New "Looney Tunes Cartoons" take away Elmer Fudd's iconic rifle: "We're not doing guns"
Elmer Fudd is still hunting wabbits, just without his signature firearm in the new series "Looney Tunes Cartoons" on the recently-launched streaming platform HBO Max. In fact, the new series won't feature guns at all.
"We're not doing guns," Peter Browngardt, the executive producer and showrunner of the series, told the New York Times in a recent interview. "But we can do cartoony violence — TNT, the Acme stuff. All that was kind of grandfathered in."
Yosemite Sam will also lose his iconic double pistols in the series. Neither Browngardt nor WarnerMedia, HBO Max's parent company, have explicitly stated the reason for the decision to drop guns from the series.
So, while guns may be out, the campy violence fans have grown to love — including dynamite explosions, anvils dropping on characters' heads and complex booby traps — is still part of the new series, according to the Times.
Last summer, Warner Bros. TV released a short on its YouTube channel titled, "Dynamite Dance," which appeared to be from the new series. The cartoon shows Fudd chasing his nemesis Bugs Bunny with a scythe before the rabbit puts a stick of lit dynamite in the hunter's mouth. The 90-second clip features many sticks of dynamite and a plethora of massive explosions as Bugs Bunny blows up Fudd in multiple creative ways, all set to Amilcare Ponchielli's "Dance of the Hours."
While there does appear to be plenty of violence in the new series, some "Looney Tunes" fans were less than pleased with the announcement.
"Elmer fudd without his gun, is like yosemite sam without his moustache," wrote Twitter user @Alien_McQueen on Sunday.
"Give Yosemite Sam and Elmer Fudd their guns back! #justiceforelmer #justiceforyosemite," tweeted user @JwQueck on Monday.
Other fans appeared to support the decision. "I can't believe this needs to be said, but Yosemite Sam and Elmer Fudd were never responsible gun owners anyway," tweeted Dr. Jacqueline Antonovich, a historian and assistant professor at Muhlenberg College.
The new "Looney Tunes Cartoons" series is comprised of 80 episodes, each 11 minutes long, made up of animated shorts that include "adapted storylines for today's audience," according to an April press release from HBO Max.
The streaming platform launched May 27. HBO Max boasts a substantial library of other brand new titles, as well as 10,000 hours of "premium content," according to the press release.
WarnerMedia did not immediately respond to a CBS News request for comment.