History WesternAnimation / TheThreeLittlePigs

* AnAesop: Hard work and preparation can help prevent a disaster.

* AdaptationalModesty: The theme park costumes of Fifer and Fiddler Pig are BarefootCartoonAnimals like Practical Pig instead of HalfDressedCartoonAnimals.

''The Three Little Pigs'' is a landmark [[AnimatedFilms animated short film]] released on [[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfAnimation May 27, 1933]]. It was produced by Creator/WaltDisney (though distributed through Creator/UnitedArtists). Based on the [[Literature/TheThreeLittlePigs fairy tale of the same name]], ''Three Little Pigs'' won the 1934 UsefulNotes/AcademyAward for Best Short Subject: Cartoons. In addition to critical acclaim, the cartoon was a smash hit, so much that it was still running in theaters months after its debut, and became Disney's biggest financial success. To this day, it remains the single-most successful animated short ever made.

A few follow up shorts were made in the following years, but none of them ever matched the original in popularity. The characters also made appearances in other Disney media, including many comic books, which gave the Big Bad Wolf the name "Zeke" and also starred his WhiteSheep son, Li'l Bad Wolf, who was friends with the three pigs and would often stop his father's schemes from trying to eat them.

Has no relation to the 1995 feature length animated musical adaptation, ''WesternAnimation/The3LittlePigsTheMovie''.

* AndThenWhat: A comic story in which the Wolf finally catches the pigs sends him through this.

* BagOfKidnapping: The Wolf captures Fiddler and Fifer Pig with this method in "The Practical Pig" after first luring them over with his mermaid disguise then scooping them up in a net, he later tries to do the same to Practical Pig but he sees through his disguise and turns the tables on him with his trapdoor and puts him through his lie detector machine.

** Weirdly, current European releases, plus one Japanese [=LaserDisc=] release, restore the footage of the original Jewish peddler disguise, but continue to use the redubbed audio, [[HongKongDub resulting in a clear lack of lip sync]].

* CryingWolf: Part of the plot of ''Three Little Wolves''. Fifer and Fiddler discover their brother's wolf alarm (a horn), and start blowing it, ignoring his warnings that overusing it may cause him to ignore an ''actual'' alarm which he does when they're captured by the wolf. The only reason practical goes to rescue them at the end is that they trick the wolf into blowing the alarm with his powerful breath.
-->'''Practical:''' Someday the wolf will get ya, then you'll be in a fix. You blow that horn and I won't come. I'll think it's one of your tricks.

* {{Disneyfication}}: In Disney's version, the first two pigs manage to escape the Wolf after he destroys their houses and seek refuge in Practical's house. Several other retellings of the story, such as the Creator/RichardScarry version, also went with this.
* DivergentCharacterEvolution: The Li'l Wolves went through this. ''Three Little Wolves'' introduced [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin the Big Bad Wolf's three sons]], all of whom were just as determined to eat pork as their father. This short and its follow up, ''The Practical Pig'', were changed in later adaptations to two Bad Li'l Wolves and one Good Li'l Wolf, who feels sorry for Fifer and Fiddler and [[HeelFaceTurn helps them escape]]. This Good Li'l Wolf eventually evolved into Li'l (Bad) Wolf, Zeke's ''only'' son and the Pigs' best friend.

* EmbarrassingOldPhoto: In a 1946 comic story, the Big Bad Wolf is trying to show his son in a photo album how being bad has run in his family for a long time. But then they come across a picture of when he himself was young, dressed in a stereotypical "good boy" sailor suit with a flower and a pullstring pig toy, with "Our Little Zeke" written on it. Naturally, Li'l Bad Wolf has a good laugh about this.

* FearSong: Defied with "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?" The song starts out with Fifer Pig and Fiddler Pig joyfully singing about how they play around all day because they have no fear of the Big Bad Wolf. They mock Practical Pig for building a strong house to protect himself from the Wolf. Practical Pig sings about how he doesn't care what the other pigs think, because he knows he's right to take precautions against the Wolf. Fifer and Fiddler Pig sing the song whenever they think there is no danger, only to immediately cower and panic at the slightest hint of danger. The song carries the cartoon's overall message: When a bad situation is coming, it's best to work hard and take the proper precautions so that there's no reason to be afraid when disaster strikes.

* LikeFatherLikeSon: Both the Big bad wolf and the Three Little Wolves are evil scheming wolves interested in eating the pigs.
* LikeFatherUnlikeSon: Unlike his father, Li'l Bad Wolf is kind-hearted, doesn't seem interested in eating the pigs, is on good terms with them and antagonizes his dad when he tries to eat them.

* PaintingTheMedium: In the ''Sing Along Songs'' video series, this happens during Fifer and Fiddler Pig's song of "Who's afraid of the Big Bad Wolf". During the moment when the Big Bad Wolf finally appears before them, the ''lyrics'' start wobbling and developing FlopSweat at the same time as the pigs OhCrap moment.
* PapaWolf: A literal example, as the Big Bad Wolf becomes father of three cubs, as seen in ''Three Little Wolves'' and ''The Practical Pig'', the cubs having just as big a taste for pig as their pop.
* PaperThinDisguise: One of the Big Bad Wolf's favorite methods. Fifer and Fiddler Pig usually fall for this, but unusually not in the first short where he tried disguising as a lamb while wearing a sheepskin.

* SizableSemiticNose: The 1933 version of the cartoon had the wolf disguise as a [[GreedyJew caricatural Jewish peddler]] selling brushes, including a mask with a big nose. It was replaced by a PaperThinDisguise without a trace of antisemitic caricature in 1948.

* WartimeCartoon: In 1941, the National Film Board of Canada requested several cartoons to promote Canadian war bond sales, specifically the War Savings Certificate program, rather than the War Loans or Victory Loans. Disney responded by editing ''The Three Little Pigs'', now titled ''The Thrifty Pig'', turning Big Bad Wolf into a Nazi and the bricks Practical uses are now made of War Savings Certificates. The closing lines of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" is also changed to reflect the war and include the "Five for four" jingle advertising the bond yield.

* GratuitousGerman: The Wolf's song "Little Pigs Is Good to Eat" from ''Three Little Wolves'' contains many lines in German. Also doubles as RuleOfSymbolism in that the wolf in that short was meant to be a parallel to Hitler in various ways.

* WartimeCartoon: In 1941, the National Film Board of Canada requested several cartoons to promote Canadian war bond sales, specifically the War Savings Certificate program, rather than the War Loans or Victory Loans. Disney responded by editing ''The Three Little Pigs'', now titled ''The Three Wise Pigs'', turning Big Bad Wolf into a Nazi and the bricks Practical uses are now made of War Savings Certificates. The closing lines of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" is also changed to reflect the war and include the "Five for four" jingle advertising the bond yield.

* BlackComedy: There are two pictures on Practical's wall labeled "Mother" and "Father". "Mother" shows a picture of a sow with a bunch of piglets. "Father" shows a string of sausage.

''The Three Little Pigs'' is a landmark [[AnimatedFilms animated short film]] released on [[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfAnimation May 27, 1933]]. It was produced by Creator/WaltDisney (though distributed through Creator/UnitedArtists). Based on the [[Literature/TheThreeLittlePigs fairy tale of the same name]], ''Three Little Pigs'' won the 1934 [[UsefulNotes/AcademyAward Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons]]. In addition to critical acclaim, the cartoon was a smash hit, so much that it was still running in theaters months after its debut, and became Disney's biggest financial success. To this day, it remains the single-most successful animated short ever made.

* {{Bowdlerise}}:
** In the original cut of the original short, the wolf attempts to gain access to Practical Pig's house by disguising himself as a Jewish "Fuller Brush Man," including a mask sporting a long, hooked nose, a large beard, and small spectacles that invoked popular anti-Semitic caricatures of the era. After UsefulNotes/WorldWarII and the publicizing of UsefulNotes/TheHolocaust, the shots of his Jewish peddler disguise were reanimated to depict him without the mask, albeit still with the original version's audio (thus he still speaks with the [[FunetikAksent Yiddish accent]]).
** Some TV airings of the short, and all current American releases, further excise this, by not only omitting his Jew-mask, but also dubbing the audio, so that he no longer has the aforementioned accent.
** Weirdly, current European releases, plus one Japanese [=LaserDisc=] release, restore the original Jewish peddler footage, but continue to use the redubbed audio, [[HongKongDub resulting in a clear lack of lip sync]].

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

* BravadoSong: Before facing the BigBadWolf head-on and losing their confidence, the first two little pigs sing a song called "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?", about how they don't fear him.

* BadassBaritone: Billy Bletcher, who was 5'2" but had a very commanding voice, who voices the Big Bad Wolf in the original cartoon, would later go on to voice WesternAnimation/{{Pete}} in Disney cartoons of the 1930s, '40s, and 50s.

* PaintingTheMedium: In the ''Sing Along Songs'' video series, this happens during Fifer and Fiddler Pig's song of "Who's afraid of the Big Bad Wolf". During the moment when the Big Bad Wolf finally appears for them, the ''lyrics'' start wobbling and developing FlopSweat at the same time as the pigs OhCrap moment.

* BravadoSong: Before facing the BigBadWolf head-on and losing their confidence, the first two little pigs sing a song called "Who's Afraid of the Big, Bad Wolf?", about how they don't fear him.

* {{Flanderization}}: The pigs went through this in the sequels. The AllWorkVsAllPlay dynamic gets taken UpToEleven, with Fifer and Fiddler becoming totally incapable of taking ''anything'' seriously, displaying AesopAmnesia several times in the same single cartoon, and completely losing whatever intelligence and competence they had (see TookALevelInDumbass below). Practical, meanwhile, became not only a GadgeteerGenius but also a self-righteous workaholic who couldn't string two sentences together without admonishing the other two or giving an IWarnedYou speech. This was, however, reversed in the comics, where the pigs would work together and get along more often than not -- Practical's GadgeteerGenius trait remained, and he was still usually the most level-headed of the pigs who was least likely to fall for Zeke Wolf's schemes, but his self-righteousness was dropped, and he became more willing to take a break and relax once in a while. Fifer and Fiddler were still mainly the goof-offs but were actually willing to listen to reason and would occasionally display some HiddenDepths.

* AllWorkVsAllPlay: Practical is All Work, Fiddler and Fifer are All Play.

-->'''Practical:''' Some day the wolf will get ya, then you'll be in a fix. You blow that horn and I won't come. I'll think it's one of your tricks.

* {{Flanderization}}: The pigs went through this in the sequels. The AllWorkVsAllPlay dynamic gets taken UpToEleven, with Fifer and Fiddler becoming totally incapable of taking ''anything'' seriously, displaying AesopAmnesia several times in the same single cartoon, and completely losing whatever intelligence and competence they had (see TookALevelInDumbass below). Practical, meanwhile, became not only a GadgeteerGenius but also a self-righteous workaholic who couldn't string two sentences together without admonishing the other two or giving an IWarnedYou speech. This was, however, reversed in the comics, where the pigs would work together and get along more often than not -- Practical's GadgeteerGenius trait remained, and he was still usually the most level-headed of the pigs who was least likely to fall for Zeke Wolf's schemes, but his self-righteousness was dropped and he became more willing to take a break and relax once in a while. Fifer and Fiddler were still mainly the goof-offs but were actually willing to listen to reason and would occasionally display some HiddenDepths.

A few follow up shorts were made in the following years, but none of them ever matched the original in popularity. The characters also made appearances in other Disney media, including many comic books.

* {{Flanderization}}: The pigs went through this in the sequels. The AllWorkVsAllPlay dynamic gets taken UpToEleven, with Fifer and Fiddler becoming totally incapable of taking ''anything'' seriously, displaying AesopAmnesia several times in the same single cartoon, and completely losing whatever intelligence and competence they had (see TookALevelInDumbass below). Practical, meanwhile, became not only a GadgeteerGenius but also a self-righteous workaholic who couldn't string two sentences together without admonishing the other two or giving an IWarnedYou speech. This was, however, reversed in the comics, where the pigs would work together and get along more often than not -- Practical's GadgeteerGenius trait remained, and he was still usually the most level-headed of the pigs who was least likely to fall for Zeke Wolf's schemes, but his self-righteousness was dropped and he became more willing to take a break and relax once in a while. Fifer and Fiddler were still mainly the goof-offs but were actually willing to listen to reason and would occasionally display some HiddenDephts.

* LikeFatherLikeSon: Both the Big bad wolf and the Three Little Wolves are evil scheming wolves interested in eating the pigs.
* LikeFatherUnlikeSon: Unlike his father, Li'l Bad Wolf is kind-hearted, doesn't seem interested in eating the pigs, is on good terms with them and antagonizes his dad when he tries to eat them.

* SparedByTheAdaptation: In the original fairy tale, the first two pigs are killed and eaten by the wolf -- who, in turn, is killed by the boiling pot.

* CryingWolf: Part of the plot of ''Three Little Wolves''. Fifer and Fiddler discover their brother's wolf alarm (a horn), and start blowing it, ignoring his warnings that overusing it may cause him to ignore an ''actual'' alarm.

* LieDetector: Practical builds one in ''The Practical Pig''. Thanks to [[RubeGoldbergDevice his usual method of building]], it doubles as a punishment device for anyone it catches lying.

* AWolfInSheepsClothing: The wolf pretends to be an orphaned sheep to get the first two pigs to open the door. It doesn't work.