Will Looney Tunes ever find success again?

[D'Snowth]

I think one of the main reasons Looney Tunes were so popular in the 90s was because niche cable outlets like Nick and CN still had limited original programming, so essentially, Looney Tunes worked well as filler programming (y'know, kinda like court shows are for daytime syndication). Classic Hanna-Barbera shorts got the same kind of treatment on CN prior to the days of Cartoon Cartoons.

 

[Drtooth]

Actually, that's something that has always fascinated me about Looney Tunes vs. Mickey Mouse. Looney Tunes was always much more accessible than Disney's cartoons, yet Disney cartoons were always more popular and you'd see their characters on more merchandise despite it. Prior to cable buy outs when syndication actually ran old cartoons, Looney Tunes was a staple. And there were so many different packages both official and unofficial. There was a time before then when Looney Tunes blocks on Saturday mornings actually ran against each other. I grew up with a lot of syndicated packages of old cartoons. Popeye, Terrytoons, Woody Woodpecker, Tom and Jerry...staples. But Looney Tunes was the most ubiquitous. I swear each channel had their own package, be it named Looney Tunes, Merrie Melodies, and various LT character names. And I'm sure a lot of it had to do with a lot of the LT shorts being public domain. Disney cartoons, however... you had to pony up money for 3 cartoon compilations or get lucky and have a TV special that aired them sometimes. it wasn't until like Mickey's Toontown in the late 90's to see those on local television.

When it comes to Looney Tunes somehow not being successful, that's on Warner Bros, I feel. They have every means to make these characters household products on sheer nostalgia alone. And sure, the 90's were kind to the characters with Space Jam and those 3 new cartoon series as well as networks and syndication rerunning them. But somehow, in the 00's, they felt the need to attach the entire franchise's fate to a movie that opened poorly against Elf and Cat in the Hat (the latter being a real insult). They dropped all plans for more LT shorts and cartoons,. thought "hey, let's get the guys who created the SWATCats cartoon our boss Ted Turner hated to re-imagine them as what we thought that five seconds of Dragon Ball one of us caught at a nephew's house, then respond to criticism that is sucks by making it even stupider." And seriously. It sucks because Duck Dodgers was what a hip version of Looney Tunes should have been. It had some great Simpsons, early good Family Guy humor. But screw it. Bad Action cartoon.

 

[D'Snowth]

Disney cartoons, however... you had to pony up money for 3 cartoon compilations or get lucky and have a TV special that aired them sometimes. it wasn't until like Mickey's Toontown in the late 90's to see those on local television.

Well, there was QUACK ATTACK in the early 90s - that was about as close to a syndication package for older Disney cartoons as it got. But yeah, I see what you mean about those old DTV specials - but even with those, you really only got brief excerpts of clips, or the clips were set to copyrighted songs when they were trying to go for that MTV-esque vibe.

 

[minor muppetz]

The thing that never fails to get me is the Looney Tunes were huge in the 90's for some reason. I'd say partially because of Taz-Mania and the fact local syndicated stations still ran LT cartoons during the day.

I don;t think I'd give Taz-Mania most of the credit. It was popular enough to be on the air for about five seasons, and the Tasmanian Devil is one of the most hugely popular Looney Tunes characters, but I don't think the show was THAT popular. Certainly not as much as Tiny Toons or Animaniacs. It seems like there wasn't a lot of Taz-Mania merchandise (there were a few video games, with very few of the supporting characters, there were only a few VHS releases, and I don't think there's ever been any toys of any of the supporting cast... Were there ever any Tasmanian Devil toys with the Taz-Mania logo on the packaging?).

One thing I see fans say on Facebook regarding Space Jam 2 is that they hope this leads to Warner Bros. remastering more of the classic shorts and releasing them on DVD. I hope so as well (it has been reported that Warner Bros. started remastering more Popeye shorts because of the in-development Popeye movie, but then they put it on hold as the movie was in development heck). Of course there are other options to getting the shorts on DVD beyond remastering. They could do what they've been doing in the last few years and just release family-market, retitled versions of existing discs from bigger sets. Or they could just put out new compilations comprised entirely of already-remastered cartoons (maybe family-market, maybe collectors market despite all the cartoons being released already). Maybe rerelease the first two Super Stars discs in full frame.* Or they could ignore the classic shorts entirely and put out new releases of other Looney Tunes things (like more volumes of The Looney Tunes Show/other shows, release more specials, maybe special editions of the compilation films, I wouldn't be surprised if they put out a new Space Jam release).

*One thing I've thought would be slightly good, and would make a good April fools post (though I don't think there's any good Looney Tunes message boards anymore, Toonzone Forums is the closest but I don't know whether this would be acceptible for that forum), would be a seventh Golden Collection, comprised entirely of already-remastered shorts. The first two discs would be the entire contents of the Bugs and Daffy Super Stars releases, only with all the cartoons in full frame and some bonus features (almost a reveral of how several Golden Collection discs have been rereleased on their own), the third disc would be a variety of cartoons released on other Super Stars releases, and the fourth disc would be all-already-remastered cartoons that weren't released on a Golden Collection or Super Stars set (mostly from the Platinum Collections, maybe some from Mouse Chronicles).

 

[scooterfan360]

Maybe part of the problem is that Wabbit isn't even on CN, it's now airing on Boomerang.

Frankly, I preferred The Looney Tunes Show although... Who the heck decided to make Witch Hazel an Afromerican mamma? And make her mother to a small-sized pre-school aged version of Gossimer? That's really the only thing that I didn't fully like about the show.

why didn't you like that the creators of the show, made witch hazel African American ?

 

[scooterfan360]

The thing that utterly baffles me about CN is their scheduling. I understand that they feel the need to run TTG and Gumball at all hours. But what I don't get is the fact they announced 3 perfectly good shows that they could run Saturday mornings, ran them there for 3 weeks, and then dumped 2 of them on Boomerang. And now they feel that there's too much of a programming gap that they have to air crap movies from over 10 years ago (Cat in the Hat?! REALLY?!?!) in the middle of the day. Wabbit and Be Cool Scooby-Doo are stuck in infinate reruns on Boomerang, Bunnuicula's dead.

Had Wabbit a regular slot on CN, I'm sure it would have been more successful and we'd be seeing either the next season or the rest of the first season by now. But then again, Scooby is their cash cow outside of DC superheroes, and they've been doing everything they could to screw the last 2 series. Mystery Inc had that year and a half "hiatus," while the new series is buried in Boomerang. Now, from what I a m to understand, both Wabbit and Scooby were intended for Boomerang to begin with, but no one really gets that channel, even though they started running commercials on it. So basically, they were asking for these shows to do poorly.



I get the feeling they were too afraid to give June a secondary role in Hazel, so they went another direction. I didn't like it much either, but I see why it managed to work in giving a nice sense of chemistry between Daffy and Gossamer. I'm a little more annoyed that they didn't have more episodes centering on characters besides Daffy and Bugs. But if there's one complaint that always ticks me off, it's the "Boo! They changed Lola from a one dimensional 'grrrrl power' Furry Porn star to a character that actually belongs in a Looney Tunes Cartoon! WAAAAA!" Lola Bunny sucks. She was a cynical addition to a movie Looney Tunes purists still hate to sell little girls tickets to see it, as Looney Tunes has always been kinda a carrot fest. Tiny Toons fixed it brilliantly, but Space Jam added a character that was Bugs's equal, but superior. And I give credit to various internet shorts made during Back in Action's release (hmmm...the movie she wasn't in) trying to make her funny, but in the end she wasn't a good character until they just threw Kristin Wiig's personality into her.

what ! you didn't like what the creators of the show did to witch hazel ether ? i thought that it was creative of them, to take a classic loony toons character, and make her African American, it adds diversity to the loony toons, which the loony toons don't have. and i liked the fact that they created an African American character, that made an one time appearance, Rodney bunny, who was bugs bunny's childhood friend from camp.

 

[Drtooth]

I have to admit, I've grown to appreciate what they did with Hazel. Actually, she's not even really Hazel, she's supposedly named Lezah. It worked for the format, and Roz Ryan did a great job with the character.

Actually, the more I think of it, the more I feel there were too many blown opportunities with a lot of the characters (most seen in the theme song) not being seen or used much in the series. Sure, Marvin got at least 2 songs out of it, but he's barely anything in the show. Petunia Pig, in the opening since the beginning appeared in the second to last episode. I'm glad they were even able to work the Bear Family in when they did. The show really deserved a third season, especially since the second season really turned things around.

I just resent the fact that something can only be successful if it's tied down to a movie. Looney Tunes don't really work well as movies. That's why most LT films were compilations with linking material. And I'm sure if WB execs didn't screw around with BIA it would have been a better movie, but still no match for Will Ferrel's most overrated Christmas flick. The Looney Tunes can thrive on nostalgia alone if they have to. Sure, a good TV series helps, but there's nothing better than those old 40's-60's cartoons. Just keep airing them, even their extremely censored versions, and there will always be a demand for them.

 

[minor muppetz]

But Looney Tunes was the most ubiquitous. I swear each channel had their own package, be it named Looney Tunes, Merrie Melodies, and various LT character names. And I'm sure a lot of it had to do with a lot of the LT shorts being public domain.

Only 123 Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies are in the public domain, which is still a lot, but I don't remember knowing of any stations that ran their own Looney Tunes shows comprised entirely of public domain shorts. Maybe there were some and I just don't know it.

But Warner Bros. also separated the cartoons it owned the rights to into three separate television packages, though the packages did swap cartoons every few years (Nickelodeon promoted this fact in 1992). The "Looney Tunes on TV" page at Jon Cooke's old Looney Tunes site on the Golden Age Cartoons website (which now redirects to the Golden Age Cartoons Facebook page, though the pages were saved for internet archive) talked a bit about it, saying that there was a package of the most popular shorts, a package of some well-regarded shorts, and a package of everything else (practically what the networks did not want to touch). But considering they swapped cartoons every few years, the packages wouldn't completely be that. I know that in the late-1990s, Kids WB aired a lot of the really well-known cartoons, like Duck Amuck, One Froggy Evening, The Rabbit of Seville, and Duck Dodgers, but Nickelodeon also aired some of the best-known ones, including What's Opera, Doc?, Duck! Rabbit! Duck!, The Hasty Hare, and Porky in Wackyland.

When Nickelodeon started airing Looney Tunes, they mostly got all the cartoons that weren't on other stations. Various black and white cartoons, including Bosko and Buddy,redrawn colorized Porky Pig cartoons (though I don't know why other networks would have been against those, they may be badly redrawn but wasn;t the point to get those old shorts television exposure?), many post-1964 cartoons (the ones that don't star Speedy Gonzales, Daffy Duck, or Road Runner) were broadcast for the first time, Nickelodeon never seemed to have a problem with airing Speedy cartoons (and this was when ABC started airing Looney Tunes and refused to air anything with Speedy), and the channel got a number of politically incorrect cartoons that would have probably been rare sooner otherwise (though there were also a lot of politically incorrect cartoons in Nick's package that didn't air on the channel). It's amazing that the channel got the rights to some of the cartoons made between 1948 and 1964, I'm not exactly sure how small that selection was. But when cartoons swapped in 1992, Nickelodeon started airing more of the better-known pre-1964 cartoons and dropped the Bosko, Buddy, Beans, and early Merrie Melodies cartoons (and started to phase out black and white Porky and Daffy cartoons, though they still continued to air for a few more years).

I think Nickelodeon might actually have helped make the Looney Tunes popular in the 1990s. Looney Tunes came to the channel around the time that Nickelodeon was starting to become a really popular cable channel. I had seen Looney Tunes before seeing Nickelodeon, mainly the syndicated Merrie Melodies Starring Bugs Bunny and Friends and some public domain videos, but Nickelodeon's airings was the first time I really remember seeing Road Runner, Wile E. Coyote, Speedy Gonzales, and Pepe le Pew (though I do remember that Road Runner cartoons were frequent on Merrie Melodies so I don't know why seeing one on Nick was the first time I remember seeing one, maybe I actually saw Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon before Merrie Melodies).

 

[Daffyfan4ever]

I have to admit, I've grown to appreciate what they did with Hazel. Actually, she's not even really Hazel, she's supposedly named Lezah. It worked for the format, and Roz Ryan did a great job with the character.

Yeah. I think I hear there was an episode planned that established that Lezah was Hazel's twin, but that's something that we've never seen.

I think CN is doing well with their new shows. I mean for those who didn't like the sitcom format of TLTS, they went with "Wabbit" which was more like the classic shorts especially next season when we'll see some episodes sans Bugs that focus on other classic LT characters. But anyway, it seems like lately they've been doing both (sitcom format of TLTS and classic shorts format of "Wabbit") so they can appeal to different types of viewers. Since different people have different tastes.

 

[D'Snowth]

It would be nice too if there was some consistency with the voice actors, which there hasn't been since the days of Mel Blanc.