Porky and Daffy are busy sleeping away when the alarm clock begins to ring at 6:00 a.m. Porky turns away from the clock and they resume sleeping until four hours later when Porky realizes how late they are. They quickly dress and get into their car before zooming to work. Upon arrival, Daffy and Porky run into the building, only to slow down and tip-toe inside the room. They manage to clock in around 11:15, just in time to be caught by the boss despite Daffy changing the time on the device. He starts to speak to them in a calm manner, eventually yelling at them and telling them they will be fired if they ever show up late again!
The following night, Porky and Daffy prepare for bed around 8:00 p.m. Daffy isn't very happy about this but Porky reminds him that they can't show up late again or else they're out of jobs. So after he turns out the light, Porky goes to bed. At first all is calm... until a cat and dog begin to make too much noise as they chase each other around off-screen.
Porky gets up and throws a shoe outside the window, then thinking he hit both animals, he turns away and prepares to get back into bed - only to be hit with the shoe in the process as the cat and the dog (off-screen) team up to throw the shoe back. Porky tries again, this time closing the window so that the first mistake isn't repeated. But Porky didn't count on the shoe flying in through the other window...
Porky decides to try a third time, only this time he uses a book titled "The Falcon." But like with the shoe, another book titled "The Falcon Returns" hits Porky.
Later, the clouds part to reveal the moon and the window shade begins to rise, causing moonlight to shine into the room. Porky gets up and shields his eyes before getting out of bed to close the shade, which seemingly develops a mind of its own. Multiple times it threatens to rise, only to instantly shut when Porky catches it in the act. This tricks Porky into believing it is shut and he returns to bed. However, the shade resumes raising, then shutting as he looks at it. This continues for a couple of minutes until Porky has finally had it and he yanks the shade to hang under his bed. But when the uncooperative shade snaps away, it pulls the bed springs out with it from Porky's bed, causing his bed to fly against the wall and Porky to fall out of the frame. Shortly after, the moon started to annoy Daffy, who then marched up to the window with a rifle and fired at the moon, causing it to drop down and surprise Daffy. Daffy even told his audience... "Unbelievable, isn't it"?
Even later that night, a thunderstorm occurs at 2 am. Porky gets up to shut the window and gets into bed with Daffy, as his bed is still ruined. A puddle on the roof leaks onto the bed and Daffy investigates it. And just for a moment, he thinks Porky wet the bed until rain drips onto his face. He angrily yells and opens an umbrella. Porky warns him its bad luck but Daffy refuses to listen.
Just then lightning strikes the umbrella. Daffy unhappily complains he has enemies and accidentally makes things worse ("I might as well be sleeping under Niagara Falls!") when the small puddle on the ceiling opens and causes a massive wave of water to rain down on the two of them, causing the entire bed to break and fall to the floor.
As a result, Porky and Daffy spend the rest of the night inside shelves of their dresser when the alarm suddenly rings to inform them it is time to get up. At first, upon seeing it, Porky goes back to sleep but seconds later he wakes up Daffy and they quickly rush to get to work again. Unfortunately as they arrive, Daffy and Porky see that their workplace is closed on Sundays and Porky told Daffy that they don't have to work that day. Daffy even said, "Now he tells me" before he beats himself up in his head. So they quickly rush back home to return to bed. As soon as the alarm resumes ringing, Porky blasts it and the episode draws to an end...
Availability[]
VHS - Viddy-Oh! For Kids Cartoon Festivals: Porky Pig and Daffy Duck Cartoon Festival Featuring "Tick Tock Tuckered"
VHS - Cartoon Moviestars: Just Plain Daffy
Laserdisc - The Golden Age of Looney Tunes Vol. 2, Side 10: Variations on a Theme
DVD - Looney Tunes Super Stars' Daffy Duck: Frustrated Fowl
In this short, Daffy Duck is Porky Pig's roommate. In "Porky's Badtime Story", it was Gabby Goat a now retired character who was his roommate.
Color remake of "Porky's Badtime Story"
The boss character in this cartoon was a caricature of Clampett's immediate boss, production manager Ray Katz.
The original titles have said to have the opening music in the credits. However, this is just a recreation and no one knows when the credits now really air as of 1950.
Blue Ribbon uses 1945-55 version of the Merrie Melodies music as there is original audio from the film.
The US dubbed version has no borders around the opening titles and keeps the original BR closing cue, used in "The Wacky Wabbit", while the EU dubbed version has red borders and uses the 1941-55 ending cue. The EU dubbed version sometimes airs on CN USA, although this could be a time-compressed USA print, but not many pre-1948 cartoons air in PAL speed, usually at NTSC.