Warners Gags Travel East

You know how Wile E. Coyote used to draw a tunnel or a landscape, the Road Runner would zip into the picture as if it were real, but when the coyote did it... well, sure, you’ve seen it countless times.

I’m too lazy to look up when Wile E. did it for the first time, but I know his debut cartoon was in 1949. But three years earlier, the same gag was used in the Terrytoon “The Tortoise Wins Again.”



And you’ll remember the closing gag in Tex Avery’s “Tortoise Beats Hare” (1941). It’s classic Avery; he used it at the end of “The Blitz Wolf” at MGM. Bugs contemplates whether he’s been tricked by the turtle. A gaggle of turtles pop up and chime the Mr. Kitzel catchphrase “Mmmmm...it’s a possibility!” The same thing happens in this cartoon, except the turtles use Kitzel’s other catchphrase “Mmmmmm...could be!”



John Foster received the mandatory story credit.