Bugs
Bunny pimped out
by greedy cartoon execs

By John Breneman

There is a new word for ripping the soul from classic creations
of American contemporary art in exchange for another couple
million bucks. It’s called "re-imagining."

At least that’s what the greedy bottom-liners at Warner Brothers
are calling their insidious plot to give Bugs Bunny (to use
the terminology of the day) an "extreme makeover."

Hapless, heavily armed Elmer Fudd could never kill Bugs.
So now the job falls to the WB gang, convinced they can squeeze
more cash out of the beloved cartoon icon by "re-imagining"
him and his friends as futuristic crimefighters in the year
2772.

Reimagine? Pardon me if I repudiate this repulsive
and reprehensible bit of revisionist animation.

Executives at Warner Brothers — reeling from the fact that
their Saturday-morning Kids WB lineup is getting thrashed
by Nickelodeon, the Cartoon Network and the Disney Channel
— apparently dismissed the challenge of creating something
cool and original and instead hatched a lame plan to recycle
Bugs Bunny in outer space.

Entitled "Loonatics," the new cartoon series takes
the classic "Looney Tunes" characters and retrofits
them with retrorockets to see how they will fare in a zero-gravity,
zero-creativity environment.

Does this mean the new vehicle will flatten old Bugs into
festering carcass of cultural roadkill? No, the animated folk
hero who for decades disarmed adversaries with wit and wise-cracks
will certainly survive this ill-conceived case of identity
theft.

But make no mistake, despite strenuous objections from the
SPCA (the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animated
Animals), the real Bugs Bunny is being harmed in the
making of this sequel.

First of all, he has been skinned and scalped – his familiar
fuzzy gray-and-white pelt replaced with a futuristic black-and-yellow
exoskeleton. His neatly gloved hands now resemble razor-sharp
claws and his mischievous grin has been erased, replaced on
his face with a dark, menacing leer.

So is this the latest sign that the entertainment apocalypse
is upon us? Or just another so-what moment in the decline
of American arts and culture?

Sadly, we are no longer surprised when a TV show we have
come to care about is forced by its creators to "jump
the shark." That’s the term – inspired by the episode
of "Happy Days" when Fonzie did just that in water
skis and a leather jacket – now used to describe the moment
when a show becomes so ludicrous that there is nowhere to
go but down.

Somehow we thought Bugs Bunny might be spared such an indignity,
but now we learn that the proud legacy of one of America’s
greatest cartoon heroes is in danger of being squashed by
a 20-ton space anvil.

Joining Bugs (now called Buzz) for his descent into the black
hole will be Wile E. Coyote (aka Slick), the Road Runner (Roadster),
the Tasmanian Devil (Spaz), Lola Bunny (Lexi) and Daffy Duck
(Duck). We are told that each character possesses a special
crime-fighting power and that the plots are action-oriented
– filled with chases and fights.

Unfortunately, Bugs was more adept at fending off shotgun-toting
hunters than craven cartoon honchos at Warner Brothers, where
the thinking seems to be: If it ain’t broke, distort it into
a barely recognizable shadow of its former self and try to
parlay brand recognition into advertising and merchandising
revenue.

I’m trying hard not to imagine where else all this "re-imagining"
could lead. But the real Bugs Bunny must be spinning in his
hole, haunted by visions of Buzz Bunny action figures and
"Loonatics" DVDs.

We can only hope that Daffy Duck, with his over-the-top lisp,
will sound effeminate enough to irritate the anti-gay cartoon
crusaders who have been persecuting poor SpongeBob SquarePants.
Insufferable succotash.