Road Runner cartoon
The Road Runner cartoons are a series of Looney Tunes cartoons created by Chuck Jones for Warner Brothers.Chuck Jones once said of his most famous protagonist and antagonist that "Wile E. is my reality, Bugs Bunny is my goal." The shorts are very simple in their premise: the Road Runner, a flightless cartoon bird (loosely based on a real bird, the Greater Roadrunner), is chased down the highways of the Southwestern United States by a hungry coyote, named Wile E. Coyote (a pun on "wily coyote"). The coyote never catches the Road Runner, (Save once - in the 1980 Chuck Jones short, "Soup or Sonic" - see below under "Later Cartoons") and there is never any dialogue save the Road Runner's "beep beep" (though both these rules were broken later). The two characters do sometimes communicate by holding up signs, to each other or to the audience, or some the cartoonist. Another key element is that while Wile E. is the aggressor in this series, he and his hopelessly futile efforts are the focus of the audience's sympathy - as well as virtually all of the humor. Wile E. seems doomed, like Sisyphus, forever to try but never to succeed.
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2 The Acme Corporation 3 The rules 4 Later cartoons 5 Plymouth Roadrunner 6 Road Runner High Speed Internet 7 External links |
Typically at the start of each episode, during a chase sequence, the action pauses, to show us the apparent latin names of Roadrunner, and Wile E. Coyote, usually emphasising the former's speed, and the latter's hunger. For example, in the episode Lickety Splat, they have latin names "Fastius Tasty-us", and "Apetitius Giganticus". These names changed between episodes.
Wile E. Coyote often obtains complex and ludicrous devices (Rube Goldberg machines) from a mail-order company, the fictitious Acme Corporation, which he hopes will help him catch the Road Runner. The devices invariably backfire in improbable and spectacular ways. The coyote usually ends up burnt to a crisp, squashed flat, or at the bottom of a ravine. How the coyote acquires these products without any money is never explained...nor is any distinction made between equipment defects or operator error. (See also: Acme).
The company name was likely chosen for irony (acme means the highest point, as of achievement or development). The expansion A Company Making Everything is a backronym.
Among the products produced by the Acme Corporation are:
In his book Chuck Amuck, Chuck Jones explains some of the rules the artists followed in making the Coyote-Road Runner series:
The Road Runner and coyote appeared again after the end of the original Chuck Jones productions in 1964.
A series of 11 cartoons were done later in the 1960s by David DePatie and Friz Freleng, animators of the Pink Panther cartoons.
Post-Chuck Jones cartoons allowed the coyote to speak, and he once (in the episode called "Soup or Sonic") had the Road Runner in his grasp but thanks to a gag involving a tunnel that got smaller and narrower as he went through it Coyote is only a few inches tall and can only grab the Road Runner's leg - at which point he holds up a sign that reads "Okay, wise guys, you always wanted me to catch him. Now what do I do?".
Wile E. Coyote has also unsuccessfully attempted to catch and eat Bugs Bunny in another series of cartoons. In these cartoons, the Coyote does speak with a smooth, generic East Coast upper class accent -- provided by Mel Blanc, of course:
In another, Wile E. lectures two young TV-watching children about the edible parts of a Road-Runner attempting to explain his somewhat irrational obsession with catching it, with help from an illustrated chart showing each section of the bird and its flavor.
In another series of Warner Bros. cartoons, the character design of Wile E. Coyote was copied and renamed "Ralph Wolf." In this series, Ralph continually attempted to steal sheep from a flock being guarded by the eternally vigilant Sam Sheepdog. As with the Road Runner series, Ralph Wolf used all sorts of wild inventions and schemes to steal the sheep, but he was continually foiled by the sheepdog. In a move seen by many as a satirical gag, Ralph Wolf continually tried to steal the sheep not because he was a fanatic (as Wile E. Coyote was), but because it was his job. At the end of every cartoon, he and the sheepdog would stop what they were doing, punch a timeclock, and go home for the day. The most prominent difference between the coyote and the wolf, aside from their locales, was that Wile E. had a black nose and Ralph had a red nose.
In 2004, Wile E. appeared (along with Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck) in an AFLAC commercial, in which he is shown as being a prime candidate for the company's services (before he plummets, taking the AFLAC duck with him, he holds up a sign reading "Ask About It At Work" (one of AFLAC's taglines).
The Plymouth Roadrunner was a performance model of car produced by the Plymouth division of Chrysler between 1968 and 1980. An official licensee of Warner Brothers (paying $50,000 for the privilege), the Roadrunner used the image of the cartoon bird on the sides.
In the late 1990s the Road Runner name and character image would later be used for cable internet service, which is currently run by Time Warner Cable, although the name was previously licensed to MediaOne. Balloon sculptor John Cassidy and his Road Runner balloon animal creation were featured on a commercial for this service.Latin names
The Acme Corporation
Like in other cartoons, the Road Runner and the Coyote follow the laws of cartoon physics. For example, the Road Runner has the ability to enter painted caves, which the Coyote cannot. Sometimes the Coyote is allowed to hang in midair until he realizes that he is about to plummet into a chasm. The Coyote can overtake rocks which fell before him, and end up being squashed by them.The rules
Later cartoons
In one short, Bugs--with the help of amphetamines--even sits in for Road-Runner, who has "sprained a giblet", and carries out the duties of outsmarting the hungry scavenger.Plymouth Roadrunner
Road Runner High Speed Internet