Looney Tunes: Deep Thoughts About Comedy, Animation, and Breaking the Fourth Wall

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Definitely not meant for kids.
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They were not meant for kids because they were being shown before, you know, the Saturday evening movies.
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They were intended for adults.
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They became for kids in our generation when they were being shown on Saturday morning cartoon TV, but they were not created for children.
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And you can tell that with the jokes and the references to pop culture and the music.
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There's a lot of Chuck Jones.
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I mean, they were called Merry Melodies.
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They were called Looney Tunes, T-U-N-E-S.
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Like it was about the music, the classical music.
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My sister, Emily Guy Birkin, no hyphen, is an overthinker.
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And my sister, Tracy Guy Decker, yes hyphen, is an overthinker.
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And we both love pop culture, a well-crafted story, and eminently quotable movie lines.
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Each week, with the help of Feminism, Our Super Smart Brains, and each other, we uncover the lessons lurking behind the nostalgia of our favorite comedies, dramas, science fiction, and horror.
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Because pop culture is still culture.
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And shouldn't you know what's in your head?
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I'm Tracy Guy Decker, and you're listening to Deep Thoughts About Stupid Shit.
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On today's episode, I'll be sharing my deep thoughts about some Looney Tunes with my sister, Emily Guy Birkin, and with you.
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Let's dive in.
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Okay, um, I'm not talking about all the Looney Tunes.
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There were over 300 cartoons made just by Chuck Jones.
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That's only Chuck Jones's cartoons.
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I'm gonna talk specifically about five, and I'll I'll give you them in the chronological order.
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There was Hair Raising Hair, which is the one with the monster when Bugs Bunny's giving him a manicure and says, monsters must be such interesting people.
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That was from 1946.
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Then Transylvania 65000, where he ends up in Count Blood Count Castle, and the two magic words abacadabra and hocus pocus turn the vampire into a bat, into a back into human form.
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There's what's opera doc, which was the six-minute version of Wagner's Ring Cycle, uh, with kill the wabbit, kill the wabbit.
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One froggy evening is the one with the frog who sings only when the one guy's watching, hello my baby, hello my honey.
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And then Duckamuk is the one where it's a daffy cartoon and like weird stuff is happening, and we can see the animator working.
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And at the very end, the reveal is that Bugs is the animator.
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Those five created between 1946 with hair-raising hair and 1963 for Transylvania 65000.
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I gave you gave them to you in the wrong order.
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So I'm narrowing our focus, but based on those episodes, is there anything you want to share that like you hold on to in daily life?
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Well, the monsters are so interesting, hair-raising hair.
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At the end, the way that Bugs like finally defeats the monster is he breaks the fourth wall and says, Do you ever feel like someone's watching you?
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Like, look, call the people in the audience who are watching you.
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And the monster goes, people, and runs when I am not expecting to have to people.
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Yeah.
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Like, or like uh, you know, sometimes I go to conferences sometimes and I'll I'll get to like the end of my ability to people.
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I'll in my head, I'll be like, people, and like want to run through walls.
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Yeah.
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So that's in my head.
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I remember how much you loved duckamuk as a kid.
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I like I remember that being like, if it came on, you're like, all right, I'm locked in.
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Yeah.
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I couldn't tell you if this is in any of these, but something that sticks in my head is I must have made a wrong turn at Albuquerque.
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I just I love that repeated gag when when bugs is in the wrong place.
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Uh and I actually I read a sci-fi kind of horror novel several years ago called The Fold by Peter Kleins, where the uh scientists have created what they think is a like transportation device, like a it beams you from from one place to another.
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But actually, what it has done is it uh sends you into an alternate universe that's almost exactly the same.
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But they call the device the Albuquerque door.
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Because it's the wrong turn.
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Well, because the lead scientist it really loves Looney Tunes.
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He's like, it's the I Ching.
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Like anything, the any question you have, it's in there.
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And then he was calling it because he was saying, well, whenever he takes a wrong turn at Albuquerque, it seems like he's going too far for how much effort he's putting.
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So that's why they called it the Albuquerque door.
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So that's in my head.
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And then knowing that this has influenced so much was like kind of delightful to me when I read that book.
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So tell me, what's at stake here?
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I mean, we we talked about how much you love these specific episodes, but you know, why are we talking about them?
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Yeah, so we're talking about them right now because I recently went.
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There's a a guy who does Bugs Bunny at the movies, where you know how I think you've done this in Milwaukee and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra does it too, where they'll screen a movie and the score is live music from the symphony orchestra.
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So this is that with with Looney Tunes cartoons.
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And I was absolutely delighted by this experience.
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And I learned a lot that I didn't know as a result of this experience, because the the guy, the conductor of the Looney Tunes orchestra, you know, he knows a lot about the music and about the way that these cartoons came to be.
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It just got me thinking again about these cartoons, which were very important to me as a kid, as you know.
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As regular listeners know, my childhood aspiration was to become an animator.
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I loved all things animation.
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I was not a snob at all.
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Like anything animated was made me happy.
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I had particular fondness for the Looney Tunes and these ones in particular.
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Looney tunes were on the list in general because they were so important to me as a kid.
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And now, because I recently had this experience with the live music, I actually remember really enjoying Pepi LePew, the skunk who is has amorous intentions toward a poor cat who's got a white stripe on her back.
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This is many, many episodes that have Peppy and that same gag.
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And I went to try and re-watch one.
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I just randomly picked a Pepe LePew.
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This was a couple weeks ago before I was even planning on doing this episode because I see this is funny.
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I said, Le Sai, which came from Peppy Le Pew.
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I said that in a conversation with someone and I was like, I haven't seen a Pepi Le Pew episode in a long time.
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And went back to rewatch it.
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And these things are like six minutes.
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The cartoons are between six and eight and eight minutes.
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And I watched the first like 60 seconds, and I was like, oh, oh no, no, I can't, nope, I can't do this anymore.
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I think in the innocence of childhood and in the 80s, the, you know, him chasing the cat was just kind of funny.
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In adulthood, understanding sexual assault and how horrifying it is, it ain't funny anymore, at least not to me.
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So that's why Pepe's not on this list.
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I also, the Roadrunner and Wiley Coyote, there's a lot going on, you know, with the new movie that's out that would have made an obvious choice, but I didn't like those as much, you know?
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And likewise with Sylvester and Tweety Bird.
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I just, I liked them, but I didn't like them as much.
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These are the ones.
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Now I could have kept going though.
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Like I loved Foghorn Leghorn.
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I love, you know, that there are many more.
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There's no Elmer Fud, except for what's opera doc, in this short list.
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But I was trying to narrow it down so that I could actually do some real analysis.
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So that's why I picked the ones that I picked.
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I do want to say one real quick thing about Pebula Pew, because I recently saw Coyote versus Acne.
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And there is one lovely, hilarious throwaway gag where the characters are touring like a like a science lab of like different things that they have come up with.
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And they're like, oh, this is a a spray to repel predators.
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And they say it in such a way that you're expecting like monsters going, yeah, wolves, that sort of thing.
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Then they they use the spray on Pepe Lapina.
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On Pepe.
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Yeah.
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So they I'm not the only one.
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That was like this really, and like my kids did not understand that Joe.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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But it was like the acknowledgement in a funny way.
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Yeah.
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I recently to prepare for today, I watched a a brief video called Every Frame of Painting.
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I will link to it and all of these five episodes that we're talking about in our show notes.
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Uh that and this every frame of painting is a little bit of a documentary about Chuck Jones.
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So Chuck Jones is the animator on all of these five, and he had 295 others during his career.
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He was very prolific and very good.
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And some of the things that they pointed out are that Jones really cared about character.
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So, and he cared about sort of the boundaries, the discipline of the character and of the universe he was creating.
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And so he always followed his own rules.
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And I think that is part of why we like it so much.
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That this this YouTube that I'll I'll share talks about the fact that as his style and expertise in artistry developed, he came to actually use very subtle gestures in order to convey the convey meaning.
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And it reminded me of times when you and I have sort of marveled at actors who are able to convey an entire paragraph of meaning just in their eyes.
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Jones does that with his characters as he grows up, if you will, as an animator.
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And so that's kind of interesting.
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I do want to talk about the music since I saw this concert.
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And I want to talk about why it remains funny.
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Like some of the literary, is that the word I want?
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The like the literary devices, if I may use that term, that are used that make it continue to be exciting.
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Other things will probably come up.
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I'm going to give you very brief of each of these five.
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I'll try and do them in chronological order.
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Um, so first is hair-raising hair.
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Bugs is lured into the layer of an evil scientist as a meal for a big hairy-red monster with sneakers on.
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Shenanigans ensue.
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He doesn't get eaten.
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He's lured, by the way, by a mechanical female bunny.
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That's how the evil scientist lures him in.
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So that was that was released in 46.
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In 1953, there was Duckamuk.
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And that's the one where Daffy is the conceit is that Daffy is an actor, an animated actor in an animated movie.
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His scenery keeps changing and he's talking to the animator, like, all right, Mac, get with the program.
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And and shenanigans ensue.
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And it's I still find it hilariously funny.
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And then at the very end, we find out that Bugs is the animator.
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That was 1953.
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In 1955, one froggy evening, a man in 55 discovers in a cornerstone of a building that's being demolished, a box in which a frog jumps out.
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And the frog jumps out and sings with a little froggy-sized top hat.
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The man, we see dollar signs literally, that he thinks he can make a bunch of money.
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But every time anyone besides this man is watching, the frog is just a frog.
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And so his the man, we don't have any name, and there's actually no dialogue except for the frog's lyrics.
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The man like loses everything and it like becomes an alcoholic and gets arrested.
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And in the end, he drops the box with the frog into a cornerstone of a building that's being built.
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And then we see in the future, in 2056, 2055 or 2056, a construction worker finds the box and the frog is still singing, and that's the end of that one.
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What's opera doc?
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I don't know how to describe.
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It is a six-minute version of Wagner's ring cycle with Elmer Fudd wearing like Viking horns and controlling the thunder, and then these loony tunes lyrics to Wagner's Ring Cycle.
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There's a gag where Bugs is dressed up as Brunhilde with like fake boobs and fake blonde braids and riding a very fat horse.
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And at the very end, Elmer Fudd as the I don't even know who he's supposed to be, the guy, the thunder god, does kill Bugs Bunny and is walking away really, really sad.
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And Bugs, he's he's like limp in Elmer Fudd's arms, but he sits up, he kind of picks his head up and looks out at the audience and says, Did you expect a happy ending in opera?
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Uh what's opera doc was from 57?
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And then from 63, Transylvania 6500, which is a pun on a song that was very popular at the time, Pennsylvania 6500, which was the actual phone number of a hotel.
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Bugs is trying to go to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and ends up in Pittsburgh, Transylvania.
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And he ends up, he thinks that he calls it a motel in this vampire's castle.
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And I already said in in the opening when I was telling you about this one, he's he can't sleep.
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And so he's reading this book of magic phrases and says abacadabra, which turns the vampire, the human form into bat form, and hocus pocus does the reverse.
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And like it's happening behind him.
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So he doesn't know that this is happening for a lot of it.
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And he, and then he ends up like walking down the hall looking for a phone, like singing it, and behind him, the vampire's turning into a bat and turning into a human and turning into a bat.
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And then he starts mixing them up and says ab abacof pocus, hocus cadabra, and like the vampire like is like a human head, but bat wings.
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And in the end, he wins against the vampire by turning him into a two-headed vulture, which we had met a two-headed vulture before.
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A female two-headed vulture, Emily and Agatha are their names.
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And so the count, blood count is flying away as a two-headed vulture being chased by the female two-headed vulture, 1963.
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So those are the episodes.
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So I'll start with a very easy one to get out of the way in talking about gender.
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None of these episodes pass Bechtel test, except possibly the one I just said, because Agatha and Emily both have names and nope, they only talk about bugs and other men.
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So the Bechtel test for our listeners, a reminder, you ask yourself three questions.
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Are there at least two named female characters?
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Do they talk to one another?
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And do they talk to one another about something other than a man or a boy?
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Most of these cartoons don't even pass the first question.
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There are no female characters unless it's bugs in drag, as Brunhilde.
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So that's easily enough disposed of.
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Well, one of the things we mentioned in with Pepe Le Pew, and then like Emily and Agatha run like flying after the Count.
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And even um Bugs after the mechanical bunny.
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Yeah.
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There is this sense of sex being out of control.
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Yeah.
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What's Opera Doc has that as well.
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Because as soon as Elmer Fudd sees Bugs and Drag and doesn't recognize him as Bugs, he's like instantly in love.
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Yes.
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There is this sense that generally men can't control themselves.
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And then it's turned on its head as a joke when women can't control themselves.
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And even I kind of remember there being like a man as uh from some woman character.
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And that might have been, I might be remembering something from who framed Roger Rabbit, because that's definitely in there.
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And it might be from Tex Avery instead of Chuck Jones.
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But that was part of the joke was when a woman was boy crazy or sex crazy, as opposed which, while a man being unable to control himself because he saw an attractive, like female rabbit that's not even a real rabbit, uh, you know, Pepe Le Pew not being able to control himself is considered natural.
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And the humor comes from the shenanigans that is ensue because of that natural, you know, force of uh impulse.
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Yeah, impulse.
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Thank you.
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That's it's a product of its time.
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Very much a product of its time.
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Very much.
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I was struck by that again when we watched Hair Raising Hair from 46.
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And Bugs is basically doing a Groucho routine in the way that they draw him walking kind of hunched forward.
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And yeah, it's Bugs is Groucho Marks to a certain extent in hair raising hair.
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Or all of the Marx brothers, I maybe, because I feel like the monsters are just interesting people, could be uh Chico.
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And the evil scientist is also a recognizable actor, whose name I don't know, but I'm certain they were parodying a recognizable actor from the time.
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Oh, I know who it is, but I'm drawing a blank.
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But yes.
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These cartoons were very intentionally of their time.
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They were transient at the time.
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They were disposable, kind of.
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The studios wanted them to show before the film, like just as a little entertainment to get the crowd warmed up or whatever.
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And they they just churned them out.
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They didn't care what was in them.
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They just churned them out.
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It was just like commercials are today.
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They were not necessarily meant for kids either.
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Definitely not meant for kids.
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They were not meant for kids because they were being shown before, you know, the Saturday evening movies.
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They were intended for adults.
00:17:52.389 --> 00:18:00.629
They became for kids in our generation when they were being shown on Saturday morning cartoon TV, but they were not created for children.
00:18:00.710 --> 00:18:06.629
And you can tell that with the jokes and the references to pop culture and the music.
00:18:06.789 --> 00:18:08.869
There's a lot of Chuck Jones.
00:18:08.950 --> 00:18:10.710
I mean, they were called Merry Melodies.
00:18:10.789 --> 00:18:13.589
They were called Looney Tunes, T-U-N-E-S.
00:18:13.829 --> 00:18:17.509
Like it was about the music, the classical music.
00:18:17.669 --> 00:18:32.470
And on that score, actually, while mentioning the music, I learned when I went to this concert that all of the studios, all of the major studios, had orchestras like on staff in the 40s, Jewish musicians fleeing Europe.
00:18:32.710 --> 00:18:34.710
This is where a lot of them got jobs.
00:18:35.109 --> 00:18:35.909
I'm kidding.
00:18:36.069 --> 00:18:36.389
Wow.
00:18:36.549 --> 00:18:36.869
Yeah.
00:18:37.109 --> 00:18:43.029
Because they, I mean, each of the studios had these standing orchestras that they were employees of the studio.
00:18:43.190 --> 00:18:44.950
And I never thought about it.
00:18:45.109 --> 00:18:47.509
Once I learned it, I was like, oh yeah, that makes sense.
00:18:47.589 --> 00:18:49.349
But I never really thought about it.
00:18:49.509 --> 00:18:57.349
And there's something when you pay attention to the music and the way that the music helps to tell the story, right?
00:18:57.509 --> 00:19:09.990
Like the little sort of piccolo or woodwind that does the ha ha ha ha ha ha while Bugs is laughing, how we know it's supposed to be scary or whatever the atmospheric piece might be.
00:19:10.309 --> 00:19:13.109
There's a specific sound when someone turns around.
00:19:14.549 --> 00:19:18.470
Or when it's unexpected and we hear them blink, right?
00:19:18.789 --> 00:19:18.950
Yeah.
00:19:19.430 --> 00:19:19.750
Yes.
00:19:20.069 --> 00:19:29.509
All of that was done by musicians, like highly trained professional musicians, which also speaks to the fact that it was not for kids.
00:19:29.669 --> 00:19:32.309
But there's tension here because I just said they were disposable.
00:19:32.549 --> 00:19:41.909
You know, so it's really interesting to me that there's this high degree of artistry in the visual art and the music for these things that at the time were kind of throwaway pieces.
00:19:42.069 --> 00:19:43.990
They've turned out not to be throwaway.
00:19:44.230 --> 00:19:46.710
Here we are talking about them all these years later.
00:19:46.950 --> 00:19:53.029
I find that really interesting to see the live performance, you know, of what's opera doc, for instance.
00:19:53.269 --> 00:19:59.029
The orchestra played this abbreviated ring, but they also played the theme song to the Looney Tooth.
00:19:59.190 --> 00:20:00.950
Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo.
00:20:01.190 --> 00:20:11.349
Like, and that was really fascinating to be reminded that a symphony orchestra was playing that tune that is so baked into my head.
00:20:11.509 --> 00:20:19.990
I I want to stick with this for just a second, in part because of the story behind getting Coyote versus Acme out into the world.
00:20:20.230 --> 00:20:21.990
So I don't know if you're familiar with it.
00:20:22.230 --> 00:20:22.950
I mean, you told me.
00:20:23.109 --> 00:20:26.389
I'll link, include a link in the show notes to the video that I saw that talked about it.
00:20:26.629 --> 00:20:30.389
The film was made, I believe, in 2022 originally.
00:20:30.629 --> 00:20:40.149
And then the studio was sold before it was it was supposed to be uh released the same weekend as the Barbie movie, and so they they held off.
00:20:40.389 --> 00:20:40.950
Understandable.
00:20:41.269 --> 00:20:42.389
The studio was sold.
00:20:42.629 --> 00:20:48.950
The new owner of the studio shelved the movie to get a$30 million tax break.
00:20:49.190 --> 00:20:53.750
Because if you uh can write off something that didn't make any money, you can get a tax break.
00:20:53.909 --> 00:21:06.950
Um and the the people behind the movie had to fight, and fans of the movie had to fight to get that studio to sell the rights of the movie to another studio to put it out.
00:21:07.109 --> 00:21:19.750
Even though, and it's not because it was a bad movie, it's not because it was just this particular studio owner looked at the calculation and decided, I'm gonna make more money by shelving this movie than I am by putting it out.
00:21:19.990 --> 00:21:29.430
And the reason why I bring this up is because the YouTuber that I think it was Anna Adam Conover was talking about how movie studios aren't in the business of making movies anymore.
00:21:29.509 --> 00:21:30.950
They're in the business of making money.
00:21:31.109 --> 00:21:40.149
And that is in such contrast with studios having standing orchestras for disposable entertainment.
00:21:40.470 --> 00:21:43.029
Well, it wasn't, they weren't only playing for cartoons.
00:21:43.190 --> 00:21:44.069
Oh, no, no.
00:21:44.230 --> 00:21:44.470
Right?
00:21:44.629 --> 00:21:50.149
So the the orchestras would be playing scores for all of the movies being yes.
00:21:50.549 --> 00:21:52.470
But still, they used the orchestras.
00:21:52.629 --> 00:21:54.629
Yes, they definitely did use the orchestra, yes.
00:21:54.789 --> 00:21:56.629
That cost money and time.
00:21:57.109 --> 00:22:05.589
And you know, Chuck Jones put so much uh into these, knowing that they were just gonna run before the main the main show.
00:22:05.750 --> 00:22:19.750
And so, like the difference between the artists and the studios taking the art seriously, even when it's not serious art, and modern day movie studios that are so focused on the bottom line.
00:22:19.909 --> 00:22:20.309
Mm-hmm.
00:22:20.629 --> 00:22:22.710
You know, Justin let the art rot.
00:22:22.950 --> 00:22:23.349
Yes.
00:22:23.509 --> 00:22:23.750
Yeah.
00:22:23.909 --> 00:22:35.269
Like it's it reminds me of um Grapes of Wrath, you know, like it's better to let the food rot on the vine because it's uh better for the owners than to the bottom line.
00:22:35.430 --> 00:22:39.589
It's better for finances than it is to put the food out there for the people who are starving.
00:22:39.750 --> 00:22:49.509
And I I'm just reminded of we recently had Justin Cram on to talk about UHF and about how we are so focused on box office returns these days, instead of like, is this a good movie or not?
00:22:49.669 --> 00:22:50.869
Did I enjoy myself or not?
00:22:51.029 --> 00:22:57.430
I just wanted to put that in there, especially since it is a Looney Tunes property where this happened.
00:22:57.589 --> 00:22:57.909
Yeah.
00:22:58.149 --> 00:22:59.669
Let's talk about why it's funny.
00:22:59.909 --> 00:23:06.069
The every frame of painting suggests that every single gag that Chuck Jones does is a two-part gag.
00:23:06.149 --> 00:23:07.109
They all work the same way.
00:23:07.269 --> 00:23:10.869
They set up some expectations and then they subvert your expectation.
00:23:11.109 --> 00:23:14.629
And you and I have talked before about how that is how comedy works.
00:23:14.789 --> 00:23:16.069
It subverts your expectations.
00:23:16.230 --> 00:23:17.589
It's also how horror works, right?
00:23:17.750 --> 00:23:19.750
It's the subversion of expectations.
00:23:19.990 --> 00:23:21.269
And that's absolutely true.
00:23:21.430 --> 00:23:27.509
I'm not arguing with a commentator who said that, but I want to dig a little deeper because that's how most gags work.
00:23:27.589 --> 00:23:34.950
But Chuck Jones is, I can remember, you remember me laughing out loud at Duckamuck when we were kids.
00:23:35.109 --> 00:23:38.950
I still, I know what's gonna happen, and it still makes me chuckle.
00:23:39.909 --> 00:23:42.710
And I don't think it's just because it's subverting expectations.
00:23:42.869 --> 00:23:44.230
I think there's more to it.
00:23:44.389 --> 00:23:47.829
And I so I want to talk about, we've already mentioned breaking the fourth wall.
00:23:47.990 --> 00:23:49.589
I want to talk about breaking the fourth wall.
00:23:49.669 --> 00:23:55.589
I also want to talk about dramatic irony, and I want to talk about subverting expectations based on the medium.
00:23:55.829 --> 00:23:58.549
Let me define some things first, and then I'll tell you what I mean.
00:23:58.789 --> 00:24:05.909
Breaking the fourth wall, for listeners who don't know, that is when the character talks directly to the audience.
00:24:06.069 --> 00:24:10.710
Break the fourth wall being the one between the audience and the player.
00:24:11.029 --> 00:24:17.109
Most art, the characters don't know they're being watched by us who are reading or watching.
00:24:17.269 --> 00:24:22.069
So when they break it and they talk to us directly, it subverts expectations and it's often funny.
00:24:22.309 --> 00:24:25.109
Dramatic irony is a very specific thing.
00:24:25.269 --> 00:24:32.389
So dramatic irony is when the viewer or reader knows something that the character does not.
00:24:32.629 --> 00:24:42.549
Vampire movies, which I love, often trade on dramatic irony because I, the viewer, know that that guy is a vampire, but the people around him do not know that he's a vampire.
00:24:42.710 --> 00:24:45.669
The subverting expectation is specifically related to the medium.
00:24:45.829 --> 00:24:47.349
That's the other thing that I want to talk about.
00:24:47.669 --> 00:24:56.789
In that case, I want to talk about when the cartoon behaves as if Daffy Duck is an actor who exists outside of his cartoons.
00:24:56.950 --> 00:24:57.990
That's what I mean by that.
00:24:58.149 --> 00:25:15.750
And in Duckamuk, which is the one where Daffy is an actor, there's a point where the frame of the screen starts to droop and the animator draws a little stick that Daffy has to prop up the ceiling of the frame he's in.
00:25:15.909 --> 00:25:22.629
And so that's what I mean by the subverting expectations based on the medium, which breaking the fourth wall does.
00:25:22.789 --> 00:25:24.389
That's a specific way that it does it.
00:25:24.549 --> 00:25:34.309
I believe that those three together are why I personally still find these five shorts funny, even in 2026.
00:25:34.549 --> 00:25:40.710
Transylvania 6500, which was the most recent, it's the newest, the youngest of these five that we're talking about.
00:25:41.029 --> 00:25:52.230
As Bugs is walking down the hall, just kind of singing to himself these magic words, and count and blood count behind him keeps turning into a bat and then flying away.
00:25:52.309 --> 00:25:54.389
I'm making you laugh, just talking about it.
00:25:57.589 --> 00:25:59.349
That's dramatic irony.
00:25:59.509 --> 00:26:01.669
Bugs doesn't know what's happening behind him.
00:26:01.909 --> 00:26:08.869
Now, late in the same film, they're fighting, they're having like a battle of magic, sort of.
00:26:09.190 --> 00:26:19.190
And Bugs turns him into a bat, and he kind of burrows underneath uh a stone that's part of the walkway that they're on, because they're in this big stone castle.
00:26:19.430 --> 00:26:24.149
And he says, blood count says the words to make himself into a human.
00:26:24.309 --> 00:26:30.710
And he rises up and he's holding this block of stone above his head and he says, I'll crush you now.
00:26:30.869 --> 00:26:38.230
But before he can toss it, Bug says, Abacajabra, Abacadabra, and gravity works and crushes the bat.
00:26:38.389 --> 00:26:40.710
And that happens back and forth multiple times.
00:26:40.789 --> 00:26:49.190
And each time he rises up after he has said after Blood Count has said hocus pocus, he's like shaking just a little more because he got crushed a minute ago.
00:26:50.230 --> 00:26:53.109
In that case, it's not traumatic irony.
00:26:53.269 --> 00:26:56.149
They both know exactly what's happening, just like we do.
00:26:56.309 --> 00:26:58.389
It's not always dramatic irony.
00:26:58.629 --> 00:27:06.629
Sometimes it's like I took a left turn at Albuquerque, and it's the same gag over and over and over again that makes it funny.
00:27:06.789 --> 00:27:15.190
Now, one thing to note that I learned from this YouTube is that bugs, Jones had a rule that bugs never initiated a fight.
00:27:15.349 --> 00:27:16.629
He never picks a fight.
00:27:16.869 --> 00:27:18.309
He always retaliates.
00:27:18.470 --> 00:27:20.950
If he gets into a battle like that, he's retaliating.
00:27:21.109 --> 00:27:39.029
I think that was one of those things that sort of developed, like the more nuanced facial expressions and things, because in hair-raising hair, which is the oldest of the ones we're talking about, in Duckamuck, which is not the oldest, hair-raising hair is the oldest, but duckamuk is only a few years later.
00:27:39.190 --> 00:27:42.149
I think you could argue that bugs initiated.
00:27:42.549 --> 00:27:56.470
And yet it's a little different because it puts Bugs as the animator as opposed to, you know, duck season, rabbit season from one of the Elmer Fudd cartoons, which I we didn't even talk about, but you know, one of the ones where he's actively fighting with someone.
00:27:56.869 --> 00:27:57.669
Talk a little bit more.
00:27:57.750 --> 00:28:02.950
Like one of the things you said was that Chuck Jones was very disciplined and that he had these rules and he followed them.
00:28:03.109 --> 00:28:04.470
And so it sounds like that's one of them.
00:28:04.549 --> 00:28:07.109
You know, Bugs doesn't initiate a fight.
00:28:07.430 --> 00:28:10.309
What other kinds of like rules did he have?
00:28:10.629 --> 00:28:12.470
He knew who these characters were.
00:28:12.549 --> 00:28:15.589
And it was important to him to understand their motivation.
00:28:15.750 --> 00:28:16.710
What did they want?
00:28:16.869 --> 00:28:19.190
He wanted to know what they wanted.
00:28:19.430 --> 00:28:22.230
And that was what would drive the episode.
00:28:22.470 --> 00:28:27.029
The ones, these five that I picked as an example, don't do that quite.
00:28:27.190 --> 00:28:30.069
I mean, like, Coyote is very clear what he wants.
00:28:30.230 --> 00:28:33.509
And in these ones that I did pick, here's what I mean.
00:28:33.669 --> 00:28:35.909
One froggy evening, there's no dialogue.
00:28:36.069 --> 00:28:38.470
That was a constraint he put on himself.
00:28:38.629 --> 00:28:41.909
Like, so this was in this film, this is the rule.
00:28:42.069 --> 00:28:46.069
We only tell the story visually and through the frog's singing.
00:28:46.230 --> 00:28:47.109
We don't use dialogue.
00:28:47.269 --> 00:28:49.029
That was a rule for that particular piece.
00:28:49.269 --> 00:28:57.829
In What's Opera Doc, they needed to make Wagner's Ring, which is, by the way, 16 hours or something of opera.
00:28:57.990 --> 00:29:00.710
Like you watch it over multiple consecutive nights.
00:29:00.869 --> 00:29:02.230
It's, it's, it's huge.
00:29:02.389 --> 00:29:04.470
And they condensed it down into six minutes.
00:29:04.710 --> 00:29:07.990
I am unfamiliar with the, like, I am not an opera scholar.
00:29:08.069 --> 00:29:10.869
So if there's a listener who wants to correct me, I'm I'm open to that.
00:29:11.029 --> 00:29:14.470
They use a symphony orchestra, they took it seriously.
00:29:14.629 --> 00:29:27.109
And so the the sets and the way that things move in what's opera doc on the screen need to match the musical power and energy.
00:29:27.269 --> 00:29:29.829
And that was a the d thing that was the discipline there.
00:29:30.069 --> 00:29:38.789
Jones would set the sort of like we talk about any kind of world building, it was important to him that the world building have a coherence.
00:29:39.190 --> 00:29:53.109
What you're saying is, and like it sounds like the he had rules for in like within individual episodes, but then he had like overarching rules that were how the characters interacted with the world.
00:29:53.509 --> 00:29:56.149
Yes, he had rules for the specific characters.
00:29:56.389 --> 00:29:59.589
They they needed to stay in character.
00:29:59.990 --> 00:30:06.069
And I think you told me before we started uh recording that he wouldn't break a a character rule for a joke.
00:30:06.389 --> 00:30:06.710
Right.
00:30:06.950 --> 00:30:07.430
That's right.
00:30:07.669 --> 00:30:14.389
If a writer came presented a joke that he felt was out of character, even if it was funny, he wouldn't accept that.
00:30:14.549 --> 00:30:18.149
It was important to follow the rules of that character's motivation.
00:30:18.230 --> 00:30:28.230
And I want to stick with that for a second just because part of the staying power of these is that Bugs Bunny is Bugs Bunny, no matter which episode you watch.
00:30:28.389 --> 00:30:40.309
Whereas, like one of the things that has always bothered me about long-running sitcoms is the fact that the characters are unrecognizable by the final season because they keep pushing the envelope.
00:30:40.470 --> 00:30:44.789
And obviously, long-running sitcoms are not the same thing as animated short.
00:30:44.950 --> 00:30:51.669
It feels like if the like the writers of Friends had created like a like this is who this character is.
00:30:51.909 --> 00:31:01.190
And even though like they do things where they are pushing who that character is for a joke, and then they have to push it further and push it further to get the next joke.
00:31:01.349 --> 00:31:05.669
But it seems like that would be a kind of discipline that would be very helpful for the writing.
00:31:05.909 --> 00:31:07.190
Yeah, possibly.
00:31:07.349 --> 00:31:21.109
I mean, the window moves regardless, you know, like the The Simpsons are a great example where the early Simpsons, like Homer's not very bright, but by the end, he's a complete buffoon because it kept getting, you know, pushing that.
00:31:21.190 --> 00:31:24.230
I think it's called the Overton window of what the audience will accept.
00:31:24.470 --> 00:31:25.750
Bugs does evolve.
00:31:25.990 --> 00:31:27.109
Daffy does evolve.
00:31:27.190 --> 00:31:36.869
I mean, even the bugs of hair-raising hair, the earliest one, versus the bugs of Transylvania 6500, you do see an evolution.
00:31:37.109 --> 00:31:39.909
I don't want to suggest that like it's static.
00:31:40.069 --> 00:32:02.710
And even the way that in so one of the things that the ev every frame of painting points it out is that earlier cartoons, when a character was scared, like when or surprised, they would go through like really quickly a whole bunch of different facial expressions, like, uh, ooh, uh, you know, like, and that would be the vocal, the Melblank vocalization would be a bunch of different grunts.
00:32:02.869 --> 00:32:12.230
In hair-raising hair, that happens when Bugs sees the monster for this first time and he holds up a sign that says yep, and then he turns it around, it's really big, it says yep.
00:32:12.309 --> 00:32:32.389
By the end, but you know, as he evolved, as Jones got better at his craft, instead of running through 20 different facial expressions, there's like a close-up and maybe only his eyes move or a whisker twitches, or, you know, something much more subtle with less movement and sort of more dramatic power.
00:32:32.629 --> 00:32:40.869
I don't want to compare apples and oranges that, you know, long-running sitcoms versus the evolution of drawing Bugs Bunny.
00:32:41.109 --> 00:33:00.710
And I do think that having sort of a clear understanding of a character and how they interact with the world and prioritizing that rather than prioritizing the cheap joke or the cheap laugh would positively impact sort of long-running sitcoms.
00:33:00.950 --> 00:33:08.230
I think that's the the kind of discipline that people spoke about about Jones and he spoke about it himself.
00:33:08.470 --> 00:33:28.389
In addition to the things we've already talked about, about like keeping the rules of the particular like Duckamuck has specific rules about how Daffy interacts with his environment that break what are normal rules, but within Duckamuck, they're there.
00:33:28.710 --> 00:33:38.309
I also think that my favorite humor in like long-running sitcoms is when the humor is based on how well the audience knows the character.
00:33:38.549 --> 00:33:41.990
My very favorite episode of Friends is one with all the embryos.
00:33:42.230 --> 00:33:43.430
That's that's the title of it.
00:33:43.509 --> 00:33:50.950
But uh, it's the one where the guys and the the women uh each claim they know the other one better, and so they create a quiz.
00:33:51.109 --> 00:33:59.269
And so like there's a lot of in-jokes for people who've been watching the previous, because I think this is around season five, season six, you know, all that time.
00:33:59.509 --> 00:34:13.110
And then uh there's also like the humor of knowing how these characters will react to each other, to different stimuli, like that you just you know, and that is like that's hard to do.
00:34:13.269 --> 00:34:15.349
Like that that kind of humor is hard to write.
00:34:15.510 --> 00:34:25.349
But then that's part of what is so delightful about like Duckamuk, for example, because we know Daffy, we know what's gonna annoy him.
00:34:25.510 --> 00:34:35.510
And so we are enjoying ourselves watching him be annoyed, in part because we know he's gonna lose it when he has to hold up the ceiling with a stick.
00:34:35.830 --> 00:34:59.510
Like that's part of, I think, what's gives this such staying power, is that even though these characters do evolve, even though Chuck Jones's artwork and writing changed over time, there is still this sense of knowledge of a character that not only the creator has, but the audience shares and the humor can come from, like, oh, this is gonna be good.
00:34:59.670 --> 00:35:02.710
You know, that's it's sort of it's akin to dramatic irony.
00:35:02.870 --> 00:35:08.150
The breaking of the fourth wall, fleabag is famous for that, where she talks directly to the viewer.
00:35:08.550 --> 00:35:12.470
Duckama breaks the fourth wall in a different sort of way, right?
00:35:12.710 --> 00:35:14.789
Because Daffy's not talking to us.
00:35:14.950 --> 00:35:16.150
He's talking to the animator.
00:35:16.310 --> 00:35:25.430
And I think that's also sort of an interesting twist and part of if if humor is, and I believe it is, setting expectations and then subverting them.
00:35:25.590 --> 00:35:33.910
Even the sort of breaking of the fourth wall, which is already subverting an expectation, but then have it be talking to the animator rather than to the audience.
00:35:34.070 --> 00:35:40.630
I think that's also part of what I found so delightful when I was 10 that remains really interesting to me.
00:35:40.710 --> 00:35:44.870
And the Looney Tunes break the fourth wall semi-regularly.
00:35:45.030 --> 00:35:48.870
As you remember, as you noted, it it stays in your head, the people.
00:35:49.750 --> 00:35:59.430
That episode, Hair Raising Hair, the earliest, broke the fourth wall twice, actually, because there's one point where Bugs is freaking out and he says, Is there a doctor in the house?
00:35:59.590 --> 00:36:10.470
And then some like a silhouette stands up and says, I'm a doctor, which if we had been watching in a theater rather than on my computer screen, wouldn't have fooled anybody.
00:36:10.630 --> 00:36:13.990
But it the illusion would have made more sense, I guess.
00:36:14.070 --> 00:36:18.630
It would have been coherent with your experience of sitting in a theater to have the silhouette stand up.
00:36:18.789 --> 00:36:21.830
And then he breaks the fourth wall, he just subverted expectations.
00:36:21.990 --> 00:36:25.350
And then when the guy says, I'm a doctor, he says, What's up, doc?
00:36:25.990 --> 00:36:28.310
So then they subvert our expectations again.
00:36:28.550 --> 00:36:43.510
I think it's really interesting that this cartoon property that were made just to amuse, relatively throwaway, used that particular device regularly and did so in a way, like not like Fleabag, which is also delightful.
00:36:43.670 --> 00:36:44.230
I really love it.
00:36:44.310 --> 00:36:45.430
I really love Fleabag.
00:36:45.510 --> 00:36:53.750
She's talking to me, and part of it, there's a dramatic irony because she's talking to me, and the other characters don't know who I am, that I'm here, because only she breaks the fourth wall.
00:36:53.990 --> 00:36:55.990
Until the hot priest asks her, Where did you go?
00:36:56.310 --> 00:36:56.870
What's she looking at?
00:36:56.950 --> 00:36:57.110
Yeah.
00:36:57.190 --> 00:36:57.350
Yeah.
00:36:57.590 --> 00:37:03.190
The Looney Tunes use of breaking the fourth wall is similarly like nuanced.
00:37:03.350 --> 00:37:05.190
It's not just a fourth wall breaking.
00:37:05.269 --> 00:37:12.789
It's fourth wall breaking, and and I think that's it's interesting to me to sort of think about the way that these things show up and play out.
00:37:13.030 --> 00:37:16.390
It strikes me how influential this is as well.
00:37:16.630 --> 00:37:19.430
Because we both loved Bloom County when we were kids.
00:37:19.670 --> 00:37:34.630
And there were multiple storylines where the characters, like there's one where they go on strike because the comics pages are gonna get smaller, and so they're striking for better uh working conditions.
00:37:35.030 --> 00:37:38.390
And oh my god, I loved that so much.
00:37:39.350 --> 00:37:44.150
The idea that like these are actors in a comic strip.
00:37:44.230 --> 00:37:48.470
And I have no doubt that Burke Brethid grew up watching Looney Tunes.
00:37:48.550 --> 00:37:55.110
And I mean, this idea that the characters are actors who framed Roger Rabbit, you know, like that sort of conceit.
00:37:55.269 --> 00:37:57.670
These drawn characters are actors.
00:37:57.910 --> 00:38:02.789
Even we just recently did an episode about Monsters Inc., and I talked about the outtakes.
00:38:02.950 --> 00:38:09.269
I'm putting quotes around that word that the animators did, as if the characters were actors on a soundstage somewhere.
00:38:09.510 --> 00:38:15.190
Talking about influences too, I want to name Steven Hillenberg, who created Spongebob.
00:38:15.430 --> 00:38:16.630
There's, I love Spongebob.
00:38:16.870 --> 00:38:19.269
We did an episode about Spongebob, I'll make sure I link to it.
00:38:19.430 --> 00:38:29.430
But when I look at the backgrounds that Chuck Jones uses, they're they're sort of stylized and abstracted in the ways the bikini bottom often is.
00:38:29.590 --> 00:38:36.710
And even the ways that like some of the funniest moments for me in Spongebob are when Spongebob goes, Be cool, Patrick, be cool.
00:38:36.789 --> 00:38:47.590
And then it cuts to a live action like yellow sponge and pink starfish quickly that they're like pretending to just and they're they're hiding, like a yellow kitchen sponge.
00:38:47.750 --> 00:39:00.789
And that kind of subversion of expectation, I think, also is directly influenced by the Chuck Jones' style of comedy that used the medium to its fullest.
00:39:00.870 --> 00:39:03.110
Because you can do anything with animation.
00:39:03.269 --> 00:39:04.150
You can do anything.
00:39:04.310 --> 00:39:05.590
That's part of its power.
00:39:05.750 --> 00:39:09.750
And I think that two-part gag, acknowledging the medium or playing with it.
00:39:09.990 --> 00:39:14.870
Hillenberg, I think it's clear to me that Hillenberg was very influenced by Jones.
00:39:15.030 --> 00:39:21.430
I think it's safe to say that all contemporary animators working in the Western culture were influenced.
00:39:21.590 --> 00:39:23.990
But sometimes it's you can see a direct line.
00:39:24.150 --> 00:39:29.030
And I would say the backgrounds and some of the way the gags were in Spongebob are that way.
00:39:29.350 --> 00:39:37.670
Something that just struck me when you were talking about that is it feels like Chuck Jones refused to have two-dimensional humor.
00:39:37.830 --> 00:39:40.390
Like he was looking at the humor in three dimensions.
00:39:40.630 --> 00:39:50.710
Whereas I think someone who wasn't as talented as he was would have kept the the jokes flat instead of looking in three dimensions.
00:39:50.789 --> 00:39:57.830
And because so much humor opens up itself to you when you start thinking in coming at it from different directions.
00:39:57.990 --> 00:40:00.230
Um, you don't have to just go back and forth.
00:40:00.470 --> 00:40:02.390
You can go up and down too.
00:40:02.630 --> 00:40:04.710
And that to me is just brilliant.
00:40:04.950 --> 00:40:05.830
I think that's right.
00:40:05.910 --> 00:40:10.550
And I think I would suggest too that third dimension, there's more than three.
00:40:10.710 --> 00:40:17.430
Because sometimes the third dimension is sort of literal as in coming off the screen, but sometimes it's through the music.
00:40:17.670 --> 00:40:31.269
The episode that I'll have to look up what it's called, but there's one where the characters are the musical notes on the page and they move around and they end up in a drinking song, you know, no dialogue at all.
00:40:31.510 --> 00:40:41.350
And the music is the characters because the orchestra's playing the sheet music, but each of the notes is its own little anthropomorphized being.
00:40:41.510 --> 00:40:47.110
When I saw the live show, they did this short and it is delightful.
00:40:47.269 --> 00:41:00.150
And it's exactly kind the kind of three-dimensional thinking that you're talking about, except that the third dimension is the music, I think, or the way that music is annotated.
00:41:00.310 --> 00:41:01.910
And it's really delightful.
00:41:02.070 --> 00:41:05.830
I I'll send it to you, Emily, and I'll link to it in the show notes if folks want to check it out.
00:41:05.910 --> 00:41:07.190
It's just just really, really fun.
00:41:07.430 --> 00:41:07.750
All right.
00:41:07.910 --> 00:41:12.150
We were a little all over the place today, but I'll see if I can reflect back.
00:41:12.390 --> 00:41:20.310
We started with a relatively narrow focus of these five specific episodes from 1946 to 1963.
00:41:20.550 --> 00:41:24.390
We opened up a little bit as things became relevant.
00:41:24.630 --> 00:41:34.150
We talked about how these came to be and the fact that the major studios, including Warner Brothers, had orchestras on retainer.
00:41:34.550 --> 00:41:49.830
And you brought in, you contrasted that with today, where Coyote versus Acme sat on a shelf for four years because of bottom line concerns rather than about the power of the art.
00:41:49.990 --> 00:42:02.470
And there's a tension there, even from the 40s, 50s, 60s, where the studios were churning these things out, these cartoons and the movies too, but they're just churning them out.
00:42:02.550 --> 00:42:08.630
Like, who knows if the heads of Warner Brothers were even watching these shorts before they were released.
00:42:08.789 --> 00:42:10.789
They just were a commodity.
00:42:11.269 --> 00:42:16.630
And the people actually making them, Chuck Jones and his animators and his writers and the orchestra.
00:42:16.870 --> 00:42:17.750
And all blank.
00:42:18.230 --> 00:42:19.830
They took their craft seriously, though.
00:42:19.910 --> 00:42:21.350
And presumably not themselves.
00:42:21.510 --> 00:42:21.830
I don't know.
00:42:21.990 --> 00:42:25.110
We talked very briefly, talked a bit about gender.
00:42:25.510 --> 00:42:30.550
There are very, very few female characters, and about sex and sexuality.
00:42:30.630 --> 00:42:48.789
And you brought in the fact that consistent with the time, there was this sense that male sexual urges like could not be contained and the shenanigans were beautiful and were natural and normal and funny when women had to run from them versus women having sexual urges they could control.
00:42:48.870 --> 00:42:49.750
That was funny enough.
00:42:49.910 --> 00:42:53.350
We don't really need too many shenanigans, we just have that happen.
00:42:53.590 --> 00:42:57.350
And both of those extremes don't feel too good today.
00:42:57.510 --> 00:42:59.269
They were a product of their times.
00:42:59.430 --> 00:43:05.830
We talked around Chuck Jones referred to himself and other people referred to him as disciplined, and that showed up in multiple ways.
00:43:05.990 --> 00:43:08.950
We've already talked about the fact that he talked took his craft very seriously.
00:43:09.110 --> 00:43:18.550
It also showed up in the way that he treated his characters and in the way that each short film had a set of rules that were followed.
00:43:18.789 --> 00:43:25.910
Sometimes it was no dialogue, sometimes it was something else, but each of them had rules that it followed.
00:43:26.070 --> 00:44:16.630
We talked about the nature of humor in these and that in addition to the standard two-part gag, which a lot of humor is where expectations are set and then subverted, these particular episodes that I find so delightful, in addition to that, or as a part of that two-part gag, that subversion of expectations, we often had some sort of dramatic irony where the viewer knows something that the characters don't, some sort of breaking of the fourth wall where the characters are talking either to us or to their animator, and some sort of often play with the fact that this is a drawn medium, whether it was in Duckamuk, where we're treating Daffy as if he's an actor on an animated set, or if it's in Hair Raising Hair, where Bugs, you know, breaks the fourth wall, acknowledging that this is being shown in a theater, or it was at the time.
00:44:16.789 --> 00:44:18.150
I talked a bit about the music.
00:44:18.310 --> 00:44:22.789
And because these orchestras were on staff, the music is really fine.
00:44:22.950 --> 00:44:26.310
I mean, it's it's really good, well done music that.
00:44:26.870 --> 00:44:30.470
Contemporary audiences, or I'll speak only for myself.
00:44:30.630 --> 00:44:39.269
Before I saw the live experience with a live symphony orchestra playing the whole thing, including the credits, I didn't think too much about the music.
00:44:39.430 --> 00:44:43.510
But it is really essential to the viewing of these shorts.
00:44:43.670 --> 00:44:44.950
And that feels important.
00:44:45.110 --> 00:44:49.750
You talked about Chuck Jones thinking in three dimensions rather than just two dimensions.
00:44:49.910 --> 00:44:55.269
One of the third dimensions might be literal to have the characters sort of come off the page.
00:44:55.430 --> 00:44:58.230
It might be the music, as I just named.
00:44:58.390 --> 00:45:03.990
And it also had to do with his commitment to the characters and their integrity.
00:45:04.150 --> 00:45:21.830
And you named that perhaps contemporary sitcom writers could learn from that to sort of hold characters' character in a degree of integrity so that that Overton window of what the audience will accept doesn't need to keep moving toward absurdism.
00:45:21.990 --> 00:45:30.710
Lastly, we talked a bit about Chuck Jones' influence, the Looney Tunes in general, but Chuck Jones in particular influence on so many things.
00:45:30.950 --> 00:45:32.470
You brought in Bloom County.
00:45:32.550 --> 00:45:34.070
I talked about Roger Rabbit.
00:45:34.230 --> 00:45:36.630
I brought in Spongebob and Steven Hillenberg.
00:45:36.950 --> 00:45:52.789
So much humor and storytelling that's happening today, that's been happening since you know Jones was creating these, is influenced by these what were thought of as disposable short films.
00:45:52.950 --> 00:46:00.550
Well, one thing I forgot, you named that running gag across episodes, which is part of the character's integrity, I think, that you found.
00:46:00.630 --> 00:46:07.110
Like you named the specific one of Bugs saying, I must have taken a wrong turn at Albuquerque, but there are lots of others.
00:46:07.269 --> 00:46:25.990
There, you know, there are many, many separate, you know, gags that kind of are through lines through multiple episodes, which adds to the thing that you named about a kind of humor that you particularly like, which is a form of dramatic irony, I would argue, where the viewer understands the character almost better than they do.
00:46:26.150 --> 00:46:30.070
As the scene is being set up, the viewer is kind of like, oh, this is gonna be good.
00:46:30.310 --> 00:46:39.110
And I think those repeated gags are part of the character's integrity, which leads to that kind of humor that you enjoy so well.
00:46:39.350 --> 00:46:40.070
This was really fun.
00:46:40.310 --> 00:46:47.190
I mean, I'll do another one with other cartoons once I maybe, if we ever, you know, run out of things to talk about.
00:46:47.350 --> 00:46:49.269
Because, you know, I it's funny.
00:46:49.350 --> 00:46:56.310
I I was, as I was researching, I found one person who watched the Transylvania 65000 and was like, I don't, it's not funny.
00:46:56.390 --> 00:46:57.110
It's just not funny.
00:46:57.190 --> 00:46:58.150
It's an old rechat.
00:46:58.310 --> 00:46:59.269
And I was like, what?
00:46:59.830 --> 00:47:01.030
Yes, it is.
00:47:01.990 --> 00:47:05.350
I was like offended on Chuck Jones' beach.
00:47:05.590 --> 00:47:08.950
Just reminding me of that episode makes me laugh.
00:47:09.190 --> 00:47:09.910
I know.
00:47:10.150 --> 00:47:11.670
How is that not funny?
00:47:11.910 --> 00:47:12.470
I don't know.
00:47:12.550 --> 00:47:16.150
But this this person like really didn't like it and found it like.
00:47:16.390 --> 00:47:24.950
I wonder though, if that's because of the last thing I said, which is that it's had such an influence that now it seems cliche.
00:47:25.350 --> 00:47:27.110
Cliche, but he did it first.
00:47:27.590 --> 00:47:34.550
You know, it's like when LLMs are like, yup, this piece written by Emily Guy Birken was definitely written by AI.
00:47:34.630 --> 00:47:37.830
And you're like, no, you learn to write from me.
00:47:44.470 --> 00:47:45.110
Oh my goodness.
00:47:46.150 --> 00:47:46.950
What are you bringing me next?
00:47:47.030 --> 00:47:47.990
Oh, what are we doing next week?
00:47:48.070 --> 00:47:48.390
I don't remember.
00:47:48.630 --> 00:47:51.030
Next week, remember, um, we have a special guest.
00:47:51.190 --> 00:47:53.190
Our mom is coming and talking about it.
00:47:53.269 --> 00:47:53.670
That's next week.
00:47:54.070 --> 00:47:54.470
That's next week.
00:47:54.710 --> 00:47:55.030
Next week.
00:47:55.110 --> 00:47:55.269
Yeah.
00:47:55.430 --> 00:47:55.590
All right.
00:47:55.830 --> 00:47:56.230
That's fantastic.
00:47:56.470 --> 00:48:01.030
My mom, Marion Berman, will be talking about her, uh, talking about the the film nine to five.
00:48:01.350 --> 00:48:02.230
With Dolly Parton.
00:48:02.390 --> 00:48:03.269
With Dolly Parton.
00:48:03.350 --> 00:48:04.070
It's gonna be great.
00:48:04.310 --> 00:48:05.190
It is gonna be great.
00:48:05.910 --> 00:48:06.470
See you then.
00:48:06.789 --> 00:48:07.350
See you then.
00:48:08.390 --> 00:48:12.630
This show is a labor of love, but that doesn't make it free to produce.
00:48:12.950 --> 00:48:18.230
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00:48:20.950 --> 00:48:22.230
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00:48:22.710 --> 00:48:25.190
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00:48:25.590 --> 00:48:28.390
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00:48:28.710 --> 00:48:33.670
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00:48:34.310 --> 00:48:36.230
Find full music credits in the show notes.
00:48:36.630 --> 00:48:40.710
Until next time, remember pop culture is still culture.
00:48:41.190 --> 00:48:42.789
And shouldn't you know what's in your head?