The Saber and Scroll Journal Volume 8, Number 2, Winter 2019 | Page 91

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about social problems that “drew stories
from the news,” 48 while also attempting
to produce “pictures for the entire family.”
49 Legendary creators, Hugh Harman
and Rudolf Ising, crafted Warner Brothers’
Merrie Melodies, which evolved into
the Looney Tunes we know today. These
animated shorts often parodied real life
problems and are often considered “the
most accurate portraits of an era that the
animated screen has ever produced.” 50
Some of the Roaring ’20s and Depression-era
topics explored include speakeasies
(Goopy Gear), the vaudeville stage
(You Don’t Know What You’re Doin’!),
the college football craze (Freddie the
Freshman), and even Russian mystic
Rasputin (Wake Up the Gypsy in Me). 51
Music was everything in these shorts,
and the jokes and gags were often of the
crude, schoolboy variety.
Legendary Warner Bros. creator,
Tex Avery, often took aim at an existing
film or genre (often Disney-related)
and crafted a parody with gags that
tended to “explode the fundamental
assumptions underlying these genres.” 52
Examples of these include first Cinderella
Meets Fella in 1938 and later Little
Red Riding Hood in 1943. In Cinderella
Meets Fella, the future princess calls
the police because her fairy godmother
is missing. The fairy godmother is then
dropped off in a police van at Cinderella’s
house, visibly drunk. She’s also
witch-like and uses pumpkin from a
cane to create Cinderella’s ride to the
ball. Prince Charming is also a dope. 53
Cinderella Meets Fella is also one
of the earliest cartoon shorts that breaks
a bit of the fourth wall and makes the au-