"Ouch!"
"Welcome to the Wacky-wack-wack
Wacky, wacky-wack-wack!
Welcome to the Wacky World of Tex Avery!"
Wacky, wacky-wack-wack!
Welcome to the Wacky World of Tex Avery!"
The Wacky World of Tex Avery is a 65-Episode Cartoon show produced by DiC Entertainment and Les Studios Tex in 1997. Named after the late great Tex Avery, a cartoonist who is most famous for his work at Warner Bros. and MGM, the creator Brody Dowler describes the show as a "homage to the brilliant, hilarious and groundbreaking animator Tex Avery and the wonderful squash-and-stretch cartoons of his era."
The show contains the following shorts:
- Tex Avery: A goat-riding cowboy who saves the day and his girl Chastity Knott from his nemesis Sagebrush Sid (no relation to the real one). Based on Bob Clampett's character Red Hot Ryder from "Buckaroo Bugs"; although it always appears as the opening segment, not every episode has a Tex Avery segment.
- Einstone: A brilliant caveman who is the world's first inventor, trying to teach the other cave people how to be civilized with his inventions; a play on the name Albert Einstein, he's also loosely based on another one of Tex Avery's cartoons, "The First Bad Man."
- Ghengis & Khannie: Ghengis the Lionhearted leads his army across the world to conquer in the name of his Emperor and meets a young female panda named Khannie who tends to ruin his conquering plans; a play on the name Genghis Khan, the former is based on the lion from "Slap Happy Lion".
- Maurice & Mooch: Maurice the Chicken outwits Mooch the Fox who tries to eat him, the former based on the canary character from "King-Size Canary".
- Pompeii Pete: A short bumbling Roman super centurion from Pompeii was buried in lava and 2,000 years later breaks free from his preserved state to live in the modern world, annoying a businessman named Dan. Though Dan sometimes is portrayed as a criminal.
- Power Pooch: A normal dog gained superpowers after licking a superhero's shoe, becoming a superhero himself along with his blue cat sidekick Little Buddy.
- Freddy the Fly: An obnoxious fly bugs an obese billionaire named Amanda Banshee, the former loosely based on one of Tex Avery's earlier characters, Homer the Homeless Flea.
Is not to be confused with The Tex Avery Show, a block of Avery's classic shorts aired on Cartoon Network in the early 2000s.
The Wacky World of Tex Avery provides examples of:
- Adults Are Useless: Maurice's parents are absolutely clueless that Mooch is trying to eat them or just Maurice.
- Animated Anthology: Each segment is based on Tex Avery characters.
- Animation Bump:
- The main title sequences for the show and segments have much more fluid animation than the episodes themselves (much of the intro was animated by Glen Kennedy).
- As for the episodes themselves, around half of them used digital coloring, while others used the hand-painted method.
- Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: "Attack of the 50-Footed Woman" has a giant woman who has literally fifty feet.
- Bittersweet Ending: The mud pie episode ends this way for Ghengis & Khannie. Ghengis finds out she's earning money from mud pies and spitefully smushes them when he can't cut into the market; Khannie is despondent until she realizes they've become mud pizzas! Cue a new venture. Meanwhile, Ghengis's corporation goes out of business and is fired. Khannie offers an olive branch: would he like to go into business with her? Cut to them running a mud pizza joint together, where she's the manager and he's the chef.
- Bolivian Army Ending: This is how "A Man Called Horsey" is supposed to end when Tex and a horse-Sid are cornered by horse bandits, who are armed to the teeth. Tex then shouts, "Hold it!" and pushes away their guns. He yells at the director that this is a stupid cartoon, and can't they see that?
- The Cape: Power Pooch.
- Catchphrase:
- Tex Avery: "You try to be a nice guy but no...!" "I don't think so."
- Sagebrush Sid: "What are YOU looking at?!"
- Pompeii Pete: "Scusi, scusi."
- Freddy: "Hiya, toots/pal/folks!"
- Amanda: "Time to die, fly!"
- Censor Box: One Tex Avery episode has one to cover Tex's nudity.
- Covers Always Lie: Tex is shown riding a horse in the opening of his shorts and in bumpers, while he actually rides a goat. In one of the "We'll be right back" bumpers, his horse is shown being abducted by aliens while Tex was sleeping, which might explain his absence.
- Dastardly Whiplash: Dan has several traits of one.
- Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: Being cartoon characters in the same vein as the old Tex Avery shorts, they cannot actually die.
- Dogs Are Dumb: Power Pooch himself being the Idiot Hero that he is.
- Dragon-in-Chief: Genghis does most of the conquering compared to the Emperor.
- Evil Twin: Power Pooch gets one in one episode. He wears black and has a skull on his chest. And likes cats while the real Power Pooch hates them (except for Little Buddy), this fact helps Little Buddy Spot the Impostor.
- Expy:
- While Maurice is based on the character from "King-Sized Canary", he's also similar to Tweety Bird, sharing the blue sailor hat and having eyelashes despite being a boy.
- Khannie's goody-goody personality is based on Elmyra Duff's. (Her voice actress Cree Summer adds to the fun.)
- Fiery Redhead: Amanda Banshee has red hair and goes berserk when she's annoyed by Freddy, to the point it exaggerates her features
- Fiery Sensuality: In one Power Pooch episode, PP spots a very attractive female walking down the street. To demonstrate her hotness, she leaves a trail of fire everywhere she goes.
- Hair-Trigger Sound Effect: Thunderclaps for Banshee, consummerate with her Hair-Trigger Temper.
- Harmless Villain: Up and down in regards to Sagebrush Sid.
- Heart Beats out of Chest: Power Pooch catches sight of a female poodle named Fifi. His heart beats so strongly that as Fifi is walking by him, it actually blocks her path.
- In Name Only: Really has nothing to do with the legendary Avery. Though as stated, it was meant as a homage.
- In One Ear, Out The Other: This visual gag happens to several characters but most frequently Dan and Amanda Banshee.
- Kawaiiko: Khannie and Maurice. Arguably Little Buddy as well.
- Larynx Dissonance: Amanda Banshee is voiced by Scott McNeil giving her a voice of a man trying to imitate a woman
- Lustful Melt: Following the above-mentioned Heart Beats out of Chest moment, Power Pooch melts after Fifi passes by. Though the actual melting happens offscreen, the puddle he becomes is seen after Fifi leaves.
- No Antagonist: Einstone is the only segment to not feature a recurring antagonistnote , as Einstone's inventions are usually undone by the stupidity of his fellow cavemen. Although they occasionally run into carnivorous dinosaurs.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed:
- Genghis the lion's voice channels a bit of Sean Connery's, while Khannie might be considered a furry version of Shirley Temple.
- Chastity's voice appears to be based on that of Katherine Hepburn.
- Freddy the Fly's inspired by, and named after, Red Skelton's character, Freddy the Freeloader.
- Public Domain Soundtrack: Both the show, and most (but not all) of the segments has an original theme based on PD music (e.g., Home on the Range for the Tex Avery segment, If You're Happy and You Know it for Einstone, Home Sweet Home for Maurice and Mooch, The Can-Can for the show itself, etc).
- Rich Bitch: Amanda Banshee, oh so much. She uses her servants as furniture, for one thing.
- Setting Update: One Genghis & Khannie short takes place in a Space Opera setting, which parodies Star Wars.
- Shout-Out: One "Maurice and Mooch" short has an Elmer Fudd-like hunter carrying a rabbit. Another Bugs-ish bunny showed up in a Tex cartoon. Amanda once saw Red's face in her mirror. One Power Pooch short was pretty much a rehash of King Size Canary. There were quite a few nods to the master, actually.
- Spexico: In one Tex Avery short, the Latin Land setting was
changed to Switzerland in-story so as not to be culturally insensitive. But the Mexican villagers remained, thus making it close to this trope. - Three Shorts: The regular number of shorts in an episode.
- Toilet Humor: In the first episode's Einstone segment, one of Einstone's efforts to grab the dinosaur egg involves him using a dinosaur as a hot air balloon. His cavemen assistants pump the air through the dinosaur's butt, and the dino starts passing gas to move around once Einstone is ready to use the hot air balloon.
- Who Writes This Crap?!: This is how Tex Avery ends "A Man Called Horsey". As the sapient horses corner him, he says "Hold it!" and asks them if they can see how stupid the premise is. The horse director and production crew say in unison, "I don't think so."
- Yes-Man: Short men with Stepford Smiles that wear hats with signs that says "Yes!", and they always agree on their boss(es).
