Western Animation / Ducking the Devil

"Ducking the Devil" is a 1957 Merrie Melodies cartoon short directed by Robert McKimson, starring Daffy Duck and the Tasmanian Devil.

Taz is dropped off at a zoo, but breaks out of the shipping cage before the zookeeper can put him in his designated enclosure. He then goes on a rampage and eventually makes his way to Daffy's pond. After their initial encounter, Daffy is at first determined to steer clear, but changes his mind after learning from a radio broadcast that there's a $5,000 reward for returning Taz to the zoo. When the bulletin also mentions that Taz will become docile at the sound of music, Daffy hatches a cunning plan....

This short is unique for the classic era in that it pairs Taz with Daffy rather than Bugs Bunny.

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"Ducking the Devil" provides examples of:

• Agitated Item Stomping: When Daffy plays the bagpipes, Taz just stomps on them until they let out one last note as if it were a dying breath.
• Alliterative Title: Ducking the Devil.
• Aside Glance: Daffy when the radio talks back to him. He does it again later when he sees his singing works on Taz as well as any non-bagpipes instrument.
• Berserk Button: Taz swiping a dropped dollar leads to Daffy beating the living hell out of him.
• Bring It: After getting the trombone, Daffy does this to goad Taz into getting closer.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Taz suffers this at Daffy's hand at the end of the short after taking a dollar from Daffy.
• Cutting the Knot: When Taz comes by, Daffy tries hiding underwater. Taz responds by drinking the entire lake with a makeshift straw.
• The Dreaded: Taz, of course.
  • The short starts with the driver of a truck dropping Taz off to the zookeeper.
    Driver: It's all yours, Mac, and good riddance!
  • When Taz breaks out of the cage, the zookeeper promptly runs away, and everyone else evacuates the zoo as well.
• Everything's Louder with Bagpipes: One of the instruments Daffy plays to calm Taz is the bagpipes. They actually enrage Taz more, causing him to take the bagpipes and stomp them flat.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: When Daffy grabs the radio, it clearly has an extension cord, demonstrating how this ploy will ultimately fail.
• Greed: The only thing that will overcome Daffy's cowardice is his greed.
  Daffy: I may be a craven little coward, but I'm a greedy craven little coward. I just gotta have that five Gs!
• Hope Spot: Daffy thinks the radio means he's got it all sewn up, but then it becomes unplugged. He was also doing just fine with the freshly delivered trombone, only for the slide to come loose and get stuck in a tree.
• Indy Ploy: After Taz stomps on the bagpipes and starts snarling, a nervous Daffy — having nothing else on hand — just starts singing. To his surprise, it works.
• Instant Home Delivery: Except for the "home" part due to the mailbox not being at Daffy's residence, the trope is played straight when he places a mail-order for a trombone to play en-route to the zoo.
• Ironic Echo: Self-induced by Daffy.
  Daffy: He better not come messing around in this neck of the woods, brother, 'cause this black duck may be small, but I'm not a coward.
  [Taz splits a boulder into two, tunnels through a tree trunk, digs through the ground and emerges, and eyes Daffy with a hungry expression upon reaching the pond]
  Daffy: Correction. I am a coward.
• Let's Get Dangerous!: Daffy spends the entire short running in terror from Taz or appeasing him with music. Then Taz steals a dollar from Daffy, and Daffy trashes him with his bare hands.
• Meaningful Echo: When setting out to catch Taz, Daffy says, "I may be a craven little coward, but I'm a greedy craven little coward." At the very end, he repeats this after beating up Taz over one dollar.
• Miles Gloriosus: When Daffy first reads about The Tasmanian Devil in the newspaper, he boasts that he can take anything or anyone on and that Taz had better not come along his neck of the woods. When Taz promptly shows up and starts chasing him, Daffy admits he is a craven coward after all. But ironically subverted at the end of the cartoon when Daffy delivers a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown on Taz when the latter steals a dollar bill from him.
• Music Soothes the Savage Beast: One part of the reason Daffy finally decides to lure Taz back into the zoo, after learning about this weakness of Taz from a radio report. He tries several unsuccessful ways of providing it — including a radio (the extension cord doesn't go far enough), a trombone (he loses the slide up a tree), and a set of bagpipes (apparently, the only kind of music Taz doesn't like) — and ultimately ends up having to constantly sing to Taz for the 10 mile walk to the Zoo.
• Only in It for the Money: The other part of the reason why Daffy eagerly decides to bring Taz back into the zoo, as the radio also mentions the $5,000 reward for doing so.
• Rogues' Gallery Transplant: Taz is pitted against Daffy rather than Bugs as per usual.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: The zoo guard when Taz breaks out of his cage. Everyone else in the zoo does similarly.
• Standard Snippet: Several of the songs Daffy sings to lure Taz into his cage are popular ones from before the era the cartoon was made, including Mort Dixon's Looking Over A Four-Leaf Clover, Gus Kain and Walter Donaldson's Carolina In The Morning, and Chauncey Olcott and George Graff, Jr.'s When Irish Eyes Are Smiling.
• Take That!: Bagpipe music is the only music that does not calm Taz down. If anything, it makes him angrier.
• Tempting Fate: Using the radio to play music so as to make Taz docile, Daffy leads the way for the 10-mile hike to the zoo with Taz in tow. He remarks that what a cinch it will be... only for the music to stop abruptly due to the cord of the radio unplugging, requiring him to come up with alternate sources of music on the fly to tame Taz.
• Throw the Dog a Bone: After many shorts getting the bad end courtesy of Bugs Bunny or the Fourth Wall, Daffy actually prevails, successfully outwitting Taz, earning the reward money and finally getting revenge on the ferocious beast all by his lonesome.
• Tired After the Song: Daffy lures the Tasmanian Devil back to the zoo by singing. As it's a long walk, Daffy gets progressively more tired as he goes along, and by the time he arrives, he's too hoarse to sing another note. Fortunately, he pulls out a mister to soothe his throat and sings the last note that gets Taz inside his cage.

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"Like I said, I'm a coward, but I'm a greeeedy little coward!"