Nightmare Fuel / Looney Tunes Cartoons

"If you ain't gonna eat me, you have to at least wear me. Wear me, Doc. Wear me... you're beautiful."

The Looney Tunes have never been strangers to the macabre, a tradition this iteration not only follows up on in stride, but in some ways ups the ante on.

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• While Looney Tunes has always been a violent franchise, this series takes it to levels comparable to that of The Itchy & Scratchy Show, Happy Tree Friends and even the Gene Deitch-directed Tom and Jerry cartoons; the first set of shorts alone feature the likes of Sylvester being cracked in half while frozen in a block of ice, Wile E. having his fur and skin burned off (and then being caught between salt and lemon trucks), and Elmer having a bear trap clamped onto his head.
• The ending to Fully Vetted, where Sylvester, having been neutered, walks out on to the road and proceeds to lie down to commit suicide by truck. Depending on who you ask, it's either this or a glorious piece of Black Comedy.
• Kitty Livin starts out tame enough, though things very quickly take a turn for the gruesome once Tweety starts unknowingly tormenting Sylvester from the inside. Body Horror is aplenty, including but not limited to Tweety breaking apart Sylvester's ribcage.
• Rotund Rabbit ends with Elmer deflating Bugs, rendering him a gangly monstrosity. Bad enough as that is, it's even worse when Bugs starts goading Elmer into "wearing him", with the creepiest dry voice you can ever imagine him having. Even Elmer is freaked out by it and runs off into the distance screaming. It makes MeatCanyon’s take on Bugs look like Chuck Jones.
  • The end of the short even manages to make "That's All, Folks!" unsettling; the carrot crumbs in Bugs's mouth don't help in the slightest.
    • Even creepier; usually, the shorts come to a close with an iris out or a fade to the end title. This short just...Cuts there...
  • If you think Bugs looks creepy as this monstrosity in the fully animated short; take a◊ good look◊ at how he looks in the storyboards for the short.◊ Sweet dreams!
• In Mummy Dummy, after finally getting Bugs where he wants him, the titular mummy begins to brutally contort him. Bugs' expressions and the accompanying crunching sounds, not to mention his screams, are absolutely horrifying... at least until it's revealed that not only did it not kill Bugs, he actually saw it as a massage.
  • It's even Harsher in Hindsight, when you think about it. Imagine the character you've grown up with for years that almost never loses and is lovable for his gags getting horribly maimed and genuinely murdered onscreen, and then his entire neck snapped. Even with the sudden Mood Whiplash that came afterward, it can still scare younger audiences and genuinely shock older audiences that are used to the Chuck Jones incarnation of Bugs...
  • Bugs arrives in a room filled with urns, thinking it's a buffet. Out of these urns, he pulls out several, decayed organs thinking that it's delicious food. However, once he sniffs the spleen, he notices how rank it smells, correctly thinking that the food is old. Especially with how disturbingly detailed the organs look.
    • It gets worse from there... The mummy appears, trying to catch Bugs, but is stopped by Bugs stuffing the organs down his throat - thinking that the mummy was a garbage can. If that wasn't enough, he tries to stuff the organs down the mummy's throat. It goes into a Gross-Up Close-Up of him squishing the innards inside his body with old green blood splashing everywhere and awfully realistic squishing noises. Sometimes, you'll forget that this is Looney Tunes with scenes as gross and creepy as this...
• Rabbit Sandwich Machine has a rather effective jumpscare in the form of a Gross-Up Close-Up of Elmer's face when he proclaims in a monotone voice "everybody loves mayonnaise. EVERYONE."
  • To say nothing of when Elmer is put through his own creation! After plucking off his clothes, he's tenderized by being smashed into a flabby mess with one of his bones sticking out. Then he's rolled flat twice, basted with enough marinade to bloat his body, roasted into a char, slathered with mayonnaise, and finally, launched off into a deep fryer to be turned into an Elmer Sandwich. And Bugs actually takes a bite out of it, before realizing how disgusting it tastes.
  • Also the face Bugs makes when he eats the sandwich. You can tell its one of the worst things he has eaten.
  • Elmer as a whole pulls off some rather impressive Nightmare Faces in this show.
• "Taziator" has Taz slowly walks toward Bugs while growling angrily at him with a couple of bruises and bloody claw marks on his face and the music in the scene makes it very scary while Bugs backs away in fear from Taz once Bugs gets cornered by Taz. We see the close up of Taz's red eyes, red irises, and his teeth close to the screen that would make any kid hide under the covers! We've seen Taz angry before but this time he looks very peeved off and wants to eat Bugs then and there! Luckily, Taz eats the emperor instead but still it's disturbing!
• Most of "Practical Jerk" is this combined with Tearjerker. Daffy pranks Porky by dramatically promising that he'll never prank him again...only for him to prank him again straight afterwards with a bunch of bombs and dynamite. You'd expect this to end up like most Looney Tunes gags where Porky will either get back up and dust it off or everything will go back to normal the next scene, right? Nope. After Porky has been blown up, Daffy laughs it off before worriedly checking on Porky; he sees him supposedly knocked out with Wingding Eyes and winces at the damage he made. All is well afterwards, right? Not exactly. The doctor reveals that Porky is actually dead. Daffy's crying is noticeably much less dramatic and much more genuine here than any other short; especially when they lower his casket into his grave. He then goes on by putting flowers near his grave every day for years and staring at old photos of him and Porky depressedly. This entire scene is played out for the rest of the short and is eerily prolonged. And the worst part about this scene? It's played entirely straight without even a hint of humor (save for Daffy making a That's All, Folks! pun and the photos of their time together mostly being Daffy torturing him with his usual gags.) Brrr... Thankfully, it is revealed both Porky and Daffy are alive, young, and well in the end; of which it's all revealed to be a very convincing prank.
  • As if it weren't convincing enough; Porky's "corpse" is shown to be grayed out with an almost soulless look and he has pinkish-red Wingding Eyes. It's a prank not only for Daffy, but for the viewers as well.
• In Graveyard Goofs, after constantly trying to find an open grave to place Daffy’s old friend in, Daffy and Porky decide to pick up shovels and speedily dig one themselves. After dropping the casket in, it’s a job well done, right? Wrong. The casket shoots up into the sky, and Daffy and Porky manage to catch it. Out of the grave comes the Grim Reaper himself. He’s disturbingly drawn more detailed in comparison to the wacky designs of Daffy and Porky, and his introduction is overall pretty bone-chilling. Daffy and Porky are rightfully traumatized by the sight of him and hightail out of there. Fortunately, he was actually nice, and helped Daffy repair his dead TV and watches it with the duo.
• Inn For Trouble might be one of the most disturbing shorts of the entire series!
  • The very fact that at the very start of the episode, we’re treated to some poor guy being murdered by some deranged lunatic! It’s not explicitly shown, and it goes offscreen the moment the killing does happen, but this being shown in Looney Tunes of all things is nothing short of horrifying!
    • How the said murder is treated. Unlike most of the violence on Looney Tunes, there are no bombs, goofy sound effects, or anvils being dropped in this scene, just a cold-blooded and awfully realistic murder happening behind the curtains. Sylvester had every right to be terrified by this...
    • The fact that we’ve witnessed a guy legitimately die (albeit, offscreen) in a realistic manner on LOONEY TUNES of all things.
  • Porky, thinking the aforementioned murderer is the owner of the inn they’re trying to stay at for the night, decides to stay. However, Sylvester notices the victim’s corpse (Thankfully in a Gory Discretion Shot) on the side of them. Before Porky could notice, the murderer kicks it inside of the booth to avoid being caught. And as they leave to go to their room, the murderer waves goodbye to Sylvester with the corpse’s limp hand and a Slasher Smile.
  • The murderer’s voice actor, Tom Kenny, did an excellent job at displaying his downright terrifying and deranged personality throughout the entire short. And it shows...
  • Throughout this entire short, the Murderer attempts to murder Porky. While Porky is getting ice, he seemingly...teleports towards Porky with the lights flickering every time. Once he's close enough, he attempts to stab Porky while he's unaware of his presence; only to miss and stab the ice instead. Then, he tried to drop extremely sharp silverware from the vents in an attempt to kill Porky in his sleep, but Sylvester protects him from that. Eventually, he attempts to strangle Sylvester; but Sylvester was quick-witted enough to use the bowl of ice from earlier to disorient him. And then as Porky is complaining about room service, he attempts to slice Porky's head clean off with a butcher knife. Some of this is played for Black Comedy, but it doesn't make it any less unsettling...
• Elmer's wall of mounted animal heads in "Birthday Grifts". These animals are mutilated and absolutely brutalized; with a surprising amount of detail. A pained moose head who is apparently still alive pleads in a soft and raspy voice to help them with a Thousand-Yard Stare.
  • Elmer in this short as a whole has his more aggressive side turned up to eleven; from simply a guy with a Hair-Trigger Temper and a bit of Jerkass qualities, to an absolute feral murderer attempting to kill Bugs simply for eating his birthday cake. Sure, he's been quite murderous before in these newer shorts, but not to the extent of nearly maiming him as early as the first minute.