Magician Mickey is a 1937 Mickey Mouse cartoon, directed by David Hand.
Mickey puts on a magic act, but when Donald Duck heckles the performance, he becomes a less-than-willing recipient of Mickey's magic tricks.
Magician Mickey provides examples of:
- Alliterative Title: Magician Mickey
- Ash Face: What happens to Donald after burning down the building with Mickey's fireworks gun.
- Boxing Kangaroo: Mickey's magic hoop briefly turns Donald into a kangaroo wearing boxing gloves.
- Chekhov's Gun: A literal example: Mickey's prop gun, which he uses to fire a shrunken Donald into an egg, is later used by Donald against Mickey in the climax.
- Covers Always Lie: Despite being featured on the poster, Mickey never summons a turtle to bite Donald in the short.
- Fatal Fireworks: Downplayed: the prop gun that Donald uses against Mickey can apparently release fireworks, which result in Donald literally bringing the house down on himself, Mickey and Goofy. Luckily, no one is killed in the ensuing inferno caused by the fireworks, although Donald in particular does wind up much the worse for wear.
- Flare Gun: Mickey's prop gun, which can shoot fireworks, apparently.
- Forced Transformation: Mickey's magic hoop briefly turns Donald into a different animal every time he goes through it, including a kangaroo, a walrus and a monkey.
- The Heckler: Donald.
- Karmic Trickster: A rare time where Mickey plays the role. He's visibly annoyed by Donald's heckling from the get-go, but otherwise does his best to ignore him and continue on with the show. It's only after the duck starts interfering with his tricks and actively ruining them does Mickey start to retaliate. Unfortunately, Donald can dish it out, but can't take it, with horrific consequences.
- Magicians Are Wizards: As Mickey demonstrates to Donald, with his tricks becoming more elaborate and implausible as the cartoon goes on. Most of these tricks are directed at Donald in practically Looney Tunes fashion.
- Pyrrhic Victory: Donald succeeds in destroying Mickey's magic show, but gets himself burnt up in the process and the whole building destroyed.
- Red Boxing Gloves: Mickey conjures up a cactus wearing boxing gloves to fight Donald.
- Running Gag: Thanks to Mickey, Donald accidentally spews cards from his mouth whenever he gets angry.
- Stage Magician: Mickey.
- Suddenly Speaking: Although Mickey remains silent throughout most of the cartoon, he does speak in the climax to warn Donald that the gun he threatens Mickey with is loaded.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Donald may be at his worst here. He repeatedly ruins several of Mickey's magic tricks just because he can, and in the end almost gets everyone killed by firing a gun that shoots fireworks.
- Villainous Breakdown: Donald continuously heckles Mickey's performance, but gets more and more visibly angry throughout the short as Mickey continues to turn the tables on him. By the time he gets transformed into various animals, though, he snaps to the point that he steals Mickey's prop gun and, ignoring the latter's warnings about how dangerous it use, uses it to literally bring the house down on everyone (i.e., destroy the set (and probably the entire building)).
