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To Beep or Not to Beep
Tobeepornottobeep
Directed By: Chuck Jones
Maurice Noble
Produced By: David H. DePatie
Released: December 28, 1963
Series: Merrie Melodies
Story: John Dunn
Chuck Jones
Animation: Richard Thompson
Bob Bransford
Tom Ray
Ken Harris
Harry Love (effects)
Layouts: Maurice Noble (uncredited)
Backgrounds: Philip DeGuard
Film Editor: Treg Brown
Voiced By: Mel Blanc
Paul Julian
Music: Bill Lava
Starring: Wile E. Coyote
Road Runner
Preceded By: Transylvania 6-5000
Succeeded By: Dumb Patrol

To Beep or Not to Beep is a 1963 Merrie Melodies cartoon directed by Chuck Jones and starring Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote. It is one of the few Chuck Jones-directed Road Runner cartoons to have a running theme/plot, namely a series of catapult gags.

Plot

When he finds a picture of a baked Road Runner while skimming a book of Western Cookery, Wile E. Coyote licks his chops. He is unaware that the Road Runner has just sneaked up behind him, also licking his chops.  Turning around to determine the source of the noise, he finds himself snout-to-beak with the bird.  One beep sends the coyote jumping into the air, book and all, and into an overhead ledge, with his neck caught inside.

Determined to catch and eat the bird, the coyote tries to snare him in a noose. Instead, he falls backward off a cliff.  A rock fragment also falls off the clip and right on top of him.  He marches off, in accordion form, with his arms dragging on the ground behind him.

During a more-traditional chasing of the Road Runner, a few cactus plants are uprooted and dragged along, toward a bridge. The bridge contracts, with only the last plant failing to clear. A few seconds later, the Coyote runs off the edge of the cliff. The cactus follows and catches him on his rear end, upon which he unleashes an agonized scream right back up to the top (his mouth completely filling the shot).

He tries to leap forward, using a large, coiled spring attached to a boulder. The boulder becomes propelled, dragging Wile E. off a cliff. He manages to hold onto the ledge for his dear life, which causes the boulder to rebound and take the ledge with him. The ledge falls onto another rock, with the Coyote landing on one side and the boulder landing on the other in a teeter-totter fashion. He bounces upward, taking the boulder with him. When the boulder is caught in a narrow gap, the coil spring causes him to snap all the way back up and become suspended in the process. He unstraps himself to take another fall. And lands face first on the ground, with his legs drooping.

The coyote tries a wrecking ball, but it rolls backward toward the control cab. Then, he tries a catapult, whose purpose is to hurl a boulder at the Road Runner. It manages to crush Wile E., no matter where he stands. On his last try, the catapult stalls, and the coyote cautiously creeps out from his manhole to unjam it. He gets tossed through the air, riding the boulder as it goes through a mountaintop before being bounced back, flattening the coyote like a pancake. The catapult was built by the "Road Runner Manufacturing Co."

Used in Compilation Movies

The lasso and catapult gags (though the ending was edited out) that were used in this cartoon were used in the Road Runner compilation of The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie.

Availability

Notes

  • This was the only Chuck Jones Road Runner cartoon not to involve either character taxonomy or any ACME products.
  • This short is entirely comprised of scenes featured in Adventures of the Road-Runner TV pilot (which did feature the taxonomy) with new music by William Lava.
  • Parts of the rope sequence and the catapult sequence were reused in the later "Roadrunner a Go-Go".
  • The boulder that falls on Wile E. appears in the Boulder Museum.
  • Wile E.'s scream from when a cactus falls on him is re-used at the near end of Daffy Duck's Quackbusters when Daffy gets hit by a wrecking ball (and similarly eats the camera).  It can also be heard in "Tugboat Granny", when Sylvester leaps out of the smokestack and back onto the bridge.



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