O Abominável Coelho das Neves

The Abominable Snow Rabbit is one of those Bugs & Daffy travel cartoons, in which the left turn at Albuquerque is always forgotten. This time, they go further than usual, ending up in the Himalayas. Here they inevitably meet the abominable snowman, a successful one-shot for many years until he made a second appearance on Mars - of all places - in Chuck Jones' TV production, Spaced Out Bunny. For such an insufferable analyst as me, I can watch, rewind and watch again my tape of this cartoon just to study how Bugs and Daffy are drawn in Jones' unique style in the 60's and beyond. Daffy is once again the heel of the picture, trying to cook Bugs' goose but repeatedly getting squashed himself. An excellent cartoon for all fans.

One can point to this short as proof that Chuck Jones shorts could succeed without his frequent writing partner Mike Maltese. Here, Tedd Pierce (who at the time was mostly working for Robert McKimson) takes over the reins, and it has a lot of funny dialogue. In particular, he nails Daffy's self-centered personality: "It was me or him, and, obviously, it couldn't be me. It's a simple matter of logic. I'm not like other people. I can't stand pain. It hurts me." Classic!

The animation and music is still full of personality, even though budgets in both departments were slimmer by 1961. The snowman character, a take-off on Lennie from Of Mice and Men, is a fun "antagonist"- I say it in quotes because he's not really a bad guy, he just doesn't know his own strength and is a constant impediment to Bugs and Daffy's vacation.

It definitely holds up; give it a watch, especially if you're convinced Looney Tunes had no bright spots after 1960.

"I told you to turn left at East St. Louis," yells a shivering Daffy Duck to Bugs Bunny after the latter made another wrong turn in another long underground excursion. This time, the two Looney Tunes characters wind up in the Himalayas (a tiny bit off their destination!).

Daffy heads back to Perth Amboy and leaves Bugs to become a "snow shoe bunny." However, our duck hero doesn't go far, running into the "Ambomniable Snow Man," who is anything but scary. He's just a big dumb oaf, modeled after "Lenny" of the novel "Mice and Men." You know that because he calls daffy "George" and the little duck is a rabbit and adopts him as his pet.

The cartoon turns out to be a familiar story in a lot of LTs when Bugs and Daffy are together, meaning each other tries to foist off the other to an unwanted character. Many times it was Elmer Fudd, the hunter; this time, an "abominable snowman."

The best gag, I thought, was the last minute when all of the characters wind up in Hawaii- type island.

In their tradition of coming up with any crazy plot, the Termite Terrace crowd sticks Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck in the Himalayas, where the two characters run into the Abominable Snowman (named Hugo). The big guy immediately tries to adopt Daffy as a pet rabbit, and Bugs helps with this. "The Abominable Snow Rabbit" brings up an interesting point. It seems like for years, our stereotype of the Himalayas was the Yeti - it's anyone's guess as to whether or not such a being really exists. Nowadays, there's of course the issue of the Dalai Lama. I wonder whether or not the cartoon's creators knew about the Dalai Lama.

Oh well. That's just what I notice. The point is, this is a pretty funny cartoon. It's not abominable at all.

In this very funny Looney Tunes episode, Bugs Bunny has taken Daffy Duck somewhere or other and has ended up miles from home in the Himalayas. Bugs Bunny is pretty anxious and Daffy is also very annoyed. Just when things start to become better, a very mad yeti arrives on the scene. He likes bunny rabbits and thinks Daffy is one...

I was surprised this episode was so funny, as usually I do not particularly enjoy episodes where Daffy duck is greedy. However, I very much enjoyed this episode for his and Bugs' brilliant quotes, the mad yeti, the layout of the episode and the turn-out.

One theme about this episode to consider is that here, Bugs Bunny is quite stupid, taking Daffy Duck to a place a thousand miles from Palm Springs (where the pair originally wanted to go). Bugs Bunny is usually thought of as a clever character, although a great deal of the time he can be almost as stupid as Daffy. Hmm...

This is well worth spending seven or so minutes for, recommended to the average Looney Tunes fans and people who like mad yetis.

8 and a half out of ten.