🍁DUDLEY DO-RIGHT: A Canadian Legend!🍁

What can I say? In the hands of legendary cartoon moguls Jay Ward and Bill Scott, the ridiculous became sublime. Back in the early '60s, the whole family gathered around the TV set (well, those under 25 did - my parents had no idea what any of this meant) to watch Rocky and Bullwinkle, and it's not because we were interested in the goings-on at Frostbite Falls, the adventures of Mr. Peabody or Fractured Fairy Tales. Those innovative animations were but an introduction to the main event: 7 minutes of rapid-fire, clever satire aimed right at the most stereotypical of Canadian images: THE MOUNTIES. 

Most Americans, if they thought about it at all, pictured the RCMP as a horde of red-serge-and-Mountie-hat-wearing anachronisms straight out of a Nelson Eddie-Jeannette McDonald movie of the 1940s. They believed the Mounties' motto was "We always get our man." Where this drivel came from is anybody's guess, but Dudley Do-Right hit all the buttons and summed up, not the ridiculousness of the Mounties, but the idiocy and ignorance of Americans and their narrow and highly-limited view of Canada. Much later there was a lame movie attempt to recreate the madness, but it flopped nearly as badly as George of the Jungle. You simply had to be there, watching Nell endlessly tied to the railroad tracks by Snidely Whiplash, Dudley riding backwards on his horse and, of course, "getting his man" (though the actual motto of the RCMP is Maintains le Droit, meaning uphold the right, as in righteousness). 

Thanks to the internet, none of this ever dies, and I have to admit I find it all hugely enjoyable. I am dredging out stuff I was sure I'd never see again. Meantime, Americans continue to assume the RCMP ride all over town on horseback, wearing their red serge tunics and those damned hats. I don't know how to tell them this, but that's only ever done for the tourists in the famous Musical Ride, an amazing feat of dressage (and I'm not sure it even exists any more, as it would likely just cost too much to  keep all those horses). 

Bullwinkle's Corner - the 1961 commercials

"It's not that I don't trust you, William Tell,
But first I have some Cheerios to sell!"

Some of the best commercials of the era. For certain, the best animated commercials. And for double-sure, the best Cheerios commercials.

Along with The Flintstones and Top Cat, Rocky and Bullwinkle was among that rare cartoon series which was shown in prime time. Along with the continuing adventures of "Moose and Squirrel" in Frostbite Falls, we had Peabody and Sherman, Fractured Fairy Tales and the inimitable Dudley Do-right. Attempts to turn these into live-action movies were a miserable failure. You had to be there. 

Meantime, here's an obvious animation mistake that reveals just how low-budget these things were in the '60s. It was the style then. Characters could appear and disappear, and either nobody noticed, or nobody cared.

Uglify

I feel like crap today - I mean, REALLY like crap, to the point that my hands won't obey me and place multiple mistakes in every word.

There is a reason for this, but I don't want to say it.

What brought all this up was a "hello" from a new Facebook friend. An OK thing, right? He asked how I was doing. I was reminded of the line from Bob Dylan's Desolation Row: "When you asked me how I was doing/Was that some kind of joke ?"

No, he was only messaging me the way anyone would message me now that we have a sort of cheery Rocky-and-Bullwinkle relationship on Facebook.

I was supposed to say, "Oh, fine!", the way you're supposed to, but I felt too drecky to do that. I can't even TYPE this morning without making ludicrous mistakes (nine corrections in the word "can't"). But since he is a brand new 
friend, and just being friendly, I don't feel comfortable even implying how I actually feel.

It's the social media bind.

Really, all you can say is "Hi!', like on Rocky and Bullwinkle. Or you'll get a sympathetic,"Ohhh! What's wrong? Tell me all about it." Just being friendly, or concerned, the way you are supposed to be on social media.

Then you'll be totally stuck. It's not even appropriate to tell him how you feel, because the truth is, you don't know him.

I haven't yet found the expression that will encompass both "Fine!" and "I feel like shit today!' I realize I might even lose a few followers if I say what I really feel. One is a lie, the other leaves you wide open to someone you don't even know.

I have to assume I am not the only person in the social media world who has experienced this bind. If not, well, it's back to the playground , standing in the corner watching everyone else skipping, skipping, skipping. 

I found a big mistake!

We all love Rocky and Bullwinkle, right? No? Okay. That was just a rhetorical question. I have no idea if you like them or not, or even know who they are. But I found something interesting on a YouTube video featuring the running gag which appeared on the show every week: "Hey, Rocky! Watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!" In every case, Bullwinkle the magician pulls the head of a wild animal out of the hat and responds with some quip like, "No doubt about it. I'd better get another hat." (A different wild animal each time.) Then Rocky says, "And now for something we hope you'll really like!" This gif is the full non-audio version of the segment, about ten seconds long.

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But if you keep watching it, it becomes apparent that at about the six-second mark, something very strange happens. Hint: keep your eye on the lower left-hand corner.

One of the main characters. . . disappears. Rocky vanishes. He just isn't there any more.

Slowing this down, it looks even more bizarre. What were the animators thinking? 

Then witness Bullwinkle making his usual smart remark to an empty stage! There's a great big wall of nothing where Rocky should be. He's looking down and talking to nobody.

This is followed by Rocky's cheery announcement, "And now here's something we hope you'll really like!" It's likely this little bit of animation was reused in all these segments to save money.

But notice that it bears little or no resemblance to the original set. The colours are more saturated, the curtains look strange - sort of gathered into folds - and there's a big black "something" above Rocky's head. There was some sort of emblem or crest on the curtains behind Bullwinkle's head that appeared to have a B on it. This, whatever it is, looks nothing like that. It looks like they got some three-year-old to draw their backgrounds for them with a black crayon. This was some sort of cut-rate animation sweat shop. We didn't see just how amateurish and ugly all this was, because we all loved Rocky and Bullwinkle so much.

Well, I did.

Oopsy. I was wrong! This is the Rocky announcement at the end of one of the other magician bits, and it's totally different. The curtains are green, blocky, no gathers, and have some sort of thing on them like an upside-down hot water bottle (if you know what THAT is). But pay attention to Rocky, and you'll see they have repeated the animation from the first one verbatim, except for little details like the tail. In the first one, it looks like an animated slug with no features on it at all. But the second one - pay attention to his feet, how they lurch back and forth in a way that is horribly cheap and unnatural. In fact, I can almost see the bottom line of the curtains showing through his little feet. 

Disney it ain't. Not even Rankin-Bass. And yet, these guys were wildly popular in their day, in the style of early '60s animation. We were much less critical as kids.