 min)
The Booze Hangs High (1930 · 6 min)
Bosko has a grand time on the farm, dancing with a cow, playing a horse's tail like a violin, and getting into mischief with a litter of piglets who find some bootleg liquor during Prohibition.
Up To Mars (1930 · 6 min)
The Office Boy (1930 · 8 min)
A romance between two office workers — thinly veiled knockoffs of Mickey and Minnie Mouse — is threatened by their lecherous boss.
Box Car Blues (1930 · 7 min)
Bosko and his porcine pal are hobos riding a runaway boxcar, making music and getting into comic scrapes as the train hurtles through the countryside.
Crying For the Carolines (1930 · 6 min)
Stone Age Stunts (1930 · 7 min)
The King Of Bugs (1930 · 8 min)
Any Rags (1932 · 6 min)
Toy Time (1932 · 8 min)
Mechanical Man (1932 · 6 min)
Freddy the Freshman (1932 · 7 min)
Fly Frolic (1932 · 8 min)
Crosby, Columbo and Vallee (1932 · 7 min)
A generation gap erupts in an Indian tribe over the popular crooners of the day. The elders despise Crosby, Columbo, and Vallee, while the children adore them — and must also save three baby birds from a fire.
Making Good (1932 · 8 min)
Goopy Geer (1932 · 7 min)
The debut of Goopy Geer, a lanky singing and piano-playing dog. Customers at a nightclub clamor for Goopy, who takes the stage and entertains with increasingly wild piano playing — including with his ears and a pair of animated gloves — while food gags and inanimate objects come to life around him.
Magic Art (1932 · 6 min)
It's Got Me Again! (1932 · 1 min)
Late at night in a music shop, mice emerge to dance and play all the instruments. A hungry cat lurking in the rain spies them through the window, enters through the chimney, and chases them — but the united mice drive him out using the instruments as weapons.
Spring Antics (1932 · 6 min)
Battle of the Barn (1932 · 6 min)
Moonlight for Two (1932 · 1 min)
Goopy Geer courts his girlfriend to a barn dance. Their buckboard crashes on the way, reassembling into a wheelbarrow, and at the dance a villainous bear threatens Goopy's girl. Goopy and a helpful stove team up to drive the bear away.
A Circus Romance (1932 · 6 min)
The Farmerette (1932 · 6 min)
The Queen Was in the Parlor (1932 · 1 min)
Goopy Geer plays court jester for a king, performing musical tricks to entertain the royal court. When a villainous Black Knight threatens the princess, Goopy must battle him to save the day.
The Stone Age Error (1932 · 6 min)
The Ball Game (1932 · 5 min)
I Love a Parade (1932 · 1 min)
A circus barker introduces a succession of acts and performers in a lively parade, with each act providing its own comic set piece.
The Wild Goose Chase (1932 · 6 min)
Bring 'Em Back Half Shot (1932 · 6 min)
You're Too Careless with Your Kisses! (1932 · 1 min)
I Wish I Had Wings (1932 · 7 min)
Feathered Follies (1932 · 6 min)
Venice Vamp (1932 · 6 min)
The Flop House (1932 · 6 min)
A Great Big Bunch of You (1932 · 7 min)
Hokum Hotel (1932 · 7 min)
The Bad Genius (1932 · 6 min)
Three's a Crowd (1932 · 7 min)
The Wolf At the Door (1932 · 6 min)
The Air Race (1933 · 8 min)
The Shanty Where Santy Claus Lives (1933 · 7 min)
On a bleak Depression-era Christmas Eve, a poor orphan boy trudges through the snow to his miserable cabin. Santa Claus arrives, singing the title song, and whisks the boy off to his North Pole workshop where all the toys come to life to entertain him. When a Christmas tree catches fire, the boy saves the day.
Silvery Moon (1933 · 6 min)
The Plumber (1933 · 7 min)
The Mad Doctor (1933 · 7 min)
A mad scientist kidnaps Mickey Mouse's dog Pluto, intending to graft Pluto's head onto a chicken's body to find out what sound the creature would make. Mickey braves the doctor's terrifying castle full of booby traps and animated skeletons to rescue Pluto — only to wake up and discover it was all a nightmare.
Tumbledown Town (1933 · 6 min)
Magic Mummy (1933 · 7 min)
Opening Night (1933 · 8 min)
Is My Palm Read (1933 · 7 min)
Panicky Pup (1933 · 6 min)
Love's Labor Won (1933 · 7 min)
The Last Mail (1933 · 7 min)
The Match Kid (1933 · 6 min)
Barking Dogs (1933 · 7 min)
The Bully's End (1933 · 7 min)
The Wizard of Oz (1933 · 8 min)
The first animated adaptation of L. Frank Baum's classic story. A storybook opens on grey Kansas where Dorothy plays with Toto until a cyclone whisks her to the colorful land of Oz. She meets the Scarecrow and Tin Woodsman, and the group parades to the Emerald City to meet the Wizard, who performs magic tricks involving an enormous hatching egg.
Doughnuts (1933 · 7 min)
Fresh Ham (1933 · 7 min)
The Snowman (1933 · 8 min)
Play Ball (1933 · 6 min)
Cubby's Picnic (1933 · 7 min)
Sandman Tales (1933 · 6 min)
Spite Flight (1933 · 7 min)
Marching Along (1933 · 7 min)
The Pet Store (1933 · 6 min)
Stratos-Fear (1933 · 7 min)
Galloping Fanny (1933 · 6 min)
Jack and the Beanstalk (1933 · 8 min)
Croon Crazy (1933 · 6 min)
No Fare (1934 · 7 min)
She Wronged Him Right (1934 · 7 min)
Scrappy's Art Gallery (1934 · 7 min)
Davy Jones' Locker (1934 · 7 min)
The Little Red Hen (1934 · 7 min)
Hell's Fire (1934 · 7 min)
Robin Hood Jr. (1934 · 7 min)
How's Crops (1934 · 7 min)
The Brave Tin Soldier (1934 · 7 min)
Art for Art's Sake (1934 · 6 min)
Puss in Boots (1934 · 7 min)
Reducing Creme (1934 · 8 min)
Rasslin' Round (1934 · 7 min)
The Queen of Hearts (1934 · 8 min)
The Caveman (1934 · 7 min)
Pastry Town Wedding (1934 · 8 min)
The Great Experiment (1934 · 7 min)
Scrappy's Expedition (1934 · 7 min)
The Good Scout (1934 · 7 min)
A Little Bird Told Me (1934 · 9 min)
The Parrotville Fire Department (1934 · 7 min)
The Headless Horseman (1934 · 9 min)
The Valiant Tailor (1934 · 8 min)
The Concert Kid (1934 · 6 min)
Don Quixote (1934 · 8 min)
Buddy the Dentist (1934 · 7 min)
Jack Frost (1934 · 9 min)
Buzz Saws and Dynamite (1935 · 9 min)
Hector the Pup (1935 · 8 min)
The Sunshine Makers (1935 · 8 min)
Parrotville Old Folks (1935 · 8 min)
The Song of the Birds (1935 · 8 min)
The Gold Getters (1935 · 6 min)
The Bremen Town Musicians (1935 · 8 min)
Old Mother Hubbard (1935 · 8 min)
Spinning Mice (1935 · 8 min)
Graduation Excercises (1935 · 6 min)
Mary's Little Lamb (1935 · 7 min)
The Picnic Panic (1935 · 9 min)
The Kids in the Shoe (1935 · 7 min)
The Merry Kittens (1935 · 7 min)
Summertime (1935 · 8 min)
Puppet Murder Case (1935 · 7 min)
Parrotville Post Office (1935 · 7 min)
Dancing on the Moon (1935 · 8 min)
The Rag Dog (1935 · 7 min)
The Hunting Season (1935 · 8 min)
Scotty Finds a Home (1935 · 8 min)
The Three Bears (1935 · 8 min)
Time for Love (1935 · 7 min)
Bird Scouts (1935 · 7 min)
The Quail Hunt (1935 · 8 min)
Balloon Land (1935 · 7 min)
A Fable of the New Deal (1935 · 7 min)
Hollywood Capers (1935 · 7 min)
Let's Ring Doorbells (1935 · 7 min)
Simple Simon (1935 · 7 min)
Plane Dippy (1935 · 8 min)
Humpty Dumpty (1935 · 7 min)
Betty Boop and the Little King (1936 · 6 min)
Tea Pot Town (1936 · 5 min)
Boom Boom (1936 · 8 min)
Neptune Nonsense (1936 · 7 min)
Tom Thumb (1936 · 7 min)
Westward Whoa (1936 · 7 min)
Dick Whittington's Cat (1936 · 8 min)
Little Boy Blue (1936 · 7 min)
Little Swee'Pea (1936 · 7 min)
Happy Days (1936 · 9 min)
Beach Combers (1936 · 9 min)
Grampy's Indoor Outing (1936 · 6 min)
A Boy and his Dog (1936 · 7 min)
I'm in the Army Now (1936 · 6 min)
House Cleaning Blues (1937 · 6 min)
Betty Boop wakes up after her birthday party to find the house a shamble. She struggles with chores and sings the blues about it until Grampy arrives, puts on his thinking cap, and invents a series of labor-saving contraptions — including a cuckoo clock dishwasher and a player piano that folds laundry — to clean the house in time for a drive.