Friday, August 20, 2021

Ha! Ha! Ha!



Ha! Ha! Ha! is a 1934 Betty Boop cartoon that was taken out of circulation because of its depiction of drug abuse. It sure makes laughing gas look like fun! (via Oddee)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Besides the title of this youtube video, and the 2013 Oddee listicle ("14 Censored Cartoons You’ll Never See on TV") that doesn't list any sources ... do you have any information that this was actually "banned" or otherwise "taken out of circulation?"

Granted, I don't know where exactly any Betty Boop cartoons ARE "in circulation" in 2021 ... but maybe there's a TV station playing them somewhere. Still I don't see any actual references to anyone committing to "banning" it or never playing it again. In fact, if anything, it's more accessible due to the laughing gas - certainly I don't recall ever watching any Betty Boop cartoon in my lifetime, except now I've seen this one.

Anyway, this seems like internet speculation going haywire.

IMDB, the Big Cartoon Database, Wikipedia ... nothing mentions this cartoon being "banned" except that 2013 clickbait listicle.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025213/
https://www.bcdb.com/cartoon/1584-Ha!_Ha!_Ha!.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ha!_Ha!_Ha!_(1934_film)

Miss Cellania said...

I suppose it was a victim of the Hays Code, which took a lot of movies and cartoons out of theaters. https://bettyboop.fandom.com/wiki/Betty_Boop_%26_the_Hays_Code