My (horribly delayed) June Bugs reviews...

[BobChief]

Because I tape the shows I follow (not all of which are on CN) in the order they air, and because I've had very little time lately to watch taped stuff, I'm just now getting to the June Bugs stuff (I only taped four hours IIRC, the first was all dubbed Turner Ent. stuff, the last came later on Sunday, after they started mixing titles up).
Only the newer shorts are reviewed. For some reason they skewed the hour with Box Office Bunny ahead roughly the length of a classic toon, ergo I missed that one, and wound up a short bit into Blooper Bunny. Anyhoo, "hare" we go...

This is a Life?
A cheater, really, I saw at least one of the embedded shorts (Hare Remover?) during the first (dubbed) hour..."Ahhh, yer red hot Doc!"

Hyde and Hare
I still don't get how he couldn't have "made the connection" while in the dark closet, or why he didn't turn oogly straightaway having drank the potion in the flask (are rabbits' metabolisms slower? Whoever told me the one about dogs and redwoods prolly knows this, too)

Knight-Mare Hare
Pouf! Brings back great memories, but didn't it seem like something was missing? (I don't know what...)

Roman Legion Hare
Don't remember this. I keep thinking there would be a Bugs crack after the lions turned on Charlie* (sorry, Nero...) and Sam, but there wasn't...


Bear with me, my ISP is cutting in and out...

Bugs' Bonnets
We've gone over this before. Great toon. Loved the scenics (Phil DeGuard, wasn't it?)

Broomstick Bunny
Another great short RUINED by time compression!

Blooper Bunny
I saw this soon after it debuted on CN. Great job with the "steadicam" effect, and the "editing"!!

Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers
I may have seen this someplace other than CN...wild!

Carrotblanca
Totally silly! But, so was Roger Rabbit, which I liked...

From Hare to Eternity
Nope, I'm not touching this...:(

People are Bunny
NOW I know who that host looked like... Mel Blanc! (right?) Way back in the days of 12 channels, WNEW-TV in New York badly edited the closing scene (I think it was actually film breakage...)

Rebel Rabbit
Well, I guess he IS a taxpayer technically, he cost WB plenty of $$$!

High Diving Hare
Don't remember this either. An Indian imitation, a little more than fleeting as in "Bonnets", but passed over by the PTB...

Rabbit Fire
See "Broomstick" above.

Bugs and Thugs
Great scene at the gas station. Who had that "hidden stuff in WB toons" page, Matthew? Note the certificate in the final scene: "Local 839" was the Screen Cartoonists' union designation for the Warner studio.


*Nero was done in the style of Charles Laughton, who starred in 1937's I, Claudius as another Roman emperor.

[Brandon Pierce]

Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers
You said you may have seen it other than CN... Nickelodeon used to play it.

[Jack]

From Bobchief:
Bugs' Bonnets
We've gone over this before. Great toon. Loved the scenics (Phil DeGuard, wasn't it?)


It's great that they stopped editing this one, one of my favorite post 53 Jones cartoons. Also, Robert Gribbroek most likely designed the backgrounds. Maurice Noble had left to do industrial films before the 3D shutdown, and did not return right away. This left a VERY variant period in Jones cartoon design. Gribbroek also designed "Two Scents Worth," and "One Froggy Evening" before others such as Ernie Nordli and Bob Givens took over more permanently. When Noble returned, Gribbroek settled into the McKimson unit until the studio closed. Nordli went back to work for Disney, doing layout on such films as "101 Dalmations," and some short subjects. DeGuard did lay out a few films, though.

Gribbroek had worked for the Jones unit from about 1944 up until about 1953, when he vanished someplace temporarily. He worked on over 120 films doing backgrounds in some form at WB, only Hawly Pratt is credited with more. Jones never speaks of Gribbroek for some odd reason, but he never really goes into depth about his 40s and early 50s cartoons...

Generally, the layout man/woman would design everything for the background painter to paint, while all character layout was done by the director. Some even chose all the colors giving the painter little chance to make his own mark on the backgrounds. The only unit that didn't really follow this setup was Freleng's unit. Hawley Pratt would do some design, and the character layouts. That unit's background stylings seemed to radically change when the background painter changed, so I'm left to assume that the painter decided most of what went into the backgrounds, or at least the color. Look at all the stuff Paul Julian got away with in his backgrounds, I doubt he could have done so much name dropping in a Jones cartoon, or even a McKimson flick. Sorry for going on, but this is a bit of an interest for me.


Jack:D
P.S. Laugh4me has the hidden gags site... (http://gregbrian.tripod.com/hidden/hidindx.html) He has a message board for mentioning gags.

[J Lee]

{{NOW I know who that host looked like... Mel Blanc! (right?) Way back in the days of 12 channels, WNEW-TV in New York badly edited the closing scene (I think it was actually film breakage...)}}

Yes, it was film breakage, right after "They always shoot bl.." WNEW's print immediately cut to Daffy saying "Blanks...have a handful of blanks --- Jeeez!" Backe before around 1982 or so, Syndication packages were on film, and if there was a break, that's the way it stayed for years...

Also, the "People Are Bunny" host was supposed to by Art Linkeletter, though Daws Butler did a crappy imitatationof him...

[BobChief]

Brandon Pierce:

You said you may have seen it other than CN... Nickelodeon used to play it.

That HAS to have been it. The later LT show with the non-sung theme.

There were other hours I wanted to tape, but either they were on against the stock-car race that day (Dover, Delaware?) or they had (dubbed) toons in them I *really* don't want to see anymore (the list is not in front of me, I printed it out and then marked them)

I really would have liked to see Box Office Bunny (see my note above) and French Rarebit, a GREAT McKimson toon I also haven't seen since the days of 12 channels...

[Crazy Tom]

During "June Bugs", I saw Roman Legion Hare for the first time in years. CN (Cartoon Network) shockingly edited the final crack line that Bugs says. The quote, "Well, as the Romans say, E Pluribis Uranium!" (obviously a mockery of E Pluribis Unum on all of our coins). I jumped out of my pants when CN cut the quote out.
Are they now telling us that the quote is inappropriately offensive to Italian-Americans or a farce of their history? I hate to tell you this, but little by little, we are losing part of our culture thanks to the minority (the people who complain) and the moneymakers. Somebody please wake Ted Turner up!!

[PorkyandDaffy]

I can only hope that Pluribus Uranium edit was some sort of mistake or oversight. The edit makes no sense, even less sense than the censoring of DRIP ALONG DAFFY's ending.

It might've just been a mistake. Something similar - even though all of AMC's prints of the Three Stooges shorts were supposed to be unedited, Columbia accidentally (?) supplied them to edited versions of a few shorts, like MOVIE MANIACS (which is rarely shown uncut on TV) and SPOOK LOUDER. I bet if they ever get rights to THEY STOOGE TO CONGA, Columbia will give them a version of the short that's missing the controversial Climbing Spike scene.

[Jack]

I'm curious, what IS the the controversial Climbing Spike scene.


Jack:D

[BobChief]

Crazy Tom:
During "June Bugs", I saw Roman Legion Hare for the first time in years. CN (Cartoon Network) shockingly edited the final crack line that Bugs says. The quote, "Well, as the Romans say, E Pluribis Uranium!" (obviously a mockery of E Pluribis Unum on all of our coins). I jumped out of my pants when CN cut the quote out.


Well, that answers my wondering above, thanks Tom!

But really, WB Animation staff (probably before the short was aired on the ABC Bugs show) are the real culprits of that edit...it looked like a normal iris-out of the period. Don't blame CN; they just use what WB sends them.

And no, I don't know either who's offended by a cartoon character who butchers a line of Latin.

[PorkyandDaffy]

I'm curious, what IS the the controversial Climbing Spike scene. .

It's a scene in THEY STOOGE TO CONGA where Moe and Larry are helping Curly climb a telephone pole, and in the process, Curly's leg keeps slipping and his climbing spikes stab in Moe's head, ear, and eye. OUCH! It's the single most violent moment in a Stooge short (and that's saying a lot for three guys who beat each other on the head with hammers and heavy objects) and many TV stations in the past have either heavily edited the short, or just banned it altogether (the short is also WWII themed and has a stereotypical buck-toothed Japanese soldier who says "so" all the time, so that might also have something to do with it). It's a very funny short, regardless.

[Jack]

Thanks!

[BugsandTweety]

>This is a Life?
>A cheater, really, I saw at least one of the >embedded shorts (Hare Remover?) during the first >(dubbed) hour..."Ahhh, yer red hot Doc!"

Have to give them credit, though. The cheaters in those days were still done with flair, unlike the lame "Hare-Abian Nights" or "Devil's Feud Cake".
Great to see Daffy, Elmer, and Sam all together in a Bugs cartoon.

>Hyde and Hare
>I still don't get how he couldn't have "made the >connection" while in the dark closet,

Darkness conceals a multitude of sins. Including changes into monsters.

>or why he didn't turn oogly straightaway having
>drank the potion in the flask (are rabbits' metabolisms slower?

Maybe he did and we don't see it. We don't see Bugs drink the potion because the POV is Jekyll's during this time. Remember that Jekyll comes into the lab looking for Bugs. Bugs could have changed and then changed back. Alternatively, it may take longer to affect Bugs because this is the first time he's drank it whereas Jekyll has been addicted to it for some time and his body is used to it (yeah, Tweety and Sylvester change instantaneously in their cartoons, but maybe this one is a different variant on the formula...) Or it could be the potion Bugs drank was from a different mixture and was impure, etc..

>Knight-Mare Hare
>Pouf! Brings back great memories, but didn't it >seem like something was missing?

Could be. But I doubt CN would edit this cartoon.
Unless references to Cab Calloway and Louis Armstrong "date" the cartoon and are no longer suitable.

>Roman Legion Hare
>Don't remember this. I keep thinking there would >be a Bugs crack after the lions turned on >Charlie* (sorry, Nero...) and Sam, but there >wasn't...

Ah, E pleuribus uranium. Really offensive, that.
Might give the kiddies the idea that the Romans were nuclear physicists.

>Bugs' Bonnets
>We've gone over this before. Great toon. Loved >the scenics (Phil DeGuard, wasn't it?)

Richard H. Thomas, actually. Odd that Bill Butler's backgrounds for "Now Hare This..." are so strikingly similar.

>Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers
>I may have seen this someplace other than >CN...wild!

Probably Nickelodeon, or maybe on its original broadcast on CBS' Bugs Bunny's Creature Features.
A wild cartoon, indeed, and I have quite the soft spot for it. A black hole that burps, dopey doppelgangers, carrots that beget murderer
bunnies, Daffy drawn with human lips inside his
beak.

>From Hare to Eternity
>Nope, I'm not touching this...

Two great gags. Yosemite Sam digging up Michigan J. and the tribute to Friz Freleng on Sam's ship.
The song he sings is quite snappy, if only Mel Blanc could have sung it 50 years ago.

>People are Bunny
>NOW I know who that host looked like... Mel >Blanc! (right?)

Art Linkletter and Ed Nelson, I do believe.