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Short opens in the office of
J.O. Dunkfeather, special investigator. Eyeing a
skull, the sleuth tells a reporter, "Just as I suspected,
she had dandruff, which proves it was suicide."
Dunkfeather recounts a case involving three stooges, "jap"
spies, and the invention of a "death ray machine that will
destroy millions."
The Stooges, not having much
luck selling the Miracle Reducing Machine, go door-to-door
until they get to the home of Graves, the inventor.
They're hired as caretakers getting $100 a month room and
board. "I want you to look out for spies—especially
jap spies," says Graves. "You're not a jap, are you?"
he asks Curley, who's indignant. Sure enough, the
spies show up, dressed as goblins.
When The Stooges lampooned the
Nazis, their targets were always veiled, but in this short
and several others that go after, the Japanese—with whom the
United States was also at war when the short was filmed—the
attack is squarely ethnic and racist, with the Japanese
always depicted as long-toothed morons. Today, these
shorts are a bit uncomfortable to watch.
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