Release Date:

June 11, 1955

Main Character(s):

Bugs Bunny

Summary:

This time, it’s Bugs Bunny’s turn to be tormented by an unseen animator.

That’s Not All, Folks:

The production number is 1341 and was released as a Looney Tune.

The cartoon is a reworking of “Duck Amuck”, only with Bugs being the one who’s harassed by the animator (ironically, he was revealed to be the animator in the other cartoon).

Ernie Nordli did the layouts for this one (and is again credited as “Ernest Nordli”).

Ben Washam is the sole animator on the cartoon. As is the case with cartoons that have only one animator, we will not be pointing out who animated what scene for this post.

During the revelation of who the animator is at the end, a live-action animation desk is used (this was also the case with the ending of “Duck Amuck”).

Spoiler Alert: The animator is revealed to be Elmer who is delighted to finally have gotten even with that “scwewy wabbit”. I’m pointing this out, here, however, because he actually did win against Bugs in “Hare Brush” (which was coincidentally the previous Bugs cartoon).

Bugs at one point uses Sam’s word for idiot, “idjit”.

The cartoon was put as a bonus on the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 6 DVD set in a standard-definition restoration. It was re-restored for HBO Max in 2020, and contained a very horrendous Photoshop error in the title card that’s hard to describe. Fortunately, this was fixed when this same HD restoration was later put on the Looney Tunes Collector’s Choice Volume 2 Blu-ray set in 2023 (since this IS actually a new, superior transfer over the original restoration this time, I have no complaints about it being present there).

Favorite Scene:

The animator draws Bugs in a childlike, stick-figure way which Bugs only realizes when looking at how large his feet are. “Continue to draw me like THIS, buddy, and we’ll BOTH be out of work!”

What Happens in This One:

The title card and credits are shown as the pages in a script. After this, the page for “Act 1, Scene 1” reads, “A Woodland Scene… Rabbit Hole in Foreground… Bugs Bunny Comes Up Through Hole… Bugs: “Eh, What’s Up, Doc?”. The camera pans over to the animation paper as the animator paints in the forest landscape along with Bugs’ hole and his mailbox, but then erases Bugs’ hole and puts it in the middle of the sky. Bugs, who has just woken up as evidenced by yawning, begins to step out of his hole, and takes the long drop down to the ground once he steps out.

Having landed chin-first on the ground, Bugs takes out a carrot and asks, “Eh, what’s up, doc?” and then realizes who the animator is, becoming angry. “Oh, YOU, huh!? Well, if you’re the one who’s gonna draw this picture, you can count me out! Capital O, Capital U, Capital T, OUT! So goodbye to you and farewell to thee!” He begins to dive into another hole, only for the animator to erase this one as well, causing Bugs to hit the ground headfirst. Irritated, Bugs gets up, “Look, buster! What’s the big idea? I said I wasn’t working with you and that is that!”, before folding his arms with a shut-eyed expression.

The animator then paints a yellow streak on Bugs’ back as a way of calling him a coward, with Bugs making a startled yelp when the animator does this. Bugs takes the paintbrush and snaps it in half, “What’s coming off here anyway!?” He then looks at his painted back before scolding, “I’ve got a good mind to tell the Warner Brothers on you! You’re a menace to society! And besides, I-” In the midst of Bugs talking, the animator paints a picket sign labeled “I Won’t Work” in Bugs’ left hand, before Bugs takes notice of it and tosses it aside in horror. “What are you trying to do, make me lose my job? After all, I’ve worked here for years and built up good will, and-”. The animator paints another picket sign, with this one reading, “I Refuse to Live Up to My Contract” in Bugs’ right, which he also reacts in horror to before running off-camera to dispose of it.

Bugs then comes back into view, wiping the paint off his back with a towel, “Alright, you’ve made your point! YOU’RE the boss! Just cut out the shenanigans and I’ll go to work. Now, uh, what’s the first thing on the agen-”. The animator paints a green hat with a flower on top on Bugs’ head, who throws it off while exclaiming, “You know I’m not supposed to wear a hat!” The animator then paints a very over-sized flowery bonnet on Bugs’ head, “Cut it out! Ya crazy idjit!” Bugs then disposes of several more stuff put atop his head by the animator- a green sock with blue polka dots on his left ear and one with red and yellow stripes on his right, a diving helmet, a baby bonnet, an overly long judge wig, a large red hunter’s hat that is too big for him, another very large hat with Harpo Marx-type hair underneath, and a giant top hat that obscures his body from the ears down to his crotch. Fed up, Bugs fumes while throwing the top hat aside, “That settles it! Get yourself another boy! I’m through! What a Leonardo da Punchy! What a Too-Lousy La Trek!”

The animator then paints the whole scenery upside down with Bugs clinging onto the tree in fear once he realizes this. Bugs climbs up the tree and down to the ground, using flowers to climb across to his hole. Once he gets inside the hole, the animator draws an anvil tied to Bugs’ tail, causing Bugs to fall out. To add insult to injury, the animator paints a highway landscape, which results in Bugs landing behind-first in the middle of the pavement, creating a hole from the impact. After untying the rope the anvil is attached to from his tail, Bugs rolls across into an empty background. He then jumps up and down angrily while grumbling, “You- (indistinct grumbling)- are ya trying to do!? Of all the low, dirty-!” The animator erases Bugs’ head, to which Bugs taps his foot and points to his face area. He instead gets a jack-o-lantern painted on his head area. Realizing his head is now pumpkin-shaped, Bugs becomes annoyed, “Okay, buddy. You’ve had your fun. Now what about a RABBIT’S head?” The animator only draws rabbit ears atop the jack-o-lantern. “Alright, you comic-book Rembrandt! Make with the eraser!”

Bugs is then erased and redrawn with his correct head, but now way too small. With his voice high-pitched, Bugs is initially oblivious, “Well, that’s better. Why didn’t ya do it in the first place?” Upon taking out his carrot to chomp, Bugs realizes, “Gad! What a huge carrot!” before realizing something else, “Hey! What’s the matter with my voice!?” Bugs also sees that he is now able to grab his whole head with his hand before opening said hand and pointing to his head as a gesture for it to be drawn in its correct size. The animator does so, but doesn’t draw something important, which Bugs lets the animator know about in an annoyed tone, “Ears?” The animator points the incorrect ones on the sides of his head, “Not HUMAN ears, my friend. RABBIT ears, LONG ones!” Taking this literal, the animator draws Bugs’ ears to be super-long in the manner of Rapunzel. “Don’t be so dang literal!”

After his ears are erased down to the correct length, Bugs walks off while sulking, “Brother, if I could only figure a way out of this trap!”, before his tail gets erased by the animator. “Alright, you vandal, put that tail back!”, Bugs demands. The animator draws him with the wrong tail, “That is a horse’s tail, my friend! It belongs on a HORSE!” The animator erases Bugs, but leaves the horse’s tail, and draws a horse in Bugs’ place. Keeping Bugs’ brain and voice, the “horse” chomps a carrot and states, “Look, my contract clearly states that I am always to be drawn as a rabbit! So if you don’t want to get yourself into a peck of trouble, just-” The animator erases Bugs the horse and redraws him as a rabbit again, but draws him as a childlike stick figure which Bugs is also initially oblivious to, “Alright, okay, that’s better”. He then takes notice of how abnormally large his feet now are along with how the rest of his body now appears, “Holy codfish, look at my feet! Hmmph! Continue to draw me like THIS, buddy, and we’ll BOTH be out of work!” He is erased once more.

Redrawn as his usual self, Bugs becomes sarcastic, “So I’m me again, eh? What a novel idea. Uh, sure you wouldn’t want to make me into a grasshopper or something?” When the animator reaches his paintbrush in to comply, Bugs shouts while shaking his head, “No, no, no, I take it back!” He then tries to reason, “Look, eh, why don’t we be friends? Maybe we could BOTH benefit. Eh, do something revolutionary”. The animator has drawn two Bugs clones to Bugs’ right and left, respectively as they both say, “Eh, what’s up, doc?” in unison. Bugs shoves the right clone away, “Oh, no ya don’t!”, and then the left clone, “Out, you impostor!”

Bugs comes back into frame, sore. “That REALLY does it! I suggest that you go get the big boss, and we’ll SEE about this! ‘Cause I ain’t moving from this spot ‘til you do!” The animator paints a background of a railroad track underneath Bugs with him in front of a tunnel. Hearing the sound of an oncoming train, Bugs looks behind him and gets off the tracks just in time. Bugs pants, “Well, okay. But there’s still one way out. And you can’t stop me!” He pulls down a card covering the screen that reads, “The End”. The animator is revealed to be Elmer Fudd, who does his trademark laugh in delight over his work, “Well, anyway, I finawwy got even with that scwewy wabbit!”

Where Can I Watch It?

At toontales.net!

Carrot Rating:

🥕🥕🥕🥕 ½