Line #8 WesternAnimation/CalvinAndTheColonel


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/calvin_and_the_colonel.jpeg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:The Colonel (left), Calvin (right)]]
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4	One of the very first PrimeTimeCartoon shows, ''Calvin and the Colonel'' aired for one season (1961–62) on [[Creator/AmericanBroadcastingCompany ABC]]. The series was essentially an AnimatedAdaptation of ''Amos 'n' Andy'', but with [[FunnyAnimal cartoon animals]]. Both series were created by Charles Correll and Freeman Gosden, who also voiced the titular characters of each show; and several of the original ''Amos 'n' Andy'' radio scripts were adapted for the cartoon series. The use of animal characters avoided the touchy racial issues that had plagued the earlier show.
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6	The show's eponymous protagonists were the conniving Col. Montgomery J. Klaxon (voiced by Gosden), a fox, and his friend and patsy Calvin T. Burnside (voiced by Correll), a bear. The Colonel was constantly coming up with get-rich-quick {{Zany Scheme}}s, which tended to backfire. Rounding out the cast were the Colonel's wife, Maggie Belle (voiced by Beatrice Kay); her sister, Susan "Sister Sue" Culpepper (voiced by Virginia Gregg); and the Colonel's shady advisor, Judge Oliver Wendell Clutch (voiced by Creator/PaulFrees).
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8	This final attempt at keeping the ''Amos 'n' Andy'' formula alive[[note]](the radio show was cancelled in 1960; a live-action TV adaptation which aired in 1951-53 got cancelled due to the aforementioned racial issues and an attempt to revive it in 1956 got nowhere)[[/note]] was not successful. The show only lasted one season; even then, it was cancelled two months into its run due to low ratings and was only brought back two months later to fulfill contractual obligations.
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10	----
11	!!''Calvin and the Colonel'' provides examples of:
12	* AmbulanceChaser: Judge Oliver Wendell Clutch is this, definitely. His role in the show is to provide the Colonel with legal loopholes in order to pull off an unlawful scheme (which most of the time doesn't work anyway).
13	* CastHerd: There are two: one with the Colonel, Maggie Belle and Sister Sue, and the other with the Colonel (again), Calvin and Judge Clutch. Even though they all appear in (almost) every episode, Calvin's on-screen interaction with the Colonel's wife and sister-in-law are minimal at best. And the only time we see Judge Cluch interacting with Maggie and Sue is at the end of "Colonel's Old Flame".
14	* ButtMonkey: Usually the title characters when their schemes go wrong but's mostly the Colonel whenever he makes Maggie Bell and Sister Sue mad.
15	* CigarChomper: Calvin
16	* ComicBookAdaptation: Dell put out two issues in 1962.
17	* CriminalDoppelganger: The Colonel suspected in one episode that his sister-in-law was a jewel thief known as the "Polka Dot Bandit". Then the Colonel himself got arrested because the police discovered that the thief was really a man disguised as a woman and the Colonel happened to be carrying the polka-dot dress (he was going to turn her in). The real thief was finally captured in the end, who turned out to be [[spoiler:Sister Sue's ex-fiancé, who plotted to frame her for the robbery]].
18	* DartboardOfHate: The Colonel has one of Sister Sue in his office.
19	* {{Expy}}: Of ''Amos 'n' Andy'', as described above. More specifically, Calvin is Andy and the Colonel is the Kingfish.
20	* FishOutOfWater: The title characters are natives of the DeepSouth now living in an unnamed Northern city.
21	* FullyDressedCartoonAnimal: Maggie Belle and her sister Sue in the main cast.
22	* FurryConfusion: Apparently, in the show's universe humans exist, but in a manner that is equivalent to animals in our world. Judge Clutch is seen watching humans perform dog tricks on TV, leading him to tell the Colonel, "Did you know they actually have people in there talking like animals? It's completely unbelievable!"
23	* HalfDressedCartoonAnimal: The Colonel, Calvin, and several other characters.
24	* InstrumentalThemeTune: A jaunty organ-based number.
25	* JerkassHasAPoint: Sister Sue is a very unpleasant woman, but she's not exactly wrong about the Colonel being a slimeball.
26	* LaughTrack: An animated example.
27	* LimitedAnimation: In the style of Creator/JayWard.
28	* OnlySaneMan: Calvin might be dumb but he sometimes knows when Colonel's schemes can go worng.
29	* ObnoxiousInLaws: Colonel's sister-in-law Susan. Justified in that the Colonel is not exactly an honest man.
30	* OnOneCondition: One episode has the Colonel sabotaging his sister-in-law's wedding after he finds the will of her deceased first husband, which stipulates that the $300 a month she gets from his estate (of which the Colonel gets $200 as per the agreement when he married his wife) will be cut off if she remarries.
31	[[spoiler: After The Colonel succeeds in stopping the wedding, he finds out that the money would have gone directly to him instead if she remarried.]]
32	* ThePlan: Colonel's nephew, Newton (a con man himself), pulls this off when he visits in one episode.
33	* ShadyRealEstateAgent: The Colonel.
34	* TheTeaser: As with the other prime-time cartoons released at the time, ''Calvin and the Colonel'' had cold openings during its ABC broadcasts. However, in syndication reruns they were removed.
35	* ThanksgivingEpisode: "Thanksgiving Dinner", in which the Colonel -- having to make good on an invitation he'd brashly extended a year earlier -- scrambles to procure enough food to host thirty-six relatives for dinner at his apartment.
36	* ThickLineAnimation
37	* ThrowTheDogABone: The Colonel gets one in the end of "Wheeling and Dealing", where he goes through the usual ZanyScheme in order to replace his nephew's car ([[ItMakesSenseInContext which got filled with cement]]) before shipping it out to him in California. Where this differs from other episodes is that for once the Colonel's plan actually succeeds, and his wife and sister-in-law praise him for getting the job done. The Colonel [[BreakingTheFourthWall admits to the audience]] that he didn't earn the praise and affection, but because it so rarely happens he decides to take it anyway.
38	* TitleSequenceReplacement: When the show went into syndication, they attached the earlier, more abstract opening sequence to every episode. In the original broadcast this opening was only used in the first six episodes.
39	* ZanyScheme: The whole premise of this show.

Context WesternAnimation / CalvinAndTheColonel