Where's the love for Rocky and Bullwinkle?

[minor muppetz]

Been watching the entire Burried Treasure storyline, and there's a number of things I noticed...

This must be the only time we see Rocky without a hat on (well, I also recall an episode where Rocky quickly swithces his night cap with his aviator cap, but I think the animation was a bit fast... given the quickness of it I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't even draw a frame of Rocky's bare head). It's when the police fire at Rocky and Bullwinkle, when they mistakenly think the two are trying to rob the bank (as opposed to warning them). Rocky quickly puts his hat on a stick to put up in the air. I paused the scene, and it looks like Rocky doesn't have any ears (though I wonder ears were covered by the stick Rocky was holding).

When Bullwinkle opens his suitcase to see all the money, piles go all over the ground... But we see a little of an edge of the cliff. Looks like some of that money was just floating off the cliff.

And at the end, Boris and the money get in the ice making machine. First Rocky brings back the money, in the block of ice, and then he brings in Boris, trapped in a block of ice. But when Boris is shown, for a quick second the ice is shown to have money instead of Boris, before cutting to a close-up (I think the footager of the second shot of an ice block coming was reused).

Also, I've known this for ten years, but it's worth pointing out that one of Boris' gang members was voiced by William Conrad, making it one of the few times Conrad voiced a character other than the narrarator.

Also noticed a goof in the second Fan Club segment. Throughout the segment, Boris, Rocky, Captain Peachfuzz and Natasha are all sitting together in a row (in that order), all next to each other (no seat gaps between them), but in certain close-ups the seats next to Rocky and/or Captain Peachfuzz can still be seen and they are clearly empty all of a sudden. Do Boris and Natasha just walk back-and-fourth from their seats in such a little amount of time?

 

[D'Snowth]

The thing I noticed about the "Buried Treasure" storyline is that this is probably the only time Boris pulled an evil plan without Natasha.

As for Rocky without his helmet, you're right, they didn't draw him with any ears, but I remember at some point in the "Upsidasium" storyline, we see back in Pottsylvania, cars are being powered by squirrels running inside little hamster wheels, and those squirrels basically resembled Rocky in every form, only they ran on all fours instead of two, and they did have ears.

 

[minor muppetz]

The thing I noticed about the "Buried Treasure" storyline is that this is probably the only time Boris pulled an evil plan without Natasha.

One of the reasons I don't watch that storyline too often, heh heh heh...

But I wonder what the show would have been like if there were more recurring villians besides Boris and Natasha, if there were other storylines with Boris and his gang, if the segments had a rogues gallery of villians.

 

[D'Snowth]

Somehow I think perhaps maybe the show MIGHT have been a little more interesting if there were some other recurring villains aside from Boris and Natasha... I think they may have tried to accomplish that with Mr. Big but realized that would not have worked too well, lol. It would have been interesting too if there were more recurring characters that were talking animals, but I believe on the Season Two DVD, June Foray mentions that was kind of the point of having Rocky and Bullwinkle be the only anthropromorphic animals speaking to people. The anecdote was funny when June said she met up with Jay Ward and Bill Scott, who apparently already had a few martinis, and her thinking the idea was strange at first... after her first martini, thinking the idea wasn't too bad... after her second, thinking it was sensational, lol.

 

[minor muppetz]

It would have been interesting too if there were more recurring characters that were talking animals, but I believe on the Season Two DVD, June Foray mentions that was kind of the point of having Rocky and Bullwinkle be the only anthropromorphic animals speaking to people.

I've been thinking the same thing lately. Rocky and Bullwinkle are the only anthromorphic animals in their segments (or do Gidney and Cloyd count?), Mr. Peabody is the only anthromorphic animal in his segments... Fractured Fairy Tales and Aesop and Son are the only ones that have many anthromorphic animals, and they're always one-shot characters. Though I think some of the Bullwinkle's Corner segments have additional talking/anthromorphic characters (Bullwinkle's grandfather in one poem, the mouse in Hickory Dickory Dock, the dog in Old Mother Hubbard).

 

[minor muppetz]

Been watching certain chapters of Jet Fuel Formula tonight. And noticed a few interesting things.

When Rocky and Bullwinkle are at sea on the life boat with the mooseberry bush disguised as Boris' uncle, there is a full shot of the boat and the "uncle" isn't in the shot.

Also, Bullwinkle puts his antlers in the holes to stop it from sinking, but after the boat comes near them, Bullwinkle pulls his antlers out, and we don't see water shooting out again, and it does take a bit of time before they're saved.

When Rocky and Bullwinkle are tricked into disguising themselves as Boris and Natasha, Boris glues part of their disguises. But when Rocky and Bullwinkle try to take their disguises off, Rocky only tries to get his fake mustach off, and Bullwinkle only tries to get his wig off. They never try to get their clothes off, which would at least prove they're not human, but was the clothing glued on?

And when Bullwinkle is about to be beheaded, he's not wearing the clothes that Natasha was wearing, but then part of it suddenly appears back on Bullwinkle's body while he's about to be beheaded (can't remember if it stays on after that).

And I wonder if having Natasha wear the extra clothing on the boat (the cape/coat, hat, gloves, and sunglasses) was only done for the sake of eventually disguising Bullwinkle as her. It would have looked weird for Bullwinkle to wear the strapless dress, and might make it more obvious it's not her. Then again, the wig Bullwinkle wears doesn't match Natasha's hair (the wig makes it look like Bullwinkle let his hair grow out), and of course with this being a cartoon the other characters are easily fooled by disguises no matter how bad they are. Speaking of the matching hair, I wonder if Natasha was officially a spy for Pottsylvania... They refer to her as "female spy", when they see Rocky and Bullwinkle in disguise as Boris and Natasha they seem to focus on Boris, saying he "travels with tall female spy", the newspaper for the next day in pottsylvania only refers to Boris getting beheaded, and later Fearless Leader only seems interested in beheading Boris, though when they think Bullwinkle is Natasha they try to behead him while tossing Rocky dressed as Boris off a cliff. Maybe they're not familair with what Natasha looks like.

I like the Rocky and Bullwinkle segments the best. The supporting segments are okay, but when I watch the DVDs I usually tend to watch things with R&B, in part because I'd rather watch all parts of a storyline (especially a long one) in one sitting, more than watching several full half-hours in a row. The supporting segments are fine, and lately I've been liking the Dudley Do-Right segments better than I did as a kid, but I wonder if I'd currently like Dudley Do-Right, Mr. Peabody, and Fractured Fairy Tales as much if those were parts of other cartoons that were on the air in the 1960s. There aren't many other cartoons from that era that I'm still a big fan of (the only ones I'm really big on are Looney Tunes, which had been around for years before and after Bullwinkle was on the air, and to an extent The Flintstones and Wacky Races), though some I was a bigger fan of as a child (Underdog, Yogi Bear). Something to think about.

 

[D'Snowth]

I see now that Vivendi has the distribution rights to the show since the demise of Sony Wonder that they're now putting out re-releases of previous seasons, in cheap little single-disc packages... and IMO, Vivendi is one of the worst offenders for the new "greener" DVD cases: less plastic means less sturdiness and easier-to-breakness.

 

[PanthraDion]

I'm sorry if this is a little random, but I just remembered this. Anyway, what I want to say is that all of the Rocky and Bullwinkle episodes are on Hulu. Just saying.

 

[D'Snowth]

I've just recently noticed something, I'm not sure if it was intentional or conscious or what, but in early segments of Peabody's Improbable History, Mr. Peabody almost always walks on all fours, and sits the way a dog usually sits, yet overtime in later segments, he walks more like a biped (like Rocky and Bullwinkle do). I've also noticed his voice is a bit higher and more nasally later on, as opposed to earlier when his voice was more monotone and somewhat deadpan... of course it could have been somewhat experimental on Bill Scott's part, as Bullwinkle's voice changed with time as well, his wasn't quite as deep or dumb-sounding in the end as it was in the beginning (I've also noticed in the very first few chapters of "Jet Fuel Formula", it almost sounds like he also has a bit of a lisp).

Speaking of which, I recently added the TV broadcast versions of the first few "Jet Fuel Formula" chapters that contained laugh tracks on YouTube.

 

[minor muppetz]

I've been watching some of the Upsedaisium storyline, and noticed in one chapter, Boris looks in a "Crook Book" for a recipe with the written phrase "Guaranteed to succeed..." but then after failing they turn the page to see the rest of the sentence, "...to fail miserably". But I noticed that they actually turn to the page BEFORE that one, as opposed to the page after.