"This is what entertainment is all about... idiots, explosives and falling anvils."
—Calvin, Calvin and Hobbes
One of the most widespread of animated cartoon genres and one of the most popular for representing animation in other media. The zany humour of these cartoons date back to the peak of The Golden Age of Animation but actually came to dominance slightly afterward. After the big focus on musical aspects had passed, this style of humour which focused on wild and wacky physical reactions and behaviours from hammy cartoon characters came to the fore. It is filled with Cartoon Physics and highly unnatural situations. This is where walking off the cliff but not falling until you look down or painting a hole in a wall and then having it become a real hole came from.
Several of the first examples came from the Looney Tunes crew and Tex Avery creations. The characters are as important to the genre as the visuals here. The action was surreal and subverted natural laws and the characters were subversive and explosive themselves. Daffy Duck is a mad overreaction that would just be physically impossible and Bugs Bunny's iconic line "What's up, doc?" was a coolness in the face of danger that subverted expectations of the time.
Ren and Stimpy and Warner Bros's output in the 90's are some other good examples of this genre.
Tropes associated with this genre
- Absurdly Bright Light (Lights are way brighter than their real-life counterparts)
- Absurdly Ineffective Barricade (Failing miserably to seal a place off because the thing the person is using to seal it off is obviously useless)
- Acme Products (Products from a corporation that sells just about everything)
- All Balloons Have Helium (Balloons inflated with human breath float like helium balloons)
- All Cloth Unravels (All clothes can unravel down to a single thread)
- Amusing Injuries (Injuries that are Played for Laughs)
- Accordion Man (Someone gets injured in a way that makes them able to spread out like an accordion)
- Agony of the Feet (Someone's foot gets injured)
- Anvil on Head (An anvil, weight or a safe falls on somebody's head)
- Ash Face (Something explodes in a character's face and the character is fine but their face is covered in ash)
- Belly Flop Crushing (A small character gets squashed against a big character's belly)
- Butt Sticker (A big character sits on a smaller character and the smaller one gets stuck to the bigger one's butt)
- Cranial Eruption (Someone gets a big lump on their head because they banged it)
- Harmless Electrocution (Someone isn't negatively affected by electricity)
- Harmless Freezing (Getting frozen won't kill you or even give you frostbite and usually, not even hypothermia)
- Hyperspace Mallet (Pulling a mallet/hammer out of nowhere)
- Illogical Safe (Someone appears to be crushed by a falling safe but it turns out they were fine because they somehow ended up in it)
- Non-Fatal Explosions (A character survives an explosion with no serious injuries)
- Non Sequitur, *Thud* (Somebody talks nonsense before going unconscious)
- Punctuated Pounding (Somebody yells at another person and hits the other person for each insult)
- Rump Roast (Someone ends up with their butt on fire)
- Squashed Flat (Someone gets squashed and ends up flat like a piece of paper)
- Sweeping Ashes (A character explodes, turns into ashes and gets swept up)
- Thumbtack on the Chair (A character puts a thumbtack facing up on a chair)
- X-Ray Sparks (Electricity means you can see the bones of the one getting shocked)
- Your Head Asplode (Someone's head explodes)
- Badly Battered Babysitter (Somebody babysits a baby who accidentally hurts them)
- Balloon Belly (Someone gains a lot of weight in their belly very quickly)
- Balloon-Bursting Bird (A bird pops a balloon)
- Banana Peel (Jokes about slipping on banana peels)
- Bankruptcy Barrel (A poor character wears a barrel)
- Barely Missed Cushion (There is a soft item ready to break a character's fall, but the falling character lands next to it instead)
- Behind a Stick (Characters are able to hide behind things way smaller than them)
- Berserk Board Barricade (Someone hastily seals off a door by hammering a bunch of planks over it)
- Be the Ball (A character turns into a ball shape and is used like a ball)
- Big Ball of Violence (When characters who are fighting are mostly obscured by a large dust cloud)
- Big Shadow, Little Creature (A large shadow turns out to belong to a small creature)
- This Billboard Needs Some Salt (A large creature eats a large food-shaped object)
- Boomerang Comeback (The good guy throws something at the bad guy and misses, but then comes back like a boomerang and hits the bad guy anyway)
- Braces of Orthodontic Overkill (Crazy-looking braces (the kind you put on teeth, not on pants))
- Bubblegum Popping (A bubble from bubblegum popping that's played for comedy)
- Burning Rubber (A fast driver leaves a trail of fire behind them)
- Cartoon Bomb (Bombs depicted as black spheres the size of bowling balls with fuses sticking out)
- Cartoon Cheese (A yellow wedge or wheel of Swiss cheese)
- Cartoon Conductor (When it seems like the conductor, rather than the orchestra, is making the music)
- Circling Birdies (A dizzy character sees things floating around their head)
- Conspicuously Light Patch (Something in the background is conspicuously animated so the viewers can predict that it will be important)
- Covered in Kisses (Someone gets covered in lipstick marks)
- Cut a Slice, Take the Rest (Someone cuts a slice of something, then eats all the food and saves the slice)
- Dinner Deformation (Somebody swallows something whole and a food-shaped bump appears in their throat)
- Door Judo (The villain tries to break down the door, but actually the door's not even locked and the hero lets them out)
- The Door Slams You (Somebody gets the door slammed in their face)
- Dynamite Candle (Mistaking dynamite for a candle)
- Eat the Bomb (Eating an explosive device)
- Eek, a Mouse!! (Fear of mice)
- Elevator Gag (Any cartoony joke involving an elevator)
- Explosive Cigar (A cigar explodes when lit)
- Eye Pop (Somebody is so shocked that their eyes stretch or pop out of their sockets)
- Finger in a Barrel (Somebody puts their finger into the barrel of a gun and the shooter gets injured instead of them)
- Flower-Pot Drop (A flower pot lands on a character's head)
- Follow Your Nose (A character smells something, usually food, and levitates while following the smell)
- Funny Animal (An anthropomorphic animal, but more animal-like than a Petting Zoo Person)
- Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress (Gravity doesn't work like it should)
- Hammered into the Ground (Someone gets driven into the ground by being clonked on the head)
- Hammerspace (Pulling objects out of nowhere)
- Heart Beats out of Chest (A character's heart gets thrust out of their thorax (remaining in the body but visible). Usually means they are in love/infatuated)
- High-Pressure Emotion (A character literally steams when embarrassed or angry)
- Human Knot (Somebody ties someone else (or at least part of the victim's body, often a limb) into a knot)
- Human Snowball (Someone ends up rolling in a ball of snow)
- Human Snowman (A person gets made into a snowman)
- Impact Silhouette (Someone runs towards a wall and makes a hole shaped like them)
- Inflating Body Gag (Someone swells up full of gas or liquid)
- Instant Bandages (Somebody instantly gains bandages upon getting injured)
- Instant Ice: Just Add Cold! (Something/somebody gets frozen in ice when there's no water or there's water but it's not freezing)
- Instant Roast (When an animal gets singed, it ends up looking like the kind of roast that some humans eat)
- Invisible Holes (Someone gets holes in their body that liquid pours out of when they drink, but the holes are invisible when the character is not drinking)
- iSophagus (Somebody swallows a musical instrument and music comes from their body. Additionally, they can't speak while it's in their stomach/throat)
- Jaw Drop (A surprised character opens their mouth very wide)
- Juggling Dangerously (Juggling weapons or other dangerous things)
- Limited Wardrobe (Character always wears the same outfit or nearly always)
- Lustful Melt (Melting due to sexual attraction)
- Matchlight Danger Revelation (One or more characters are in the dark, one lights a match and realizes that danger is nearby)
- Medium-Shift Gag (A cartoon character turns live-action/puppet/CGI/whatever)
- Mouse Hole (Mice live in perfectly-round holes in the wall)
- The Not Catch (Someone fails to catch a falling character)
- Overly Nervous Flop Sweat (A scared/nervous character excessively sweats)
- Packed Hero (A character in a cereal factory ends up packaged into a cereal box)
- Painted Tunnel, Real Train (Drawn-on tunnels work like real ones)
- Pain-Powered Leap (A character jumps impossibly high as a result of a literal pain in the butt)
- Pain to the Ass (Someone's butt gets hurt)
- Paper Bag Popping (Blowing up a paper bag until it pops in order to wake a sleeping character)
- Piano Drop (A piano falls on the sky, usually onto something or somebody)
- Pinball Gag (A joke scene where something or someone gets knocked around like a pinball)
- Plunger Detonator (A type of detonator with a plunger-like device on top)
- Rapid-Fire Nail Biting (A nervous character bites their nails very quickly)
- Red Boxing Gloves (Goofy-looking, bright red boxing gloves)
- Something Else Also Rises (A Visual Innuendo for sexual arousal)
- Stock Femur Bone (Most bones are straight with two bulbs at each end)
- Surprise Jump (A surprised character leaps unrealistically high)
- Talking with Signs (Someone writes on signs instead of speaking)
- Telephone Teleport (Teleportation via phoning someone, then climbing out of the telephone.)
- Toon Physics (The laws of physics are out of whack in a cartoon)
- Torso with a View (Someone's torso gets a whole through it but they're OK)
- Traveling-Pipe Bulge (When a character or thing travels through a pipe, the pipe bulges out)
- Typewriter Eating (Someone eats corn and it makes a typewriter noise)
- Unraveled Entanglement (A character gets tangled in something)
- Vacuum Mouth (A character inhales things with their mouth)
- Weight Taller (Someone becomes buff or fat, which makes them taller)
- Wild Take (A ridiculously exaggerated shock response)
- Winged Soul Flies Off at Death (A character dies and their soul, which resembles an angel, flies upwards)
- Wipe That Smile Off Your Face (A character's mouth is removed)
- Wrong Parachute Gag (A falling character looks for a parachute and gets something that's not)
- Xylophone Gag (A xylophone has one exploding key)
