The Butter Battle Book (Cartoon)

The Butter Battle Book is a 1989 animated TV special by animator and filmmaker Ralph Bakshi, narrated by Charles Durning and produced by TNT. It is based on the eponymous book by Dr. Seuss, who called the short the most faithful adaptation of his work.

The special followed the book closely, notably in its preservation of its original cliffhanger ending, with the title card "The end... maybe" at the conclusion of the story. Seuss himself called the short the most faithful adaptation of his work.

Story

This is an adaptation of the published The Butter Battle Book, which Dr. Seuss tells a story about two societies that share a border by land. It is told through the perspective and opinions of The Yooks, primarily Grandfather, a soldier on patrol of a Brick & Stone Wall that divides them. Also what seems to divide them is the belief that the other society butters their bread differently, not unlike the belief that two warring factions in the first part of Gulliver's Travels about exactly where are you supposed to crack an egg.

The Yooks are depicted in Blue, while the Zooks, who are not presented out side of the perspective of The Yooks, are depicted in Orange. This includes their uniforms as well as most of their weapons.

It begins in the present day, ten hours before The Autumnal Equinox, (known as the beginning of Fall for rhyming purposes) where the two opposing guards are on patrol for the final time. The Grandson is there too and is told by his Grandfather of his long tenure patrolling the wall, which was at one time not even knee height. Grandfather begins the story by ensuring that Grandson remembers the anthems taught in school about how to butter bread and much more importantly, to mention that the enemy society does not butter their bread in the same. Grandfather seals the deal by telling Grandson that an enemy Zook "has kinks in his soul".

Grandfather's deployment to the border zone is initially successful as he has in his possession a Switch Weapon made from rare and valuable Snickberries that does not seem to be available on the other side. However, since the wall is new and short, a rival guard slingshots it in half at the stem. Three Zooks, two males, and a female, laugh at the victory.

Grandfather walks away slowly and in shame, with other citizens supporting him. Chief Yookeroo tells him to stop using Snickberries and instead the defense contractor builds a powerful weapon. The agile engineers take notes and discuss with each other in a language that Grandfather does not understand, most likely it is advanced math. They decorate his uniform, and give him the weapon: A Triple Sling Jigger armed with potatoes. He immediately pushes it towards the zone with every body on the way cheering. The Butter Up Marching Band And Flag Team joins him shortly.

The next scene (of which Grandfather backtracked a few steps) has him approaching Van Itch. He is trembling at the very tall slingshot. Van Itch withdraws while Grandfather continues his patrol.

The next day, Van Itch returns with an extensively decorated uniform and introduces an electromagnetic Jigger Rock Snatch Em weapon that can grab and repel the projectiles back towards The Yooks. The slingshot concept is now useless. The factions also have to upgrade their wall.

Chief and The Defense Contractors advise him about a new weapon, a Kickapoo Kid. Grandfather takes it to work, with more decorations in his uniform also. a Spaniel dog named Daniel carries it on his back.

However, Van Itch him self is riding on top of an Eight Nozzled Elephant Toted Boom Blitz. Van Itch has since been promoted. Daniel decides to quickly dig a hole and bury their embarrassingly small weapon. The wall is yet again deemed to be too short.

Despite all of that humilation, The Right Side Up Song Girls gently sing an encouraging song. The Chief promotes Grandfather to be a General. They have also finished their artillery vehicle, an Utterly Sputter. It is a semi automatic weapon capable of learning and adapting, armed with poison meant for The Zooks to get Allergies. The Utterly Sputter contains in its stern four fuel tanks designed to dust crops. Each tank has two spouts, with the exhaust at the very end. Grandfather test drives it, and immediately proceeds towards the zone with crowds of Yooks following.

Also, around this time Grandfather stopped narrating.

The Zooks have also finished their Utterly Sputter. Since they are evenly matched, nobody releases any gas. Grandfather lowers his Utterly Sputter and ejects from it.

This time, The Right Side Up Song Girls betray Grandfather. They inform him that The Chief Yookeroo is urgently needing Grandfather's attention. Grandfather finds the headquarters seemingly very extremely empty. They were busy working on the next project while Grandfather was away. A single finger wave signals Grandfather to let him self in. The room is dark, sufficiently lit to be able to find the stairs. During this scene is when it gets to be not only like another shocking Ralph Bakshi production but also a typical psycadelic scene from a Doctor Seuss cartoon. He enters a corridor that goes to the largest science lab seen yet. An engineer approaches him in a pod while they compute the instructions to the machines. Eventually, a single prototype Little Bitsy Big Boy Boomaroo is given to Grandfather, while his team evacuates. The Red Pill is handled with a pillow, and can be handled with bare hands if necessary, so long as it is not dropped, and prolonged exposure might kill the two Guards no matter what happens.

On the way to the zone, the buildings have their openings boarded up. The Zooks have also evacuated, with the wall 100 meters in height. Grandson is filling in for Grandfather, who has no time to look after Grandson. They decide to climb the wall together. Van Itch also climbed the wall. Both guards are in plain uniforms, and both of them have a Little Bitsy Big Boy Boomeroo of their own, with subtle differences. Grandson intervenes by asking who is going to go drop the weapon first. It buys every body a small amount of time to examine the situation. The story halts with the two guards pointing their Red Pills towards each other, trembling immensely, knowing that nobody is going to win, as even one of the Red Pills can easily obliterate an entire continent, whether a wall is there or not.

The next shot is of the iconic The End (Maybe) sign which is taken verbatim from the published book text.

Cast

• Charles Durning - Grandfather
• Christopher Collins - Chief Yookeroo, Various Yooks
• Miriam Flynn - Yookie-Ann Sue, Teacher, Various Yooks
• Clive Revill - Van Itch
• Joseph Cousins - Grandson

Songs

• Zooks Spreading Ritual
• Gramp's Patrol Song
• On the Other Side of the Wall
• Battle Song
• Big Boy Boomeroo

Trivia

• Since the only time we actually see a Zook outside of Grandfather's narration, that being just Van Itch, it is very possible that The Zooks do not actually butter their bread any differently.
• After The Right Side Up Song Girls find Grandfather and cheer him up, Grandfather stopped narrating. He is no longer telling a story to Grandson, and seems to be much closer to the present day. The final time we hear Grandfather talk as such, as when he thinks to him self as he sees Van Itch approaching with the other Utterly Sputter.
• Grandfather finds Grandson a second time.
• Thus, the arms race has sped up so rapidly that both sides began work on the doomsday weapons before they even released The Utterly Sputters.
• They literally went from the stand off between The Utterly Sputters to evacuating to Fallout Shelters within hours.
• An advantage that The Yooks have is they have Snickberries on their side of the wall.
• An advantage that The Zooks have is unique Cherries. This includes High Explosive Sour Cherry Stone Pits, which ordinarily make the perfect weapon.
• Nobody actually is harmed in this story.
• Because nobody actually fires a shot. Not even one. Both sides are prepared thus both sides withdraw every time.

Production

• This is the first Dr. Seuss TV special ever since The Cat In The Hat, The Lorax and Dr. Seuss on the Loose to be based on a Dr. Seuss book.
  • In addition, it also returned to using a production design that is more accurate to the style of the books akin to said specials, only the animation in this special is much more faster-paced.
• This is the first Dr. Seuss TV special to be aired on TNT.
• This is the only Dr. Seuss TV special to be directed and produced by Ralph Bakshi.
• This was the last Dr. Seuss TV special to be produced and released in Dr. Seuss's lifetime before his death in 1991, two years after this special aired.
• This is the first Dr. Seuss TV special since Horton Hears a Who! not to have a Sing-Along release.
• Geisel considered this animated special the most faithful to his book, especially since it kept the original lack of an ending. He wanted to do more animated specials with Ralph Bashki, but he died before he could.

Goofs

• Van Itch's first appearance has the sky as white, instead of blue as it is in shots before and after it.
• The sky reverts to white again when the three Zooks start laughing.
• The grass is not supposed to be white either, yet half of it is also during the same shot of the three laughing Zooks.
• The scenes surrounding a commercial break do not match up with each other.
• When the Triple Sling Jigger is knocked down and falls in the mud, the surrounding ground is white.
• The path leading up to The Chief's base is white instead of grey.
• More white ground appears when Daniel is introduced,
• As well as the song that follows,
• And again after Daniel buries the weapon.
• White ground also appears when The Utterly Sputter goes outside.
• Numerous shots of The Utterly Sputter is missing a fuel tank.
• When Grandfather is inside The Utterly Sputter, his eyebrows are jet black.
• When Utterly Sputters move, they emit a "Boing! - Crash!" sound effect. However, these sounds cut in and out during the shot of Grandfather approaching the wall. The sounds no longer match the movement of the Utterly Sputter.
• Van Itch's Utterly Sputter also has the same missing fuel tank problem.
• The Face Off between the two guards in their Utterly Sputters has a white sky yet again.
• The scene involving the construction of The Little Bitsy Big Boy Boomaroo contains no errors.
• However, the scene following it where they evacuate, is awkwardly drawn. They form single file and many are static scribbled silouhettes.
• Of course they continued to not paint the backgrounds during this scene also.
• The scene where Grandfather and Grandson meet has a white ground.

Gallery

Video

The Butter Battle Book (1989) (Full Episode) -High Quality-