The first Road Runner and Coyote cartoon ever made (and their only one made in the 1940s). It's directed by Chuck Jones with a story by Michael Maltese. This team would be responsible for most of the great Road Runner and Coyote shorts. This first one sets the template for the rest of the series. The concept was always the same in that Wile E. Coyote tries various devices and traps to catch the Road Runner but constantly fails, typically in hilarious fashion. Here we have the basics already on display: boomerangs, dynamite, a roadblock, disguises and costumes, rockets and jets, running off a cliff, and classic ACME gadgetry. Chuck Jones would use a variation of every gag in this first short over and over throughout the series. The animation is beautiful with great colors and well-drawn backgrounds. The Road Runner and Coyote look slightly different than they would look later, but that's true of pretty much all the Looney Tunes characters in their first appearances. It's a fun, fast-paced short that begins one of the best and most consistently creative and funny series in the Looney Tunes library. It's one every fan should see at least once. A classic by every definition.
