Really like to love a good deal of Popeye cartoons and like the character of Popeye. Love Bluto more and his chemistry with Popeye has always driven their cartoons. Will admit though to preferring the Popeye cartoons from the Dave Fleischer era, the cartoons tend to be funnier and there is more originality and more risk taking in some of them.
1955's 'Cookin with Gags' is a late Popeye cartoon and made in Famous Studios' roughest and most variable period where budgets were much smaller in particularly the animation and deadlines and time constraints were shorter and tighter. There are infinitely better Popeye cartoons (especially during the Fleischer era) and there are signs of what made this period. Not terrible but definitely one of the lesser later Popeye cartoons from personal opinion.
As to be expected, the story is standard and formulaic when there is signs of one (not a lot), with not as much variety as many other Popeye cartoons and it also feels much too cluttered. Complete with an easy foreseeable ending. There are lots of gags and the action never lets up, though a few don't feel cooked all the way through and some of Bluto's behaviour is at times rather cruel.
'Cookin with Gags' worst asset is Olive, one of those infrequent occurrences where she is so unbearably obnoxious that you are at a loss as to what Popeye sees in her. Their chemistry doesn't sparkle that much here either, and the little material Olive has is not funny at all (grating actually) and is very repetitive. Mae Questel is also too shrill.
However, the animation quality is not too bad for this period. The colours are fine and there is smoothness and nice detail, and there isn't much that's sparse, static or rough
What is especially fantastic about 'Cookin with Gags' is the music score, the best thing for me. It's beautifully orchestrated, rhythmically it's full of energy and there is so much character and atmosphere, it's also brilliant at adding to the action and enhancing it. There are some amusing and well engineered gags, the interplay between the characters is lively and witty if in need of more variety and the pace is never dull.
Of the three characters, Popeye is the most likeable and most rootable, but Bluto is the funniest and most interesting. Jack Mercer and Jackson Beck give great vocal characterisations, Beck in particular and Mercer is the voice actor that spring to mind generally for me for Popeye's voice.
In summary, didn't really work for me. 5/10 Bethany Cox