Goofy is a Private Detective named Johnny Eyeball who takes on the case of the missing "Al", despite being told by a cop, played by Pete not to get into the whole scenario and to "leave the Al case to the police".
How to Be a Detective provides examples of:
- Bait-and-Switch: At the end of the chase, Goofy captures the weasel thug and tells the lady "Here's Al." Only it turns out the real Al was Pete, who was set to be married to her, while the thug is the priest officiating the ceremony.
- Car Chase: The climax of this cartoon, set to "The William Tell Overture".
- Cement Shoes: Having been drugged by the weasel, Goofy awakens at the bottom of the bay with his feet in a tub of cement. Fortunately, Pete rescues him with a fishing pole. Or maybe he pulled him out accidentally while fishing.
- Dame with a Case: Goofy is visited by a woman wearing a veil who asks him to find a man named Al. Who turns out to be her runaway groom.
- Darker and Edgier: Certainly one of the most violent Disney cartoons ever made, even for a Goofy cartoon (which is certainly no stranger to violence). Even before Goofy makes his appearance, there are scenes of murder or attempted murder (such as someone being pushed from a bridge, someone being held a gunpoint, a brutal beating and someone hanging in a noose). Goofy himself both delivers and is subjected to violence in this cartoon as well. It is this Family-Unfriendly Violence that has prevented the cartoon from ever being shown on TV for years.
- The Faceless: The face of the woman who asks Goofy to find Al is never shown; she either hides it behind a veil or is shown from behind.
- Follow That Car: When Goofy is nearly run over by a car presumably driven by a crime suspect, he hails a cab and gives this command to give chase. Pete and the dame hail two more cars with this same phrase, resulting in an epic Car Chase.
- Jurisdiction Friction: Pete's cop insists that Goofy leave the Al case to the police, although the fact that he himself is Al may have something to do with it.
- Literal-Minded: When the weasel thug orders Goofy to give him his "heater" (meaning his gun), Goofy of course gives him a space heater instead. The weasel is not amused and has to be more specific: "No, stupid, your rod! Your gat! Your gun!"
- Mythology Gag: When Goofy is first seen, he is reading a Mickey Mouse comic book.
- Noir Episode: This cartoon features Goofy trying to be a hard-boiled private eye.
- Officer O'Hara: Although he doesn't have the requisite brogue, the last name of Pete's character Al is revealed to be Muldoon.
- Ominous Pipe Organ: Heard throughout the cartoon — at least until the climactic car chase. It is a nod to radio detective dramas of the time, which were scored with electric organs.
- Only a Lighter: The gun Goofy gives the weasel thug turns out to be a novelty lighter.
- Pop the Tires: During the car chase, the weasel attempts to do this to Goofy's car by pouring tacks all over the road in Goofy's path, but Goofy, lying on the hood of the car, manages to sweep the tacks out of the way in the nick of time with a convenient broom.
- Private Detective: Goofy.
- Railroad Tracks of Doom: At one point during the car chase, the cars are caught between two trains from opposite directions on a bridge. They somehow escape by holding on to the edge of the bridge (the cars, that is).
- Roofhopping: Parodied, as it is being done by cars.
- Runaway Groom: What Al (AKA Pete) is implied to be.
- Slipping a Mickey: At one point, as Goofy searches for Al, he goes into a bar, where the weasel thug, tending bar, tries to get rid of him by serving him a martini spiked with a goofball.
- Wicked Weasel: A weasel thug tries his own way to prevent Goofy from solving the Al case. It’s revealed, however, that the same weasel serves as the parson for Pete's wedding (after it is revealed he is in fact Al).
