Maybe it’s just me, but aside from Gossamer, the Three Bears and Hassan, I always thought the “second-line” cartoons sucked.
I especially hated the Dover Boys.
Oh well, guess I’m just a Lonney Tunes starfucker.
The character list is: hummingbird, big tough bulldog, barnyard cat – no names given. And the vocal talent is Mel Blanc. Thanks ‘jayjay.’ I had forgotten how the bulldog involuntarily starts groovin’ to the hummingbird’s song as he is walking along. Priceless.
I’ll go with Gossamer. though I never knew that was his name!
I used to love Granny’s direct way of dealing with misbehaving animals. Pick up the bulldog; whack him until he coughs up the cat he’s swallowed, then pick up the cat; whack him until he coughs up the bird.
But I came in to mention the genie voiced by Jim Backus.
Great stuff. Thanks! High quality vid, and an in-the-wild sighting of Scott’s “Powerhouse” as well.
Ok - that really sounds like it’s a play on the phrase “hammer time” from “U Can’t Touch This”, which of course is nowhere near possible. So was “hammer time” a reference to something else much older? If not, what sense does the title “It’s Hummer Time” make?
BTW, mine is the dodo, from “Porky in Wackyland”.
o/ Hummer Tiiiiiiiiime... and the hover'n is easy. Blossoms pumpin' out nectar all right. Your daddy's green and your momma's a'nestin'... so hum, little hummer, glitt'ry and bright... o/
He wasn’t, until 1980, when Duck Dodgers and the Return of the 24 1/2th Century came out.
Ah, pfft, of course.
The tune the bird is humming at the start is “The Good Ol’ Summertime” and hummingbirds come out in the summertime, I guess.
What?!? No mention of Count Blood Count from Transylvania 6-5000? Or the totally overconfident but horribly confused Henery Hawk?
Pretty much all the rest mentioned so far are ones I enjoy hugely as well.
Probably the Goofy Gophers.
Way before WB cartoons came out on DVD, I started collecting them on VHS, starting with the public domain reels. You know, the ones that were $2.99 in a bin at the drug store. I managed to get quite a few WB cartoons I’d never seen nor heard of. The quality of the dubs is not so great, but there are some gems. They had a couple of cats patterned after Abbott & Costello, which I’d never seen. Somewhere I have the one with the American Indian in his mansion, with the waterfall down the staircase for his canoe…that one’s banned now.
There was at least one cartoon that had mice as shoemakers or something, and the head mouse would give a presentation to the others on how to automate a factory, etc. I haven’t seen this or any others like it since the '60s on TV.
And of course, there’s “Coal Black And De Sebben Dwarfs,” which is a masterpiece.
I think I remember that one…Moe Hican was his name, I believe. At least, that’s what I remember reading on his mailbox. Is that right?
That’s the one!
Good ol’ early morning Nickelodeon. Hell, I watched so many cartoons from the mid '80s to early '90s that I was thrilled when Nick started advertising the end of Bosco reruns. Fucking Bosco.
How about the Sheep Dog and the Wolf that have to clock in every morning to their respective jobs.
I love the way the dog is just about to get destroyed by some contraption when the whistle blows and they clock out and are just two guys heading home for the evening.
I do believe you mean Sam Sheepdog and Ralph Wolf. Yeah, I always enjoyed them.
The amazing thing this thread has made me realize is how many of these odd, offbeat or obscure characters are ones I appreciate and remember after all these years. Yeah, Bugs, Daffy, Porky and the rest of the lead characters are great but this really was a world rich with wonderful 2nd or 3rd tier characters that have stuck with me for alot longer than I would have imagined.
Henery Hawke was my favorite second billing.
*It’s Hummer Time * is a good example. The characters, three of them, don’t even have names. It is quite an obscure short, but even so, the quality is there and the characters have depth and are memorable.
There’s a companion cartoon to* It’s Hummer Time* called Early To Bet, in which The Gambling Bug, in his only appearance, bites the barnyard cat, giving him gambling fever. The cat keeps betting with the bulldog and keeps losing, leading to the punishments.