My Charles Jones Bunny is Deadly to Your Funny Bone! Die, Duck, Die!

Let me make one thing perfectly clear. I grew up watching cartoons during the Nixon era.




I grew up watching cartoons.  Didn't make a whole lot of distinction between where they came from.  The only thing I cared about was whether or not they were funny.  I didn't like unfunny cartoons.  I don't think I was a whole lot different from most younger children in that way.  Kids like me are the reason that Scooby-Do had dumb chase scenes and Casey Kasem is still making a living saying crap like "Zoinks!" at the ripe old age of ninety.

Strange thing is, even as a kid, I never exactly knew what I was going to find funny.  The Banana Splits were funny in a way that The Monkeys weren't.  I think I can safely say I was in the definite minority there.  I pretty much found cartoon violence funny. Almost always. When Bugs talked Elmer into shooting Daffy it was funny.  When Daffy talked Elmer into shooting Daffy, it was funny.  When Daffy talked Elmer into shooting Daffy for the second time, it was funny.  When Daffy talked Elmer into shooting him for the third time, it's just fucking cartoon nirvana.

If you don't find this shit funny, this isn't the blog for you.

I watched this stuff growing up every morning.  Looney Tunes were sprinkled liberally on the local network channels along with episodes of Captain Kangaroo and locally produced children's programming.  Seeing ping-pong balls raining down on the good Captain was snicker funny, but couldn't touch the charred face of Daffy Duck as he explained to Bugs that Elmer was "still lurking about" and that he wouldn't go back up to re-check.  "No more for me, I'm driving."  Chuck Jones was my God even back then, though I didn't know his name.

This was the early '70s.  But by the time the decade ended, the Tunes got their balls cut off, "7-Zark-7" subbed for death, destruction and mayhem in Battle of the Planets, and even the producers of Star Blazers were dubbing in dialogue like "Good thing he made it out alive" to cover the death of characters. What changed, exactly? And when?  And how the hell did I miss it?

"Should I blow up now, or wait 'till I get home?"