Tag Archives: Comedy

Every Bugs Bunny Ever: Which is Witch (1949)

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Which Is Witch (1949)
Directed by Friz Freleng
Written by Tedd Pierce
Animation by Arthur Davis
Music by Carl Stalling

Like “All This and Rabbit Stew” and “Nips the Nips,” this one is strictly for hardcore Bugs Bunny completists. It’s not that “Which is Witch” is so unabashedly racist and filled with racial stereotypes. It’s that it’s so painfully unfunny. Even at his worst director Friz Freleng can pull out a few chuckles here and there, but “Which is Witch” trades good solid laughs and prime comedy in order to once again punch down and turn a gross racist caricature in for Bugs Bunny to use as a source of utter humiliation. When Cartoon Network was a big name in the animation medium, the network would hold annual weekend long marathons of Bugs Bunny shorts titled “June Bugs.”

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Welcome Back, Kotter: The Complete Series (DVD)

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Now Available from Warner Home Entertainment.

“Welcome Back Kotter” is mainly known as the launch pad for John Travolta’s huge career beginnings, but on its own it’s a solid sitcom. “Welcome Back Kotter” garners a fun premise teeming with so much comedic cache, and it’s remained immortal thanks to John Sebastian’s theme “Welcome Back.” Sebastian who spent most of his career in the band Loving Spoonful delivers on a theme that sets the stage for the series quite well and is definitely catchy enough to where you’ll hum along to it on occasion. Comedian Gabriel Kaplan is a teacher who returns to New York to teach in an inner city school.

He’s an idealist tasked with teaching the special ed class which is taken up by local gang “The Sweathogs.” Kotter, being an ex-“Sweathog,” takes an interest in getting his students in the right track amounting to some hilarity.

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ClearMind (2024)

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Now Streaming on Amazon Prime Video and Tubi TV.

Aw hell, I’m always complaining about wanting to see something new and Rebecca Eskreis’ “ClearMind” is something new. It’s such a mixing of genres that it eventually comes out of the other end as this unusual amalgam that’s hard to peg down. I dare you to peg this in one hole. It’s a dramatic science fiction situation comedy about grief that follows a woman who uses virtual reality to become a slasher. There are shades of horror, and satire about new age medicine and the quackery of nonsense like Goop et al. It’s so far and away amorphous that it’s tough to hate it.

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Inside Out 2 (2024)

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Now Exclusively in Theaters.

2015’s “Inside Out” felt like such a genuine and sincere attempt to figure out not just emotions but the importance that both negative and positive emotions can have. It simplified itself through normal subconscious cues like colors and characters, but through it all “Inside Out” was touching and a complex look at dealing with our feelings and learning to accept them. “Inside Out 2” is a perfectly okay follow up that has a lot to live up to. Its predecessor set the bar high and the sequel never quite hits that bar. “Inside Out 2” is stuck in the middle of trying to figure out what it’s trying to say and hitting that bottom line of introducing new characters for the sake of merchandise sales.

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Every Bugs Bunny Ever: Frigid Hare (1949)

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Frigid Hare (1949)
Directed by Chuck Jones
Written by Michael Maltese
Animation by Phil Monroe
Music by Carl Stalling

I think “Frigid Hare” is the point in Bugs Bunny’s career when he stopped being a mere foil or protagonist and started being something of a hero. When he finally steps up to defend a small penguin named “Playboy,” who–a very small cute penguin… from the wrath of an inuit. That’s the exact time Bugs started becoming something of a hero for the little guy. All of the other scenarios of Bugs giving in to his baser urges to be egomaniacal, or just plain antagonistic are a bar he’s just toppled. With “Frigid Hare” the animators and writers set a high bar with a short where we’d see him defending and fighting for other smaller animals in the near future.

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Bad Boys: Ride or Die (2024)

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Now Exclusively in Theaters.

I’ve had my problems with the “Bad Boys” series in the past, but unlike the “Fast and the Furious” franchise, it’s been one of the most consistent series of action films ever released. The vision for “Bad Boys” has remained very precise and direct without adding too much or taking too much away. The stakes get higher with every film, and through it all we’ve stayed with Marcus and Mike only without adding on so much excess characters like “Lethal Weapon” fell victim to. “Bad Boys” has mainly been a vehicle for Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, sure, but at least it knows what it is and tries to deliver on more complex ideas and bigger stakes.

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Every Bugs Bunny Ever: The Windblown Hare (1949)

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The Windblown Hare (1949)
Directed by Bob McKimson
Written by Warren Foster
Animation by John Carey
Music by Carl Stalling

I am one that was never much of a fan of cartoons like “Rocky and Bullwinkle” or “George of the Jungle.” I always found those series to feel cheap and kind of dull so I was never a fan of their fractured fairy tales. Besides, Warner bros. always set the bar high when it came to taking fairy tales and distorting them for their own twisted purposes. “The Windblown Hare” is a hilarious take on the Three Pigs and Red Riding Hood, the first confrontation with the three pigs for Bugs and his second confrontation of Red Riding Hood’s universe. While not as funny as “Red Riding Rabbit,” this visitation to the latter’s world is small but hysterical as the writers take this whole dynamic and twist it up for some prime comedic material.

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