- Date: April 23, 1948
- Type: Movie
There's Good Boos To-Night is a 1948 animated short directed by Izzy Sparber and narrated by Frank Gallop, featuring Casper the Friendly Ghost. The title is a play on "There's good news tonight", the sign-on catchphrase of radio commentator Gabriel Heatter. The cartoon opens with Casper sitting beside his grave which is decorated with the Bible segment 'love thy neighbor', reading a book on animal friends. Around midnight, while the ghosts at the cemetery, where Casper is buried, are getting ready to go off and "boo" people, Casper is trying to make friends with animals instead of humans. The ghosts leave the cemetery, as does Casper, who wanders off looking for friends in a couple animals. However, when Casper tries to make friends with a baby calf, it runs away, calling for its "mama"; when the mother goes up to Casper, she runs away from the farm and jumped over the moon. Later, Casper comes across a skunk and asks it to be friends, but it runs away in terror and quickly sprays him. After bathing himself, Casper sits on a log and ultimately cries because none of the animals want to be his friend. While Casper is sitting on the log, he catches the attention of a small fox cub who feels sorry for him. Casper and the fox quickly bond and he names the cub "Ferdie" and considers him to be his best friend. However, Casper and Ferdie's relationship is put in tremendous jeopardy, while they are playing a game of Hide and Seek. While Ferdie is hiding, a hunter and two of his hunting dogs come and try to kill Ferdie. They pursue him until he is exhausted and out of breath. While the hunter is firing gunshots towards Ferdie, Casper flies in the hunter's direction, and demands that he leaves Ferdie alone. When the dogs and hunter see Casper, they flee in terror. Casper looks for Ferdie to tell him that everything is fine, but finds that he's too late because the bullets went through him and hit Ferdie. Casper starts mourning because he lost "the only friend he ever had in his whole life." Casper returns to the cemetery where he buries Ferdie next to his own gravestone. Casper begins mourning but is soon overjoyed to find that Ferdie has returned as a ghost himself. Reunited, Casper and Ferdie live "happily ever after." --- ---