Tweekums This 'Tom and Jerry' short starts off gently with Jerry skating on the slippery surface of the alley; things don't remain gentle for long though as Tom appears and the two of them end up fighting it out as usual. Being in a bowling alley means plenty of violence involving heavy bowling balls and pins as well as the various mechanisms used to reset the pins and return the balls. Who has the upper hand switches between them although for the most part it is poor Tom taking the battering... frequently due to his own actions or stupidity... would any sane person try to catch a flying bowling ball!?This is a fairly standard 'Tom and Jerry' short although it benefits from the novelty of the location; if you are a fan of the duo I'm sure you'll have plenty of laughs here and if you aren't then odds are you won't. The animation is top notch with the balls given just the right amount of shine to make them look real and thus heavy; clearly the animators weren't rushing and making this on the cheap. The action is inventive as are the accompanying sounds; we hear a speeding steam train as a 'train' of bowling balls bears down on Jerry. Overall it is a fun cartoon than can be enjoyed by viewers of all ages.

ccthemovieman-1 For at least one reason, this was better than the rest of these 1942 Tom and Jerry cartoons: they got out of their house. With new surroundings - in this case, a bowling alley, - it allowed for different and better gags than the normal house scenes.This starts off slowly, however, and I wondered if it was every going to produce some laughs, but it did, especially with Tom caught in the automatic pinsetter and then the caravan of bowling bowls was pictured as a train. Decent, overall, with the really clever stuff to come in a couple of years. This would have been much better, let's say, in 1945, with crazier stunts. Nonetheless, this cartoons starts to set the stage for the really funny (and violent) material that also was to come.

Shawn Watson This is one of the first Tom and Jerry shorts that doesn't take place inside a generic 1940s house but inside, as the title would suggest, a bowling alley. This new environment allows for fresher gags and more imagination. There are some inventive sequences and it doesn't resort to the ancient clichés of Jerry plugging Tom's tail into a power socket or putting his tail in a mousetrap.There are no humans to be seen at all and it appears that Tom and Jerry at alone in the bowling alley. Which is good. I find that extra characters such as stray cats and unseen humans (including the staggeringly un-offensive Mammy-Two-Shoes) to be a distraction. New locations, new torture devices and no diversions would make Tom and Jerry funny every single time. Too bad they mostly never really turned out that way.

JonathanDP81 This is one of the early Tom & Jerry cartoons and also one of the best. The animation is superb and extremely well done. The antics of both Tom and Jerry as they try to outwit each other are classic. The parts of Tom trying to bowl with a ball that's much too heavy for him are some of the most fluid and natural looking animation of the entire time period. This and another two other sports shorts they made (Tennis Chumps, 1949, and Cue Ball Cat, 1950) have to be on list of top Tom & Jerry cartoons ever. Definitely one of my all-time favorites.