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May 25, 2012

The Five: Forgotten Looney Tunes characters

by Adam Finley, posted Jun 9th 2006 6:28AM

goofy gophersWell, perhaps "forgotten" isn't the right word, but for every Bugs Bunny, Sylvester, Daffy Duck, Yosemite Sam, Porky Pig, and Elmer Fudd there's a plethora of one-shot or secondary characters from Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies who still had their own unique personalities, even if they weren't quite as popular as their iconic counterparts. So today, we pay tribute to those we haven't forgotten, but should think about more often anyway. Here we go:

The Goofy Gophers: These two gophers, named Mac and Tosh, appeared in eight shorts between 1947 and 1965. The characters were created by Bob Clampett, based on designs from an earlier cartoon. They were, essentially, a sarcastic reply to Disney's cutesy Chip and Dale, speaking to one another in fawning tones, always injecting lines like "please" and "no, you must go first" into the conversation. Their voices were provided by Mel Blanc and Stan Freberg, and based, apparently, on actors Edward Everett Horton and Franklin Pangborn.

Marvin the Martian: This character only appeared in five of the original Warner Bros. shorts, always pitted against Bugs Bunny, save for "Duck Dodgers in the 24 1/2th Century" where he matched wits with Daffy Duck. What not many people notice is that his wardrobe is actually based on the god Mars. Well, except for the sneakers. He also has one of the best voices, despite having no mouth. He's never referred to by name in any of his original cartoons. It was only afterward that his creator, Chuck Jones, gave him the name "Marvin."

Gossamer/Rudolph/Big Orange Hairy Monster: You know, the big orange hairy guy with the sneakers. Yeah, that's the one. Depending on which cartoon you see him in, he was either named Rudolph, Gossamer, or had no name at all. Although, is it really worth naming a creature whose only purpose is to chase people and eat them?

Pete the Puma: Pete, voiced by Stan Freberg, stars in one of my favorite Bugs Bunny shorts, "Rabbit's Kin." Every character in the Warner universe was mentally unbalanced, but something about Pete's mannerisms and manner of speech made you think something was especially wrong with his brain. I don't know if he made any appearances in any other Warner shorts besides "Rabbit's Kin," but he did return decades later in Tiny Toon Adventures as the school janitor, still voiced by Freberg.

Michigan J. Frog: It's somewhat of a shame that most people only recognize Michigan J. Frog as the former mascot of the WB, because he was the star of one of the best cartoons ever. One critic for Time wrote that "One Froggy Evening," Michigan's first and only cartoon where he played a singing and dancing frog who only sang  and danced for one man, a construction worker trying to make money off the frog and failing miserably, "comes as close as any cartoon ever has to perfection." Like Marvin the Martian, Michigan wasn't actually given a name until afterward.

A lot of the information in this post comes from my well-worn copy of That's All Folks! The Art of Warner Bros. Animation by Steve Schneider. It looks like it may be out of print, now, but if you find a copy laying on the street, I recommend you grab it.

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JW

I was wondering if anyone remembers the name of the character of the young boy who has fantastic fantasies about being a pilot or a spaceman? The cartoon he is in (only one I believe) starts with a baseball breaking a window and his mother sending him to his room. Was it Ralph something?

November 25 2007 at 12:40 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Goran D. Kleut

I like that cute puppy who keeps scaring the cat by sneaking up behind it and barking, resulting in the cat attaching itself to the ceiling. What's it's name.
Also the 5 inch elephant.
Or the "where's the gravy" dog
Jose and Manuel the crows
and even the squirell and the coconut.
But i can't forget the drunk stork who delivers the giant son.
Brilliant.

July 20 2006 at 10:59 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Jeff

Am I the only one who remembers Gerald Mc Boing Boing ?

June 12 2006 at 12:47 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
scott mclendon

What about the little penguin that Bugs took to Antartica,who turned out to be from Hoboken(that cartoon was an extra on the DVD of "March of the Penguins").

June 10 2006 at 9:56 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Jesse Pindus

First post here. I would not describe any of the characters listed here as "forgotten," since Marvin for example eventually became one of Warner's most popular characters and appeared on countless Warner Bros. memorabelia in the early-mid '90's (perhaps the golden age of Warner Bros. merchandise, when they had the Warner Bros. Studio Stores) and was most recently given a regular role on the "Duck Dodgers" television series (as "Commander X2," which was actually his name in his first appearance, "Haredevil Hare" in 1948 by Chuck Jones.) For that matter the Tasmanian Devil was also only featured in five theatrical shorts (as well as one made-for-television short) before starring in his own television series, "Taz-Mania" in the early '90's. And again, as you mentioned, Michigan J. Frog eventually became very well known as the WB Network mascot (and was also very prominent at the Studio Stores), Pete Puma for his recurring janitor role on the popular "Tiny Toons", and Gossamer was also featured on tons of merchandise. Probably a more appropriate term for these characters would "less featured." You could also include Beaky Buzzard (though he was more widely used in comic books) and Chuck Jones' version of the Three Bears.

June 09 2006 at 6:16 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
stu in nyc

to Ellen Tuck - Diver Dan was not a cartoon. It was live action with marionettes. The diver and the mermaid were human, and all the fish were marionettes.

June 09 2006 at 1:05 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Josh

One of my favorite unsung characters (I believe created by Tex Avery) was the yellow dog (maybe called butch) that was often faced off against a cat. One of my all time favorite shorts is where the cat gets a hold of a voice projection trick and makes Butch meow causing him to be accosted by other dogs. I laugh so hard I almost cry every time I see this one, which is unfortunately rare. The same character design shows up in several different incarnations, including Droopy cartoons and he is always very funny. I know not a Looney Tunes character, but he also might have shown up in the LT cartoon with the magician conducting the opera singer.

June 09 2006 at 12:45 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Adam Finley

Hey Nancy, I talked about Slowpoke here:

http://www.tvsquad.com/2006/05/05/the-five-cinco-de-mayo-special/

June 09 2006 at 11:34 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Mike

Oh, by the way, Mack Swift: I'm quite certain that both "Mac and Tosh" and the Apple Macintosh, or "Mac", computer got their names from the variety of apple.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McIntosh

June 09 2006 at 10:59 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Mike

Marvin was my favorite Looney Tunes character. I had a stuffed plush version of him (as well as numerous other likeness on everything from shirts to neckties to pencils and so on...)

June 09 2006 at 10:58 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply

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