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  • Accidental Innuendo:
    • Part of a sign in "My Favorite Duck" says, "DON'T EVEN MOLEST A DUCK".note 
    • "Look buster, you're in the wrong hole. This one happens to be mine.".
  • Aluminum Christmas Trees: Wile E. Coyote ordering ACME anvils?...those actually used to exist.
  • Archive Panic: Exactly 1,000 classic-era theatrical shorts, plus the Private Snafu shorts and other bits of miscellanea—it's been estimated that watching a non-stop marathon of them all would require a week without sleep—even getting through all the shorts already on DVD note  would take a considerable amount of time. At least there haven't been new Looney Tunes shorts regularly made since 1969. That would make the series even more grueling to get through (both in viewing it and for Warner Bros. to actually put out all the classics — and not-so-classics — on DVD and/or Blu-ray).
  • Audience-Alienating Era:
    • Most, if not all, cartoons produced in the 1960s after the WB animation studio initially closed its doors in 1964 are often considered as such.
    • Far earlier than that, the studio went through a slump during the period after Harman and Ising left from late 1933 to 1935, resulting in a huge downslide in quality, as well as the advent of the impossibly bland Buddy. Fortunately, Tex Avery and Frank Tashlin's arrival began pulling the studio out of this from 1936 and onward.
  • Award Snub: With Disney and MGM dominating the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film category in The Golden Age of Hollywood, Warner had atrocious luck. Just five of their cartoons won (Tweetie Pie, For Scent-imental Reasons, Speedy Gonzales (1955), Birds Anonymous, Knighty Knight Bugs),note while many classics either lost or didn't get nominated.
    • A Wild Hare, the first Bugs Bunny cartoon (and the one that pretty much established the kind of cartoons Warner Bros. would put out in the years to come), as well as Puss Gets the Boot, the first Tom and Jerry cartoon, were passed up for an Academy Award for one of MGM Oneshot Cartoons, The Milky Way. It was also the first year no Disney shorts were nominated, no less!
    • Happens in-universe in What's Cookin', Doc? Bugs loses the Oscar for "Best Actor/Actress" to James Cagney. He spends the entire cartoon trying to convince everybody that he really deserved that Oscar (even playing footage from Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt - a cartoon that was itself nominated for an Oscar but lost. The whole cartoon was made as an in-joke by Bob Clampett to make fun of Friz Freleng for Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt getting snubbed). The cartoon ends with Bugs being given his very own Oscar just to finally shut him up.
    • What's Opera, Doc? didn't get nominated, but it was submitted to the Academy for review. Which means the Academy viewed the short but didn't think it was worthy enough for a nomination. Just wrap your head around that.
      • Same for Duck Amuck.
      • Speaking of What's Opera, Doc? the 2002 Cartoon Network special The 1st Ever 13th Annual Fancy Anvil Awards Show Program Special (Live in Stereo) featured What's Opera, Doc? as one of the nominees for the Best Cartoon award. Unfortunately, it lost to the Dexter's Laboratory episode "The Mock 5." Although, at least Rabbit of Seville won the Best Original Song award.
  • Awesome Music: Has its own page!
  • Badass Decay:
    • Daffy Duck changed from a Crazy is Cool prankster into a pompous Straw Loser and Butt-Monkey for Bugs and other stars. It took until New Looney Tunes to show he's still capable of being a crazy little black duck.
    • Tweety starts off as a Pintsized Powerhouse who actively fights back against his aggressors but gradually turns into a cutesy and somewhat more naive Distressed Dude who often depends on Granny to be saved from Sylvester (he can still be a Karmic Trickster when he wants to be, but only occasionally).
    • Milder case for Cecil Turtle. In his first two appearances, he was a clear-cut Always Someone Better to Bugs, anticipating the latter's every move and having the full control usually adorned to the rabbit himself. In "Rabbit Transit," however, he is a more arrogant cheat, the short playing more as an Escalating War with Cecil even getting visibly frustrated at Bugs outsmarting him at times (Bugs actually beats him this time, though Cecil returns to form with a moral victory). Justified, as by 1947, Bugs being the loser in a completely one-sided fight would be unheard of.
    • Yosemite Sam started off as a worthy opponent for Bugs to counter Elmer's pitiful streak, being more capable of genuinely menacing Bugs. As time passed, however, the series' usual Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain formula took over him as well, and by the mid-fifties, he was actually less of a threat than Elmer (who could at least outsmart Bugs on rare occasions), just more of a prideful Asshole Victim about it.
    • In Daffy's cartoons, Nasty Canasta was a properly formidable villain who even pulled a rare complete victory in his second due to pulling a No-Sell on all of Daffy's attempts to trick him or engage him. In Bugs' cartoons (though only one, "Barbary Coast Bunny"), however, he's been retooled almost to In Name Only levels (different design, personality, and voice acting) and comes across as much more of a buffoonish thug who Bugs is able to outfox quite easily.
  • Base-Breaking Character:
    • Tweety. His cuteness makes him one of the most popular characters with merchandising. However, he also has haters for this exact reason, as there are people who feel he was made more for cute appeal rather than humor and he's less funny than the other characters. Also, there are people who like how he can be Badass Adorable and smarter than he looks behind his cute and innocent appearance, but other people consider Tweety The Fake Cutie and a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing and hate how he always wins against Sylvester, especially since Tweety uses Hector and Granny's protection to humiliate and hurt the cat.
    • Daffy Duck, mostly after his personality change. Some fans find his "greedy loser" characterization unlikable, due to being changed from a crazy prankster to a jerk who is too similar to Donald Duck and fails at everything he does. Other fans find him more relatable and complex as a Loser Protagonist, since he has many human flaws, like jealousy and frustration, compared to his early "Woo-hoo!" characterization. Similarly, his Comically Lopsided Rivalry with Bugs Bunny in later years can be seen as hilarious and iconic, or annoying and overused.
    • Bugs Bunny himself. He's very popular for being the wittiest Karmic Trickster in animation, but some fans find him annoying for being a smug smartass Invincible Hero and actively root for his enemies, even though they have no chance of winning.
    • The Road Runner to certain degree, who is either loved by people for his speed, guile, and his adorable "Beep beep!" sound, or is somewhat hated for always winning over the Coyote because of how they sympathize with him.
    • Cecil Turtle can bring divisive opinions. Some believe his victories over Bugs were unearned, others believe giving Bugs A Taste of Defeat helped make him avoid Invincible Hero status and thus retain the audience's interest.
    • In this day and age, Pepé Le Pew is hated by Moral Guardians and some fans due to Values Dissonance. Those who don't hate Pepé see him as an Ensemble Dark Horse because the values dissonance of his cartoons presumably represent how free and audacious Golden Age cartoons were. Others point out later reimaginings of him manage to keep his nature recognizable while avoiding the Values Dissonance issue (such as Wabbit: A Looney Tunes Production making him a James Bond parody), and thus getting rid of him altogether is a poor choice. A lesser charge laid against Pepé by some fans is that his shorts are formulaic. Pepé's defenders point out that a) the outcome of each Pepé short is unique, and b) he is hardly the only "formulaic" member of the Looney Tunes. Most Looney Tunes could be accused of being formulaic to some degree, and that's without counting exceptions like Sylvester the Cat and Tweety Bird or Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner.
    • Some fans see Lola's Bunny original Space Jam version as a prime example of how the Flawless Token trope can go wrong, seeing as she exists just to create more diversity among the mostly-male Looney Tunes but has no defining personality beyond eye candy anyway, nor does she participate in any of the slapstick (which sticks out even more in a scenario where everyone, even the franchise's usual Comically Invincible Heroes and the live-action characters, are suffering cartoon beatings but her). Others enjoy her tomboyish attitude and the fact that she leans into her sex appeal, as evidence that she has at least some personality worth merit (or they just like the fanservice). A third faction exists that says that she has the makings of a good character that just aren't explored because she's too bogged down with her more superficial traits. Her later appearances in the franchise downplayed her Immunity To Slapstick and turned her into a Cloudcuckoolander more at home among the other Looney Tunes, which won over the fans who had originally criticized her, although other fans prefer her original version and don't like how her character is changed into a Dumb Blonde and a boy-crazy stalker. And then there's a fourth faction that likes both iterations of Lola Bunny or at least certain traits from both, seeing her redesign as unnecessary, but also wanting to keep both her smartassery and her newer slapstick sides (which is sort of what happened in New Looney Tunes). This group often defend Lola's old visual design, reasoning that a shapely figure or sex appeal does not equate to being "unrealistic" or "unreasonable".
    • You can either like Beaky Buzzard for being an adorable doofus, or dislike him for his annoying voice and stupidity.
    • Hubie and Bertie can be liked for their Comedic Sociopathy or hated by being jerkass Karma Houdini's who always succeed in making Claude Cat life miserable.
  • Bizarro Episode:
    • "Porky in Wackyland" and "Dough For The Do-Do" are extremely nonsensical, even by the standards of these cartoons.
    • The second half of "Hare Brush," where Bugs' and Elmer's usual roles are reversed.
    • "Rabbit of Seville". ALL OF IT. It's just a chain of Big Lipped Alligator Moments that could even make the most creative and crazy of people go: "Huh?"
  • Broken Base:
    • Surprisingly heated arguments get started between Looney Tunes fans as to what the correct onomatopoeia is for Road Runner's vocalizations: "Meep Meep" vs. "Beep Beep" vs. the incredibly specific "Mwheep Mwheep!" Paul Julian, who provided the Road Runner's voice, said it should be "Hmeep, Hmeep!"
    • Beginning in the 1950s and thanks to Chuck Jones, Daffy would undergo a shift in character that would transform him from the wacky and crazy screwball he was depicted as in his earlier shorts to a prideful and greedy Butt-Monkey. The shift in Daffy's character and whether or not it is better than his original characterization continues to be a very divisive subject amongst fans. Some prefer his original characterization for how hilarious he was in the early shorts, finding his later characterization to be boring by comparison and a forced attempt to emulate the success of Donald Duck, taking away much of his original appeal in the process. Others, though, love his later characterization, feeling it makes him a lot more versatile and allows him to stand out from Bugs Bunny (who has largely superseded Daffy as the screwball troll in later shorts). It helps that this shift would lead to many of the best shorts in the franchise, such as Duck Amuck and Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century. A third camp prefers Robert McKimson's interpretation of Daffy, feeling that he struck a good balance between Jones' and Clampett's versions of him; McKimson's Daffy would have shades of his old screwball self as late as 1958's Don't Axe Me. The fact that recent versions of Looney Tunes, such as Wabbit: A Looney Tunes Production and Looney Tunes Cartoons, have reverted Daffy back to his original personality after years of using his Jones-era characterization has only deepened the divide.
    • Who's the best director is. It really comes down to preference, but the debates still rage about whose cartoons were "objectively" better. Debates between fans of Chuck Jones and Bob Clampett are probably the most heated because they're the two most influential directors, and they didn't like each other in Real Life.
    • While What's Opera, Doc? is widely known as Chuck Jones' masterpiece, there are a number of fans who consider Rabbit of Seville (Jones' other opera-themed Bugs Bunny short) to be the superior cartoon, due to its faster-paced slapstick and keeping the series' usual comedic tone throughout.
  • Common Knowledge:
    • Mel Blanc, as talented as he is, didn't voice every Looney Tunes character as is occasionally claimed. The series had a wide range of voice actors, but most of them went uncredited (June Foray, who voiced most lady characters like Granny and Witch Hazel, was usually the only other one whose name appeared in the credits, and even then, not until the early 1960s when the restrictions on voice actor credits eased up a bit). It’s also worth noting that he didn’t do any voice work for the series until 1937.
    • Also of note, although not as recognized, is that Bugs Bunny, despite being the Series Mascot when it comes to the Looney Tunes cast, was not the leading star of the franchise at first. That role was previously assumed by Daffy Duck, who in turn took that role from Porky Pig, who in turn took that role from Buddy, who in turn took that role from Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid. And, between Buddy and Porky, there was an incredibly short period where Beans Cat was the franchise's leading star with Porky first introduced as Beans' sidekick.
    • Virtually everyone knows Wile E. Coyote only communicates with signs, except this isn't entirely true. While this is the case when it comes to the Coyote and Road Runner shorts, as shown in "Zip Zip Hooray" and the few shorts where his opponent is Bugs Bunny instead of the Road Runner (aside from "Hare-Breadth Hurry"), he is well capable of full speech, and ironically, he is one of the more eloquently-spoken characters in the series.
  • Designated Hero:
    • Bugs Bunny often falls into this if his Karmic Trickster nature seems a bit overblown. It was for this reason that a more vicious villain was made as his foe in the mid-forties (Yosemite Sam) to occasionally replace Elmer Fudd (who's much more affable) because Bugs was looking like an outright bully toward him. Eventually, Yosemite Sam was looking like an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain as well, and therefore Marvin the Martian was created, a character who's calm and polite but a competent villain who could still pose a threat.
    • The mouse in Canned Feud is apparently supposed to be the hero of the short, but it's difficult to see him as such. The short focuses on Sylvester's owners going on vacation and forgetting to put him out before they leave. He's understandably afraid that he'll starve, but as it turns out there's a huge supply of canned cat food in the house. Cue the mouse, who swipes the can opener and won't let Sylvester have it, then proceeds to spend the rest of the short tormenting Sylvester with it. And when Sylvester DOES get the can opener, the mouse improvises by locking the cupboard. Sylvester did nothing to provoke this mouse, nor does he even attempt to eat the mouse at any point in the short. And yet we're apparently supposed to cheer on the mouse as he torments Sylvester with the intent of making him starve.
    • In Lighthouse Mouse, we have another mouse who, thanks to a contrived Light and Mirrors Puzzle, is unable to sleep thanks to the lighthouse light and suppose to feel he's justified in trying to keep it off, disregarding the fact that by turning off the light, the mouse is putting ships in danger, as seen when a ship crashed into the island. Further contradicting the mouse's case is the fact that at the end of the cartoon, after Sylvester is forced to play the light after the mouse had permanently damaged it, the mouse is seen sleeping soundly underneath the light platform, proving that the mouse's problem could've been solved by simply finding somewhere else to sleep.
  • Designated Villain: Sometimes, Elmer Fudd (when outside hunter roles, keep that in mind) zigzags with the villain simply for trying to get animals off his property for bothering him (Robot Rabbit, Pests For Guests). Granted, he calls for rather extreme measures to do so, but there is a reason seeing as how annoying they can be.
  • Director Displacement: For a long period of time, despite only being a producer, Leon Schlesinger often received credit for the Looney Tunes cartoons as opposed to the actual directors of the cartoons, with posters proudly proclaiming Leon Schlesinger's name on them in huge letters, while completely omitting the name of the directors outside of the shorts themselves. The displacement was so bad that the Los Angeles Examiner erroneously calls Leon Schlesinger the creator of Bugs Bunny (who was actually created by Tex Avery) and the creator of Looney Tunes (which was created by Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising) when reporting his death in 1949. This has since died down in later years thanks in part to the breakout success of Chuck Jones and the fact that all of Schlesinger's successors (Eddie Selzer, John W. Burton, and David H. DePatie) went uncredited, and nowadays, the situation has arguably been reversed, with the directors now getting the proper credit and recognition for their work, while the producers are barely acknowledged.
  • Ensemble Dark Horse:
    • The mynah bird, despite only appearing in a handful of cartoons (many of which are banned for also featuring a stereotypical African boy named Inki), is somewhat popular as a Memetic Badass.
    • The Dodo, who only appeared in one cartoon (and its color remake), was popular enough that he gained a son in Tiny Toon Adventures.
    • Michigan J. Frog, who, despite appearing in one cartoon, was integrated into the main ensemble in the 1990s when he became the mascot of the WB Network.
    • Penelope Pussycat garnered a following due to being an amusing yet sympathetic character whose behavior around Pepe Le Pew was quite progressive for the time in which their starring shorts were made.
    • Taz was originally only going to appear in one cartoon (partly due to producer Eddie Selzer objecting to the character), but he was saved by fans requesting he makes more appearances; he made four additional cartoons and a major role as a villain in the Christmas special, proving popular enough to get his own TV show. He is now part of the main character rosters and one of the most recognizable characters in the series.
    • Marvin the Martian, despite appearing only five times, became popular due to his characterization as a comedic and friendly villain who also managed to pose a bigger threat than even Yosemite Sam.
    • Witch Hazel became popular due to being a Laughably Evil Large Ham. It helps that she's an actual threat to Bugs.
    • Ralph Wolf and Sam Sheepdog are beloved for their dynamic of being good friends off the clock, to the point where they got their own video game.
    • Marc Antony and Pussyfoot, thanks to the former's lovable nature and Large Ham expressions and the latter being just so adorable. The fact that they're at the center of probably the most emotional moment in Looney Tunes history is a big plus as well.
    • Owl Jolson from "I Love to Singa", for being adorable, his titular song being very catchy, and said song being a rare example of one from an early Merrie Melodies short that didn't interrupt the plot.
    • Lawyer Goodwill from "The Case Of The Stuttering Pig," the cause being that he is one of the most intimidating villains to have ever appeared in a Porky Pig short. Scratch that, in Looney Tunes in general.
    • Hatta Mari from "Plane Daffy" for her attractive design and being a competent villainess who managed to match wits with Daffy. Despite only appearing in one short, she was popular enough to even make a reappearance in Tiny Toon Adventures 57 years after her debut.
    • There's an unnamed, upright-walking, smart, and soft-spoken bulldog who appears in a few of Robert McKimson's cartoons (see "Hippety Hopper," "Early to Bet," "It's Hummer Time," and "A Fox in a Fix") who was funny every time he appeared. Unfortunately, he was phased out and never became a major character.
    • Gossamer is a rather popular antagonist thanks to a striking monster design, which opens him up for some unique slapstick.
  • Epileptic Trees: An IMDb user named oscaralbert has written many tongue-in-cheek reviews of Looney Tunes cartoons, claiming they predicted the future and/or are social commentary about current/past events.
  • Ethnic Scrappy: Some fans see Speedy as this (in his early years) due to his tendencies to yell "Arriba! Andale!" and chase around his opponents not completely unlike a Troll. Granted, he's a Karmic Trickster, but it can still be pretty annoying.
  • Fandom-Enraging Misconception:
    • The easiest way to annoy fans of the series is to misspell it as Looney Toons; ironically, even some official art or descriptions make this mistake.
    • You'll get a similar reaction from the fans by referring to Tweety Bird as a girl.
    • Insisting that the original theatrical shorts are for kids is definitely a way to get fans angry at you. While it saw success with kids when The Bugs Bunny Show was released, and it was a part of many people's childhoods, the series was never really for kids in the first place, with humor that is either not appropriate for children or will fly over the heads of children and those who know nothing of the pop culture or history at the time. Not only that, there are scenes with either extreme violence or Values Dissonance that have been edited when aired on television. The likes of Hollywood Steps Out, Bacall to Arms, Wild Wife, and Norman Normal (1968) are definitive proof of this, as they all deal with more adult themes and subjects, the first of which features cameos by countless celebrities that most people born after The '50s wouldn't know.
    • Thinking that the entire series was done by a single person (most likely Chuck Jones due to him directing the most iconic short in the series), when in reality more than one person directed different shorts and created different characters. Hell, their very first character was created by two people.
  • Fanon Discontinuity:
  • Fandom Rivalry: Looney Tunes fans opposed to Classic Disney Shorts fans, although there is a substantial bit of Friendly Fandoms thrown into the mix, as many cartoon fans love both of them.
  • Friendly Fandoms:
    • Fans of Looney Tunes and Tom and Jerry tend to get along very well due to their gag-based Slapstick nature, both series being under ownership of Warner Bros., the fact that Chuck Jones was involved in both series (albeit at different points in time), and the fact that Harman and Ising had a hand in the creation of both of them.
    • While there is a huge Broken Base over who the best director is, fans of Bob Clampett tend to also be fans of Tex Avery due to their similar sense of humour. It helps that Clampett was mentored by Avery, and that both were instrumental in shaping the franchise into what it is today. Clampett fans also tend to love the works of Max and Dave Fleischer for their propensity for Deranged Animation.
  • Gateway Series: When asking someone what was their favorite cartoons or what inspired them to do animation, and it isn't a more contemporary work, it will be either Looney Tunes or Disney, or both.
  • Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
    • Tweety is pretty popular in Japan. He even has a few volumes of DVDs titled "I Love Tweety" sold there. Japan's fondness for small, adorable creatures probably helped him out a lot.
    • Back in the Fifties, Tweety (and arch-nemesis Sylvester) had an immense fandom in France with comic books, toys, and various other merchandise.
    • Marvin the Martian also seems to be moderately popular in Japan; there's a good amount of Japanese fanart of him, and many Japanese fans, when making posts regarding him, will often mention how they think he's cute.
    • The Looney Tunes brand in general is very popular in Mexico, thanks to the Mexican Spanish dubs and localizations, and also having a positive Mexican figure, Speedy Gonzales, thus matching the popularity of the Classic Disney Shorts, Hanna-Barbera, Mario, and other major big names in the country.
  • Growing the Beard:
    • Initially, the Looney Tunes started as shameless ripoffs of Disney's success and Merrie Melodies was just made to sell Warner Studio's sheet music (it's the 1930s version of the music video). That all changed after Hugh Harman and Rudolph Ising parted ways with Leon Schlesinger, forcing him to assemble a new staff—many of them important in shaping the studio's future. While the shorts still remained Disney-like in nature, Tex Avery and Bob began going against the status quo of animation, starting with Tex's landmark short Gold Diggers of '49 where he started taking advantage of cartoons being able to do anything and use them as vehicles for gags. It's generally agreed that things vastly improved as a whole when Tex Avery and Bob Clampett began to direct, as they were both a big part of shaping the Looney Tunes sense of humor we know today. However, it's the '40s, combining the Avery-Clampett anything-goes mentality with Chuck Jones' educated sensibilities that are often seen as the high point in the studio's history (ironically, Avery had left WB in 1941, but his influence had already been established).
    • Chuck Jones' cartoons greatly improved over time. His earliest cartoons (especially his early Bugs Bunny ones) are often considered among the worst Looney Tunes cartoons (Elmer's Candid Camera and Elmer's Pet Rabbit being seen as some of the bigger offenders) due to their sluggish pacing, weak gags and being too Disney-like (especially the ones starring Sniffles the Mouse). The Dover Boys is considered his breakout moment as a director, and he quickly established his Signature Style after that, going on to direct classics such as Duck Amuck and What's Opera, Doc?, plus his cartoons from The '50s especially being seen as part of the series' golden age.
  • Harsher in Hindsight:
    • The Japanese getting bombed in "Tokyo Woes" and the end of "Hop And Go."
    • Beaky's Disney Death in "The Bashful Buzzard" (complete with his mother fretting over him) has a slightly tragic undertone, given Beaky's voice actor, Kent Rogers, died in action during the production of the short.
    • In "Often an Orphan," Charlie Dog laments that he doesn't want to go back to the city and imagines a hypothetical scenario where "the towers, they're falling!" The short was released in 1949, so obviously, this was meant to be a non-sequitur remark about how overwhelming and unforgiving the city landscape is, but hearing about "falling towers" is kind of eerie post-9/11.
    • Similarly, "Falling Hare" shows a plane on a collision course with a pair of boxy-looking skyscrapers as its pilot (the Gremlin) laughs maniacally. Again, a bit jarring post-9/11.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight:
    • In "Tortoise Wins by a Hare," one of the headlines on the newspaper advertising the race between Bugs Bunny and Cecil the Turtle reads, "Hitler Commits Suicide." This cartoon was released in 1943, a mere two years before that actually happened. Talking about a person committing suicide after a piece of media joked about it would normally be Harsher in Hindsight, but this is Hitler we're talking about.
    • In addition, Hermann Goering and Joseph Goebbels committing suicide in "Plane Daffy" before their actual suicide.
    • Some jokes about prices unavoidably get this, thanks to inflation. Daffy complaining about paying 25 cents for cab fare in "Show Biz Bugs" is one of the funnier examples. Most people nowadays would kill for fare like this.
    • In 1990's "Box-Office Bunny," Daffy complains about paying seven dollars to see a movie. Compare that to today, where it can cost more than twenty dollars for just one person to get admission!
    • 1943's "Super-Rabbit" parodies the Superman Theatrical Cartoons of the 1940s, with Bugs as a Captain Ersatz version of Superman. A similar premise is used in "Stupor Duck" in 1956, only with Daffy instead of Bugs. Now, many years later, Superman and all of the other DC Comics superheroes are legal property of Warner Bros. This has enabled direct Shout Outs in later cartoons such as The Looney Tunes Show, where both Bugs and Daffy claim to be Batman, and the batsuit and Bat Signal are both shown.
      • In "Tortoise Beats Hare," Bugs derogatorily calls Cecil Turtle "Superman."
    • Similarly, the 1967-1969 shorts Warner Bros. Animation produced under executive producer Bill Hendricks and ownership of Warner Bros. -Seven Arts tend to somewhat resemble Hanna-Barbera cartoons at times, complete with using some of the same Stock Sound Effects. Then three decades later, Warner Bros. would actually acquire Hanna-Barbera and, eventually, fold the studio into Warner Bros. Animation.
    • Knowing the fact that Elmer Fudd always falls hard for Bugs in drag back in the day, and then everyone saying that Bugs makes an ugly woman in The Looney Tunes Show is pretty amusing.
    • "Porky and Gabby" has the latter character climbing up two trees, one foot and hand on each tree. This would become a central game mechanic in Donkey Kong Jr.
    • In Witch Hazel's 1954 debut, "Bewitched Bunny," Hansel and Gretel insult her by saying, "Your mother rides a vacuum cleaner!" One of the gags in the 1993 Disney movie Hocus Pocus is the witch Mary Sanderson being stuck with a vacuum cleaner to ride.
    • The 1955 short "Pizzicato Pussycat," had the cat becoming popular for being able to play the piano (even though it's really a mouse doing all the work). Fast forward to 2007 with a certain viral YouTube video of a cat playing the piano.
    • In the 1955 short "Roman Legion-Hare," the sacrifice to the lions is advertised with "Detroit Lions in Season Opener — Undefeated Lions out for First Taste of Victory." Back then, it referenced how the Lions were a powerhouse of the pre-Super Bowl era. After decades of the team being The Chew Toy of the NFL (even being the first to lose all games in a season), recent viewers can laugh thinking it mentions how the Lions are often struggling to win.
    • One of the villains in "A Cartoonist's Nightmare" is named "Dirty Dan."
    • The Martians in “Martian Through Georgia” bear a striking resemblance to Teletubbies.
    • In some shorts from the 1950s and 60s, Sylvester had a friend (sometimes rival) named Sam Cat.
  • I Am Not Shazam: The title Looney Tunes does not refer to the characters, be it individually or as a group, just to the no-continuity cartoons themselves.
  • Iron Woobie: Wile E. Coyote. After all he's been through, it's a mystery how he's even still alive. While all of the villains (and even some of the good guys) get screwed over time and time again, Wile E. is unique in never having gotten a single victory, and the closest he ever came was a Yank the Dog's Chain. He's also unusual in that his failures almost never have anything to do with his intended prey-the universe just goes out of its way to screw him over for no apparent reason. Still, he never even considers giving up on catching the Roadrunner.
  • It's Not Supposed to Win Oscars: Leon Schlesinger was quoted as saying about his cartoons, "Let Disney make chicken salad and win awards. I'll make chicken shit and make money."
  • Jerkass Woobie:
    • Daffy is a self professed cowardly and greedy egomaniac, and has a plenty moments of assholery, but he's also a HUGE Butt-Monkey, making him one of the most pathetic characters in the Looney Tunes Universe.
    • Sylvester is a conniving predator in most his shorts, however he is always completely out of his foes' league and earns more than a few solid beatings in nearly every appearance he has. Some shorts begin with him out in the cold desperately digging through trash cans in search of something to eat - sure, you can't blame characters like Tweety for, you know, not wanting to be eaten, but it's hard not to hope the short will end with Sylvester getting SOMETHING to fill that belly of his. Not to mention he was often at the receiving end of abuse from unprovoked adversaries as well (with many examples, particularly Canned Feud, turning him into a regular woobie). His neuroses and small number of victories even compared to other Looney Tunes Butt Monkeys makes him arguably the most pitiful villain in the series after Wile E Coyote.
    • Henry Bear, from the Three Bears shorts. He's temperamental and an abusive father, but he also suffers a lot, often due to Junyer's stupidity.
    • Charlie Dog often forces himself to be Porky Pig's pet and is a smart aleck and master manipulator, but he's also clearly homeless and desperate for love and shelter. He faces constant rejection from several of his "masters". There's also the fact that he can pull off really adorable tears.
  • Jerks Are Worse Than Villains: At least before being Rescued from the Scrappy Heap in New Looney Tunesnote , Gabby Goat is viewed as obnoxious due to being an aggressive and abrasive Jerkass. Meanwhile, many villains (e.g., the Coyote, Sylvester, etc.) are adored by the public.
  • Launcher of a Thousand Ships:
    • Bugs has been shipped with Lola (his canon Love Interest), Honey (his girlfriend in the comics before Lola's introduction), Penelope (because of the Crack Pairing in Carrotblanca), Daffy (one of the most popular ships in the Looney Tunes fandom), Elmer, Yosemite Sam, Marvin the Martian, Wile E. Coyote, and others. Foe Yay Shipping also helps.
    • Daffy has been shipped with Bugs, Porky, Marvin the Martian (especially in the Duck Dodgers series), Melissa, Tina, or even Lola (thanks to their similarities and interactions in The Looney Tunes Show). He also has many different wives in the original shorts.
  • Magnificent Bastard:
    • Cecil Turtle is a seemingly timid tortoise who has the unique distinction of being the only character to have defeated Bugs Bunny on a consistent basis. Having been challenged to a race on three separate occasions, Cecil was able to outsmart Bugs every single time. In Tortoise Beats Hare, Cecil recruits the help of his identical-looking cousins to fool Bugs into thinking that he was in the lead throughout the race. He managed to sneak past the finish line and forced Bugs to fork over the ten bucks he wagered on their match. In Tortoise Wins by a Hare, Bugs challenged Cecil to a rematch, and he convinced Bugs that his shell was the key to his superior speed. Bugs dresses up as a turtle in order to beat Cecil but is targeted by the rabbit mob, who bet all their money for the rabbit to win. Cecil disguises himself as a rabbit and tricks the mob into helping him win the race. In Rabbit Transit, Cecil uses a jet engine hidden beneath his shell to gain the lead during their race. Bugs manages to cross the finish line first, but Cecil gets him to admit that he was going over the speed limit and has him arrested for speeding. With a perfect track record, Cecil is Bugs' only foe who could beat him at his own game.
    • Bye, Bye Bluebeard: The unnamed mouse wants to eat the huge feast Porky Pig has prepared. Rebuffed in his initial attempt, when a radio report mentions Bluebeard the killer is at large, he disguises himself as Bluebeard to threaten Porky into giving him food. When a followup report states Bluebeard's height as 6 foot 11, he escapes Porky and watches as the real Bluebeard attempts to kill Porky with a rocket. Wanting in as Bluebeard eats the feast, the mouse pretends to be his conscience and cleverly avoids being eaten by covering himself in tabasco sauce, then uses his size to escape the killer and foil him repeatedly. When Porky escapes and Bluebeard builds a guillotine to finish him off, the mouse decides to save Porky and gives Bluebeard a plateful of lit bombs, making the killer explode—and in gratitude, Porky lets the mouse dine with him freely.
    • Hare Brush: Elmer J. Fudd, reimagined here as an "eccentric Millionaire", seeks to avoid paying for his taxes. To this end, he fakes being insane by pretending to be a rabbit and gets sent to a sanitarium, where he tricks a nearby Bugs Bunny into taking his place while he escapes, leaving Bugs to be hypnotized into thinking he's Elmer. Upon being hunted by Bugs, Elmer manages to stay one step ahead of the hunter before Bugs is arrested for tax fraud, scoring one of the character's few victories against Bugs.
    • Bunny and Claude: We Rob Carrot Patches & The Great Carrot Train Robbery: Bunny and Claude are a pair of infamous rabbit criminals who specialize in stealing carrots from stores. Often robbing multiple stores in a row with ease, the duo consistently outwit the persistent Sheriff, managing to thwart his attempts to catch them even on the odd occasion he corners them. In their second short, they manage to hijack the Carrot Train and successfully steal most of the carrots within, once again outwitting the Sheriff when he attempts to stop them.
  • Memetic Mutation: Enough to get its own page.
  • Mexicans Love Speedy Gonzales:
    • The Trope Namer. Speedy Gonzales, despite being perceived as an Ethnic Scrappy by Cartoon Network and even banned from airing, was very popular with Latin Americans, Mexicans to be more specific.
    • Crossing over with LGBT Fanbase: Bugs Bunny's signature gag of crossdressing to fool his opponents trying to hunt him down was, at the time, seen as just a bog standard joke with no real societal impact. However, current-day members of the LGBTQIA+ community, notably those who're transgender, non-binary, or genderfluid, like to consider Bugs a personal icon of theirs, given that despite those he fools being shocked by the fact that he's not a woman, Bugs himself never has any issue with having to crossdress, often times genuinely liking it (especially in The Looney Tunes Show, where he sees himself crossdressed as beautiful). Amplified by a number of Twitter messages citing an interview Chuck Jones gave, in which he essentially described Bugs as genderfluid.
  • Misblamed: Some fans blame Larry Doyle for the 2003 Looney Tunes shorts, but he was only involved in the earlier stages of production. He later expressed disappointment at how they were tinkered with after he left. Of course, others involved with their production said that Doyle's ideas were terrible and the resultant cartoons were the result of salvaging what they could.
  • Moe:
  • Most Wonderful Sound: Carl Stalling's iconic madcap arrangement of "Merrily We Roll Along," especially that slide-guitar sting at the beginning.
  • Newer Than They Think: As all the other songs in One Froggy Evening are from the late 1800s and early 1900s, one could be forgiven for thinking that "Michigan Rag" was also a vintage tune. But it was created specifically for the short by director Chuck Jones, writer Mike Maltese and composer Milt Franklyn.
  • No Problem with Licensed Games: The licensed games based on the franchise are well-made and faithful to the original cartoons.
    • Infogrames held the exclusive video game license to the franchise and over 200 characters from 1998 until 2003, and throughout this time, they produced many Looney Tunes games that are usually classified as the best ones that use the license.
      • The company's first Looney Tunes title: Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time on the PS1 and PC is actually a pretty fun licensed platformer. Its Spiritual Successor, Bugs Bunny & Taz: Time Busters for the same two platforms, wasn't too shabby either.
      • Looney Tunes Collector: Martian Alert! and Marvin Strikes Back!/Looney Tunes Collector: Martian Revenge! for the GBC were great Zelda-esque Looney Tunes games faithful to the style of the show with many of the characters from the show in them.
      • Duck Dodgers was a really fun Nintendo 64 game.
      • Looney Tunes: Space Race is a competent Mascot Racer with a great soundtrack.
      • Looney Tunes Racing is another decently-made mascot kart racer.
      • Sheep, Dog 'n' Wolf (also known as Sheep Raider in some regions) is a surprisingly creative stealth game with memorable gadgets (including one that allows you to travel through time) and funny expository dialogue from Daffy Duck.
      • Their last Looney Tunes game: Taz: Wanted is arguably one of the best Looney Tunes games out there. While it is incredibly derivative of other collectathons, this is not a bad thing, and the game puts enough of a spin on familiar concepts to keep them fresh. It helps that the game has a very varied sense of humor, and the objectives are usually pretty varied enough to keep the relatively simple gameplay fresh- you won't just be collecting stars, but blowing up beach huts, crashing submarines, and destroying an entire shopping mall.
    • As with Infogrames, Sunsoft also produced several excellent licensed Looney Tunes games:
      • Their SNES games fulfilled this trope to a heartbeat. Road Runner's Death Valley Rally was an entire game-long reference to nearly every classic Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote short ever. Daffy Duck in The Marvin Missions referenced the Duck Dodgers original cartoons (as well as Marvin's appearances in some Bugs Bunny shorts), and Bugs Bunny: Rabbit Rampage managed to combine references from dozens of Bugs cartoons, from "Bully For Bugs" to "Bunny Hugged", in an overarching plot in which an animator clearly out to get Bugs turns out to be Daffy attempting to get revenge for "Duck Amuck." There was also Looney Tunes B-Ball, a NBA Jam-esque game that even has snippets of old dialogue.
    • The simply titled Looney Tunes for Game Boy Color is an oft-forgotten gem. It's a surprisingly fun platformer spanning 7 levels, each taking control of one of the Looney Tunes. Whilst nothing special, it's by no means a bad game and is surprisingly well-made.
    • Looney Tunes: Duck Amuck (based on the short of the same name) is a very fun game for the Nintendo DS. Although it's very short, it has hilarious dialogue and minigames and several Continuity Nods to classic shorts. The best part? Daffy Duck was the one tormenting himself in the entire game.
    • Desert Demolition for the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive is a very fun game as well. In addition to being able to play as Road Runner like the other Road Runner games, you also get the option of playing as Wile E. Coyote and using the various Acme gadgets to catch Road Runner.
    • Bugs Bunny in Double Trouble for the Sega Genesis and Game Gear is also fairly decent; despite the controls being off, the surprising difficulty in later levels, often-obnoxious music, and having an Excuse Plot (it's All Just a Dream), the graphics are actually pretty good (mainly the Genesis version), especially the 3D rendering and animations, and the callbacks to the original Bugs Bunny cartoons are definitely satisfying for long-time Looney Tunes fans.
    • The video game based on Looney Tunes: Back in Action has a wonky camera and platforming segments that can get annoying, but overall is a decent and fun game with some rather good minigames and plenty of collectibles.
    • Sylvester and Tweety in Cagey Capers is a decent game for the Sega Genesis in which you play as Sylvester and chase after Tweety. The game has good graphics, a large inventory, and all the characters you'd expect (Granny, Hector, Hippety Hopper, and Sylvester Jr.).
  • Older Than They Think:
    • Some people have accused Goopy Geer of copying Goofy due to their similar names and character designs. In reality, it was a coincidence since Goopy Geer debuted about a month before Goofy did, and even then, Goofy was initially named "Dippy Dawg."
    • Many people think Daffy Duck’s transformation into a greedy Attention Whore had its roots in the 1950s shorts. He was actually showing signs of this characterization as early as 1940, with the cartoon You Ought to Be in Pictures.
    • Bosko is often accused of being a ripoff of Mickey Mouse. This is not the case; Bosko was created a full year before Mickey, while Harman and Ising were still working with Walt Disney on Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.
  • Once Original, Now Common:
    • Given these are some of the most popular, influential cartoons in the history of animation, it's very easy to take for granted just how groundbreaking and unique these shorts were for their time.
    • When Bugs Bunny first said, "What's up, Doc?" in the 1940 short, A Wild Hare, it was a shock in ways modern audiences simply can't imagine or appreciate. In 1940, audiences saw the hunter (Elmer Fudd, of course), heard the hunter say he was hunting wabbits (er, rabbits), and then they saw the rabbit. 1940s audiences were expecting that rabbit to scream, run, pick a fight, play dead, anything except strike up a casual conversation with the guy trying to kill him. So, when Bugs did that, he brought the house down - a response that led to it becoming his catchphrase. Nowadays, not only does nobody find, "What's up, Doc?" funny, most people don't even realize it was ever supposed to be funny in the first place. It's just that thing Bugs always says in every freakin' cartoon he's in.
  • Parody Displacement: Potentially, the largest offender of this trope has its own page.
  • Popular with Furries: Especially Bugs Bunny, Wile E. Coyote, Pepe Le Pew, and Sylvester.
  • Popularity Polynomial: The franchise first dipped in the 60s with the original creative team mostly away and inferior new shorts, but then reruns on television in the 70s exposed the cartoons to a whole generation of fans. The 80s had the Tunes not enduring against Merchandise-Driven shows, and then the 90s, between Tiny Toon Adventures, reruns on Cartoon Network, and all sorts of original content, such as Space Jam, Sylvester And Tweety Mysteries and Taz-Mania, brought the franchise back to the forefront, and they have been on and off while never leaving ever since.
  • Portmanteau Couple Name: Bugs/Daffy = Baffy. This ship is actually quite popular with fans and has been acknowledged by the official social media pages a few times.
  • The Problem with Licensed Games: Unfortunately, many of the other Looney Tunes tie-in video games range from mediocre (i.e., The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout or The Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle, though the latter did get a bunch of sequels) to outright terrible, most notably Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal which was critically panned.
  • Recurring Fanon Character: Big Chungus originated from an image of an obese Bugs Bunny (mocking a similarly-obese Elmer Fudd) from the short Wabbit Twouble and has become quite the Memetic Badass. While originally just Bugs, many fans act as if Big Chungus is his own unique character.
  • Replacement Scrappy:
    • Buddy, who replaced Bosko as the studio's main character in 1933. While he isn't considered that annoying, he isn't considered really anything at all. Buddy's problem was that he had absolutely zero personality, making it quite obvious that Buddy was rushed to replace Bosko after Harman and Ising left for MGM. Bob Clampett had a particular hatred for Buddy, nicknaming him "Bosko in whiteface". Animaniacs also took note of this by having the in-universe creation of Yakko, Wakko, and Dot, to spruce up Buddy's cartoons by smashing him with mallets. They also made Buddy the villain of his sole appearance and had Jim Cummings (1952) voice him with the same voice he used for the most competent version of Dr. Robotnik.
    • William Lava (the series' composer from 1962-69) is seen as this to Carl Stalling and Milt Franklyn for his more atonal, dissonant style, as well as his music not fitting the action as often, and his work coming in during the series' Audience-Alienating Era, when he was forced to work with a progressively smaller orchestra.
  • Retroactive Recognition: Jim Backus played the genie in the Bugs Bunny short "A-Lad in His Lamp". He is better known in the animation world for his role as Mr. Magoo, which debuted a couple of years later.
  • Rooting for the Empire: Most of the shorts' antagonists are jerks, but utterly harmless and pitiful, usually getting maimed and humiliated to a sadistic degree by their far more competent foes. Chuck Jones implemented this trope deliberately with Wile E Coyote and the Road Runner and even lampshaded it in Adventures of the Road Runner.
  • Sacred Cow: People will open fire upon you if you openly declare your distaste for the 1940s and a lot of the 1950s shorts (or worse, say you like the post-1964 shorts). That's not even getting into disliking the characters or any of the 90's television series directly descended from the theatrical series.
  • The Scrappy:
    • Gabby Goat, who was Porky Pig's sidekick in three 1937 cartoons. He was introduced as a foil to the shy, good-natured Porky, but was considered to be rather obnoxious and unlikable by fans. He only appeared in those three shorts before being dropped, and it took 80 years for him to make another appearance in the franchise, where he appeared to have been Rescued from the Scrappy Heap while still remaining the same hot-headed character but now a Deadpan Snarker and is given a Take That, Scrappy! moment with Porky finally retaliating against Gabby for his jerkishness, something Porky never did before in the original cartoons with Gabby.
    • Henery Hawk from the Foghorn Leghorn cartoons is practically the Ur-Example of a Scrappy due to Scrappy Doo's personality (both are belligerent, loudmouthed little pipsqueaks who picks fights with other characters many times bigger than them) and physical traits. The fact that Mark Evanier admitted outright he used Henery's character as a basis for Scrappy doesn't help at all.
    • The series introduced a whole army of Scrappies in the late 1960s when the original creative staff was dumped and Alex Lovy took over the studio. In a desperate attempt to stay in the game, Lovy created some new characters to supplant the classic line-up, and we were treated to such memorable characters as Cool Cat, Merlin the Magic Mouse, and Bunny & Claude. The new characters proved unimaginative, unfunny, and unmemorable, and it was soon game over for the original Looney Tunes series. One "Cool Cat" cartoon even went to the trouble to introduce "Spooky," a seriously dull ghost character, with a mention in the opening titles. A case of hitching your wagon to a sinking ship there. By this point, the few original characters still present in the shorts were considered Scrappies as well. Daffy and Speedy in particular (especially Daffy, whose Jerkass tendencies and irritability were stretched to ludicrous extents) due to personality changes and a questionable team-up of the two, though granted outside this Audience-Alienating Era, they are Ensemble Dark Horses more than anything else. However, Cool Cat, Colonel Rimfire, and Spooky eventually improved as characters to an extent in The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries.
    • Sylvester Jr. is this to many fans who find him an annoying brat and being from the fan unfavorite Hippety Hopper shorts, hence why he is rarely used in modern incarnations.
  • Seasonal Rot: The period in which the quality of the shorts goes downhill varies for everyone (similar to how people argue about the quality going downhill on such shows as Saturday Night Live, The Simpsons, and Family Guy), but it's generally agreed that when duties moved to DePatie-Freleng in 1964, things took a turn for the worse and, outside of a few exceptions, never really recovered.
    • There are some who argue that while DePatie-Freleng's cartoons were a big step down from the studio's heyday, they were still better than 95% of what the other animation studios at the time were producing. However, even DePatie-Freleng fans generally admit that the quality of the cartoons totally bottomed out when the Warner Bros.-Seven Arts era began in 1967 and that while things did improve when Robert McKimson returned for one last spell during the studio's final year, it was too little too late.
    • The batch of cartoons made in late-1933 until mid-1935 are also considered inferior to both the Harman and Ising shorts beforehand and anything from the studio’s heyday (1936-1964), albeit for completely different reasons: the more Disneyesque direction and the introduction of the hopelessly bland Buddy. It wasn’t until Friz Freleng grew the beard and Tex Avery and Frank Tashlin came on board that the studio really recovered.
  • Serial Numbers Filed Off: Foxy the Fox, an early character who was initially planned to headline the Merrie Melodies, is a shamelessly transparent copycat of Mickey Mouse, right down to having a Pluto-like dog in one of shorts, and a Minnie Mouse-esque girlfriend—so much so, that the characters title card even adorns the Captain Ersatz page. Walt Disney was not amused at this plagiarism and ordered Foxy's creator, Rudy Ising, to stop using the character after just three shorts.
  • Song Association:
    • The theme songs for the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies were actually not made for them, but were originally standalone songs, "The Merry Go Round Broke Down" and "Merrily We Roll Along", but because of them being the themes of both series for decades and heard virtually nowhere else, they will always be associated with the Looney Tunes franchise.
    • Likewise, Raymond Scott's "Powerhouse", a music track originally made in 1937, is a music cue that is often known because of its recurring use in Looney Tunes shorts.
  • So Okay, It's Average:
    • The cartoons made by Harman and Ising are generally considered this. They’re on the whole decent cartoons when standing on their own two feet, but while considered better than the 1933-1935 and 1964-1969 Audience Alienating Eras, they’re simply nowhere near the caliber of the shorts made from late-1935 until 1964.
    • The De Patie Freleng Enterprises shorts (1964-67) occasionally get this reception, especially the ones that don't co-star Daffy and Speedy (and even those have their defenders). While they had weaker writing and animation than the older shorts, some fans will say that they were still better than what most other studios were putting out at the time and did the best they could considering their low budgets and Executive Meddling.
  • Superlative Dubbing: The Mexican Spanish dub, to the grade that Warner Bros. normally excludes anything related to the Looney Tunes (even stuff like Loonatics Unleashed) from being dubbed in Venezuela (due to internal politics in WB and also for cost reasons), possibly due to the complains when they tried to dub some shorts in Venezuela and due the way they were voiced in Tiny Toon Adventures. In fact, when some of the Looney Tunes' shorts appear as cameos in other Venezuelan-dubbed series like Animaniacs, WB decided to keep the Looney Tunes' voices in English rather than being voiced in Venezuelan Spanish.
  • Suspiciously Similar Song: At the very end of "Hare Brush," Elmer does a victory dance to a tune that is very similar to the (then) recently-created "bunny hop" dance.
    • The beginning and end of "The Last Hungry Cat" feature a melodic parody of the theme to "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," aka "Funeral March of a Marionette" by Charles Gounod.
    • Bugs Bunny's cameo in the Paramount George Pal Puppetoon Jasper Goes Hunting is introduced with an ersatz rendition of the Merrie Melodies theme.
    • A few cartoons used a soundalike to Mel Kaufman's "Me-ow": Tree-Cornered Tweety, Cat Feud, Cat's Paw, Goldimouse and the Three Cats, Hyde and Go Tweet, and The Last Hungry Cat.
  • Sweetness Aversion: The pseudo-Disney Looney Tunes made around the mid-'30s, especially the Merrie Melodies of that period. They tried to emulate Disney's cutesy fare and failed miserably. The arrival of Tex Avery by late 1935 soon pulled them out of this phase.
    • However, most of Chuck Jones's early work (like the earliest Sniffles cartoons), made during the 1938-1941 period when he was still heavily influenced by Disney's Silly Symphonies shorts, tend to suffer from this. Sniffles the Mouse was one of Warner Bros' few attempts to create a cutesy Disney-like character.
  • They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: The Warner Bros.-Seven Arts regime in the late 60s axed all the original Looney Tunes characters — save for Daffy and Speedy — and introduced a bunch of new forgettable ones such as Rapid Rabbit, Merlin Mouse, and Cool Cat. Needless to say, most of the new characters only lasted three years, aside from Cool Cat, Colonel Rimfire, and Spooky, who appeared in The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries and Tweety's High Flying Adventure and later Looney Tunes Cartoons.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
    • Beans was the first real example of The Prankster in the series and a refreshing change from the characters who had gone before him. After his first few cartoons however, the animators started depicting him in much the same way as Buddy, meaning that while he at least outlasted some of the other characters from that period, in the long term, he was completely eclipsed by Porky.
    • Gabby Goat from the '30s, who was basically a Captain Ersatz of Donald Duck, could have been a great star if they had bothered to have any chemistry between him and Porky. Thankfully he was brought back in New Looney Tunes which gave him somewhat more development as well as starring in shorts with characters other than Porky.
    • For her fans, Penelope Pussycat, who doesn't get many appearances since the conclusion of the classic cartoon's run. Which is disappointing for her fans, who wish she could become a proper Looney Tune in her own right.
      • Daffy Duck's girlfriend, Melissa Duck, suffers from a similar problem to that of Penelope Pussycat; her lack of appearances overall caused not many people to remember her at all.
    • The series actually ran on this. The studio was constantly attempting to find new stars that the audience would take to, with many previous bit players or one-shots given a test in center spotlight. Porky, Daffy, and Bugs were among those that took on and became the series' Breakout Characters. The likes of Beaky Buzzard, Charlie Dog, and The Three Bears, however, ran only a brief stint of shorts before becoming mostly forgotten extras.
  • Tough Act to Follow:
    • With only a handful of exceptions, not a single revival has been able to live up to the spirit of the original shorts, the biggest reason being that the creators simply left very big shoes to fill, not to mention worked in a specific environment conducive to that creative process (you could say Animaniacs was Steven Spielberg buying that environment).
    • Carl Stalling and Milt Franklyn's scores are iconic and have that very looney quality. Bill Lava's scores, on the other hand, don't match up quality-wise and are often deep, ominous, and sometimes downright nightmarish, and play out this way in scenes that would otherwise be very funny.
  • Unintentional Period Piece:
    • A lot of the original shorts were very heavy on gags and references that were relevant for the 40s and 50s but have long lost their cultural context with the passage of time. The 1930's shorts, in particular, suffer this the hardest. To give an idea of how obscure some of them are, Cartoon Research had a regular column that detailed the origin of many oft-repeated phrases and caricatures in the shorts, many of them coming from radio programs of the time. Even their use of Acme Products came about from companies of the 1920s naming themselves with the word Acme on the front to be in the first on the lists in the phonebook (only some of which still exist to this day).
    • In My Generation G...G...Gap, the CD commercial announcer says that downloading songs can take up to half an hour. Laughable today.
  • Unpopular Popular Character: Daffy is one of the longest-running examples. His ever-escalating rivalry with Bugs Bunny has always been balanced by the audience knowledge that Daffy is very funny... or more accurately, his constant and frequently self-inflicted suffering is. A major theme of Looney Tunes: Back in Action is that everyone hates Daffy, but can't get rid of him because he is a pivotal part of the show. Interestingly enough, after that movie, Warner Bros. began using Daffy a lot more, giving him bigger roles and even his own show.
  • Values Dissonance: A number of the old Looney Tunes shorts can't be shown on TV anymore due to overt racism, sexism, smoking, drinking, or other topics that are no longer considered acceptable to show to young audiences. In particular, many of the old racial stereotype jokes are no longer considered funny in a post-Civil Rights world.
    • Some of the racial stereotypes are so old- such as the reference to the "Mammy" scene from The Jazz Singer- that many modern audiences wouldn't realize it was a stereotype, much less understand why they should be offended about it.
    • Horse Hare has a regrettable scene where Bugs Bunny picks off Native Americans with a rifle while singing "Ten Little Indians." He keeps count of the Indians he's shot by scratching numbers on a post. After he gets to six, he erases half of a scratch because "that one was a half-breed."
  • Vanilla Protagonist: Porky Pig's not a Flat Character, but he's also not very interesting either (especially compared to the other major characters, Daffy Duck, in particular). He's just a nice guy with flip-flopping luck and stuck constantly playing straight man to characters more shaded, assertive, and weird than he is. Even the directors admitted they didn't like using Porky because of how inflexible his character was.
  • What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: A lot of people, particularly the ones who grew up seeing the Edited for Syndication broadcasts of the Looney Tunes on Saturday morning TV, after school on weekday afternoons (or before school, depending on local station scheduling) that didn't include the cartoons made before 1948 that Warner Bros. didn't have the rights to until 1996 (when the merger with Turner brought them back), will be surprised to discover that Looney Tunes has a lot of humor that is either not appropriate for children or will fly over the heads of children and those who know nothing of the pop culture or history at the time. In that regard, the Looney Tunes can be seen as The Simpsons or Family Guy if either show was a 5-7 minute short shown exclusively in theaters before a feature film, right down to the fact that all three are or have been shown on TV with jokes and scenes cut for time and/or content and are readily available on DVD or online with these "offending" scenes intact.
    • In interviews with each of the main directors, when asked this question, they replied that they never had kids in mind when making their cartoons.
      • The shorts originally played before anything in the WB library (which could include gritty crime dramas aimed at older audiences), so yeah, they weren't for kids. It's just that due to edgier material that has come out since its heydey (as well as the aforementioned airings on Saturday mornings), a lot of the content seems tame today. Also, due to the Hays Code being in effect from 1934 until the late 1960s, all Hollywood movies could be watched by a family audience in theaters.
  • The Woobie: There's a surprising number of characters whose suffering isn't meant to be entirely comedic:
    • The alien in "Martian Through Georgia" who just wanted to make friends from another civilization and exchange but was instead labeled a monster and chased away.
    • Penelope Pussycat, especially if you consider the hints that she actually does like Pepe.
    • Porky Pig, while his abuse is usually Played for Laughs, there are sometimes you really have to feel sorry for him, especially considering, unlike most other Butt Monkeys in the series, he rarely brings it on himself. Taken to poignant levels in "Porky's Romance".
    • Also the big, friendly dog from Dog Collared who became obsessed with becoming Porky's pet to the point of sobbing uncontrollably when Porky slapped him and shooed him away and even considered suicide.
    • The little chihuahua in Scentimental Over You is laughed at by the other dogs for not having a fur, and when she finally wears one, she chooses a skunk's one driving every single person away from her. The scene where she cries dejectedly in a park bench says it all. And that's before Pepe shows up.
    • Beaky Buzzard tries to live up to his "Killer" moniker; however, in reality, he's a shy, clumsy imbecile, making him one of the most wrathless antagonists in the series (except in "The Lion's Busy," where he's oddly depicted as screwy).
    • The poor lovebird in Life with Feathers (Sylvester's first cartoon) is just textbook heartbreak and depression. His violent wife has kicked him out of their nest, and he explains to the audience that he cannot live without love, being a lovebird and all. He decides to end his life and spends a few seconds considering the different ways of doing so.

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