by Brian Hines

Judging from the merchandise in its retail store, the Warner Brothers Co. has neglected the most brilliant creation in its starry history. I'm talking about one character: Bugs Bunny. Bugs, along with his slapstick antics and rapier-sharp wit, has been the most crucial ingredient in the Warner Brother's recipe for comic success. And how have the executives at Warner Brothers repaid him? By kicking him under the rug with has-beens like the Snorks and Jabberjaw.

The amount of Bugs Bunny merchandise out there is equal to the amount of Q Bert merchandise I've seen in the stores. Don't believe me? Well, fueled by anger, and the hopes of bringing Bugs back to his deserved greatness (not to mention having no girlfriend) I've had time and fire to do some research.

Warner Brothers Merchandise,
Summer 1997 Catalog

Looking through the Warner Bros. summer 1997 catalog, I tallied up what characters got the most items, and I was shocked at the results. The leader of the pack was Tweety Bird with 44 Tweety items. For God's sake, Tweety Bird even beat out the 43 items which features a group of characters on them! What has Tweety Bird done for Warner Bros. and for their cartoons? I'll tell you this, that bird with an over-developed cranium makes me sick! All that bird does is annoy Sylvester, and then hide behind Granny's fat butt. Whoop-dee-doo!

Now Bugs is a real character. He'll annoy his rivals and face the music. Either by faking a death, dressing as a girl, or getting the rival to walk off a cliff. Bugs handles his own problems like a man. THAT'S A ROLE MODEL!

Second place in the item race is the Tazmanian Devil with 33 items. Oh, yeah, this makes a lot of sense. I would love to see more T-shirts and towels devoted to a slobbering, brainless, and frankly, redundant creature. Taz is a fool, people! He's been trying to eat Bugs Bunny for years and all it take to deter his actions is this: get Taz to run into a log, and while he's in there, swivel the end out over a cliff so he runs out and falls into a canyon. Guaranteed to work, folks! And how do they reward Taz' "brilliance"? With tons of merchandise and his own cartoon! The world is ending.

Taking the bronze medal for merchandise is poor Bugs Bunny with a scant 12 items he can call his own. There are 5 items that he shares with Taz, which is like Einstein sharing a shirt with Keanu Reeves.

And to make matters worse, I saw no Elmer Fudd merchandise! Elmer and Bugs are one of the greatest comedy teams since Gracie and George, Abbott and Costello, Siskel and Ebert. To forget about Elmer like he's a slap bracelet is disgusting. I vomit.

Perhaps people underestimate the importance of proper merchandising for our nation's star characters. Well, for those people I pose another question: how often do you buy a T-shirt with a picture of Grover Cleveland on it? Not too often, I assume, and why? Because they don't sell any.

So what is the problem? Is the so-called Gen X crowd not into our beloved Bugs? Does this mean we should discard any evidence of his existence? What are we teaching the children of the world? Maybe we should turn Bugs into an angst-filled, pot-smoking Grateful Dead fan! Perhaps that would satisfy the big wigs who spend their days watching the bottom line! Or maybe we should speed up the process and shoot each of ourselves in the head.

     

Brian Hines is a phrenology major at the University of Connecticut.
In his spare time, he seethes.