What's Opera, Doc? / YMMV

Accidental Innuendo: "My spear and magic helmet!"
Award Snub:
- This was among the shorts that Warner Bros. submitted for an Oscar in 1957, with the Academy passing on it and instead nominating Tabasco Road and Birds Anonymous, the latter of which won (though not as good as this one, it's certainly no slouch, being the only one of the five Oscar-winning Warner shorts to get included in the book The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons).
- 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 "Mock 5".
Awesome Music: "Ride of the Valkyries" by Wagner.
- Silly as a rabbit in drag singing a love duet with a little bald man is, Mel Blanc and Arthur Q. Bryan's voices are still actually pretty lovely during the "Return My Love" song.
- The whole short begins with a wonderful rendition of the Overture from Wagner's The Flying Dutchman.
Can't Un-Hear It: Much like Rabbit of Seville did for The Barber of Seville, it's damn near impossible for an entire generation to listen to Wagner's original opera and not sing the Bugs Bunny version.
"Kill da Wabbit, Kill da Wabbit!"
Ensemble Dark Horse: Almost literally! The obese horse that Bugs as Brünnhilde rides has tons of fanart, despite appearing for less than a minute of screentime. According to Jones, the horse was basically given "the operatic curves we couldn't give Bugs".
Fashion-Victim Villain: The tubular design of Elmer's armor and the hemi-spherical helmet that covers his entire head makes Elmer look like a walking horned trash can.
Genius Bonus:
- Bugs Bunny is found dead while laid out on a rock, with some kind of fluid dripping on his face. This is a reference to Loki the Norse trickster god who was punished for causing the god Balder's death. Loki was laid out on a rock with snake venom dripping on his face as punishment. (Loki appears as a character in the first Ring Cycle opera "Das Rheingold," albeit under the German name "Loge.")
- The ending is an inversion of the actual tragic ending of Siegfried and Brünnhilde's romance. In mythology and the opera ''Götterdämmerung," Brünnhilde has Siegfried murdered after he betrays her, only to be stricken with grief and remorse after he dies (and Driven to Suicide). Here "Siegfried" is the betrayed lover who kills "Brünnhilde," only to instantly mourn.
He Really Can Act: Possibly Arthur Q. Bryan's finest performance as Elmer. In particular, he NAILS Elmer's rage after he discovers that his "love" was really Bugs - and Elmer's My God, What Have I Done? moment at the end. It's a shame that Blanc was credited while Bryan never was, as this was the second-to-last performance by Bryan as Elmer Fudd. (His final performance would be "Person to Bunny" a year later, but he died in the middle of recording, and the rest of his lines would be finished by Daws Butler.)
- Also a case of He Really Can Sing, as this is a vocal showcase for both Arthur Q. Bryan and Mel Blanc, both of whom were amazing singers. You can hear the passion of Bryan's beautiful tenor in the "Return My Love" sequence.
Hype Backlash: Bound to get a bit of this since it's considered the greatest cartoon short of all time by several historians.
Memetic Mutation: With my speaw and Magic HEW-MEEEETTTT!
- "Your spear and magic helmet?"^note"Pfft. Magic helmet."
- "Kill da Wabbit! Kill da Wabbit!"
- "Well, what did you expect from an opera? A happy ending?"
  - "NO! But I expected it from a Bugs Bunny cartoon!"
Narm Charm: Elmer Fudd's famous speech impediment does not make his performances any less intense or heartbreaking.
Nightmare Fuel: Elmer Fudd actually manages to kill Bugs Bunny.
"Awise, stowm! Norf winds, blow! Souf winds, blow! Typhoons, hurricanes, earthquakes! SMMMMOOOOOOOOOGGGGGG!!!!"
- The beginning of this cartoon seems like a Shout-Out to the Night on Bald Mountain sequence from Fantasia.
- That terrifying brief moment after Elmer realizes his "twue love" is Bugs in disguise: Bugs runs away into the darkness of deformed canyon walls, the music turns ominous, and Fudd finally gets his helmet unstuck to scream, "I'LL KILL THE WABBIT!" with a berserker rage that would scare many. This may be the one and only time his hatred of Bugs was played completely straight, without even a hint of humor.
Older Than They Think: Writer Michael Maltese had already done the gag of Bugs dressing up as Brünnhilde in a cartoon he wrote for Friz Freleng, 1945's "Herr Meets Hare," where Siegfried is played by Hermann Goering. The earlier sequence even used the same music, though the parody lyrics were newly written for this cartoon.
Parody Displacement: This short is arguably the source of many a modern American person's knowledge of all things Wagner, to the point where some people don't even know the short is actually based on a real opera (as opposed to just being a spoof of Wagnerian opera and its tropes in general).
Tear Jerker: If an unintentional one, not unlike Chuck Jones' earlier Feed the Kitty. Lampshaded in the Breaking the Fourth Wall line cited on the main page.

YMMV / What's Opera, Doc?

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