text: I'm not a big fan of the Stooges' slapstick, but I find their history interesting. I've recently tried to check out stuff from each Stooge era, but the opportunity to see Joe shorts doesn't seem to come easy; this is the only one I've seen so far.<br /><br />Some say the quality problems with Joe-era shorts are really not Joe's fault, and I suspect that's the case. Joe as a performer is far from the worst thing about this. The thing that bothers me the most about it has been pointed out in another comment: the pitting of the other guys against the third violates the whole comedy-team/Stooges ethos. Perhaps Joe's style was perceived, by those in charge, as not really fitting in -- though there were no real off-camera conflicts between him & the others -- and this was their way of working around that.<br /><br />And what's with the titles of this and some of the other late Stooges shorts? Definitely a lack of creativity going on there; was that sort of thing the cause or the effect of the shorts market drying up?