A Cartoon Christmas » Friz Freleng

Dec. 20 – A Pink Christmas

cantista — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:06:37 +0000

PINK PANTHER IN “A PINK CHRISTMAS”
Original Air Date: December 7, 1978

It’s Christmas time and the world’s last remaining pink panther can’t catch a goddamned break…

BACKSTORY

The Pink Panther has a rather fascinating history, in that he was created for, and shares a name, with a property completely unrelated to him as a cartoon character. After Warner Bros. disbanded its theatrical animation, Friz Freleng, the man who created Sylvester the Cat of the Tweety & Sylvester cartoons, teamed up with former WB cartoon executive, David DePatie.

Strangely, DePatie-Freleng Enterprises got by doing commercial work, as well as basically freelancing with WB’s own characters, such as the Xmas Special Bugs Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales, until director Blake Edwards approached them to concoct an animated title sequence for his upcoming jewel heist comedy starring Peter Sellers.

From the 1963 movie, The Pink Panther

At the time, some called The Pink Panther‘s title sequence, featuring the famous Henry Mancini theme song, better than the actual movie, and the studio fully recognized the potential after the Pink Panther’s very first solo short “The Pink Phink” won an Oscar in 1964.

Pink Panther’s first cartoon, “The Pink Phink“

Stranger still, the Pink Panther shorts continued showing in theaters after they premiered on The Pink Panther Show, starting in 1969 on NBC. Pink Panther’s TV show often added a laugh track not present on the big screen, as well as new shorts featuring The Ant and The Aardvark and even a Clouseau-esque bumbling detective character called The Inspector.

Bizarre opening to 1984′s Pink Panther and Sons

The Pink Panther was so popular, his shorts were a one time packed into a 90-minute block ridiculously titled The Pink Panther Laugh and a Half Hour and a Half Show, and after nine years the show moved to ABC for one season and recieved a handful of new episodes.

For the first time in HD in 2010

After the theatrical cartoons ceased, Pink Panther received three made-for-TV specials (including the one discussed below) and both Marvel and Hanna-Barbera took a stab at producing several Pink Panther series, the last one being the MGM’s Pink Panther and Pals, which airs occasionally on the Boomerang network alongside the older cartoons.

BREAKDOWN

Man, do I have a soft spot for The Pink Panther. His shorts are pretty average and somewhat repetitive, but screw it! I love his design, I love his theme song, hell, I love his insulation!

Unlike all the leeway we’ve taken with Christmas episodes this year, this here’s a boner-fide Xmas special, in that it was produced entirely on its own, away from a TV series, and aired in a primetime slot.

Perhaps you can’t tell when seeing stuff like Darkwing Duck and Rocky and Bullwinkle in picture form, but this generally means enhanced animation and story, as it’s built outside the production mill of a weekly TV series.

Gorgeous

Thankfully, Pink Panther gets that here, with a fluidity right between theatrical animation and cheaper TV cartoons.

And it’s a good thing too, because Pink doesn’t speak here, with the exception of a sneeze, which you can plainly tell is an uncredited (and probably unpaid) Mel Blanc.

A shitty place to live

So you know, on the rare occasion that Pink Panther has spoken, it’s been via Rich Little or Max Headroom’s Matt Frewer among others. Let’s keep moving!

Pink Christmas – They weren’t kidding!

And thank The Holy Holidays for the boost in animation quality, because no one speaks here, so a lot more needs to be conveyed by character movement and facial expressions.

Please enjoy this slightly discolored panning shot

To make A Pink Christmas even more “classic,” is based off of a 1906 O. Henry story called “The Cop and The Anthem.” It’s familiar, in that it features a destitute hero trying to find warmth and food during the Holidays…

But I’m not sure if any other cartoons have adapted and/or attributed credit to O. Henry’s story specifically. So either way, kudos to DePatie-Freleng Enterprises for not simply doing yet another It’s A Wonderful Life or A Christmas Carol parody!

I know he’s docile but a panther’s instinct should triumph here

Pink Panther is essentially a hobo trying to stay alive on Christmas, only to be struck down by the cruelty of life every six seconds.

“That was my last pea, you dick!”

He’s harassed, stolen from, and kicked around for the entirety of the half-hour special. It’s not until he finds a Santa suit that there’s even a glimmer of hope for this poor asshole.

There’s a better option than nudity

A department store manager brings him in to be one of Santa’s helper…

Although, Pink is still fucking starving, and sadly wastes the opportunity of a solid paycheck by taking a bite out of a little girl’s cookie.

YEAH! Follow those animal instincts, Pink!

Even escaping the department store becomes a humiliating ordeal…

Give him a break – he’s the only one of his kind!

And he’s then mistaken for a stuffed animal and dragged around like child’s plaything

Honestly, it’s an easy mistake for a kid to make

With little diginity left to keep himself together, Pink resorts to less sympathetic measures: Outright Thievery! He rips an icey carrot nose out of a snowman, and the kids call the cops on him…

All this for one rotten, frozen vegetable?!

Which then drives him into the park, where he gets desperate enough to steal birdseed from idiotic pigeons too stupid to migrate.

Another googly-eyed hallucination

Pink then takes a brief reprieve from crime, with a genuinely earnest effort to go legit. He shovels a walk, only to be chased away by a fat human…

A failed transaction

And then hits rock bottom… a homeless shelter, where to find himself last in line during an apparent gruel shortage.

For just 10 cents a day, you could sponsor a discolored panther

And here’s where things get really sad…

Gone Gray! After drinking a shitload of dishwater

Dare I say CLASSICALLY SAD?! Pink sees prisoners dining on Holiday yum, and figures he can get some of that liberal treatment if he can make it INTO JAIL.

A whole turkey? With our tax dollars?!

But much like most of the cast of Full House, the dude can’t even get arrested! It’s not so much society’s fault – that’s not generally where giant cats get locked up.

A panther in prison seems more dangerous for the inmates

Finally he witnesses a jewel heist in action and tries to take the blame. To no avail, the cop is too simple-minded to assume a neon panther is the culprit and makes chase with the real perpetrator.

Hmmm, priceless heirlooms – HEY, A DONUT!

Luckily, the dumbass pig drops his donut in the fracass, and Pink is off on a new mission!

lol, missed a spot, animators

A homeless puppy is shoved aside, but Pink immediately has a change of heart and offers up the plain dohnut to the hapless pup.

We’ll die together!

Having dined on nothing more than a meal of moral superiority, Pink and the pup scamper across a town lit up with Christmas spirit, and make their way back to the park bench Pink calls home.

Not important! I just love this picture

It appears both animals have resigned to their lot in life, accepting nature’s cruelty and the ultra-festive winter gift of dying of exposure… but what’s this?!

We wanted walls and a mattress, but this is cool too!

MAGIC! The small park tree has caught fire with tinsel and Yuletide trimmings! Who on earth is responsible for this Solstice Miracle?

Santa’s raining pixie dust something fierce tonight, and leaves Pink Panther and the puppy with a Holiday feast that should keep both of them alive for another 48 hours or so.

Yum!

Just a tad in the a department store window during the opening Xmas montage.

“A messiah… Mommy, I want one – GIMME!”

Oh yeah! And this time he didn’t just save Christmas with material goods… he’s saved a couple of lives. Going up to five because I even love all the impostors!

Seriously, the glasses are KEY to any Santa costume

This is a pretty great special, albeit a little slow. However, everything about A Pink Christmas reeks of classic, from its literary source material to its silent, Charlie Chaplin-esque situations. Should you have any affinity whatsoever for The Pink Panther, you should absolutely seek it out.

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Strangely enough, A Pink Christmas is no available on The Pink Panther Classic Cartoon Collection set, although a helluva a lot of other awesome is. The special is only available on its own stand-alone DVD, along with two other made-for-TV specials made during this period. And if you’d like to see more of Pink Panther’s big screen appearances, you could do a lot worse than The Pink Panther Film Collection!

Yesterday’s Christmas Special
A CARTOON CHRISTMAS PODCAST

2010′s Dec. 20 Christmas Special
MICKEY’S ONCE UPON A CHRISTMAS

2009′s Dec. 20 Christmas Special
A FAT ALBERT CHRISTMAS

Dec. 16 – Bugs Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales

cantista — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:25:06 +0000

BUGS BUNNY’S LOONEY CHRISTMAS TALES
Original Air Date: November 27, 1979

SYNOPSIS:
Bugs and the partially assembled Looney Tunes gang go through the Holiday motions!

BACKSTORY:
Although many people are given credit for the creation of Bugs Bunny, only one man brought him an Oscar. While Tex Avery popularized the version of Bugs we now know and love, Friz Freleng was the one who directed him to his only Academy Award, in 1958’s Knighty Knight Bugs.

Freleng and Bugs during better times

When Warner Bros. shut down its cartoon division in 1963, it allowed Freleng and the previous WB animation director, David DaPatie, to set up shop in its old animation facilities for a nominal fee, where they operated under the name of the DaPatie-Freleng Enterprises.

Logos that accompanied many a DFE cartoon

Rather than let their characters die, however, Warner licensed out the use of the Looney stable of characters to DFE and Chuck Jones Enterprises for several television projects – Bugs Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales was a joint product of both studios.

BREAKDOWN:
As much as I like the idea of “getting the band back together,” there’s a reason Bug Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales has been lost to time. These were the cheap years, the Speedy-Gonzales-versus-Daffy-Duck times most Looney Tunes fans don’t like to talk about.

Bugs opens the special by leading a group of drunks in song

Given the budget for what was essentially a heavily licensed, made-for-TV freelance assignment, I sure as shit didn’t expect a whole lot going in. So in a way I was not let down.

Love the backgrounds here

Both Jones and Freleng were well beyond their prime and, I’d guess, basically resurrecting old tricks for the money. It’s animated pretty poorly and the gags are, for the most part, simple retreads going through the motions.

It’s okay to feel uncomfortable

Looney Christmas Tales features three cartoons made fresh 30 years ago – two by Freleng and one by Chuck Jones. Now, I was faced with an overwhelming sense of dread at having to watch another adaptation of A Christmas Carol, especially at a run-time of seven or so minutes…

This is the most Bugs ever moves

But I sorta dug it since it was a surprisingly fresh take. Sure you’ve got the same old Dickens classic, recast with the Warner Bros. menagerie. Yosemite Sam is Scrooge, Porky Pig is Bob Cratchit, etc.

I noticed it, too, Bugs

Oh, and one role that hints at a adulterous Petunia Pig:

Yep, Tweety Bird as a genetically impossible Tiny Tim

But Bugs Bunny is pretty much Bugs Bunny. The only time a ghost even appears is when Bugs dresses like one.

It’s not unlike the old formula where they simply insert Bugs into any situation just to watch him torment another asshole, so I’ve got no complaints there.

This is how it ends – on Christmas night for a change

Only problem is, there’s no fluidity to the animation, nor to the Stalling-esque score we’ve come to associate with the rabbit’s escapades. Mel Blanc is on hand to provide all the recognizable character voices, but the sound effects seem to be on loan from Hanna-Barbera.

Spirited, but stupid

Chuck Jones’ Road Runner cartoon fares a bit better. By his own admission, there really isn’t much more to the Road Runner-Wile E. Coyote duo than concocting new ACME products and FAIL gags.

The only real premise at work is that Wile E. Coyote chases the Road Runner to the top of a mountain under the assumption that road runners hate snow.

In fact, he takes to it quite well

And no offense to the Road Runner or Wile E. Coyote, but it’s undeniably cool to see them running around someplace other than an art-deco desert for once. Plus the animation is a cut above.

Because Chuck Jones knows snow, bitches!

But probably the most notable cartoon is an all-new Tasmanian Devil short. Due to his latter-day popularity in commercials, mudflaps and television appearances, people tend to forget that Taz only starred in five theatrical shorts. (By comparison, Bugs was in almost 150!)

Great! Now I have a new phobia

In a bit of contrived self-awareness, even the pilots wonder why they’re shipping a Tasmanian Devil from Australia over the North Pole on Christmas Eve. But hey, that’s what gets him where he needs to be!

Animal cruelty?

Ever-afraid to portray cartoon characters as married – and thereby unattainable – Bugs is made to be caring for his nephew over the Holidays.

Who could forget Bugs’ nephew, “Nephew?”

Bugs proceeds to torment Taz, who actually seems even more punch-drunk and lost than usual on this occasion, to the point where you almost feel sorry for him.

Taz’s don’t know that table’s not food!

Either way, The Fright Before Christmas is the only short from this special that found its way in to regular airings on Saturday mornings alongside Warner Bros.’ popular, much better looking, theatrical shorts.

Not unlike the tree, this scene was trimmed in subsequent airings

The half-assed wraparound that bookends the three shorts fizzles out with Bugs riding off into the Christmas night with the rest of the Looney Tunes…

“Goodbye, Docs”

Right before Taz eats the sleigh, for a last-ditch comedic effort before the buzzer.

Obligations

What kind of goofy God would make a rabbit who could talk?! Keep your religion the hell away from my Looney Tunes!

Plenty of characters don the famous red suit, but only the big guy’s hoause makes an actual appearance.

All dressed up with no one around

Every time I beat back my Holiday cynicism, something like Bugs Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales comes along to keep me on my toes. Even thirty years later it resembles the shameless cash-in it always was: The Godfather III of Christmas specials. And above all, NO DAFFY!

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Bugs Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales is available on its own only on VHS, so it should be easy to avoid. However, it’s also included as a special feature on the Looney Tunes: Golden Collection, Volume 5, part of the phenomenal DVD series that contains nearly seven hours of Warner Bros. bliss. While you’re at it, pick up the latest volume as well – Warner has just announced that they’re discontinuing the Golden Collection, so even a mild interest could turn into an extremely valuable collectors item! (Don’t believe me? Peep the price on this similar Disney series that went on sale just two years ago.)

Yesterday’s Christmas Special:
SANTA CLAUS IS COMIN’ TO TOWN