"The Mask of Gorgonzola" is an episode from The All-New Popeye Hour's "Popeye's Treasure Hunt" segment for Hanna-Barbera Productions in association with King Features Syndicate.
Plot[]
Popeye and Olive travel to Italy to see Popeye's aunt & uncle, The Pastas. They inform our heroes about a treasure called "The Mask of Gorgonzola" created by famed artist Leonardo Gorgonzola and the fact that his evil nephew Vinny Tortoni wants to steal it for himself. But what they didn't know is that Vinny hired Bluto to help him with the search. The Pastas give them a shopping list to help them find the mask, while Vinny orders Bluto to steal the list. The list calls for the following items: Linguini Number 8, 4, 1 & 2, 1 Pizza San Marco Medium, 1 Cheese Wheel LG.
To start, Popeye and Olive stay at the Aunt & Uncle's shop to collect the Linguinis the list asked for. Bluto wastes no time stealing everything from him and tying our heroes in cement dipped spaghetti. But the heroes sneeze themselves free with pepper and Popeye quickly stops Bluto with underwear.
After collecting the Linguini and recovering the list, Olive realizes that the four numbers are the last four digits of the phone number for Leaning Tower Pizza, which serves Pizza San Marcos. A Medium Pizza San Marco is the next thing on the list, so Popeye and Olive head for the restaurant where Vinny & Bluto are waiting for them. First, Bluto tries to steal the list by playing his fiddle, but Popeye is quickly fed up with his music, so he grabs the bow and sticks it to a fence, to which Bluto pulls and it falls on him. Then in desperation, Vinny conjures up ooey-gooey dough to make it look like a pizza. It sticks to our heroes and Bluto re-steals the list. Popeye and Olive try to get it off but they get caught in the ceiling fan. Popeye and Olive restrain themselves long enough to get the dough off and the fan flings it back to Bluto. Off-camera, they get the list back again. Shortly after, they notice a clock on the pan, which reads two o'clock. This indicates that they must go to the Piazza San Marco at two, as the bells only strike at nine and two.
On the way over, Popeye and Olive get sidetracked by Bluto's latest trap, which is getting squirted with strawberry syrup and bird seed. Birds come flying their way. But before they could get to our heroes, Popeye takes the stuff off with his pipe and squirts it to Bluto. Bluto had his clothes eaten by the birds in the process.
Popeye and Olive arrive at the Piazza San Marco just before two, but Bluto is not far behind and wraps a magnet around Popeye's neck. It attracts the bell ringing statues and causing one of them to hit the bar. Popeye takes off the magnet and it sticks to the bell just as the clock strikes two. After the bell has rung, Popeye throws the magnet back to Bluto, who helped Popeye score a wringer spinning around a flagpole. After the striking, the heroes read something on where the statue hit. This is because Leonardo Gorgonzola carved his clue into the statue's hammer. They eventually figure out that the clue refers to The Bridge of Sighs. So they take a boat ride toward the bridge and enter a building through an open door.
There, they enter a room with nothing but cheese wheels. That's good, because they are trying to find the last item on the list, which is 1 Cheese Wheel LG. Popeye assumes that the LG simply means "large". But before they could start the search, Vinny & Bluto traps Popeye & Olive through a trapdoor. Olive attempts to escape through what she thought is a window, but it is really a barrier to keep the water out; Popeye even warned her that they are below sea level. But Olive pulls it out and they end up swimming for their lives. Popeye eats his spinach and punches through the ceiling, causing a flood and the wicked pair to hang from a chandelier and falling into the water. They counter attacked with no success and the fight ends with Bluto getting his head stuck in a cheese wheel. But it turns out, the cheese wheel in question is the one being sought. Inside is the Mask of Gorgonzola and Popeye learns that the "LG" are really initials, meaning Leonardo Gorgonzola.
The episode ends with Popeye and Olive returning the mask to the Pasta and in his defeat, Vinny insultingly gives Bluto a new hat made entirely of cheese.