Breaking The Glass Ceiling
God you have to give it to the folks of Termite Terrace who gave us some of the most memorable characters in the history of animation. Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Sylvester Cat, Tweety Bird, Elmer Fudd...I could go on with it if I wanted to. Yet there is something noticeably missing from that list of characters. It seems all the boxes were checked...oh wait that's right, all the names I just named happen to be male. It looks like someone forgot to mark the female box when all was said and done. Oh sure, in the original series of shorts we have had female characters appear on the screen from time to time. But their sole purpose in those shorts was to merely serve as the girlfriend or object to the main character of the story like in "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips" (1944). The hilarious Witch Hazel would have been the exception except for the fact she only starred in four cartoons. Really the only recurring female character in the classic cartoons was Granny; however, you never had a story that revolved around her life as she was a background observer to the antics of Sylvester and Tweety in the shorts she appeared in. The mindset is no surprise given it reflected the times. After all, we are talking about a different time where animation was primarily male dominated with few exceptions like Mary Blair or Retta Scott. It is ironic to think over this given that one of the biggest cartoon characters to hit the screen was a young lady named Betty Boop. But then came Will H. Hays, whose strident code meant female characters were no longer allowed to be as funny as their male counterparts. This perhaps explains why the guys got more stories at the expense of the girls. Still, it is a shame that the animators of the day did not create a female character that could compete on the same level as her peers, for it created the unfortunate impression that one sex was funnier than the other for the generations to come.
I believe the talented crew of the awesome "Tiny Toon Adventures" noticed that trend and wanted to correct it. It must have been difficult from their perspective to find any opening that could creatively improve on a classic series like "Looney Tunes". But here was a missed opportunity by the original crew that the new generation of animators could actually better the classics in. The time had come to have a female character who could hold her own and stand alongside the rest of the gang like one of the guys. But who could it be? Babs Bunny was that rabbit and she was the one who first opened the door for fleshed out female characters in the “Looney Tunes” canon for a variety of reasons. In the classic shorts we were left with undeveloped female characters like Melissa Duck, who was Daffy Duck's rarely seen love interest. A character like her merely served as a damsel in distress for the guys as was the case seen in “The Scarlet Pumpernickel” (1953). By contrast, Babs was written with a fully developed personality that successfully distanced herself from those earlier archetypes. Whereas the earlier archetypes were clue less in their situations Babs was always street smart and on the ball. She did not take garbage from anyone like in the segment “Butt Out" where she kicked out those punks who were smoking in her air space. The story underscored what a bad-ass she could truly be in her own right. Another huge factor was her heart of laughter. Voice actress Tress MacNeille deserves credit for that as she gave Babs such a fun and adventurous spirit. The character had done some of the best celebrity and political impersonations on the entire show. The ones that come to mind include her spot on parodies of reporter Barbara Walters, comedienne Joan Rivers, and even President George H.W. Bush. There were other times where she could channel her sexiness when it came to mocking singers Madonna, Cher, and even Jessica Rabbit. Those racy jokes were all done within the innocence of the show which made the hilarious humor similar to how Bugs Bunny would pull it off in his routines. In the end you could actually say with confidence that she was truly the younger female version of Bugs. Now the writers could have easily fallen into the temptation of writing Babs solely into girly situations and being overly dependent on her costar Buster Bunny for the laughs. However, they wisely made Babs an equal partner to Buster instead of being a sidekick. She could even carry on her own episodes that dealt with big themes regarding life or the art form itself. The story-line “Fields of Honey” is one of the most enduring plots in the series because of Babs’ passionate determination to save a forgotten black & white toon named Honey from certain death by showcasing her work to a new generation of audiences. With stories like that it can be argued that Babs is a much more interesting and engaging character to watch than Buster was on his own stories.
Looking back on the series, you will find that the cast of great characters were inspired in some form by the original “Looney Tunes” gang. In that context, Babs was among the few who were not based on a particular character (aside from Bugs) given the historical fact that there was no female role model for her to look towards as she lamented in "Fields of Honey". This was an acknowledgement by the crew as the issue challenged them to think really hard about what would set her apart from the cast. Perhaps as a result of that test, Babs turned out to be one of the more original creations from the series for all the already stated reasons. She ultimately set a new precedent for how a female toon could be appealing, intelligent, and hilarious within the “Looney Tunes” canon. History has a funny way of repeating itself, sometimes in the most ironic of ways. This route was all the more true with Babs as the years following her run proved she was just too much ahead of her time for studio executives to handle. One must have hoped at the time that her successful appeal would inspire the studio to progress with more characters like herself to lead a new wave of female toons in "Looney Tunes". But alas, Warner Brothers chose to regress back to the blank slate bombshell of yesteryear with Lola Bunny in “Space Jam” (1996) who would be the go to woman for the foreseeable future. Once again female characters were not allowed to be funny on their own terms. How sad it must have been for Babs to realize that the same thing that happened to Honey had fallen upon her. But all was not lost, for that critical misstep only emphasized how great a character Babs truly was. And sometimes when you are ahead of your time it takes some years for the acknowledgement to take root. Look no further than two decades later on "The Looney Tunes Show" when Lola Bunny was reintroduced not as a sex object, but as a fun spirited young woman brought to life by the always hilarious Kristen Wigg. The writers succeeded in the reboot of the character because they were channeling what made Babs such a wonderful character in the first place. It took many years for that message to get through in the "Looney Tunes" canon, but it looks like after all of those cracks the glass ceiling finally broke with Babs laughing her face off as she watched close by.
