Schadenfreude and mean spirited humor can be tempermental.
One the big ways Looney Tunes did is by having mean spirited stuff happen in response to characters' flaws - either literally by having them do something bad, or figuratively by having them be a jerk who faces some kind of ironic jab. When that sort of thing happened to someone who didn't deserve it, they usually got their own back in a big way. Someone like Chuck Jones' Daffy Duck didn't always deserve it, but was such a narcissist that felt like a balloon that deserved to be popped anyway.
This is also how Darkwing Duck did it. Most of the crap Darkwing goes through specifically targets his ego, but it's all in service of reminding the character that his ego isn't what makes him a hero, it's everything else about him.
But, making it happen to someone deserving isn't always the secret to making it work. Sometimes it works perfectly fine when the characters either don't deserve it at all, or at least very rarely deserve it. Dexter's Laboratory is in retrospect one of the meanest animated shows in the 90's, well beloved and for good reason, and Dexter while sometimes a dick usually didn't deserve everything he got. Skit shows like All That or Saturday Night Live or In Living Color! had all sorts of skits that were just all about regular people going through pretty nasty stuff for laughs. Etc.
There's all sorts of ways of doing it, I guess. I think the big thing is to, no matter what you do to the characters, not go so far as to make it feel like the movie is actively bullying them without reason.
Edited by KnownUnknown on Oct 13th 2025 at 7:02:32 AM
Dexter was balanced because Dee Dee didn't get her comeuppances often, either, and Dee Dee was ambiguously innocent in that you often couldn't tell clearly how aware she was she was being an awful sister.
Mandark, who deserved it all the time, also got it all the time.
Please remember that, ultimately, fictional works of entertainment are just that.Again I think it's the delivery of the gags. A lot of mean spirited shows feel like they're trying to be mean for the sake of it, like that alone makes it funny. "Huh, huh, look how absolutely horrible our protagonist is. Oh, and he got away with it too. That's SO subversive. You modern kids love that, right? RIGHT?" That's the vibe I get with a lot of modern mean spirited comedy. They still think unpleasantness is some instant fix over actual gag quality. I think it's why even the adult cartoons are drawing away from that now because being a mean spirited cartoon for adults is anything BUT subversive now. Most of the newer entries have some actual core besides that now, even the ones that are still kinda cynical and cruel in humour, there's a POINT to it so to speak.
Edited by Psi001 on Oct 13th 2025 at 6:11:26 AM
Yeah, early era Simpsons and King of the Hill were kind of that middle ground, being made for an adult audience but still mostly safe for family viewing (even if even Simpsons was quite controversial for its time, again it did begin in the 80s).
Granted by the 90s and 2000s it wasn't that rare for even kids cartoons to be vulgar and mean spirited. Even with Disney's cartoon shows you could see the evolution occuring at times. Talespin I'd argue was the last "cuddly" earnest show in the style of the 80s stuff, at least discounting the ones based off of the films.
Edited by Psi001 on Oct 13th 2025 at 6:37:15 AM
One thing that was common in early 2000s cartoons, especially on Cartoon Network, was having the protagonist's "best friend" be an absolute unpleasant jerk to them.
I think one show that did this character type RIGHT was Megas XLR, Yes, Jamie is an asshole, but his jerkishness is almost never towards Coop himself unlike with Bloo and Mac. And he always gets consequences for that behavior.
"COCONUTS HAVE WATER IN THEM!"
Yeah, there's some unpleasant Truth in Television behind that one. There's something about middle and high school that makes kids think that insults and putdowns and sarcasm are the best and only way to communicate and to form bonds, and if you actually are nice and friendly, then you're a stupid and immature moron who shouldn't be given the time of day. x_x
Jake Spidermonkey has to be the nadir of such best friends. And I loved Jamie, he really sounds like a best friend to a nerdy, fat boy.
As long as this flower is in my heart. My Strength will flow without end.Disney shouldn't try to be Looney Tunes, and Looney Tunes shouldn't try to be Disney.
Disgusted, but not surprisedAlso in reality, Kids Are Cruel. A lot of times when you truly look back, you will have memories of your friends being two faced pricks to you, and likely, you will remember being just as bad to them. Social circles, avoiding bullies, or just having an immature sense of humour that is more mean than funny, it's better you than me at that age (though really some adults don't grow out of that either).
Nor they should be Dreamworks.
Edited by AegisP on Oct 13th 2025 at 7:19:18 AM
As long as this flower is in my heart. My Strength will flow without end.![]()
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Yeah, that's true.
Although Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny like to go skydiving together. ;)
Arguably the Rudish Mickey shorts basically function like Looney Tunes with Mickey.
Please remember that, ultimately, fictional works of entertainment are just that.Except The Emperor's New Groove. That one can be as Looney Tunes as it needs to be.
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I heard that movie had an earnest Disney esque heart too.
I think the most Looney Tunes like Disney works are the shorts starring the iconic trio of Mickey, Donald, and Goofy. Goofy's the clumsy idiot, Donald's the angry idiot, and Mickey's the straight man trying to keep his idiot friends from hurting themselves.
Disgusted, but not surprisedYeah, Clock Cleaners is one short that springs to mind (no pun intended 😅) that encapsulates that dynamic really well.
"Hey, least I didn't lose all my artistic talent when I crash landed in the arena here."The shorts starring only one of them shows how ineffectual they are without the other two to balance them out. Mickey for one seems to be a lot more careless and flawed when he's not focused on helping Goofy and Donald.
Disgusted, but not surprisedDonald always works best in trios.
Donald, Mickey, Goofy.
Donald, Goofy, Sora.
Donald, Panchito, Jose.
Donald, Fethry, Gladstone in the comics.
Since the comics nephews functionally are a single person in three bodies Donald, Scrooge, HDL works too.
Duck Tales 17 also featured Donald, Scrooge, Della.
Edited by TomWithoutJerry on Oct 13th 2025 at 10:51:02 AM
Please remember that, ultimately, fictional works of entertainment are just that.I think Goofy really shone most brightly in his "How to..." shorts.
One of my favorite Disney shorts of all time is "Duck Pimples;" one odd thing about it, though, is that while it stars Donald, it really feels like it would have been better suited to Mickey or Goofy, as you can more easily see them both just taking all the crazy stuff that happens, whereas you'd expect Donald to blow his top and start wrecking up the joint, which he never does.
Then there's "Symphony Hour," which is a thing of beauty, and features a bit that very nearly had me rolling on the floor laughing the first time I saw it.
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Mickey, Goofy, and Donald are a classic comedy trio like The Three Stooges: Straight Man (Larry), funny man (Curly), and hothead (Moe).
You want to talk about mean-spirited. Sit through Sponge Bob seasons 4 through season 9 before the second movie or Johnny Test.

Yeah, the thing is even Family Guy didn't start off mean spirited for the sake of it. It was more a zany mock-sitcom to start off with, and while the characters still weren't brimming with depth, they were generally likeable and lucid enough to move the silly parody plots along, with the odd mean spirited gag here and there if it was FUNNY (and even then I'd argue it was more elements like character reactions that tended to make them work, which later Family Guy is almost void of, the Overly Long Gag of Peter narrating his own life in a contemptuous way works because of Lois' increasingly irritated expressions culminating in her punching him for example).
Concerning the shorts, I do wonder how popular the likes of Chip and Dale or Huey Duey and Louie actually would be if they were their one main media rather than their more courageous Disney Afternoon counterparts. (I'd argue that itself was a product of its time since the 80s was all about action and badassery while still keeping television heavily mandated so kids got good morals out of it, hence role models like He-Man, Optimus Prime and Hulk Hogan being the top faces of that era. Hence we have these characters redirected, still having their mischief but portrayed in the most altruistic and restrained manner possible.)
I'd argue the 80s was also truly when they started embracing kids being allowed to be "badasses" themselves and be part of the action, so long as they did so by learning the right lessons from their role models. This is a breakthrough Disney is still capitalizing on to this day.
Edited by Psi001 on Oct 13th 2025 at 4:53:45 AM