The new Looney Tunes animated series, which is streaming on HBO Max, will not feature any guns, according to showrunner Peter Browngardt. The series premiered to coincide with the launch of the Warner Bros. streaming service, and consists of a number of short (under eight minutes long) episodes in the spirit of the classic Looney Tunes shorts.
The series has been a surprise hit for HBO Max, with reports stating it has been more popular since launch than any other show on the service, including such heavyweights as Game of Thrones, South Park and Friends. The rebooted Looney Tunes series follows all of the classic characters, with Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Elmer Fudd and Yosemite Sam all returning, and features the classic look. The central premise of most of the shorts is the conflict between the two main characters. So for example, Elmer Fudd often coming up short while hunting Bugs Bunny. In the classic cartoons, Fudd would use a gun to hunt Bugs, much like a real hunter would, but that’s no longer the case in the HBO Max reboot.
In the new series, Fudd uses a scythe instead of a gun. When interviewed by The New York Times, Browngardt, the new show’s executive producer and showrunner, confirmed that was a deliberate choice. Browngardt says that they will allow the classic cartoonish violence, such as dynamite sticks being piled on characters and anvils dropping on their heads, as well as cartoon cannons being shot at the unsuspecting characters, but the creators have drawn the line at the use of firearms. That means that not only will Fudd be without his gun, but Yosemite Sam, who is best known for wielding a pair of six shooters, will be without his guns, too. Browngardt’s comments are below.
“We’re not doing guns, but we can do cartoony violence — TNT, the Acme stuff. All that was kind of grandfathered in.”
However, in the same interview, Johnny Ryan, a cartoonist who was hired as the story editor for the show, admits that the show does still run counter to current sensibilities. Ryan, who is best known for more adult comic books, says that while we live in an age of “anti-bullying”, where everyone needs to “get along“, Looney Tunes inherently runs counter to that, calling the series the “antithesis of that. It’s two characters in conflict, sometimes getting pretty violent.”
Neither Ryan not Browngardt explicitly state why guns won’t feature in the new series, but reading between the lines it’s clear that with gun violence increasingly a problem in the United States, they aren’t keen on courting controversy by having guns in a modern kids TV show. While the popularity of the new Looney Tunes proves that the lack of guns isn’t an issue, HBO Max could potentially face backlash from more conservative sections of society. However, it’s doubtful that the streaming service will bow to the pressure. If Looney Tunes is still entertaining, who cares that Fudd and Sam don’t have guns?
