List of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies characters
 |
This is an incomplete list of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies characters. Template:CompactTOC4
B
Babbit and Catstello
Babbit and Catstello are Looney Tunes based on the comedic duo Abbott and Costello. Although the short, fat character calls the other one "Babbit", the tall, skinny one never addresses his partner by name; the name "Catstello" was invented later. In their first three cartoons, the "Babbit" character was voiced by Tedd Pierce, and Mel Blanc performed "Catstello". Later, Babbit is voiced by Billy West, and Joe Alaskey performs Catstello.
Originally, the pair were cats in pursuit of a small bird for their meal in the 1942 Bob Clampett-directed cartoon A Tale of Two Kitties, a cartoon notable for the first appearance of the bird character, who would eventually become Warner Brothers cartoon icon Tweety Bird. The hapless duo fail in every attempt to capture the bird, establishing the pattern that would be used time and again in future Tweety cartoons.
Three years later, Babbit and Catstello reappeared in the similarly named Tale of Two Mice, directed by Frank Tashlin. Though their characterizations were the same, the two were now mice, living in a hole in the wall of a typical cartoon kitchen. Their goal in this cartoon was the cheese in the kitchen's refrigerator, the only obstacle being the resident housecat. Babbit attempts to coerce Catstello (often by beating him up) into going after the cheese solo, using various methods to get it (which involved Catstello getting hurt). However, in the end, it is Swiss cheese, which Babbit can't stand. Angrily, Catstello beats him up and begins force-feeding the cheese, uttering one of his archetype Lou Costello's famous lines: "Oh — I'm a baaaaad boy!" (At one point in A Tale of Two Kitties, he similarly remarks, "I'm a baaaaad pussycat!")
The characters make a very brief cameo appearance in canine form in Robert McKimson's second Warner Brothers short 'Hollywood Canine Canteen' released in April 1946. They play the pets of the real Abbott and Costello, Costello's dog, refers to Abbott's dog as 'Babbit'.
Finally, six months later in October 1946, Robert McKimson returned to the pair in The Mouse-Merized Cat, wherein Babbit uses a book to hypnotize Catstello. Babbit has Catstello believe he's a dog in order to scare off the cat so they can get to the food in the refrigerator. However, the cat soon studies hypnosis and is able to reverse Babbit's spell. This results in Catstello running back and forth between the two as they continue use hypnosis. Finally, Catstello becomes fed up with Babbit making him the fall guy, and turns the tables on both Babbit and the cat, hypnotizing them into believing they are, respectively, a cowboy and his trusty steed. Catstello trickes Babbit with his Yosemite Sam like voice makes babbit utters a deliberately misworded variation on the Lone Ranger's classic catchphrase — "Hi yo, Sliver, awaaayy!" — before he and the cat gallop away. The final scene shows Catstello eating cheese and reading a book on living alone, before turning to the audience and once again reciting "Oh — I'm a baaaaadd boy!"
The pair have made few appearances since then, mainly cameos in modern Warner Brothers animated projects such as The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries voiced by Jim Cummings and Joe Alaskey.
(The) Barnyard Dawg
Beans the Cat
Beans the Cat was the third Looney Tunes cartoon character star after Bosko and Buddy.
In 1935, animator Friz Freleng attempted to jumpstart the studio with his Merrie Melodies cartoon I Haven't Got a Hat. Its cast consisted of cute animal characters with funny names; e.g., Ham and Ex, Porky and Beans the Cat, Oliver Owl, and Little Kitty. Schlesinger hoped that some would catch on with audiences and become bankable stars.
Before having a role in another cartoon, Beans was already seen in the "That's all folks!" closings in the last three Buddy shorts. Six months following his debut film, Beans starred A Cartoonist's Nightmare which would be his first solo cartoon, followed by Hollywood Capers. Beans then began appearing with characters from the cast of I Haven't Got a Hat.
Throughout his brief two-year period on screen, Beans appeared in just 9 shorts. His swan song was Westward Whoa in 1936. Before being retired completely, he made a brief appearance in Plane Dippy. His best friend Porky, however, would ironically have a long run in the series as well as becoming a household name in the Looney Tunes cast.
Beans was voiced at first by Billy Bletcher and sometimes Tommy Bond, and later by Will Ryan.
Blacque Jacque Shellacque
Blacque Jacque Shellacque was created by Robert McKimson. While similar in many ways to Yosemite Sam—both are short in stature and temper—Blacque Jacque possesses his own unique characteristics, not the least of which is his comically thick French Canadian accent, performed by Mel Blanc. Also, like Yosemite Sam and many other villains, Blacque Jacque Shellacque does not have a high level of intelligence, preferring to use force instead of strategy to fight Bugs.
Blacque Jacque first appeared in Bonanza Bunny, which takes place in the middle of the Klondike gold rush. Blacque Jacque attempts to seize Bugs' bag of gold (actually "a bunch of rocks and some yellow paint," according to Bugs) through card cheating, trickery, and out-and-out threats, but Bugs outwits him as always and defeats him by replacing his bag of gold with gunpowder while poking a hole in the bag and tossing a lit match on it causing a massive explosion.
Blacque Jacque later clashed with Bugs in 1962's Wet Hare, in which his illegal damming of a river ("Me feel like pezky little beav-aire!") brings him into conflict with the rabbit—not only because he is committing a crime, but because he has blocked off the waterfall that Bugs uses as a shower. After demolishing several of Blacque Jacque's dams, Bugs turns the tables by damming the river upstream of Jacque's dam. Jacque, unsurprisingly, is enraged and wheels a small cannon along the riverbed to destroy Bugs' dam—but when he does he only reveals another dam further upstream. Jacque blows up several of Bugs' dams in succession and finally follows Bugs all the way to the "Grand Cooler Dam" (a pun on the name of the Grand Coulee Dam). Jacque tries to blow it up with his cannon, but the dam is so massive and thick that the cannonball he launches ricochets back into the cannon's barrel and the recoiling force lands both Jacque and the cannon into the back of a waiting paddy wagon.
Blacque Jacque also appears as a common enemy in Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time.
Cookie
Cookie was the flapper woman, who is a girlfriend for Buddy. Cookie may resemble the character Betty Boop. She is a 18-year old girl who has a black hair and a white shirt and black shoes, she also has a baby brother named, Baby Elmer (not to be confused with Elmer Fudd).
Count Blood Count
Count Blood Count (originally voiced by Ben Frommer and later by Bill Farmer, Frank Welker and Jeff Bennett) is a vampire from the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes animated shorts.
The Count's first appearance was in the 1963 short, Transylvania 6-5000. In this short, Bugs goes to Transylvania and looks for a telephone at what he thinks is a motel (but is in reality an ominous castle). At the castle, Bugs meets Count Blood Count and is given a room for the night (much to his chagrin) by the blood-thirsty vampire. Unable to sleep, Bugs skims through a magic book and reads it aloud. When the Count appears above the bed and tries to suck Bugs' blood, he turns into a bat when Bugs says "abracadabra". Later, when Bugs says "hocus pocus," the Count turns back to human form just outside the castle window, where he falls into the moat. Later, while wandering around the castle, Bugs sings the aforementioned magic phrases, turning the Count into a bat, then back to a vampire. When the Count states that he is a vampire, Bugs turns into an umpire. When the Count turns into a bat, Bugs turns into a baseball bat and hits him (despite the Count's bat form wearing glasses). The Count tries to crush Bugs with a piece of the floor only to turn into a bat and get crushed many times. Amused by the results, Bugs says random words which turn the Count into a whole range of things: "abraca-pocus" turns the Count into a being with his bat head and human form body, while "hocus-cadabra" does the opposite (the Count's human head with his bat form's wings). When Bugs says "Newport News," the Count turns into Witch Hazel, another Looney Tunes character. Finally, through the incantation "Walla Walla Washington," Bugs turns the Count into a two-headed vulture. Seeing an opportunity to be rid of the vampire, Bugs calls over a female two-headed vulture from earlier in the episode (named Emily and Agatha). Emily and Agatha are immediately smitten with passion, while the Count is immediately smitten with fear, and the female vultures amorously chase the terrifed Count away into the distance, musing, "Isn't it romantic? I always said, four heads are better than one!" Soon, Bugs finds a telephone and calls for a ride home. While waiting, Bugs hums and accidentally turns his ears into a pair of bat wings. Bugs then changes his mind and decides to fly home, using his new bat-winged ears.
Count Blood Count would reappear many years later in various Looney Tunes-related media. He was used as the final boss in the video game Bugs Bunny & Taz: Time Busters, and voiced by Joe Alaskey. He was also used as an enemy in Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 4.
He appeared in the "Fang You Very Much" segment of the Tiny Toon Adventures episode "Stuff That Goes Bump in the Night" attempting (with hilariously painful results) to suck the blood of series regular Elmyra Duff only for any light to turn the Count into a bat.
He appeard in the The Oddball Couple episode "Hotel Boo More", which was an almost exact copy of the Bugs Bunny's "Transylvania 6-5000" episode.
He appeared in an episode of The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries called "Fangs for the Memories".
He most recently appeared as Count Muerte in an episode of Duck Dodgers titled "I'm Gonna Get You, Fat Sucka" (voiced by Jeff Bennett), in which he aimed to suck the fat of the Eager Young Space Cadet, in the end Eager Young Space Cadet manages to defeat him by getting him to eat a pound of garlic shaped like himself causing him to disintegrate. In the episode, his appearance was based on that of Count Orlok, the vampire from the silent film Nosferatu, he also appeared in "Till Doom Do Us Part" as one of the members of The Legion of Duck Doom.
The Count's voice was sampled for the Gorillaz track "Dracula", which features the lines "Rest is good for the blood!" and "I am a Vampire!".
Bosko
Buddy
Bunny and Claude
Bunny and Claude are robbers, based on the real-life Bonnie and Clyde and the then recent film version about the pair's life that had been released by Warner Brothers They are a well-dressed rabbit male (Claude) and female (Bunny) who are always pulling off carrot heists, and their catch phrase is "We rob carrot patches", based on the film Bonnie and Clyde's "We rob banks". Bunny was voiced by Pat Woodell and Claude was voiced by veteran WB voice actor Mel Blanc. They both speak with pronounced Southern accents.
They appeared in two cartoons produced by Warner Brothers Animation and released by Warner Brothers- Seven Arts in 1968, titled Bunny and Claude: We Rob Carrot Patches and The Great Carrot Train Robbery (the latter was held over to 1969). Both films were directed by Robert McKimson, and were his first two cartoons he directed in his comeback to Termite Terrace.
Bunny and Claude were always chased by a stereotypical Southern sheriff (also voiced by Mel Blanc, his voice sounded similar to Foghorn Leghorn and Yosemite Sam), whom would always pursuit them in his police cruiser, even though the gangster rabbits would always foil his plans.
Bugs Bunny
Honey Bunny
Lola Bunny
Beaky Buzzard
Beaky Buzzard is a buzzard (although he more closely resembles a vulture or condor) with black body feathers and a white tuft around his throat. His neck is long and thin, bending 90 degrees at an enormous adam's apple. His neck and head are featherless, and his beak is large and yellow or orange, depending on the cartoon. Beaky bears a perpetual goofy grin, and his eyes look eternally half-asleep.
The character first appeared in the 1942 cartoon Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid, directed by Bob Clampett. The cartoon's plot revolves around the hopeless attempts of the brainless buzzard, here called Killer, to catch Bugs Bunny for his domineering Italian mother back at the nest. Beaky's voice was modeled after ventriloquist Edgar Bergen's character Mortimer Snerd, earning Beaky the nickname "Snerd Bird." The voice itself was provided by voice actor Kent Rogers.
Clampett brought the character back in the 1945 film The Bashful Buzzard, a cartoon that closely mirrors its predecessor, only this time featuring Beaky's hapless hunting without scenes of him chasing Bugs for food. Rogers reprised his role as the character's voice for the film, but he died in a Naval aviation training accident at Pensacola, Florida before finishing all his dialogue, so Stan Freberg was brought in to finish the work (as was Eddie Bartell, according to some sources).
Warner Brothers apparently thought they had something in the character, and Beaky was featured in much of the Looney Tunes merchandising of the time. He also appeared in several issues of Dell Comics' Looney Tunes series of comic books, usually paired with another minor player, Henery Hawk.
Clampett left the studio in 1946, ending Beaky's career for a time. The character was eventually brought back in the 1950 Friz Freleng film The Lions Busy, now voiced by the versatile Mel Blanc. Freleng made the buzzard smarter, pitting him against a dim-witted lion named Leo. Bob McKimson also featured the character in a film that year, Strife with Father. McKimson's Beaky is again back to his idiotic self, this time under the tutelage of his adoptive father, a sparrow who is trying to teach Beaky how to survive in the wild.
Most recently Beaky Buzzard has had minor roles in various Warner Brothers projects, such as Tiny Toon Adventures, where he plays the mentor of the character; Concord Condor, and the films Space Jam (1996, as a team player) and 2003's Looney Tunes: Back in Action as an Acme pilot, and is voiced by Joe Alaskey in both films. Beaky Buzzard appeared in the video game Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time and was used as an enemy in Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle 4. He also appeared in the Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries in the episode "3 Days & 2 Nights of the Condor", where he was again voiced by Alaskey. Beaky's mother, who appeared in many of his original shorts, also appeared in an episode of the show (voiced by June Foray). Beaky was put in one episode of Duck Dodgers.
Beaky Buzzard appears in The Looney Tunes Show opening.
C
Claude Cat
Claude Cat (a pun on the homonym "clawed cat") had his origins in several other cat characters used by animator Chuck Jones from 1940 to 1945. These cats were mostly similar in appearance and temperament, with black fur and anxious personalities. For example, in the 1943 film The Aristo-cat (the character's first speaking role), Jones paired his unnamed cat against the mind-manipulating mouse duo, Hubie and Bertie.
Jones redesigned the neurotic feline for the 1948 film Mouse Wreckers (perhaps to distinguish him from Friz Freleng's popular puss, Sylvester). The short is another Hubie and Bertie vehicle, only this time, the antagonist they antagonize is Claude, drawn as he would appear in all future cartoons: yellow, with a red shock of hair and a white belly (his exact markings would vary from cartoon to cartoon). In this as in all future Claude Cat cartoons, Jones' careful attention to personality is easily evident. Claude is a nervous and lazy animal. His attempts to protect his home from the manipulative mice Hubie and Bertie prove futile as the rodents torment him by (among other things) putting aquariums in all the windows to make Claude think he's underwater or by nailing his furniture to the ceiling. Jones set the mice on Claude once more in the 1950 film The Hypo-Chondri-Cat. This time, the miniature Machiavellis convince the neurotic Claude that he's dead. Claude would run afoul of the mice once more in 1951's Cheese Chasers and against another mouse duo in Mouse Warming in 1952.
Jones added another idiosyncrasy to Claude's id in another 1950 film, Two's a Crowd. Here, Claude is scared out of his mind by a diminutive dog named Frisky Puppy, newly adopted by Claude's owners. The main theme, however, is jealousy as Claude's attempts to oust the intruder repeatedly fail due to the cat's intense cowardice - a running gag has Claude repeatedly shooting up and clinging to the ceiling after the pup playfully comes up behind him and barks. At the end, however Claude gets revenge by pulling the same trick causing the dog to comically leap up and cling to the ceiling. Jones repeated the scenario with slight variations in Terrier Stricken in 1952 and No Barking in 1954 (the latter featuring a cameo by Tweety Bird).
In future cartoons, Jones recast Claude as a silent villain, still possessing his full set of neuroses. This stage of the character's evolution is best exemplified by the 1954 film Feline Frame-Up. Here, Claude convinces his owner that fellow pet Marc Antony is trying to eat the precious kitten Pussyfoot. Marc Antony is tossed out, allowing Claude the run of the house. That is, until Marc Antony outwits the cat and makes him sign a confession admitting to his crimes.
Claude was played by voice actor Mel Blanc and after classic films, Joe Alaskey using a quirky, strangulated voice similar to that of Marvin the Martian (but without Marvin's precise enunciation).
Jones retired Claude in the late 1950s. He was concentrating on other characters, such as Wile E. Coyote and Pepe le Pew. Nevertheless, the character enjoys some popularity as one of Jones' more humorous, if forgotten, creations. In the 2006 Bah, Humduck! A Looney Tunes Christmas, Claude Cat has a very brief cameo as an employee going home for Christmas.
Claude Cat appears in The Looney Tunes Show opening.
Conrad the Cat
Conrad the Cat starred in a few shorts in the 1940s. He first appeared in the 1942 short The Bird Came C.O.D.[1] before featuring in Porky's Cafe (1942) and Conrad the Sailor (1942).[2] He was voiced by Pinto Colvig, the original voice actor of Goofy.
Cool Cat
Cool Cat was a tiger (whose design was very similar to that of The Pink Panther, who first appeared on screen four years earlier, and Snagglepuss) who wore a stylish green beret and scarf. Unlike most other Looney Tunes characters, Cool Cat was unapologetically a product of his time. He spoke in 1960s-style beatnik slang and acted much like a stereotypical laid-back 1960s teenager — he was often seen strumming a guitar or traveling cross-country in his dune buggy. One cartoon — McKimson's Bugged by a Bee — depicted him as an alumnus of "Disco Tech" playing varsity football against the long-haired team from "Hippie University".
However, most of Cool Cat's cartoons dealt with his encounters with Colonel Rimfire (also voiced by Storch), a fussy, British-accented big-game hunter armed with a blunderbuss. Rimfire essentially acted as the Elmer Fudd to Cool Cat's Bugs Bunny, but was used only by Lovy. Cool Cat bears the distinction of starring in the very last cartoon produced at the classic Warner Bros. Cartoons studio: Injun Trouble in 1969. Shortly after this cartoon was produced, the venerable animation studio shut down for good.
His cartoons can easily be distinguished from most of the other Looney Tunes cartoons, for they feature an updated Looney Tunes logo with stylized animation, a 1967 remix of "The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down" by William Lava, and featuring the then-current Warner Brothers-Seven Arts logo (a combination of a simple W and 7 inside a stylized shield outline).
Cool Cat made later appearances in the television series The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries, including the 2000 direct-to-video movie Tweety's High-Flying Adventure (Colonel Rimfire also appeared in the latter). He made brief cameos in most, if not all of the episodes, appearing on posters in the background, walking by in street scenes, etc. His appearances aren't entirely overlooked by the cast, for Tweety has once responded to Cool Cat's appearance with "We had to get him in this cartoon somewhere." He was voiced by Joe Alaskey and Jim Cummings in these later appearances.
Cool Cat and Colonel Rimfire are the only W-7 Arts characters to make any further appearances, beyond the classic era shorts, to date.
The Crusher
The Crusher is a brutish boxer in 1948's Rabbit Punch and as a professional wrestler in 1951's Bunny Hugged (directed by Chuck Jones). He is voiced by Billy Bletcher in Rabbit Punch and John T. Smith in Bunny Hugged. Crusher also appeared in a Tiny Toon Adventures episode featuring two songs by They Might Be Giants: Particle Man (as a wrestler) and Istanbul (Not Constantinople) (as a henchman).
Crusher also had a cameo role in Carrotblanca as a doorman, and appeared in an episode in The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries. He also appeared in two episodes of Duck Dodgers, voiced by John DiMaggio. Crusher appeared on the web show "fast food" on looneytunes.com.
In the 2003 film, Looney Tunes Back in Action, The Crusher makes a cameo as one of the judges on DJ's stunt performance.
Crusher was a boss character in the Super NES video game Bugs Bunny Rabbit Rampage.
The Crusher also appeared in The Looney Tunes Show episodes Jailbird and Jailbunny, The Fish and Visitors and To Bowl or not to Bowl.
D
Charlie Dog
Charlie Dog, Charlie the Dog or Charles the Dog is an animated cartoon fictional character in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes series of cartoons. Bob Clampett minted the scenario that Charlie Dog would later inherit in his cartoon short Porky's Pooch, first released on 27 December 1941. A homeless hound pulls out all the stops to get adopted by bachelor Porky Pig. Mel Blanc would provide the dog's gruff, Brooklyn-Bugs Bunny-like voice and accent which became Charlie's standard voice.
However, as he did for so many other Looney Tunes characters, Chuck Jones took Clampett's hound and transformed him into something new. Jones first used the dog in Little Orphan Airedale (4 October 1947) which saw Clampett's "Rover" renamed "Charlie." The film was a success, and Jones would create two more Charlie Dog/Porky Pig cartoons in 1949: Awful Orphan (29 January) and Often an Orphan (13 August). Jones also starred Charlie without Porky in a couple of shorts: Dog Gone South (26 August 1950) which sees Yankee Charlie searching for a fine gentleman of the Southern United States, and A Hound for Trouble (28 April 1951) which sends Charlie to Italy where he searches for a master who speaks English.
In these cartoons, Charlie Dog is defined by one desire: to find himself a master. To this end, Charlie is willing to pull out all the stops, from pulling "the big soulful eyes routine" to boasting of his pedigree ("Fifty percent Collie! Fifty percent setter, Irish Setter! Fifty Percent Boxer! Fifty percent Doberman Pincher! Fifty percent pointer—there it is! There it is! There it is! But, mostly, I'm all Labrador Retriever!") when reminded by others that he is not a Labrador retriever, his response would be, "If you'll find me a Labrador, I'll retrieve it for you." —though in reality, he is just a slick-talking mutt who rarely realizes that his own aggressive obnoxiousness is sabotaging his appeal to any potential guardian.
Charlie makes a brief cameo appearance (via re-used animation from Often an Orphan) in the Bob McKimson-directed short Dog Tales (1958). Jones shelved the Charlie Dog series of films in the 1950s, along with other characters he had introduced, such as The Three Bears and Hubie and Bertie. He was turning his efforts to new characters, such as Pepé Le Pew and Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner. However, recent Warner Brothers merchandising and series and films such as episodes of Tiny Toon Adventures, the film Space Jam (1996) in the crowd scenes (here performed by Frank Welker), and Tweety's High-flying Adventure (2000) in Italy have brought Charlie back out of retirement.
The Frisky Puppy character that Jones paired with Claude Cat in several '50s shorts bears a close physical resemblance to Charlie.
Charlie Dog appears in The Looney Tunes Show opening.
Dodsworth
Dodsworth is a fictional cat from the Merrie Melodies series. He is depicted as a larger lethargic cat with marking almost identical to Sylvester's.
Daffy Duck
Melissa Duck
E
Egghead, Jr.
Egghead, Jr. debuted in 1954's Little Boy Boo, and made two subsequent Looney Tunes appearances in 1955's Feather Dusted and 1960's Crockett-Doodle-Doo.
Egghead, Jr. is a large-headed and very intelligent baby chick and appeared in several shorts with bumptuous Foghorn Leghorn (also a character directed by McKimson and voiced by Blanc). The only child of Miss Prissy, a widow hen, Egghead, Jr. was bookish and never talked (though he mumbled when he counted playing hide-and-seek with Foghorn in Little Boy Boo). Foghorn would try to teach him to play games like baseball and cowboys and Indians, with the intent that he act more like a typical boy, but invariably resulting in bodily injury for Foghorn.
It was previously noted that Egghead, Jr. was also in the 1959 cartoon A Broken Leghorn, but this was the character Junior Rooster.
In 1991, Egghead Jr. appeared in the Tiny Toon Adventures episode "Hog-Wild Hamton"; he's Hamton's neighbor and he doesn't like being disturbed, so when a wild party takes place at Hamton's house and the guests refuse to keep the noise down, Egghead takes matters into his own hands. Egghead Jr. also makes a cameo in Star Warners. He makes a cameo watching Michael Jordan bounce in Space Jam. His most recent appearance was the Duck Dodgers episode "Corporate Pigfall."
F
Foghorn Leghorn
Foxy
Michigan J. Frog
Elmer Fudd
Frisky Puppy
Frisky Puppy is a young puppy who loves to play. He appeared in three cartoons, opposite Claude Cat, all directed by Chuck Jones. Frisky often sneaks up on Claude when Claude is trying to get rid of him, making the cat jump to the ceiling. With his loud barks and yelps, and obsessed with scratching himself because of fleas, Frisky seems to cause a lot of trouble for Claude. Since the puppy's first appearance, Two's a Crowd (1950), where Frisky was a present for the mistress of the house, Claude was always trying to get rid of Frisky, since the fact if Claude does not get along with the puppy then the cat will go. And it seems from the start that Claude hated Frisky, possibly due to Frisky's hyper active self. The Claude/Frisky storyline continued from Terrier Stricken (1952) to No Barking (1954).
G
Goopy Geer
Goopy Geer was the last attempt by animator Rudolf Ising to feature a recurring character in the Merrie Melodies series of films. Goopy is a tall, lanky humanoid dog with scruffy whiskers and long, expressive ears. In all of his animated appearances, Goopy is depicted as light colored, but in an early promotional drawing for his first cartoon, he had black fur. A month after Goopy Geer's first cartoon had been released, Walt Disney released a cartoon with a character named Dippy Dawg -- renamed "Goofy" in 1934, and notably referred to as "G. G. Geef" in 1950s shorts -- whose overall appearance was very similar to that of Goopy Geer. Due to the close proximity of the two cartoons' releases, there is little chance that either character was intended to be a copy of the other. Instead, both characters may have been inspired by earlier Ising drawings shown to Walt Disney, as with the Foxy - Mickey Mouse similarity.
Like most other early sound-era cartoon characters, Ising's Goopy has little personality of his own. Instead, he sings and dances his way through a musical world in perfect syncopation. Ising only featured the character in three cartoons. In the first, "Goopy Geer" (April 16, 1932), he plays a popular pianist entertaining at a nightclub. In Ising's other two Goopy films, both in 1932, he cast the dog first as a hillbilly in "Moonlight for Two" (June 11, 1932), then as a court jester in "The Queen Was in the Parlor" (July 9, 1932). All of these cartoons also feature Goopy's unnamed girlfriend who debuted without her gangly consort in the earlier Merrie Melodie "Freddy the Freshman" (February 20, 1932). Goopy would make a cameo in the Bosko cartoon "Bosko in Dutch" (January 14, 1933), but after Ising left Warner Brothers that same year, Goopy and other recurring Merrie Melodies characters were retired, to be later replaced by such recurring characters as Sniffles the Mouse, Inki and the Mynah Bird, the Curious Puppies, and, on two occasions, Porky Pig (a character who was certainly more prevalent in the black and white Looney Tunes). Many of the Merrie Melodies nonetheless remained high-quality one-shot cartoons, until 1943, when the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies merged and became generic.
Goopy Geer had a small role in the 1990s animated series Tiny Toon Adventures. In the episode "Two-Tone Town" (September 28, 1992), Goopy, reprising his role as the happy-go-lucky pianist from his first cartoon, meets the series' stars when they visit the "black-and-white" part of town. His appearance in this cartoon is updated somewhat, and seems to be based on early promotional drawings where his fur is black, rather than his actual cartoon appearances.
Gabby Goat
Gabby Goat was created by Bob Clampett to be a sidekick for Porky Pig in the 1937 short Porky and Gabby, directed by Ub Iwerks, who briefly subcontracted to Leon Schlesinger Productions, producers of the Looney Tunes shorts. The cartoon focuses on the title characters' camping trip, which is foiled by car trouble. Storyboard artist Cal Howard supplies Gabby's voice.
Gabby looks like Porky with a beard, horns, and scowl. The goat's chief characteristics are his irritability and short temper, traits that make him a natural foil for the shy, easy-going Porky. The concept didn't play out as well as the animators would have liked, however; audiences felt that the goat's behavior was too offensive to be funny. Gabby only appeared in two more cartoons. The first was Porky's Badtime Story (Clampett's first cartoon as director), where roommates Porky and Gabby are almost fired from their jobs for sleeping in and showing up late. They vow to get to sleep early that night, but various problems keep them awake all night. The cartoon was later remade in 1944 as Tick Tock Tuckered, featuring Daffy Duck in Gabby's role as Porky's co-star.
The third and final appearance of the character was in Get Rich Quick Porky, where Porky and Gabby dig for oil. Both Porky's Badtime Story and Get Rich Quick Porky were produced in 1937.
Recently uncovered storyboards show that Gabby Goat was originally planned to appear in the 1938 short Porky's Party. However, that role was later filled by a penguin character with a similar personality.
Speedy Gonzales
Goofy Gophers
Gossamer
Granny
Gremlin
The Gremlin is a character in the Merrie Melodies short Falling Hare, and he is the sidekick of Bugs Bunny in the United States Army Air Forces of the World War II era.
H
Ham and Ex
Ham and Ex are happy-go-lucky St. Bernard twins as well as Beans' nephews. Their names are a pun of the phrase "ham and eggs." The dogs made their debut in I Haven't Got a Hat. A year later, they reappeared in The Phantom Ship where they are fully clothed. The two would also have the lead role in The Fire Alarm.
Both are voiced by Bernice Hansen.
Hansel and Gretel (Looney Tunes)
Hansel and Gretel have appeared in the short, Bewitched Bunny, originally going to be eaten by Witch Hazel.
Hatta Mari
Hatta Mari is an anthropomorphic pigeon and femme fatale featured in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes shorts. Her name is a pun on World War I spy Mata Hari. Hatta Mari first appeared in the 1944 Looney Tunes short "Plane Daffy". She was seen as a villainous pigeon working for the Axis Powers. Hatta Mari used her sultry, feminine wiles to lure male carrier pigeons into her grasp, then disposed of them. Daffy Duck, a self-professed woman-hater (at least in this cartoon) was tempted into her home once she hiked up her skirt exposing her long curvaceous leg. The buxom beauty had lulled the woman-hater into a state of ease by her charm. At first Daffy was no match against the long passionate kisses she planted on his lips. However, he quickly realised it was a trap when he noticed her various Nazi paraphernalia, including swastika earrings. Hatta Mari then went berserk, trying to kill Daffy and steal his secret message to the Allied Powers. In an attempt to keep it from her, Daffy swallowed the message, but Hatta Mari managed to get it anyway using an X-ray machine. The message read "Hitler is a stinker". Hitler, on a device that predicted the Picturephone of 1964, replied, "Hitler is a stinker? That's no military secret!" Hermann Göring and Joseph Goebbels, standing beside Hitler, would add, "Ja, everybody knows that!" just before they commit suicide by gunshot at the end of "Plane Daffy". After World War II, most of the wartime cartoons went largely unseen for decades, and Hatta Mari was virtually forgotten.
However, she was briefly resurrected for an episode of the 1990-1992 animated series, Tiny Toon Adventures. She appeared in the episode "New Character Day" during the segment The Return of Pluck Twacy. The episode was a sequel of sorts to the classic 1946 Daffy Duck cartoon the Great Piggy Bank Robbery, where Daffy took the guise of "Duck Twacy", a parody of comic book action hero, Dick Tracy. In this cartoon, Daffy's protege Plucky Duck assumes the mantle of "Pluck Twacy" and is hired by his friend Shirley the Loon to find her missing aura. The missing aura happens to be Hatta Mari, who has been hiding out in an eerie dilapidated mansion with a gang of hoodlums. Hatta Mari uses her feminine charms to seduce Plucky and then sics the numerous villains inside the house on him. One of these is "Ticklepuss", who was actually a character named "Sloppy Moe" from two other forgotten Clampett films, Injun Trouble and its color remake Wagon Heels. Ticklepuss is a bizarre, barefooted, raggedy-looking blue-skinned man with a long beard (with no moustache) who unsuccessfully tries to tickle Twacy into submission.
According to the DVD commentary on Plane Daffy in the fourth volume of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection, the blond hair and buxom figure of Hatta Mari would later be a reality as seen in 1950s blond bombshell Jayne Mansfield
Henery Hawk
Hector the Bulldog
Hector the Bulldog is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons. Hector is a muscle-bound bulldog with gray fur and walks pigeon-toed. His face bears a perpetual scowl between two immense jowls. He wears a black collar with silver studs.
Hector (or a prototype) first appeared in 1945's Peck Up Your Troubles, where he foils Sylvester's attempts to get a woodpecker. He made a second appearance in A Hare Grows in Manhattan, leading a street gang composed of dogs in a Friz Freleng-directed short; this is also the only short where the dog has numerous speaking lines. After those shorts, Hector is a minor player in several Tweety and Sylvester cartoons directed by Freleng in 1948 and throughout the 1950s. His usual role is to protect Tweety from Sylvester, usually at Granny’s request. He typically does this through brute strength alone, but some cartoons have him outsmart the cat, such as 1954's Satan's Waitin', wherein Hector convinces Sylvester to use up his nine lives by pursuing Tweety through a series of extremely dangerous situations. In most of his appearances, the bulldog is nameless, though he is sometimes referred to as Spike. Freleng probably did not intend the character to be the same bulldog as the Spike he paired with Chester the Terrier in other cartoons.
Hector’s most prominent role was as a regular cast member in the animated series The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries. In the cartoon, he plays Granny's loyal guardian. The show makes Hector's low intelligence his Achilles heel, as Sylvester is constantly outwitting him. Originally played by Mel Blanc, Hector is currently played by voice actor Frank Welker.
Hector also appears in the video game Bugs Bunny & Taz: Time Busters where he guards one of the time gears in Granwich. He is a member of the studio audience in Sheep, Dog, 'n' Wolf.
Hector the Bulldog will appear in The Looney Tunes Show voiced by Damon Jones, taking the role as the nephew of Spike the Bulldog. He will appear in the upcoming episode "Inside Granny's Mansion". He will also serve as a friend of Tweety, an enemy of Sylvester, and a pet of Granny's.
Hippety Hopper
Honey (Looney Tunes)
Honey was the female counterpart to Bosko. Appearing in a white dress and polka-dotted bow in her hair, Honey first appeared in the first Looney Tunes short, Sinkin' in the Bathtub. She was originally voiced by an uncredited Rochelle Hudson, who was only 14 years old at the time the series began.
She will appear along with Bosko in the upcoming episode of Cartoon Network's The Looney Tunes Show episode "Important Meeting", and is serving as Bosko's sister.
Hubie and Bertie
Hugo the Abominable Snowman
Hugo is a large, rather naive, and easily fooled creature who really likes bunny rabbits. He likes to name his pets "George" and tried on two occasions to make Bugs Bunny his pet. He seems to be an actual snowman, as he melted when exposed to the sun too long.
Hugo appears in the episode The Abominable Snow Rabbit when Bugs and Daffy Duck run into him after accidentally traveling to the Himalaya Mountains. In Spaced Out Bunny, it was shown that he was captured by Marvin the Martian and brought to Mars, where Marvin attempted to give Bugs to him as a pet. In both appearances, he was voiced by Mel Blanc.
He later made a brief appearance in Tweety's High Flying Adventure, this time voiced by Frank Welker.
I
Inki
L
Little Blabbermouse
Little Blabbermouse is an anthropomorphic mouse featured in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes shorts. His name is a pun on the term blabbermouth. Blabbermouse first appeared in the 1940 Looney Tunes short "Little Blabbermouse". In this short Little Blabbermouse goes on a tour with other mice around a Drug Store where the products live up to their names. The annoying non-stop talking mouse after much pestering the tour guide mouse and a close encounter with a cat gets a mouthful of Alum making him speak gibberish.
His second was the 1940 short "Shop, Look and Listen", which has basically a similar plot except the scene is a grocery shop, they do not encounter a cat and Little Blabbermouse ends up gift wrapped. Little Blabbermouse has never been featured in any future short.
Little Kitty
A nervous cat who serves as a love interest for Beans. Voiced by Bernice Hansen.
K
K-9
M
Marc Antony and Pussyfoot
Marvin the Martian
Merlin the Magic Mouse
Merlin the Magic Mouse was a nightclub magician (he usually preferred to be called a prestidigator, though he could never pronounce this correctly) who traveled around for work. Much of the humour of the character derived from the fact that, while he was often regarded as a cheap stage magician, he knew some very real and powerful magic tricks. His magic words were typically "Atascadero Escondido!" Merlin also has a sidekick, appropriately named Second Banana, which is a slang term for a magician's assistant.
Daws Butler provided the voice of Merlin and Second Banana in the first short, Merlin the Magic Mouse; Larry Storch performed the voices for the other four films. Merlin is loosely based on W. C. Fields.
Minah Bird
Miss Cud
Miss Cud is a cow and a School teacher in I Haven't Got a Hat. She is also an ice-skater in Alpine Antics.
She is confirmed to appear in The Looney Tunes Show (as she appears in the main picture of all of the most main characters) and is going to be voiced by Roz Ryan. Like her last appearance, she will serve as a teacher at Gossamer's grade school.
The Monstars(Mean Team)
The Monstars appear in the 1996 Movie Space Jam. They appear as rivals to the Tunesquad, but at the end they want to join the Looney Tunes while their boss (Danny Devito) is at the moon.
N
Nasty Canasta
O
Oliver Owl
Oliver Owl is an owl who is aside of Porky Pig in I Haven't Got a Hat. He is also on the Title Card which is the Ships Porthole, and also a movie director in Hollywood Capers.
Owl Jolson
His first and only appearance was in the 1936 short "I Love To Singa". He was voiced by Tommy Bond in his debut short. Owl Jolson also appears in The Looney Tunes Show.
P
Penelope Pussycat
Pepé Le Pew
Pete Puma
Pete Puma debuted in the November 15, 1952 Rabbit's Kin, a Merrie Melodies animated short directed by Robert McKimson, from a story by Tedd Pierce. Animation was by Charles McKimson, Herman Cohen, Rod Scribner, and Phil De Lara.
Though Pete Puma made only two appearances, in Rabbit's Kin and in Pullet Surprise, he is often vividly remembered by cartoon fans, especially for his bizarre, inhaled, almost choking laugh (based on comedian Frank Fontaine's "Crazy Guggenheim" character). In Rabbit's Kin, Pete is chasing a young rabbit (named Buster Rabbit by some fans; and though he is called Buster at least once, in the cartoon Bugs repeatedly calls him 'Shorty'), who asks Bugs Bunny for help. Bugs is eager to oblige, and subjects Pete to some of his trademark pranks.
Pete Puma's voice was used (though not by Freberg) in a Sylvester cartoon titled Mouse and Garden, in 1960.
More recently, he has made occasional appearances on Tiny Toon Adventures (as the Acme Looniversity janitor), episodes of The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries, co-starred with Foghorn Leghorn in Pullet Surprise (voiced again by Freberg in all of these appearances), made a cameo appearance in the crowd scenes of Space Jam, Carrotblanca (as a waiter), Tweety's High-Flying Adventure, Bah, Humduck! A Looney Tunes Christmas, and is a supporting character in the Looney Tunes comic books. Pete appears in The Looney Tunes Show episode "Reunion" voiced by John Kassir where he is shown to be a friend of Marvin the Martian. He also appears in "Devil Dog", as a zookeeper.
Petunia Pig
Porky Pig
Priscilla Pig
In Bah, Humduck! A Looney Tunes Christmas, Priscilla was introduced as a new character voiced by Tara Strong. She is seen as Porky Pig's daughter and also later in the film, probably Petunia's as well. she is very kind and also cute, and want to be friends with the manager of the store her father works at, "Daffy Duck". At the end when Porky is about to say his famous line, "th-th-th-th-th...", Priscilla interrupts and says, "That's all folks" instead.
Piggy
Piggy first appeared as a fat, black pig who wears a pair of shorts with buttons on the front. His coloration and dress are identical to those of the Walt Disney character Mickey Mouse before the advent of color film. John Kenworthy argues that, considering the fact that some sketches of mice which Hugh Harman had drawn in 1925 were the inspiration for the creation of Mickey Mouse, Harman and Ising never intended to copy Disney.[3]
Piggy's name came from one of two brothers who were childhood classmates of Freleng's, nicknamed "Porky" and "Piggy".[4]
Animator Rudolf Ising introduced Piggy as a second character after Foxy to star in the Merrie Melodies series Ising was directing for producer Leon Schlesinger. Nonetheless, Ising had only made two Piggy shorts in 1931 before he went on to create Goopy Geer. The animators who took over the Merrie Melodies cartoons dropped the Piggy character (as well as his girlfriend Fluffy) and turned the series into a string of one-shots.
Despite their clichéd lead character[citation needed], Ising's two Piggy shorts are well received by some critics. The first is the 1931 short You Don't Know What You're Doin'!. Here, Piggy visits a surreal night club where he heckles and plays with the club's jazz band. This was followed by Hittin' the Trail for Hallelujah Land, also in 1931. Here, Piggy plays a steamboat captain who must rescue a drowning Uncle Tom. Due to its stereotypical portrayal of the Uncle Tom character, the cartoon is included among the so-called "Censored 11", Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts that are withheld from circulation due to their heavy use of ethnic stereotypes.
In 1936, animator Friz Freleng redesigned Piggy for colour film. Piggy was given lighter, more Caucasian-like colour with distinguishing birthmarks. The redesigned character appeared as a gluttonous child in a large family of pigs in At Your Service Madame (which gives his full name as Piggy Hamhock),[5] where he leads his fellow siblings in foiling a bum's attempt to rob their mother. A year later he starred in Pigs Is Pigs in which his gluttony takes center stage.[5] This would be his final appearance. After that he was discarded with his character traits transferred for a time to Porky Pig.
Playboy Penguin
Playboy Penguin is a character in the animated cartoon Looney Tunes, created by Chuck Jones in the late 1940s and early 1950s. He debuted in 1949's Frigid Hare and he re-appeared in 8 Ball Bunny.
Playboy Penguin is a mute skating baby penguin that seeks Bugs Bunny for help. From his debut episode, an Eskimo tries to catch him until the little penguin found Bugs Bunny and wants him to help avoid the Eskimo hunter. Then, in his second episode with Bugs, the penguin either wants to go home in Antarctica or go to Hoboken to perform in the show.
Playboy Penguin also appears on The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries and Space Jam. He also makes a cameo in the DS game, "Duck Amuck".
He will also appear in The Looney Tunes Show episode, "Trip to the Frozen Iceland", where he is an inhabitant of Antarctica. He will go under the name Play Penguin, possibly an abbreviation of Playboy Penguin or changed due to the fact Playboy is the name of an adult magazine.
Miss Prissy
Miss Prissy or Prissy is typically described as an old spinster hen, thinner than the other hens in the chicken coop, wearing a blue bonnet and wire-rimmed glasses. The other hens describe her as “old square britches”.
The premise of her cartoons are centered around the fact that the other hens are ridiculing Prissy. Her first appearance was in the 1950 short An Egg Scramble, the only cartoon featuring her and Porky Pig, in which the other hens are making fun of the fact that she cannot lay an egg. Her next appearances are centered around Foghorn Leghorn. In Lovelorn Leghorn (1951), she is set on finding a husband and in Of Rice and Hen (1953) she is looking to have children. However, in Little Boy Boo (1954) she is depicted as a widow with a child Egghead Jr. and with a much more extensive vocabulary than her trademark "yes". A Broken Leghorn (1959) and Strangled Eggs (1961), featuring Henery Hawk. In these shorts, it is usually Foghorn who is pursuing Prissy for his own selfish needs.[6]
Miss Prissy also appeared in The Looney Tunes Show episode "The Foghorn Leghorn Story" voiced by Grey DeLisle. She played as Mama Leghorn on the Movie The Foghorn Leghorn Story.
Private Snafu
Q
Quick Brown Fox and Rapid Rabbit
Quick Brown Fox and Rapid Rabbit were a pair of Warner Brothers cartoon characters, created by Robert McKimson, who appeared in only one cartoon, Rabbit Stew and Rabbits Too!
Rapid Rabbit, a small brown rabbit (who's not to be confused with Rapid T. Rabbit), is every bit as fast as his name implies; a pantomime character, he never says a word, but uses a bicycle horn to express himself. Quick Brown Fox, another pantomime character, is a fox who wants to eat the fast-running rabbit, but consistently fails to catch him despite using a variety of traps and devices. The fox's name is derived from the popular pangram, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog."
Rabbit Stew and Rabbits Too! is a 1969 theatrically released cartoon, one of the last few cartoons of the Looney Tunes series (which, at that time, was owned by Warner Brothers-Seven Arts). It was a "chase" cartoon along the same lines as the Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner cartoons; a predator tries and fails to catch his intended prey, despite using a number of ingenious or comically absurd traps. It was intended to be the first of a series of Rapid Rabbit cartoons which had been planned, but no more were produced as the animation department folded soon after its release.
Quick Brown Fox wants to make rabbit stew, with the elusive Rapid Rabbit as the main ingredient. To this end, he tries several different traps — simple ones at first, but they gradually become ridiculously elaborate — and all of them fail to ensnare Rapid, and some of them end up hurting Quick. Finally, Quick sets up a trap that involves a cannon and a sign that says "Free trip to the moon," among other elements; not only does this trap fail to catch Rapid, but Quick winds up being shot to the moon!.
The duo will later appear in The Looney Tunes Show voiced by Frank Welker and Damon Jones respectively. They will be called "Brown Fox" and "Rabbit".
R
Rags McMutt
Rags McMutt is the apricot colored dog in the 1947 short Little Orphan Airedale who escapes from a dog pound, then meets Charlie Dog in a car. He only had two speaking lines, they were: "Yeah but..." then at the end he multiply says "Let me in!". The two speaking lines was most likely performed by voice actor Frank Graham.
Ralph Phillips
Ralph Phillips is an imaginative boy who likes to daydream about all kinds of things he sees around him. For example, in From A to Z-Z-Z-Z, Ralph, while attending school, daydreams about flying in the air like a bird, fighting off mocking numbers on a blackboard and Indians (this scene was later edited because of some Native American stereotypes and some violence), dispatching a dangerous saber-tooth tiger shark, and finally punching out a huge opponent in the boxing ring and leaving the school for the day as Douglas MacArthur. From A to Z-Z-Z-Z was nominated for an Academy Award. Ralph appeared in a further Looney Tunes episode, Boyhood Daze, where he was sent up to his room for breaking a window with a baseball, wherein he indulged in similar daydreaming, and in the theatrically diverted TV pilot Adventures of the Road-Runner. In more recent years he has figured in issues of the DC Comics Looney Tunes comic book as well.
A more mature Ralph Phillips was also featured as an Army recruit in two cartoons produced specifically as military recruitment promotions, 90 Day Wondering and Drafty, Isn't It?, both directed by Jones.
Ralph Phillips was voiced by child actor Dick Beals. The older version was voiced by Warner Brothers' regular voice actor Mel Blanc, in 90 Day Wondering, and by Daws Butler, in Drafty, Isn't It?.
Ralph has a cameo as an unseen character in the Chuck Jones-directed animated adaption of The Phantom Tollbooth. He calls the protagonist Milo near the start of the film (where he speaks with the voice of June Foray and is referred to by name), and briefly speaks with Milo again just before the film ends.
Ralph Wolf
Rocky and Mugsy
Slowpoke Rodriguez
Slowpoke Rodríguez ("Lento Rodríguez" in Spanish, though some more recent translations call him "Tranquilino") is described as "the slowest mouse in all Mexico" from the country side of Mexico, and is a cousin to Speedy Gonzales, who is known as the fastest. However, he mentions to his cousin that while he may be slow in the feet, which he is best known for, he's not slow in "la cabeza" (the head). He speaks in a monotone voice and seems to never be surprised by anything. While he is the slowest mouse in all of Mexico he has been shown to have certain other (more extreme) methods of protecting himself.
Slowpoke only appeared in two cartoons alongside his cousin. The first, Mexicali Shmoes (1959), ends with two lazy cats, Jose and Manuel, the former learning the hard way that Slowpoke carries a gun (though the gun bit has been edited out of this cartoon in recent years). The second, Mexican Boarders (1962), revolves around Speedy trying to protect Slowpoke from Sylvester the Cat, but in the end, Slowpoke demonstrates his ability to hypnotize Sylvester into becoming his slave. The other mice comment at this point that "Slowpoke Rodriguez may be the slowest mouse in all Mexico, but he has the Evil Eye!". This short (which was later edited into Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales) contains a possible allusion to a marijuana habit when Slowpoke sings La Cucaracha. Despite his few appearances, "Lento Rodríguez" is an immensely popular character in Latin America.
Slowpoke appears in the Robot Chicken episode "Werewolf VS Unicorn." In a segment satirizing California's immigration issue, Arnold Schwarzenegger criticizes him for taking an hour to fetch a glass of water. Schwarzenegger then orders Rodriguez's deportation, to which Rodriguez fears will cause his execution. Slowpoke also appears alongside Speedy in a commercial for Virgin Media's broadband service in the UK.
Slowpoke also appears in The Looney Tunes Show voiced by Frank Welker.
S
Sam Sheepdog
Colonel Shuffle
Colonel Shuffle is a character in the Looney Tunes stable, based in the Southern United States. He has been shown as fiercely loyal to this region and deeply offended by anything that he feels reminds him of the North.
He referred to himself specifically by name in Mississippi Hare (1949), following a game of poker in which he lost (three queens to four kings) and proceeded to let off a barrage of gunfire. Sometimes he is shown playing a banjo in classic Dixieland style.
Among his foils are Bugs Bunny (who defeated him) in Mississippi Hare and Charlie Dog (whom he defeated) in Dog Gone South (1950).
Shuffle played a prison warden in the Tiny Toon Adventures episode "Gang Busters".
Sniffles
Shorty
Shorty (aka Buster Bunny) is the fast talking little brown hare in Rabbit's Kin. He starts off afraid of Pete Puma, but with coaxing from Bugs Bunny he doesn't see Pete as much as threat anymore.
Spike the Bulldog and Chester the Terrier
Spike the Bulldog and Chester the Terrier are animated cartoon characters in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons. Spike is a burly, gray bulldog who wears a red sweater, a brown bowler hat, and a perpetual scowl. Chester is just the opposite, small and jumpy with yellow fur and brown, perky ears.
The characters starred in only two shorts, both directed by animator Friz Freleng. The first of these films was 1952's Tree for Two. In it, Chester tells his idol Spike that he knows of a cat that they can beat up. The cat is Freleng's own Sylvester, but every time Spike thinks he has the cat cornered, a runaway zoo black panther appears in Sylvester's place, thrashing the dog instead. When Chester decides to have a go of it, however, Sylvester finds himself at the little dog's mercy. By the cartoon's end, Spike and Chester have switched roles; Spike is the fawning sycophant, and Chester the smug prizefighter.
The characters' second outing came in the 1954 film Dr. Jerkyl's Hyde. Spike (here called "Alfie" and with an English accent) is once again after Sylvester, only this time it is Sylvester himself who pummels the poor pooch, thanks to a potion that transforms him into a feline monster. Chester, of course, never sees this transformed Sylvester, thinking his buddy is being beaten by the tiny tomcat. The final loss of face for Alfie is his being thrashed by a fly that has also been affected by the potion, as it occurs in front of Chester's eyes.
In both of these cartoons, Spike is performed by voice actor Mel Blanc, and Chester is performed by Stan Freberg. In modern Warner Brothers media, Spike's voice is provided by Joe Alaskey,
The pair also appear in the 1996 film Space Jam as a pair of paramedics during the basketball game.
Another bulldog character appeared in other cartoons with Sylvester and Tweety, but this character is not Spike; he is officially known as Hector the Bulldog. Several Tom and Jerry cartoons produced by MGM also featured a character named Spike the Bulldog (and his son, Tyke), Coincidentally, WB now owns the Tom & Jerry cartoons as well (through Turner Entertainment). This is another character, unrelated to the Spike used by Freleng.
Spike the Bulldog and Chester the Terrier will appear in The Looney Tunes Show voiced by Joe Alaskey and Stan Freberg.
Sylvester
T
Taz (Tasmanian Devil)
The Three Bears
The Three Bears are a family that consists of Papa Bear (sometimes called Henry), Mama Bear, and Junior Bear (sometimes spelled Junyer or Joonyer).
Animator Chuck Jones introduced the trio in the 1944 cartoon Bugs Bunny and the Three Bears. In the short, Papa Bear tries to feed his starving family by having them act out their roles in the traditional fairy tale from which they derive their name. Unfortunately for them, when they were out of porridge, Mama substitutes carrot soup for it, and the "Goldilocks" they lure turns out to be none other than Bugs Bunny. For the bulk of the series, Voice actors Billy Bletcher, Bea Benaderet, and Stan Freberg played Papa, Mama, and Junior, respectively. However, in the initial entry Mel Blanc played Papa, and Kent Rogers played Junior (Freberg assuming the role after Rogers's death in World War II). After the classic shorts, Will Ryan and Joe Alaskey play Henry and Mama.
Jones' bears as introduced in the short are perhaps the first film satire of the American nuclear family and how its traditional roles were coming under increasing scrutiny in the 1940s. Papa is a loud-mouthed, short tempered know-it-all shrimp, while Junior is an oversized, bumbling buffoon. The two are constantly at each other, leaving Mama Bear as the innocent (and deadpan) middle-bear, although she often resorts to thwacking one of them with a rolled-up newspaper to keep the peace. As Jones himself was never shy to point out, this cartoon and others in the series anticipate the failings and foibles that would later make the sitcom All in the Family such a success.
Jones brought back the Bears for his 1948 cartoon What's Brewin', Bruin?, this time sans Bugs. Here, alpha-male Papa Bear decides that it's time for the Bears to hibernate. Like any good family should, Mama Bear and Junior Bear obey, but Mama's snoring and Junior's creaky cradle keep Papa from getting the sleep he himself advocated. Junior's voice is here supplied by Stan Freberg, who would retain the role for all future Three Bears cartoons, including Bee-Deviled Bruin and Bear Feat, released on Looney Tunes Assorted Nuts, both in 1949. Mama Bear made a cameo appearance in the 1950 Daffy Duck short The Scarlet Pumpernickel.
1951's A Bear for Punishment, the last film in the series, is often considered the funniest, and it is perhaps the most satirical. This time, it's Father's Day, and Mama and Junior's well-intended gifts do nothing but dishonor the perturbed Papa. Jones later stated that many of the scenarios in the short were derived from his own experiences.
Jones retired the Three Bears in 1951. The influence of the series would linger, however, as other studios copied or altered the idea. Aside from Norman Lear's aforementioned All in the Family, Famous Studios repeated Jones family scenario in their Baby Huey series of cartoons. The Bears' cartoons most significant impact was perhaps on Jones himself, as these films (along with the Hubie and Bertie and Charlie Dog shorts) represent some of Jones's earliest work.
Mama Bear of the Three Bears can be briefly spotted in a brief headshot during the final scene of the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
In the early 1990s, the Three Bears were brought back and featured several times in the TV series Tiny Toon Adventures. Most famously, they appeared in an updated "90's version" of the classic Three Bears fairy tale (with Elmyra playing the part of Goldilocks), which parodied suburbia and the mass commercialism prevalent in American society. In the episode, "Prom-ise Her Anything", Mama Bear is seen as a lunch lady. Papa Bear also appeared as the vendor in "Garage Sale of the Century" in Animaniacs.
The Three Bears make a cameo appearance in Space Jam, watching a basketball game.
In Looney Tunes: Back In Action, the Bears are tourists in Paris. They run into DJ Drake (Brendan Fraser), whose trousers have rocketed off into the air leaving him in his underwear. DJ steals Papa Bear's trousers so he can save Jenna Elfman from a villain.
Papa Bear will appear in The Looney Tunes Show voiced by Will Ryan.
Toro the Bull
Toro the Bull is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of films. He made only one appearance in the short Bully for Bugs. What makes him distinguishable from other bulls are his red eyes. Toro also made an appearance as a boss character in the 1930s era in Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time. He also appears in the films Space Jam and Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
Toro the Bull will appear in The Looney Tunes Show voiced by Dee Bradley Baker.
Cecil Turtle
Cecil Turtle is an animated cartoon character in the Warner Brothers Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of films. Though he made only three theatrical appearances, Cecil is remarkable in that he is one of the very few characters who was able to beat Bugs Bunny, and the only one to do so three times in a row and at the rabbit's own game.
Animator Tex Avery introduced Cecil in the short Tortoise Beats Hare, released on March 15, 1941. Even from the cartoon's opening titles, Avery lets on that Bugs Bunny is about to meet his match. Bugs wanders onto the screen munching his obligatory carrot and absent-mindedly begins reading the title card, grossly mispronouncing most of the credits, such as /əˈvɛrɪ/ for "Avery" rather than the correct /ˈeɪvərɪ/. When he finally gets to the title itself, he becomes outraged, tears apart the title card, and rushes to Cecil Turtle's house. He then bets the little, sleepy-eyed turtle ten dollars that he can beat him in a race.
Cecil accepts Bugs' bet, and the race begins several days later. Bugs races away at top speed just before finishing the shout of, "Get on your mark, get set, go!" Cecil quickly (for him, anyway) goes to a public telephone and calls up Chester Turtle. After talking to Chester about the bet, he tells him to call "the boys" (cousins), and tell them to be ready when he comes to their position, and to "give him the works". Chester calls the relatives, all of whom look and sound like Cecil (some have deeper voices, some have higher voices), and relays the message. As Bugs runs relentlessly toward the finish line, Cecil and the other turtles take turns showing up at just the right moment to baffle the bunny. In the end, Bugs is convinced he has won, only to see Cecil (or one of his kin) across the finish demanding the money. Bugs suggests that he has been tricked, and all nine turtles approach and reply, "It's a possibility!" Voice actor Mel Blanc supplies Cecil's drowsy drawl, which is like a slowed-down version of Blanc's later characterization of Barney Rubble.
"Tortoise Beats Hare" follows one of the many folk variants of the Aesop fable "The Tortoise and the Hare" in which the faster beast is deceived by look-alikes placed along the course.[7] More directly, it is Avery's parody of the 1935 Disney Silly Symphony, The Tortoise and the Hare. Avery left Warner Brothers before he could produce any new cartoons featuring Cecil. However, he introduced a similar character in 1943 named Droopy. Droopy would even take some of his tricks from his slow-and-steady predecessor, such as using his relatives to help him outsmart a wolf.
Bob Clampett took Avery's scenario and altered it for his film Tortoise Wins by a Hare released on February 20, 1943. The title is an appropriate pun on "hair". Bugs again challenges Cecil to a race after viewing footage from their previous encounter two years earlier (which seems to depict Cecil as having won fairly instead of by cheating Bugs with his cousins). Bugs then goes to Cecil's tree home disguised as an old man (a parody of Bill Thompson's "Old Timer" character from Fibber McGee and Molly) to ask the turtle his secret. Cecil, not in the least bit fooled by the disguise remarks, "Clean livin', friend. Clean livin'...". And then reveals his streamlined shell lets him win, and produces a set of blueprints for his "air-flow chassis". The turtle ends the conversation with the comment, "Oh, and another thing... Rabbits aren't very bright, either!" just before slamming the door in the enraged bunny's face. Not getting the hint that the turtle's story is a humbug, Bugs builds the device and prepares for the race.
Meanwhile, the bunny mob learns of the upcoming match-up and places all its bets on Bugs. ("In fact, we don't even think that the toitle will finish... Do we, boys?" "Duh, no, Boss, no!") The race begins, and Bugs still outpaces his reptilian rival. However, in his new get-up, the dim-witted gangsters mistake him for the turtle. Cecil reinforces this misconception by dressing in a gray rabbit suit and munching on some delicious carrots. The mobsters thus make the shelled Bugs' run a nightmare, ultimately giving the race to Cecil (in an aside to the audience, as the rabbits cheer him, Cecil remarks, "I told you rabbits aren't very bright!"). When Bugs removes the chassis and sobbingly reveals that he's the rabbit, the rabbit gangsters remark, in mock-Bugsy style, "Ehhh, now he tells us!" and commit suicide by shooting themselves with a single bullet that goes through the sides of all of their apparently soft heads. (The final gag is often cut when shown on basic cable television but can be found uncut on the Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 1.)
Cecil and Bugs would have one final match up in Friz Freleng's cartoon, Rabbit Transit, released on May 10, 1947. The title is a play of Rapid Transit. Unlike Tortoise Wins by a Hare, this cartoon presumes that Bugs and Cecil have never met before now. While relaxing in a steam bath, Bugs reads about the original fable and, as he did reading the credits of Tortoise Beats Hare, becomes incensed at the idea of a turtle outrunning a rabbit. Cecil, also in the steam bath, claims that he could outrun Bugs, prompting Bugs to challenge him to a race (again, as in Tortoise Beats Hare, although at least here Bugs receives some provocation). This time, Bugs and Cecil agree to no cheating. Cecil, however, quickly reveals that his shell is now rocket propelled, allowing him to go a surprising combination between fast and slow. Bugs does his best to steal, dismantle, and destroy the device, but all to little effect. In the end, however, Bugs does manage to top the turtle and crosses the finish line first. Nevertheless, it is Cecil who has the last laugh when he rooks the rabbit into confessing to "doing 100 easy" -- in a 30-miles-per-hour zone. Bugs is taken away by the police to enjoy his victory—behind bars. Cecil closes out the cartoon by saying Bugs' famous line, "Ain't I a...um...stinker?" Iris-out.
The Warners directors retired Cecil after his third showdown with Bugs. Nevertheless, Cecil has made occasional cameos in later projects. He is seen briefly in the 1996 film Space Jam and the 2003 DVD Looney Tunes: Reality Check, his voice now provided by Joe Alaskey. He's also made cameo in an episode in The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries. He also features in some issues of the Looney Tunes comic book. His only notable Warner Brothers Animation Looney Tunes short cameo came in 1954's Devil May Hare, which was directed by Robert McKimson, Sr. and pitted Bugs against the Tasmanian Devil, who made his debut here.
Cecil Turtle will appear in The Looney Tunes Show voiced by Joe Alaskey. Cecil also appears in The Looney Tunes Show opening.
Tweety Bird
W
Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner
Willoughby the Dog
Willoughby is a hound dog created and voiced by Tex Avery for the 1940 cartoon, Of Fox and Hounds.[8] Willoughby is characterized by his below-average intelligence and overall gullibility. Willoughby later appears in other Warner Brothers animated shorts, including The Heckling Hare (1941), The Crackpot Quail, Nutty News (as the lead dog of a fox hunting party), The Hep Cat — as Rosebud (1942) and Hare Force — as Sylvester the Dog (1944). According to Chuck Jones, the character was based on Lennie, from Of Mice and Men (1941).
He will later appear in The Looney Tunes Show as a friend of Barnyard Dawg and will be voiced by Damon Jones.
Witch Hazel
Y
Yosemite Sam
See also
- Merrie Melodies
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1929–1939)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1940–1949)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1950–1959)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1960–1969)
- Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1970–present and miscellaneous)
References
- ^ The Bird Came C.O.D. at imdb.com
- ^ Conrad Cat at TV.com
- ^ Kenworthy, John The Hand Behind the Mouse, Disney Editions: New York, 2001. p. 54
- ^ Beck, Jerry. Audio commentary for "I Haven't Got a Hat" on the Warner Brothers DVD set Looney Tunes Golden Collection, Volume 3. (2005) citing Freleng's autobiography.
- ^ a b Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Brothers Cartoons. Henry Holt and Company. ISBN 0-8050-0894-2
- ^ "Miss Prissy the widow chickeness who was in love with Foghorn". Petcaretips.net. Retrieved 2011-08-30.
- ^ Aarne-Thompson-Uther type 275 http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0275.html
- ^ "Warner Bros. Cartoon Releases - 1940". Davemackey.com. 2001-03-11. Retrieved 2011-08-30.
External links
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||