Animaniacs: June 1996
Cover
Drawn by: Allen Helbig
The Warners are standing in front of the trademark James Bond iris image. Dot is dressed as a superspy, in tuxedo and bowtie, but Yakko and Wakko seem to have missed the point: Yakko is wearing a loud pink leisure suit, huge Afro wig, peace sign medallion, and platform shoes, and Wakko has on an orange coat trimmed in yellow fur, a huge lime green hat with an equally huge yellow feather dangling from the back, and platform shoes as tall as Dot's shoulders - on which he's having trouble standing. Dot's comment: "I'm pretty sure the script said super spy not fly.", referring to the Superfly genre of '70s movies.
Credits
Synopsis
The Cold War is ending, thanks to the untiring efforts of folks like superspy James Bomb. He's just foiled another bad guy. He returns to headquarters for his next assignment. Instead of Q, the regular Special Branch equipment master, he gets three new trainees: X, Y, and Z - the Warners (who have to be reminded to use their code names). They are to show Bomb the new gadgets for his next mission. After some confusion over code names, they get down to it, demonstrating several gadgets by using them on Bomb himself.
Bomb objects that none of the special gadgets will help on his mission, which involves crossing into East Berlin. The Warners decide that that needs their personal touch, and so they all head for Germany. Once there, they discover that the border guard is a German version of Ralph, and the Warners realize that this is a problem they've solved many times before.
The first thing they try is simply running through the gate on the pretext of recovering a ball. It almost works, but the guard catches them. Next, they try to drive through as though the gate were a fast-food restaurant, with a little help from Yakko who acts like the manager. The guard figures out the scam just in time. They argue about smuggling Bomb in, but the guard wins the argument when armed reinforcements show up. They finally try baking Bomb into a huge chocolate cake, figuring the guard won't be able to resist. He can't, but he bites Bomb in the process of eating it, and the spy runs away screaming.
The guard decides he'll have to arrest the Warners, but before he can do it, the Kaiser shows up - or, at least, the Warners in the Kaiser's uniform. As the Kaiser, they direct him to stop them from digging under the Berlin Wall, by directing him to dig in several spots along its length. The Wall is deprived of support and collapses. The Warners don't get credit for tearing it down, though...
Did You Notice...
Bomb is drawn to resemble actor Pierce Brosnan, the current James Bond.- The Iron Curtain bad guy is Ernst Stavro Blofeld, head of SPECTRE, complete with cat, from Diamonds Are Forever. A staple of James Bond movies is that the bad guy explains his plan and points out the one thing that can foil it to Bond. Bond movies are also filled with gratuitous shots of beautiful bikini-clad women.
- The bag of money, and box of pennies, refer to the secretary, Mrs. Moneypenny, who has a crush on Bond. There's also a barrel of instant H2O (water) - just add water; a box of disguises for all occasions, full of Groucho Marx glasses; a Dizzy Devil doll; and a self-destructing ham.
- "You're messing up my suspension of disbelilef!": The reader of a comic (or viewer of a cartoon, or a movie, or any entertainment in general) must, to some extent, ignore his natural tendency to not believe that the events being depicted are actually possible. This is referred to as "suspension of disbelief".
- Mata Hari was a female spy in World War I whose fame is probably not justified by her actual exploits. Her real name was Margaretta Gertrud Zelle.
Technical nits
The stereotypical German spiked helmets weren't used after World War I, and the Kaiser was deposed at the end of that conflict as well.
Credits
Synopsis
Slappy has just given Skippy a quarter for collecting nuts from the top of the tree. When he tries to put it in his piggy bank, it explodes from being too full. Slappy decides that this is a good time to introduce him to the wonderful world of banking, so off they go to her bank to open a savings account. While Skippy stands in line to deposit his money, Slappy goes to the vault to admire her collection of rare cartoon memorabilia. She and the bank president open her safe deposit box, and he wanders off in a daze when her booby trap hits him.
Meanwhile, four bank robbers burst in and announce that this is a stick-up. Two of them go to the vault, one goes to ransack the tellers, and the last one (armed with a Limburger cheese) proceeds to rob the customers. The two in the vault find Slappy and demand her valuables. The one robbing the customers takes Skippy's bag of coins, and he responds by threatening them with his aunt - a first for them.
Slappy disables the two in the vault, first by hitting them with a cream pie so old it's turned hard, and then by blowing them up with a couple of handy bombs. She then comes out into the main lobby and, with Skippy's help, knocks out the other two robbers. The police take the bad guys away, but there's one problem left: the Limburger has landed on the bank secretary's head. Slappy tells them to add the cheese to her collection when they get it free.
Did You Notice...
- This is the first Slappy story published in the US edition. Batic's pencil art is exactly on-model, the writing is quite in-character, and the overall effect is very good. Slappy's frequent asides to the audience are even handled very well. I look forward to seeing more.
- The Hogg Bank refers to the Dukes of Hazzard TV series, whose antagonist was named Boss Hogg, and who owned a bank.
- The Brain's duplicate #23, along with the duplicator ray from Brain for Brain, runs through the lobby just as the robbers enter.
- Krazy Kat was one of the first newspaper comics. It managed to run for years on the same plot: Krazy Kat thought she was in love with Ignatz Mouse, who tossed bricks at her head - which just made her more madly in love with him. The series was set in Kokonino Kounty.
- J. Edgar Hoover was, of course, the director of the FBI for many years.
- "Those two imbeciles on MTV" are Beavis and Butthead, who (in early shows) loved to play with fire and burn things, and who were blamed for at least one fatal case of arson by a child.
- The Tooninator refers to the Terminator movies, and Arnold Schwartzenegger played the title role.
Technical nits
- Slappy's house is depicted as closer to a normal house than is seen in the cartoons, which show something that's obviously the inside of a tree.
- Slappy appears to be looking off to one side sometimes when she's commenting to the audience. (pages 23, 25, 30)
- The highlighting around the opening that Slappy appears in to make her comment to the audience at the bottom of page 30 appears to be on the wrong side of the opening.
- Slappy wouldn't pass up her signature "Now that's comedy!" line, given half a chance.
Other items:
There are two one-page fillers in this issue:
- Useless Facts
- Three useless facts about the color blue.
- Take That!
- A tribute to Tex Avery.
Both are drawn by Neal Sternecky.
Jay Maynard, jmaynard@phoenix.net
Last updated 5 May 1996