I'm on my second round viewing all 190 shorts in order, and this happens to be where I am right now, so I might as well drop a comment. I like this short a lot. It doesn't have that manic, madcap energy that's found in some of their shorts (especially some of the earliest ones), the atmosphere seems calmer, but it's just as funny. The obvious low budget for the water scenes just adds to its charm for me.
I always get a kick out of the times where they're referred to on screen as the Stooges. If you think about it (more deeply than anyone involved certainly intended), the implication of it is stranger here than usual. In the past shorts where they've identified themselves as such, they were entertainers - and then there's the one time Bud Jamison's character said they remind him of the Three Stooges, again implying that "the Three Stooges" are known figures of some sort. Moe yelling "hey, we're the Stooges" as he does here shows that he thinks people would know who the Stooges are, but if they're recognizable figures, what are they doing working as lowly fishmongers? I know, you're not supposed to think about it, but it's fun.
As a record collector, I was paying special attention to the opening scene, and I noticed the record that Moe throws away is not the same one that comes back and hits him. I can't figure out what the first one is, it's not a label I recognize, which is rare - but the one that comes flying back is a Columbia 'gold band' disc, which would have been made between 1917 and 1923, and thus was quite old when the short was filmed. The second one that he smashes over Curly's head appears to be a Victor record from the same era. For anyone who hasn't dealt with old 78s, they're fragile, and the shattering they do on screen is definitely real. That said, those blue label Columbias are unusually thick and tough for 78s, so that one might have been a bit painful for poor Curly!
