a cartoonist and a living, sentient cartoon character (Beans). In this way it resembles (and foreshadows) Duck Amuck (1953) and Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988). Terry Lindvall and Matthew Melton have included this film in an analysis of reflexive cartoons, those whose narrative reveals something about the art of animation and filmmaking. The writers find that Jack King's A Cartoonist's Nightmare clearly draws a portrait of what animators feel about their craft. The opening scenes are telling. The scenes of the staff leaving the animation resemble crazy people leaving an asylum. The wife of the cartoonist attempts to pull him away from his work and fails. He is obsessively devoted to his work and claims that he has to "finish tonight". He eventually falls asleep at his own drawing board. The cartoonist is pulled into the cartoon by a wicked character of his own creation. Lindvall and Melton find this scene to resemble a segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), "It's a Good Life" directed by Joe Dante. In this segment a live-action character is incarcerated in a cartoon television program. As the villain (described as a "hairy monster" by the writers), drags the captive cartoonist through the corridors of the studio, various sections are seen. Among them a gag department, a story department, a music department. The cartoon villains occupy a dungeon-like section of their own. Regarding the depiction of the other villains, each has been assigned a number of their own. For example, "Battling Barney" is #20 and "Dirty Dan" is #130. These characters have apparently been created by the cartoonist, products of his imagination. And they have reasons to resent him. They sing to him: "It's our turn. Now you are in our clutches! We are creations from your pen, it's in your hands we lie; you always manage to have us sin, now by your own hand you die." The characters blame their creator for causing them to commit sins. They seem to argue that they are not inherently bad people, they have been drawn that way. A sentiment echoed in another film by Jessica Rabbit. Home media The short was released on the 'Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 6''. References Sources External links A Cartoonist's Nightmare on the Internet Archive 1935 films 1935 animated films 1930s American animated films 1930s animated short films American black-and-white films Films about nightmares Films scored by Bernard B.