Gorilla my Dreams

“I ain’t an ape, I’m a rabbit”

Sorry for lack of update. Went to Disneyland. (What? Looney Tunes fanboys can enjoy it too.)

Back in full swing now. (Pun intended.) We see Bugs in a barrel boat. How did he get here? Who knows, who cares, enjoy the cartoon already, you moron. The current is carrying him to the island of Bingzi Bangza which is home to ferocious apes. However, they seem to be good parents. One couple has no children to the dismay of the mother. (This being her and her husband’s first appearance.)

The father wants no kids, so she heads out to sob. But while she is crying, she finds Bugs. She adopts him (he only agrees to make her stop crying) and takes him home to meet his father. Deciding to do the “little” one in. He takes him out for a walk, where Bugs almost immediately catches on. A lovely chase scene (with Raymond Scott’s “Dinner music for a pack of hungry cannibals” is playing) climaxes with Bugs trapped against a cliff. He allows Gruesome to pound him but the big brute can’t. He’s too worn out from chasing him.

Personal Rating: 3

French Rarebit

“Where do ya suppose I am?”

Since I’m in such a good mood, (I actually got a real comment) I decided to begin another post.

A truck carrying carrots is driving through France, and after driving over a bumpy road one of the boxes falls off and smashes. Of course, Bugs was in there and seeing that he is in Paris decides to look around. Walking down a street he is seen by two chefs who plan to have him for their menu. They are Louie with orange hair and Francois with black hair.

After a fight (egging them on is Bugs) Francois takes the rabbit to cook. Bugs tells him of a great recipe but refuses to share it unless the chef and him trade places so he can demonstrate. The chef is desperate enough, and soon him and Louie (who also wants to know Bug’s culinary secrets) are shoved into a stove with a lit stick of dynamite. Voila! C’est magnefique!

Personal Rating: 3

Bunny Hugged

“Its a living.”

At the championships of wrestling, we have in one corner: the Crusher! An athlete who is literally one, big muscle. In the other corner Ravishing Ronald (a take on real wrestler, Gorgeous George) and his mascot Bugs Bunny. Ronald is quickly turned into a punching bag and Bugs, worrying about his job, steps in to take on the champ himself as the masked terror. (I don’t care what you say. That is a cool mask and if I had one, I would wear it everyday.)

Unfortunately, Bugs is almost as bad as Ronald was. Looks like its time to cheat. He rips his mask to make the Crusher think he ripped his shorts. Bugs disguises himself as a tailor and gives the champ a poke in the butt. After getting slammed into a safe door, Bugs is able to pin the dazed crusher to the mat.

Personal Rating: 3

Bugs Bunny Rides Again

“This town aint big enough for the two of us!”

You’d think with a title like that, it would be Sam’s second appearance. However, he appeared in the Bugs Bunny cartoon made before this one. Of course, he was a pirate there, so we can forgive that. (Besides, how could the animators have guessed it would arrive first?)

Plot time! Sam comes into western town and dares anyone to challenge him. Cue our hero! Bugs initially runs away, but eventually gets Sam to keep walking over lines until he falls off a cliff. The chase continues on horses until Bugs notes they are not getting anywhere. They play cards to see who leaves town, and even though Sam loses, Bugs hops on the train when he sees all the scantily clad women on there

Personal Rating: 4

Broomstick Bunny

“Magic mirror on the wall, who is the ugliest one of all?”

Halloween night and our lovely Witch Hazel is preparing a brew. (I’ve always wondered why witches always do that. Is there nothing else to do on a Friday night?) One thing she prides herself on is being ugly, so it is a great stroke of luck that she has a genie’s head in a mirror who can tell who is the ugliest.

Enter Bugs who is trick or treating as a witch. When he comes to her door, she is aghast to find that “she” is uglier than her. She plans to make the witch pretty by drinking a special tea. Bugs takes off his mask and she realizes that not only is he a rabbit, but a rabbit’s clavicle is the final ingredient for her brew. The chase commences and she catches her prize.

She’s about to do him in when, Bugs gives the Bambi eyes. Reminding her of her late tarantula, she bursts into tears. Bugs gives her a cup of tea to calm down, and poof! She turns into June foray. (Or a caricature, anyhow) She runs to her mirror, with the faint hope that she might still be the ugliest. Instead of answering her however, the genie chases after the now sexy witch.

Personal Rating: 3

Witch Hazel

This crazy girl had first appearance in “Bewitched Bunny”. Yeah, it was with Bugs, as was the majority of her appearances. Her name stems from the Disney witch of the same name. I think she’s the better character. Not just because she is a Looney Tune is she better, but she actually acts like a witch. Whereas the other one wasted a night helping kids get their candy back.

This girl is way crazy as well. The smallest hint of a joke and she jumps in the air cackling. Another cool thing is when she moves fast, she leaves a bunch of hair pins floating in the air. A wonderful witch if ever there was one.

(And I wouldn’t mind if you wanted to leave me a little feedback. I like to hear suggestions or just words of praise.)

The Big Snooze

“I get the worst of it from that wabbit in every one of these cartoons!”

Judging by the title, you’d think this is one boring cartoon. Nothing could be further from the truth. This is a Bob Clampett cartoon after all! Sadly it is the last one he directed before he left the studio to do his own things.

As usual, Elmer is chasing Bugs. After falling for a log gag that Bugs used in a earlier cartoon (one of the censored eleven) Elmer gets fed up. This is the last straw and he is calling it quits. Bugs tries to get him to reconsider, but Elmer has made up his mind. Deciding to just relax and fish, Elmer falls asleep. This is Bugs’s chance!

He takes some sleeping pills and proceeds have a dream of himself to invade Elmer’s dream. After tormenting him a bit, he dresses Fudd up like a girl. This attracts some wolves who can’t wait to get their paws on him. Bugs helps him escape but in doing so, leads Fudd off a cliff. He falls out of the dream and back into his body. Glad to rid of the nightmare he goes back to chasing Bugs for all eternity. With such a great cartoon as this, it makes one wonder what Bob could have created if he stayed with the WB.

Personal Rating: 4

Bob Clampett

Looney Tunes had a studio full of talented directors, but my all time favorite was, is and always will be: Bob Clampett. He was described as the nuttiest one of the group, and his cartoons stretched the limits of what not just Looney Tunes, but animation as a medium, could do.

He was the man who created Tweety, (inspired by his nude baby picture) and created the wonderfully surreal, Wackyland. You can probably guess that some of my favorites were directed by him. Including: “Porky in Wackyland” (natch), “The Great Piggybank Robbery,” Baby Bottleneck”, “A Tale of Two Kitties”,  A Gruesome Twosome”, “Wacky Blackout”, “The Bashful Buzzard” “Tortoise Wins by a Hare” and one that I shall be talking about next time.

Space Jam Part 2

Yeah, I already talked about this, but I did not say everything I wanted to.

To start, let’s talk about what about this movie I don’t like. I never liked the part when the blue mon-star scared Porky and caused him to pee. Looney tunes can do better than toilet humor. I mean, sure, they did it in earlier cartoons, but it was subtle. Nice and subtle. It also does not help that Porky is my favorite character.

Another part I don’t really like (Which is really personal and petty, I’m aware) is when after losing his talent Charles Barkley plays with some girls (I think) and since his talent is gone, they insult him to his face. That is way too rude. I would have killed them. Also I don’t get this part, but when Bill Murray appears at the end of the film to help with the game, Swackhammer says “I didn’t know Dan Ackroyd was in this picture!” Am I missing something? Does Bill get mistaken for him a lot?

Here’s another interesting bit of trivia: the gym the Tunes practice at is called Scheslinger gym. (A nod to the man who helped get Looney Tunes started) Also, if you like “The Simpsons” (and there was a moment when everyone did) you can find Dan Castatanella at the first game. He is the one who claims “Barkley is killing us!”

Finally, I made a list of every Looney Tune character I could find in this movie. There may be more. If you can name any, I somehow missed, let me know. Now in no particular order, there was: Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Lola Bunny, Porky Pig, the Tasmanian Devil, Foghorn Leghorn, Sylvester, Tweety, Granny, Hubie and Bertie, the Goofy Gophers, the Three Bears, Angus MacRory, (the Scotsman from “My Bunny Lies Over the Sea“) the Bull, (from “Bully for Bugs“) Gossamar, Beaky Buzzard, the Barnyard Dog, Yosemite Sam, Wile E. Coyote, the Roadrunner, Witch Hazel, Curt and Pumkinhead Martin (from “Hillbilly Hare”), the Gambling BugO’Pat and O’Mike, Playboy Penguin, Egghead Jr., Marvin the Martain, Speedy Gonzales, Slowpoke Rodriguez, Sniffles, Pepe Le Pew, Penelope Pussycat, Spike and Chester, Sam Sheepdog, the Crusher, Giovanni Jones, Pete Puma, Miss Prissy, Charlie Dog, Buddy, Sylvester Jr., Mr. and Mrs. Gruesome Gorilla, Rocky and Mugsy, Marc Antony and Pussyfoot, Claude Cat, Beans, Kitty, Ham or Ex, Petunia Pig, Bosko, Michigan J. Frog, the tired man from “A Pest in the House”, Cecil Tortoise, the Three Little Bops and the Wolf, the Dover Boys, the Weasel from a few “Foghorn cartoons”, Red from “Little Red Riding Rabbit”, K-9, and Henery Hawk.

Space Jam

“You guys are nuts.”

“Correction, we’re Looney Tunes”

I love this movie, but then again, I am a Looney Tunes fanboy. It’s sad most of the world seems to hate it. I think that is bull crap. This is a masterpiece if ever there was one. At least it did great at the box office.

The history is that people made commercials with Bugs and Michael Jordan advertising basketball shoes. So they figured making a movie was a good idea. (I think it was.) Our plot is that a theme park in outer space, (it is not specified which planet, but I think the whole park is its own planet) sucks. (How can people say that? Didn’t you ever want to ride an Astro-orbiter wannabe that shoots at you? Oh yeah, me neither) The owner decides they need new attractions and figures that the Looney Tunes are just the thing. I’d come.

However, Bugs tricks them into thinking they need to give the toons a chance to defend themselves. Since the aliens are short and have tiny limbs, basketball seems like a shoe in. However the aliens have the ability to steal the ability from five NBA players. Luckily, Jordan was retired at this time. So they don’t nab him. The toons get him for their side and we get the greatest game in all history!

This also introduced us to Lola. She did not have much of a personality in this movie, save for being someone for Bugs to be attracted to. Seems she was popular though, as she appeared in “Baby Looney Tunes”, “Tweety’s High Flying Adventure”, and “The Looney Tunes Show.”

Bottom line if you hate this you have no taste and at the very least you have to watch it once. (There must be more who love this, I know it!) “Tune” in next time where I will name all the Looney Tunes who appear in the film as well as some interesting facts. Woo hoo hoo hoo! Woo hoo!

Personal Rating: 3. (Unless you’re one of those people who can’t stand anything Looney that came out after the Golden age. For you, it’s a 2.)