"The Bugs Bunny & Tweety Show" Ended 5 Years Ago This Week

[musicradio77]

I must forgot to go back to September 2nd that it was 5 years ago this past Friday, ABC went "Th-th-that's all folks!" (in the words of Porky Pig) to the "Bugs Bunny & Tweety Show". :( After nearly 50 years of broadcasting the "Looney Tunes" library on all three networks like ABC, CBS and WB along with a few local channels in the New York area like WNEW-TV, WWOR-TV, and other markets that ran the "Looney Tunes" library. As I said before, WNEW-TV and WWOR-TV both did very well airing the pre-48 "Looney Tunes" during the last 20 years as well as a local Sunday morning show hosted by Mario Cantoine called "Steampipe Alley" until the show gave up since the mid-90's. On the other hand are the networks. ABC ran "The Bugs Bunny Show" as a prime time show back in 1960 and then in 1966, CBS aired "The Road Runner Show" and then "The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour" and finally "The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Show" until CBS ended its relationship with the "Looney Tunes" library. In 1986, ABC went back to air "Looney Tunes" shorts for the "Bugs Bunny & Tweety Show". That show ran for an incredible 13 seasons until the show ended on September 2nd, 2000. Today, the "Looney Tunes" short is still be shown on Boomerang and on the Golden Collection DVD's. I used to like "The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Show" when I was a kid as well as "The Bugs Bunny & Tweety Show" when I was growing up. Throughout the years, the networks like ABC and CBS both had the post-48 "Looney Tunes" as well as local stations and other markets including New York City like WNEW-TV and WWOR-TV had the pre-48 ones as well. I really missed the good old days of classic cartoons on Saturday morning TV. This dates back to "Mighty Mouse Playhouse" 50 years ago where they were showing the classic Terrytoons theatrical shorts for TV before WB airing the theatricals as well as part of the Saturday morning programming from its bygone days. I missed the good ol' days of Saturday morning TV. "Bugs Bunny & Tweety" ended 5 years ago this week. It was the last show that ABC pulled the plug. It was the end of an era. :(

[gilligan fanati]

I can't belive it has been 5 years since it left ABC. I guess that makes it 6 years since LT left Nickelodeon

[Martin Juneau]

I remember again the last time that showing on ABC. Bugs Bunny & Tweety Show also ended last winter from Teletoon (french only). :(

[Miss Marnie]

It [The cancellation of The Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show] was the end of an era. :(

I sort of see that as somewhat of a good thing. You see, I was born in 1985 and didn't start watching Looney Tunes until around 1992-1993 (before then, I was exposed to a lot of shows on CBS and NBC like Pee Wee's Playhouse and that cartoon based on Martin Short's Ed Grimley character from Saturday Night Live and [i]SCTV Network 90 [I'm glad TVLand aired the reruns to it, but they have the DVDs out and I want to see them uncut]).

Now, I liked the cartoons they aired (and I remember which cartoons ABC aired frequently, like Heaven Scent, Hare Trimmed, most of the Tweety cartoons, a boatload of the Wile E. Coyote cartoons, The Rabbit of Seville [which did have a frozen shot of Bugs looking away in disgust to remove the part where he slashes Elmer's face with a razor] and The Rabbit Season/Duck Season cartoons [which were always edited to remove the parts where Elmer shoots Daffy by replacing the scene with a frozen shot of Bugs], but it always irritated me that something was wrong with them. Years later, when I researched this on the Internet, I found the Censored Cartoons Page and found that the cartoons I loved were edited. Every detail about what ABC (and other channels, like CBS, Nickelodeon, WB, FOX, and the Turner-owned networks [TNT, TBS, and Cartoon Network]) cut was there. It was fortunate that I had tapes where the "questionable" content wasn't deleted, but I still felt like I've been lied to all these years.

In short, I'm glad ABC's sorry attempt to cash in on the success of CBS airing Looney Tunes (which were edited also, but not nearly as much as ABC) is dead and buried. May it rot in Hell.

Thank you.:D

[Chow Hound]

In short, I'm glad ABC's sorry attempt to cash in on the success of CBS airing Looney Tunes (which were edited also, but not nearly as much as ABC) is dead and buried. May it rot in Hell.

I'm torn on this issue. I am certain classic cartoons need broad TV exposure to gain new fans and be viable for companies to market on DVD and future formats. On the other hand, showing hacked up versions may turn new viewers off. I really don't know whether edited airings are harmful or helpful to the future of classic animation. The point is moot I guess, since they've largely disappeared from the airwaves in any form.:(

[ottermi619]

Saturday mornings have gone seriously down the hill since the Time Warner conglomerate issued an edict restricting all their classic properties to Cartoon Network, thereby banning permanently the airing of any of their properties by any regular broadcaster.

[ltnut]

At first I thought that Looney Tunes moving exclusively to CN wasn't so bad since I didn't get to see them on ABC very often, because of working on Saturdays like I had brought up in an earlier thread. Along with that I had gotten a new job and married a year later, and I had finally moved to where I could get cable. So getting to see Looney Tunes on CN daily was great. But if I had known that it would be where that they would only be available on Boomerang and occasionally TCM 5 years later, I wouldn't have been so happy.

[mbaker]

It didn't help matters for Cartoon Network owning exclusive rights to the 'Looney Tunes' library. That kinda limited their exposure for future generations to discover. The 'cable boom' of the 90's has killed broadcast TV, and it's ability to offer nitch programing for different demographics.

[ltnut]

Another problem with cable networks getting exclusive rights to programs is that too many times they buy up classic shows and then only show them for a short time and then just sit on them and not show them. Although I like TV Land, they're really bad about that.

[J Lee]

And, of course (and as was mentioned on the board at the time), the indignity about the final WB cartoon aired on ABC, "Guided Muscle" was that -- though some glitch/error at the network's broadcast central -- about 15 seconds in the middle of the cartoon was replaced by a commercial. Kind of an omen of things to come for the Looney Tunes in general, as it turned out...

[corey3rd]

with the boom in sales of TV shows on DVD (they account for 15% of the shelf space yet take up 30% of the sales pie), the lack of TV airplay or the butchering of episodes to fit syndication plays into the distributor's hands. They know the fans will be more willing to pay to see the show of their youth.

And with the price of the shows being rather low (long as they're not HBO productions), they aren't selling to only the hardcore. I wonder how many copies of Gilligan's Island will sell this week by people who feel sad that Bob Denver is dead?

[Chow Hound]

with the boom in sales of TV shows on DVD (they account for 15% of the shelf space yet take up 30% of the sales pie), the lack of TV airplay or the butchering of episodes to fit syndication plays into the distributor's hands. They know the fans will be more willing to pay to see the show of their youth.

Yes, but that only works for one generation. Of the next generation, only those kids whose parents were fans and showed the DVDs to their kids will know of them. Of those, some will simply not enjoy them enough to want to buy them when they grow up, and others won't need to because they will inherit or be given their parents' DVDs. There is a whole group of kids who would like classic cartoons if they were exposed to them, but won't because they had the misfortune of being born to non-animation fans ;). Also, some fans just can't afford to buy a lot of DVDs to show to their kids, so they lose those potential fans too. Eventually the market will spiral down to nothing within a few generations if this is all the exposure they get.