Rating: **½
AD: 4/9/89 TDC
9/19/89 synd.
D: John Kimball, Bob Zamboni
SEd: Bryce Malek
W: Dev Ross, Tad Stones, "The Fat Cat Stomp" by Silversher and Silversher
RSC: Fat Cat, Mepps, Mole, Snout, Wart
Voices:
Peter Cullen - Monterey Jack
Jim Cummings - radio voice
Tress MacNeille - Mrs. Squirrel
Noelle North -- Tammy & Bink Squirrel
Notes:
Disney fan Joe Torcivia: "Fat Cat isn't the only one who let The Maltese Mouse slip through his fingers."
Wonder what Koonce and Wiemers would have done with this idea? Would certainly have done a better job of parodying - cf. Fat Cat as cat clone of "The Fat Man" Sydney Greenstreet and Wart as Lorre-type sidekick - but Maltese business is only a sidelight to "babysitting"/"Tammy crush" plot. Ep begins with FC already having stolen the Maltese Mouse so "pursuit"/"chase" aspect falls a bit flat.
Some great moments scattered about: C&D in drag, "Fat Cat Stomp" (puzzlingly cut in twain by Gadget and Tammy's "heart to heart talk").
Intentional or not: irony in that pigtailed Tammy voiced by Noelle North, voice of pigtailed Princess Calla on "Gummis". Elaborate in joke?
Tammy sort of similar in personality to Calla - young, impulsive, eager to prove herself - though here she's trying to impress Chip and show up Gadget rather than prove her mettle in general like Calla.
[Having seen "The Maltese Falcon", I think that the use of the Maltese Mouse here was merely as a prop. Nothing in the plotline or any of the scenes even vaguely reference the Noir film (or even the book). Fat Cat and the Fat Man was a ironic happenstance similarity, it seems. - MP]
If you'd like to read a transcript of this episode, it's availible on Julie Bihn's The Super Gigantic Rescue Rangers Episode Guide.