Robert McKimson's 'Kiddin' the Kitten' suffers from a lack of appealing characters. Add to this problems with plot and pacing and 'Kiddin' the Kitten' is a weak effort that was never destined to be remembered. Dodsworth the cat (imagine an overweight, slovenly Sylvester and you're in vaguely the right area) cannot be bothered to fulfill his position as mouse catcher so he sets up a fake mouse-catching academy and gets a cross-eyed kitten to do the job for him. From the off it's clear that 'Kiddin' the Kitten' doesn't have much going for it. Dodsworth is a very slow-moving, dialogue based character but he hasn't been furnished with any particularly striking lines. The set-up seems to drag and when the cartoon's main plot finally kicks in it is disappointing to say the least. The other main character, the anaemic, zombie-like kitten, is badly designed and has very little personality to speak of. The mice are all generic and uninteresting. 'Kiddin' the Kitten', then, lacks both the frenzied zip of the Warner Bros. wildest cartoons and the biting wit of their more dialogue based efforts. It seems like a completely failed attempt by McKimson to convert his brilliant Foghorn Leghorn series into a feline context. The fact that 'Kiddin' the Kitten' is so little remembered or celebrated is testament to how unsuccessful this venture proved to be.
Review of Kiddin' the Kitten
