Discussion Film / WhoFramedRogerRabbit

If the current Disney executives hate Jessica Rabbit, why not just NOT have her appear or be mentioned in a Roger Rabbit revival movie? The audience can decide for themselves if she split with Roger, or they're still together and she has no role in the film?

We need to decide: Is this film Live-Action or Animated?

Roger Rabbit 2: Toon Platoon tropes:

I found a script for the never-made Roger Rabbit sequel (or prequel). I just had to put some of the potential tropes up, and this was probably the only place I could think of to put it. I will add them as I read the script. I've already had several ideas for tropes already:

• Accent Relapse: Otto puts on a German accent once it is revealed he is in league with the Nazis.
• Anachronism Stew: As in the first movie, there are Toons in this movie who weren't around in the set year of 1941. As such, this movie is a worse offender of this trope than the previous one, which contains appearances not only by Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner (who were still anachronistic in 1947), but also by other such Toons as Foghorn Leghorn and Droopy Dog (Droopy came along in 1943 and Foghorn in 1946). And those are just two ones earliest in the film.
• Anvil on Head: One of the many heavy objects to fall from the sky, thanks to Blackie.
• Berserk Button: The Air Force recruits do not like Richie calling them "a fruit or an asswipe" for joining the Air Force. Nor do the Navy sailors like it when Roger says things about their mother, when it was his own mother he was talking about.
• Big Bad: Otto Green — or rather, Otto Gruenwald.
• Bindle Stick: When Roger sets out to find his mother, he has all of his belongings packed up in this way.
• Biting-the-Hand Humor: As Roger searches for his mother, he comes across a truck from the Buena Vista Room Partitions Company, whose motto is "We divide and conquer".
• Black Sheep: Subverted. The Randalls love Roger, but they tell him solemnly that they are not his real family and that he is not human at all, but a Toon rabbit, whom his mother left on the Randalls' doorstop as a baby.
  Roger: Now I know why all the guys at school stare at me in the shower.
• Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: As Roger leaves the Randalls' farm to set out to find his mother, he tells his foster family, "I'll write every Tuesday, and I'll call every Friday, and I'll write and call every Sunday, just like you said!"
  Roger: (to himself) Or was it write every Friday and write and call every Monday? Maybe it was call every Tuesday, but don't write or call on every Saturday...
• Call-Back: When Roger refuses to believe he is a Toon at first, he says the same thing he says when, in the first movie, he learns that Jessica and Marvin Acme were playing pattycake: "I don't believe it! I can't believe it! I shan't believe it!"
  • As in the previous film, a human (in this case, the villain, Otto) is crushed by a falling piano, which is felled by a Toon.
• The Cameo: Eddie Valiant makes a very brief appearance as a customer in a barber shop, who gives Roger directions to the radio station.
• Chekhov's Hobby: Otto's building of model planes, which seems harmless enough when he is doing this in the radio station, but which proves to be pivotal as a plot element in his bid to do in Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin.
  Otto: (to Jessica) As you can see, Jessie, I still have my little hobby.
• Cowardly Lion: Richie. He gets better, though.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Richie.
• Defrosting Ice King: Richie.
• Doorstop Baby: Roger learns that his mother, unable to care for him, left him on the porch of the Randalls as a baby in one of these kinds of baskets (appropriately, an Easter basket).
• Drill Sergeant Nasty: Sgt. Dungan is a mild example.
• Exact Words: When Roger first meets Richie outside the Randall farm, he agrees to give the rabbit a lift only as far as the next town. After driving for some distance, Richie tries to drop Roger off at literally the next town they come to: the ramshackle town of Voidville, Kansas.
  Roger: But you said you were gonna take me to the next town.
  Richie: (shrugs) I did.
• Expy:
  • Blackie Cat is based on the black cat from Bad Luck Blackie.
  • Swifty Turtle is based on one-time Looney Tunes character, Cecil Turtle.
• Fantastic Racism: Once again, Toons. This film takes it further: not unlike African-Americans in the armed forces, Toons are segregated in their own platoon, to which Richie is relegated when his fear of heights threatens his own platoon. It doesn't help that the Toons' urge to entertain gets in the way of attacking an enemy. As a result, they are now simply relegated to "cleaning toilets and peeling potatoes", and they are referred to as "the fruitcake brigade".
• Fat Bastard: Otto, described as rotund and jolly-looking.
• Faux Affably Evil: Otto.
• Fluffy the Terrible: The two Toon panthers, Bambi and Thumper.
• Follow in My Footsteps: A variation: Richie was originally hoping to join the Air Force like his father had, but he is unable to do so because he has a fear of heights, and considers being a movie star as a second career choice. However, he manages to overcome his fear of heights during the climax.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Jessica is concerned that, given the war in Europe, her radio show "Life With Gramps" is tinged with antiwar sentiments, like staying in one's own backyard and not getting involved with the business of others, or how neutral is always the best gear in driving. As it turns out, she has every right to be concerned; her boss, Otto Green, is in league with Nazi Germany, and the radio program is meant to discourage America to keep out of the war.
  • Jessica as Axis Annie's script: "[Eleanor Roosevelt's] hubby and his two pals had a real blast at their little get-together [in Malta], courtesy of Axis Annie. Music isn't the only thing we send over our air waves."
  Jessica: Oh my God! The Malta Conference!
• I Lied: At the radio tower, Otto orders Jessica and Wendy to give him the keys to launch the rocket in exchange for their safe release. But when they do, he smashes a blinking red light next to them, then picks up a large shard of glass to slit Wendy's throat. As this happens and she resists with all her might...
  Wendy: You said you'd let us go!
  Otto: April Fools, toots!
• It May Help You on Your Quest: The stuff inside Swifty's shell.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Richie Davenport.
• The Jinx: Blackie Cat.
  • Richie thinks Roger is like this toward him at first.
• Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: Wendy and Richie, respectively.
• Massive Multiplayer Crossover / Loads And Loads Of Characters: Just as in the first movie, there are plenty of cartoon characters from virtually every animation studio in existence in the 1940s appear in the movie.
• Missing Mom: When Roger learns that his mother left him on the Randalls' doorstep as a baby, this becomes Roger's personal mission to set out into the world to find her.
• Mood Whiplash:
  • Richie's chase and battle with Roger in the studio is disrupted by the news of the attack on Pearl Harbor, after which the mood turns more somber.
  • As Otto takes Jessica away in the sedan and Roger falls behind after trying to keep up with it, it then abruptly changes to a Newsreel announcing the success of the Allies thus far eighteen months later.
• Ms. Fanservice: Jessica, again, although here, she tends to dress much more conservatively. She is also rather oblivious to her own charms.
• Never Say "Die": Hilariously averted and played straight: The newsreel announcer describes a typical Toon on the front lines as someone "who won't ever say die... 'cause he can't!"
• "Oh, Crap!" Smile: Richie gives one to a bunch of large Air Force cadets who glower at him in response to his inadvertently saying that you would have to be "either a fruit or an asswipe" in order to join the Air Force.
• Piano Drop: How Otto is ultimately killed at the end.
• Polite Villains, Rude Heroes: Otto and Richie, respectively (Wendy may also count for the "rude heroine" part).
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Richie, Roger, Blackie and Swifty.
• The Reveal: When Jessica and Wendy ask Otto what they can do for the war effort, he removes his hair, which is revealed as a hairpiece and tells them exactly what they're going to do as he pulls a Luger on the girls and forces them into a waiting sedan outside the radio station. He also changes his last name from Otto Green to Otto Gruenwald.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: The two panthers, Bambi and Thumper, have these kinds of eyes.
• Sadistic Choice: When Jessica resists Otto's orders to read his "Nazi trash", he forces her to do so if he wants her to spare the life of Wendy.
• Sentient Vehicle: Pee Wee the Toon biplane.
• Simpleton Voice: Swifty Turtle.
• Shout-Out: As in the first movie, there are several, to Golden Age cartoons, live action films, radio shows, and World War II.
  • The two Toon panthers are named Bambi and Thumper. Not only is it a reference to the Disney movie, but it is also refers to the names of the two hitwomen from the James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever.
• Shut Up, Hannibal! / Killed Mid-Sentence: After firing off the V-2 rocket, a delirious Otto raves to the Toons about how with it, Nazi Germany will win the war and how he will be awarded the Iron Cross and even be hand-picked by Hitler himself for something. What that something is, no one ever knows, because, all the time Otto is rambling, Blackie calmly crosses his path, which causes a Steinway grand piano to fall out of the sky and crush him.
  Blackie: Guy was gettin' on my nerves.
• Super-Breath: Roger accidentally does this with his birthday cake at the beginning of the movie when he tries to blow out the candles. It ends up sailing out of the Randalls' house and smashing into the door of a pair of elderly neighbors.
• They Walk Among Us: The Toons, again.
• Those Wacky Nazis
• Tokyo Rose: When Otto is exposed as a Nazi, he forces Jessica into servitude in Nazi Germany as Axis Annie, the German equivalent of this kind of character.
• Toon Town: The cartoon city makes an appearance, but it's mainly seen from a distance, and it does not serve as a plot element at this period in history.
• Travel Montage: One of these occurs as Richie and Roger make their way to California, hitching ride after ride with other cars. As this happens, a map of the western U.S.A. appears and shows the pair's progress, by way of a line etching along the map. Every hundred miles or so, the line stops with the sound of tires screeching, followed by a thud, and the line resumes until it finally reaches Hollywood.
• Wham Line: When Jessica and Wendy ask Otto what they can do for the war effort, this happens as a trigger for The Reveal:
  Otto: Don't bother packing, we're taking care of it.
• Your Mom: Inverted, as Roger tries to explain when he accidentally offends some Navy sailors while searching for his mother:
  Roger: I said my mother had a nice tail, not yours!

Thoughts, comments, concerns?

Removed these:

9th Aug '12 5:23:08 PM Gatchaman432

Added line(s) 104 (click to see context) :

* Conspicuous CG: Very, very, very rare, and nearly averted, as a majority of the animation is hand-drawn, but there is some obvious CGI in use whenever a Toon interacts with real-world objects.

12th Sep '12 9:14:29 AM Kalmbach

Added line(s) 106 (click to see context) :

** Nope, those were all props and practical effects, rigs, dangling on strings and such.. The only computers in this production were the ones used to type up the script.

"Square Peg Round Trope" and "Repair Dont Respond" in a queasy candy shell.

Kalmbach, if you ever read this (or for anyone else reading this really)—if you see somebody stuffing an example under the wrong kind of trope, or just puts in something that's flat-out wrong, either delete it or find a trope that better fits the example.

When Eddie's talking cartoon bullets head the wrong way, he calls them "Dum-Dums" (meaning "idiots"), but In Bruges taught me that Dum-Dums are also a special kind of Your Head A Splode bullet. What does it count as? Incredibly Lame Pun?

Big Bad: Judge Doom