The Captain and the Kids

The Captain and the Kids is a series of animated shorts based off the renowned comic strip of the same name. The first short, Cleaning House, was released on February 19th, 1938. All of the shorts, save for The Captain's Christmas and Petunia National Park, were produced in black-and-white and released in sepiatone.

Fred Quimby offered Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies director Friz Freleng "almost double" the pay he was receiving at Leon Schlesinger's studio. Freleng took the offer and was assigned to helm the Captain and the Kids series, which he "balked at" the idea of working on. Freleng later recounted to Mark Mayerson that "MGM was dedicated to making good cartoons, and they thought that this was being printed in so many papers would make it a popular cartoon. I was forced to prove them wrong."

Ultimately, the series was unsuccessful.

Shorts

1938

• Cleaning House
• Blue Monday
• Poultry Pirates
• The Captain's Pup
• A Day at the Beach
• What a Lion
• The Pygmy Hunt
• Old Smokey
• Buried Treasure
• The Winning Ticket
• Hounduras Hurricane
• The Captain's Christmas (December 17) (Technicolor)

1939

• Petunia National Park (January 14) (Technicolor)
• Seal Skinners
• Mama's New Hat (February 11)