From the 1949 Tex Avery cartoon, “The Home of Tomorrow”, the television not only answers questions, it tells questioners to shut up already, and bullies them to stop asking such questions. Here’s more from MimsyWasTheBorogove.
Hey kids (of all ages), it’s Saturday Morning Cartoon time again!
Although Egghead and Elmer Fudd have been treated as distinct characters in relatively recent ‘toons and comics, here we have more evidence that Elmer originally evolved out of Egghead. In his first fully-recognizable appearance, complete with the iconic Arthur Q. Bryan voice (previously used for the title character in DANGEROUS DAN MCFOO), Elmer is still wearing Egghead’s signature stiff-collar, green, baggy, outdated suit and hat. That, along with the fact that Egghead was actually identified as “Elmer Fudd” on-screen in one earlier picture, and on lobby posters for another, makes it a lock that Elmer and Egghead were indeed the same character…
Or does it?!
Turns out that a case can be made that the baggy-suit guy used as a running gag in cartoons mostly featuring other characters and elements was never Egghead at all, but ‘Elmer’ from the start. Unlike the wide-eyed, verbose, central-player who looked a bit like him and was also created by Tex Avery, he was never explicitly named as Egghead.
If this is the case, it’s a modern error to depict the derby-hatted, proto-Elmer as Egghead, when that was a different character from cartoons of the same period.
In any event, the Egghead and Elmer characters sort of merged in today’s picture to create the Elmer Fudd we all know. He looks like the running-gag proto-Elmer drawn in greater detail, but he is the central star of the cartoon like Egghead.
With Chuck Jones largely taking-over the character from Avery, the new Elmer gets rather a gentle introduction as a would-be amateur nature photographer. Until he gets unprovoked harassment from a certain rabbit, who is only about midway through his own evolution from the little white bunny that messed-up PORKY’S HARE HUNT a couple years earlier into Elmer’s legendary arch-rival: Bugs Bunny.
From early 1940, here’s ELMER’S CANDID CAMERA. More from the OldHorseman.
Today’s classic cartoon is another Warner Brothers’ Merrie Melodies, directed by Tex Avery, and featuring Egghead, the forerunner to Elmer Fudd. Made in 1939, A Day At the Zoo is chalkful of corny puns and homespun humor that still works because it’s fast-paced and fairly breezy. Here, we’re entertained by two bucks (deer) and five scents (skunks)! The pack of camels are smoking, of course. Egghead tests his luck with a lion. More from the OldHorseman.
We launch a new series today: Presenting a vintage cartoon every Saturday morning, just like in the good old days, before the dingbats took over the belfry! We open with a 1938 classic: Warner Brothers’ A Feud There Was, revisiting the celebrated hillbilly feuds in the Appalachian Mountains. There are McCoys here, only they aren’t battling the Hatfields, but the Weavers.
Elmer Fudd is trying, valiantly but unsuccessfully, to bring peace to the mountaintops. The great Tex Avery directed. Mel Blanc does many of the vocals, although that’s the Sons of the Pioneers as the uncredited singing group led by none other than Roy Rogers! More from the OldHorseman.
Here is one of the early appearances by Daffy Duck in a Warner Brothers Merrie Melodies cartoon from 1938. Besides Daffy Duck 1.0, we also meet his nemesis — Egghead — who would later evolve into Elmer Fudd. It’s a little bit talky, but there’s lots of great sight gags, plus a scene-stealing turtle who stretches ambidexterity into multiple new dimensions. Tex Avery directs. More from the OldHorseman.
Here’s a 1937 Merrie Melodies cartoon from Warner Brothers that introduced Egghead, sort of a forerunner to Elmer Fudd. Tex Avery (listed in the credits as Fred Avery) directed the short, with an uncredited Mel Blanc supplying the vocals for Egghead. Blanc had already done the vocals for Porky Pig but hadn’t yet brought us Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck or Barney Rubble. The cowpokes out in Wahoo, Wyoming, are actually played by the singing group: Sons of the Pioneers. More from the OldHorseman.
Going a little stir crazy being cooped up in your shack? How about some Red Hot Riding Hood, the 1943 Tex Avery cartoon from Warner Brothers? This isn’t the full cartoon. But these clips ought to help you wet your whistle and blow off the quarantine.
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Hollywood Steps Out is a 1941 short Merrie Melodies cartoon by Warner Bros., directed by Tex Avery. The cartoon features caricatures of Hollywood celebrities from the 1930s and early 1940s including Clark Gable, Wallace Beery, Bing Crosby, Greta Garbo and Groucho Marx.
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