The Mystery Cartoon Character Game, ongoing.

Spot on, Emeraldisle, it is Sweet Pea, or Swee'Pea as he is usually known.

The clues all refer to the infant's first screen appearance Little Swee'Pea (1936). Olive is too busy to go to the zoo with Popeye, and suggests he takes Swee'Pea instead. Swee'Pea happily wanders into the cages, and Popeye struggles to overcomes each dangerous animal only to discover the child at risk from another. Swee'Pea shows no fear of his pedicament, but when Popeye gets him back to Olive's house and tries to amuse him with a monkey-on-a-stick toy the baby bursts into tears. Olive beats Popeye with her broom for frightening Swee'Pea, and Popeye sings "There's no 'ifs' or 'maybes' - I'll never have babies! I'm Popeye the sailor man!"

Swee'Pea's propensity for putting himself in dangerous situations was the basis for several of his screen appearances in the Fleischer cartoons.

Over to you, Em!

Thanks, Pete. FYI, there was another cartoon about Sweet Pea at the zoo. This one had him going after a ball, and eventually saving Popeye form a gorilla after eating spinach. The ending was different, with Olive coming home, and finding animals from the zoo inside the house!

Now here's one I intended to post z year ago at this time:

1. I'm the title character of the only Thanksgiving special from my studio.

2. I travel across the sea with the humans, and even wear the same clothes.

3. My voice actor famously complained about hauling sixteen tons.

Ok, these are the last three clues:

4. I have the same name as my descendant, and one of the humans on board.

5. I meet another of my species, who's a tiny Native American.

6. Unlike most of the Christmas specials from my studio, mine is cel-animated.

Is nobody else playing? This is Willum Mouse Esquire, from the Rankin/Bass special The Mouse on the Mayflower.

Yes, Pete, you nailed it. William Mouse, Esquire, it is.

1. Self-explanatory.

2. He joined the Pilgrims on the Mayflower, and even dressed in mouse-sized Pilgrim garb.

3. He was voiced by Tennessee Ernie Ford, of "Sixteen Tons" fame.

4. He shares his name with his descendant, who narrates the story, and is also voiced by Ford. Also William Bradford, the leader of the Pilgrims.

5. He meets and befriends Thunder, a Native American mouse.

6. This special, like a few others from Rankin/Bass, was cel-animated instead of being filmed in Animagic.

Good job, Pete. You're up again.

Ok, let's try this one...

1) My tale is told by my adult self (in verse).

2) In the story I plan to win a lot of money racing.

3) When our secret is revealed my steed and I take flight and are never seen again.

This time, I haven't a single clue. I step aside so that someone else can answer.

No takers? More clues, then!

4) I got up early to go hunting in the mountains.

5) I finally catch my quarry - after it has caught me.

6) My new steed likes to share my drink.

Still don't have it. This is clearly one that I've never seen.

NB: I've just amended clue 5 - prey was not the right word!

I am sorry, I really don't have this one.

Neither do I. Offhand, this sounds like a horse, but the part about seeking one in the mountains tends to contradict that. I have this nutty notion we're talking about a bird of some kind, similar to Kevin from Pixar's Up, entered as a racing biped / quadruped disguised as another species. Y'know, like putting an ostrich in a ratty horse costume, and entering it in the Kentucky Derby ... and hope that nobody checks closely.

Ah, OUB - so close, and yet at the same time so far away...

Final clues...

7) When I saw its wings protruding from the nest, I thought it must be the biggest condor in all of...

8) But I wasn't prepared for what I saw next.

9) My story is part of a home movie birthday present watched by one of three birds.

I know this now, but I'll only supply the answer if no one else gets it.

The steed sounds like a Pegasus, but I'm having a hard time finding a match.

Ok. Now that it's after midnight, and no one else has guessed, I'll post the answer. It's the Little Gauchito.

It is indeed the Little Gauchito.

1) The narrator is "an old gaucho from Uruguay". The narration is (or was written to be) in rhyme, but this is concealed by the narrator's tendency to break off and add comments of his own, either digressions or attempts to get his on-screen younger self to keep up with the narration. When the gauchito's shadow appears on the clay oven the narrator identifies him: "Oh ho ho - you know who that is? That's me, when I was a little gauchito. Many, many years ago, of course."
2) The little winged donkey can fly very fast, so the gauchito plans to enter it in races:

"I decided to train him for racing
Far out where nobody could see
'Cause I planned to win thousands of pesos
For this little burrito and me.
I made brilliant plans for the future.
We'd live like a couple of kings
And I'd be the world's richest gaucho
With my hands full of big diamond rings."​

3) The gauchito was just about to accept the 1000 peso prize money when the little burro flies up in the air to greet a hornero, dragging the gauchito with him. "Caramba! The jig was up!" The crowd grow angry at being cheated, and the burrito and the gauchito fly off into the sky. "And what became of the flying donkey, you ask? Neither him nor me was ever seen again as long as we lived. Adios, amigo."
4) "And why was I up so early? Because I was going out hunting all alone."
5) Despite the burrito's friendliness, the gauchito has great difficulty catching it - at one point falling off the high mountain ledge. Happily, the burrito flies down and catches him, returning him back to the ledge so that the game can continue.
6) The flying burrito likes to share the gauchito's maté.
7) "I could tell from the wings he was he was a least five meters from tip to tip. The biggest condor bird in all of...Caramba!"
8) "What's this? I couldn't believe my eyes. No, it couldn't be. But there it was. I was looking face to face with a flying donkey."
9) A present for Donald Duck, in the Disney package feature The Three Caballeros.
One of the few Disney characters not to be given a name, as far as I can find. A second short, The Laughing Gauchito, was planned, and animation begun, but Walt decided the repetition of breaking glass was too monotonous and shelved it.

​

Well done, Em - another point and another turn are yours!

Thanks, Pete. Now it's time for another no-brainer:

1. Two days from now, I'll be 55 years old.

2. Although I'm often called by my nickname, I actually have the same first name as a gun-toting raccoon from one of this year's biggest movies.

3. When not having adventures, I introduce my sidekick as a know-it-all, a poetry reader, and a magician whose trick never works.

Rocky the flying squirrel of course!

Yep. You nailed it, Glowworm. Great job, once again.

1. "Rocky And His Friends," AKA "The Rocky And Bullwinkle" show premiered on November 19, 1959.

2. His full name is Rocket J Squirrel. So he does share his name with Rocket Raccoon from "Guardians Of The Galaxy."

3. He introduced the "Mr. Kn0o-It-All" and "Bullwinkle's Corner" segments, and was also interrupted by Bullwinkle's efforts to pull a rabbit out of a hat.-which never worked, as he pulled out a lion, tiger, rhino,, and Rocky.

So you get a long overdue turn, Glowworn.