One of Tugboat Mickey‘s pure joys is seeing Mickey, Donald, and Goofy together in one short — and the madcap trio light up the screen in this cartoon just as they had to highly comedic effect in shorts such as The Whalers (1938) and Clock Cleaners (1937) all the way back to Mickey’s Service Station (1935). In Tugboat, Mickey and the gang are performing routine maintenance on their tugboat until our beloved mouse mistakes an SOS announcement from a radio for an authentic one. Mayhem ensues and Mickey is relegated to a side role as Donald and Goofy whirl into action and try to get the boat out to sea (next time they should try not to bring the dock with them!). The short was directed by Clyde Geronimi, who animated many early Disney shorts until he was promoted to director the year before Tugboat Mickey was released.
