Leave It to Beaver (TV Series) Wally's Haircomb (1959) User Reviews

A VERY GOOD EPISODDE

[Sinemah_Freek · 9/10 · 4 October 2023]

This Is A Rather Good Episode, And I Thought That Wally's "Hairstyle" Was Very Cool. So Is The Music When The Focus Is On Wally's Hair.!!!

Now, June Cleaver Is Nothing But A Little Tyrant Who Seems To Be Unable To Think Out Of The Box, And Live And Let Live. She Wants, And Probably Craves Control. And, In My Humble Opinion, She Is Not Concerned As Much About Wally's Hairstyle As She Is Concerned With How Other People Seeing Wally's Hairstyle Will Reflect On Her, And Possibly On Ward As Well. How Petty. How Damn Petty.

And, This Wretched Business About Running To Wally's Principal Is A Rather Immature Act of Desperation That Is Totally Unnecessary. Of Course, Proper Appearance To Her Is Insanely Vital - Most Like Due To The Influence Of Her Overbearing Aunt Martha.

Good Grief. June Needs To Grow Up, And Let Wally Grow Up, Instead Of Trying To Shape Him Into Some Preconceived Mold Of How A Teenager "SHOULD" Look Like. Boy Oh Bpy!!!

I guess June would never allow Will & Grace into her neighborhood.

[pensman · 8/10 · 3 August 2017]

Wally has a new hairstyle that June hates; she refers to it as an oil mop. It was a very recognizable cut known as the jelly roll which competed with the DA (duck's ass) when I was growing up. It was definitely part of a Greaser's look. I believe James Dean got a lot of the blame for the style's popularity. No doubt Wally would have seen the move Rebel Without a Cause or The Wild one which helped propel the style into a segment of the youth culture in the 1950's.

June wants Ward to have a talk with Wally but Lumpy is there for dinner so Ward is trying to be diplomatic about Wally and the guys following a fad, but Ward ends up in "squaresville". June wants Ward to mount another attack but Ward remembers his own bout with fads as a kid and has some reluctance; but acquiesces.

Ward tries an end run by reminding Wally that he's trying out for the swim team and his current hair style might be a hindrance. Ward tells June that he believes Wally will be a "new" boy next morning; but when Wally comes down for breakfast, Wally has the same hairstyle. June is worried that next Wally will be wearing leather jackets and motorcycle boots. We have to figure then if Wally didn't see the Dean or Brando films that June did. Ward's approach is just too nonchalance for June. June refuses to be deterred, she makes an appointment to see Mr. Haller, the school principal.

As June is waiting outside the office, she sees a parade of hairstyles passing by, including Lumpy who has joined the in crowd. June wants Mr. Haller to ban the hairstyle; but Mr. Haller says it's the first form of self-expression and eventually Wally will move on. June says her husband said the same thing but she wanted the opinion of an expert.

At dinner, Wally announces he's not going out for the swim team because Eddie Haskell said the coach would make him cut his hair. Next Fred Rutherford calls Ward and complains that Lumpy has copied Wally's style and Fred wants to know what Ward is going to do about Wally ruining Clarence's good looks.

Next morning when Beaver comes down with a similar style in imitation of Wally, that's it for June. She marches into Wally's room and demands he change his hair style immediately because his hair is embarrassing her and Ward. Wally instantly capitulates and says he's grateful to have parents who are willing to criticize him. At dinner, Wally even tells Ward to tell him every time that Ward feels he is doing something that is embarrassing. Ward says he can't do that because it would completely take the fun out of childhood.

The memories that this episode brings back. I remember my mother howling and crying over my long hair in the 60's. She even threatened to cut my hair off when I was asleep. My dad just shrugged and said he figured it was my hair and it wasn't hurting anyone. It didn't but I miss it now. And my wife went ballistic when our son was immersed in the skateboard "cult" and he wore huge over-sized jeans. I believe her claim was we (she) would die of embarrassment when people would meet our boy. I too just shrugged and claimed he would grow out it: he did.

The real GIANT FLAW in the episode is Wally's immediate collapse after June's onslaught. I can't think of any boy I knew, including me, who would so immediately fall into line. June's reaction is certainly in character as the writers have her as a controlling helicopter parent from the first episodes to the last. Ward's character thankfully morphed from a start as a weak-willed father to a much more mature understanding man. But there are times that June's reactions make me shudder. But this episode has to be the acme of her preoccupation with the control of her children's lives. It's a wonder that both boys wouldn't have grown up to have stunted lives. I wonder what the mothers/wives of the writers were like.

Wally comes home with a definite hair don't

[AlsExGal · 8/10 · 19 May 2024]

Wally comes home from the barber's with a new hair style - the jelly roll. This was an actual hair fad of the late 50s along with the DA haircut. The hair is rolled up around the sides, flat in the front and the middle, and like an oil slick all over.

June thinks Wally looks like a gangster with his hair like this, and tries getting Ward to do something, who mentions that the haircut would not do if Wally is going to try out for swim team. This does make an impression on Wally as he ditches the idea of being on the swim team but keeps the hairdo. She makes an appointment with the principal at the high school. The principal is not alarmed by the hairstyle and says the fad will run its course. But when Beaver comes down to go to school one morning with a jelly roll as well, she tries the direct approach with Wally. How will this work out? Watch and find out.

Everybody seems pretty hard on June for going to such lengths to get Wally to rid himself of this hair fad, saying that she was a control freak. But you have to remember that in the 1950s about the worst thing you could be was a non-conformist. People might think you were a Communist or something! And I'm not exaggerating much when I say that. These were different less forgiving and accepting times.

I liked how every time the camera was focused on one of these guys with this jelly roll haircut that you would hear intense 50s rock and roll playing. It was as humorous as the voodoo drums playing in the background every time someone thought that maybe there was something to these voodoo curses in the season one episode, "Voodoo Magic".

The music

[djdifa · 10/10 · 20 July 2021]

Just the background music playing when a jelly roll head shows up is enough for me to give this episode a 10.

Astonishing!

[richard.fuller1 · 10/10 · 6 January 2012]

Wally is combing his hair in the new fad, the jelly roll, as the principal refers to it. June doesn't like it. Ward says it will pass.

June's persistence in wanting something done about the hairdo is remarkable to behold. She even goes and talks to the principal about it! "You can't do something like ban it from school?" she asks. Amazing! Hey, June, watch some soaps or go attend a garden party or something, lady! The episode is further compounded by things like her sitting at the school and seeing young boys with crew cuts and smiling with approval.

Also every time we see Wally with the 'do, we hear this hilarious saxophone, drag-racing music playing, like it is just utterly demented or something. This episode came out in '59, for crying out loud! Then we see Lumpy likewise with the 'do (after a dinner table discussion about how the style would never work on his lop-sided head).

The constant emphasis on the hairdo is likewise ridiculous, the music aside.

Wally and Lumpy will stare directly at Ward or June, "Yeah, dad?" and "hello, mrs. Cleaver" as tho they are completely oblivious to the hairdo but you get the impression they want to bow or something, to make certain the hair is being seen.

with Lumpy, "Hello, Mrs. Cleaver. Is Wally in trouble? ---- I guess you've noticed my hair, haven't you?" Wally's constant poking at it at the dinner table, as tho no one would notice even if they didn't object to the hairstyle, is irritating.

In the end, we know who brings it all home when he sports a style of his own.

And of course, June and Ward are embarrassed by the jelly roll, so June says, so Wally agrees to change it. Strange foreboding to the era of the sixties, but then Leave It To Beaver always was.

Having watched a Marx brothers marathon earlier this week and learned that Groucho's walk was also a fad in Teddy Roosevelt's time and Groucho made fun of it, as it was then outdated, and here, Ward refers to a fad when boys would wear dirty corduroys with clean white shirts (???), it does make you wonder about all the fads and how little they achieve.

This then is Leave It To Beaver's true testament. As Beaver said, "we weren't talking about fads, Dad, we were talking about Lumpy's crooked head."

Fads and Fashions

[MichaelMartinDeSapio · 10/10 · 23 June 2016]

This is an oft-remembered LITB episode, on a par with "Sweatshirt Monsters" or "In the Soup." It's perennially relevant, with its theme of teenage fads and the desire of young people to stand out - and fit in. The high school principal's discussion of hairstyles as self-expression was quite an eye-opener to what was going on in the late '50s.

The previous reviewers misunderstand the role of June in this episode. The point is that June's interventionist attitude to fixing the problem - in contrast to Ward's reticent, laid-back, self-reflective attitude - turns out to be more effective. The moment June marches upstairs and orders Wally to comb out his hair, he listens and obeys, thus accomplishing in an instant what Ward was not able to accomplish in weeks of dithering. It helps that June frames the issue as a matter of embarrassment, recalling a time when Wally was embarrassed by Beaver's wearing one of June's hats to Sunday school.

And of course June is right: Wally's haircomb looks hideous, and any self-respecting parent would be embarrassed to have their kid looking like that. June's strong, take-charge behavior is to be admired.

The use of the crazy saxophone music whenever one of the kids appears with the haircomb is hilarious, as is the moment in which June is finally compelled to go up and speak to Wally: June is photographed in a surprised reaction shot at the foot of the staircase, and we then see Beaver coming down sporting his bad imitation of Wally's haircut. The shot is like something out of PSYCHO.

Another good use of music is in the scene when June calls the principal to arrange a meeting to discuss Wally's haircomb: we hear bustling busybody music that complements June's determination to intervene. After concluding the phone conversation, June wonders aloud whether she should wear a hat to the appointment, thus humorously reinforcing the importance of norms of dress and appearance.

Boys will be Boys

[spodso · 5 March 2021]

I just watched this episode again today for the upteenth time and haven't changed my opinion at all; June Cleaver is a helicopter parenting control freak; in agreement with several other reviewers. There were a lot of other episodes in support of this view and I plan on going back and posting reviews of those.

I made a similar review on Wally's Suit so I will repeat some of that. I grew up in a small town in flyover country in the 50's and 60's. I remember the hairdos in high school. My hair was too curly for a ducktail or a jelly roll, but I did let my hair grow enough to achieve a Caesar look.

A classmate had the perfect hair for a ducktail so as an amateur hairdresser I combed it and styled it. And I didn't, but several of my classmates did have motorcycles.

As an aside, I'll just say/write, "boys will be boys, except for Wally".

SHAVE AND A HAIRCUT, TWO BITS!

[tcchelsey · 10/10 · 3 January 2024]

George Tibbles, who wrote over 100 episodes for MY THREE SONS, cooked up this gem, and probably reserved the right to do it again on his next show.

Let's face it, with the emergence of Elvis, Fats Domino and the like, loud clothes and lots and lots of slick hair gel --what would you expect? You knew it was coming. Wally gets a new doo, and it's a work of art, his hair propped like a balloon and jelled to the max.

I agree with the last reviewer, the "honking" music steals the show. It's spot on every time Wally looks into a mirror! You know that was the clever idea of producers and writers Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher.

10 Stars.

On the other side, Ward and June are fit to be tied, but they are still very understanding parents... to a degree, and that's what makes this episode. Also keep your eyes on Beave. Future fads to come?

You have to admit, by the second season, both Beave and Wally --surprisingly-- had gone through quite a few fads, if not wardrobe calamities. Again, all based on real life stories, probably some from Hugh Beaumont.

Lumpy is back on board, sort of a grown up Larry Mondello (or what Larry is destined to become!), as is Fred Rutherford. Richard Deacon was the right actor to play Fred, although I will say it again, his son should have been Eddie Haskell. The perfect match.

So how does it all end? You probably know anyway, but still fun to see it all over again. A certified tv classic.

SEASON 3 EPISODE 34 remastered Universal dvd box set.

June Cleaver: Control Freak

[ccthemovieman-1 · 6/10 · 31 January 2007]

Wally comes home from the barber shop with a new "do," and his mother his horrified. It's the latest style, something called the "jellyroll," where its down a bit in front and curled up on the sides. June wants Ward to tell Wally to change it, because she doesn't like it. Boy, the more I watch this show the more I discover how June was a control freak of the worst kind. She wants to know everybody's business and rarely lets people be themselves. Ward is the reasonable one of the family, knowing at times kids are just that, and as long as they aren't hurting anyone and being ridiculous, let's them grow up. June wants everything to be perfect - for her tastes - all the time.

Ward reluctantly speaks to Wally and mentions his hair might get in the way of his swimming prowess, but to no affect. The next morning - get this - June goes to the high school to meet with the principal demanding that he force the kids to have normal haircuts. The principal gives June the same advice Ward did: let it go, and the kids will outgrow this latest fad.

After dinner that night, Ward has to calm June down again. She says, "What are people going to think of us when they see him on the street?" To reinforce that kind of thinking, the phone rings and it is Lumpy's father, Fred Rutherford. "Ward, he says, "my boy just came home with the most perfectly ghastly haircut. He's wearing a most distressing hairdo which he says he copied from your boy. We sent him to school looking like a fine, strapping boy but he came home looking like a rather ugly girl!"

The next morning Beaver comes down for school with a greased-up punk hairdo!! Actually, it's look pretty cool. You can imagine how June viewed it. Ha ha. She marches Beaver up the stairs and orders him to change it back. She tells Wally to do the same. She tells him that she and Ward are embarrassed over his looks. Believe it or not, Wally takes it in stride. He winds up a lot more mature than his mother, thanking her for caring about whether he looks creepy or not.

Teenage Boys And Their Radical Haircombs

[StrictlyConfidential · 5/10 · 10 November 2020]

(*Beaver quote*) - "We weren't speaking about fads. We were speaking about Lumpy's lopsided head."

When June Cleaver gets a good look at Wally's new hairdo she's so outraged by it that (get this) she goes to the principal, Mr. Haller at Wally's school and makes a serious complaint about it. (Like, if that isn't a roundabout was of making some change, then, I don't know what it is)

Anyway - In the meantime - Beaver decides to imitate his brother's wild haircomb and that proves to be the comical highlight of this episode.

Ridiculous,even for leave it to beaver.

[ronnybee2112 · 4/10 · 5 January 2024]

June Cleaver really needs a hobby. She,and people like her,are the reason Valium was invented and it became so popular in the years following the cancelling of this tv series.

All parents worry about their kids,and want the best for them. Parents also need to have a good sense of perspective and a lot of common sense. June Cleaver comes up rather short in these departments sometimes,and in this episode especially.

It is nearly impossible to believe that this episode is,at heart,about boys' hairstyles and the way they comb their hair. This is the topic that drives the entire episode here. I really wish I were joking. Wally Cleaver tries out an odd new hairstyle and his mom June practically has a nervous breakdown over it. She actually goes to the high school principal to whine and worry to him about the way her son is combing and wearing his hair. I was waiting for the principal to tell June to go see a psychiatrist. It's unbelievable,one of the worst episodes in fact.

3/10.