Beep Beep!

[filkertom]

A new CGI Road Runner cartoon.

(h/t aylinn)

Comments

[realinterrobang.livejournal.com]

The juxtaposition of "CGI" and "Road Runner cartoon" breaks my heart, honestly.

[tcgtrf.livejournal.com]

Convenient, but impossible physics--check.

Lily saying, "Ow, ow, ow, that had to hurt."--check

Roadrunner is still ok at end--check

Acme equipment--check

Lots of rocks falling on Coyote--check

Doesn't matter the tech, Chuck would have liked it.

This makes me want to see the Horny Skunk.

Tom T.

[realinterrobang.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it absolutely matters what technology you use. At least when it comes to the look and feel of animation.

That was definitely diet, caffeine-free Warner Brothers; not bad in a pinch I suppose if you're absolutely desperate, but otherwise, why bother?

Seriously, I will stop loathing computer animation quite as much as I do when computer animators learn how to a) make their worlds look as though there's some goddamn air (would a little Gaussian blur kill them?!), and b) when computer animation stops looking hypernaturally 3D. It is getting better, but it has gone, IMO, from "unwatchably bad" to "merely sucks a lot."

Also, they couldn't just let the characters die with Chuck and Tex? Shades of the infinite dragging-on of Sherlock Holmes...

[tcgtrf.livejournal.com]

There are wonderful computer-generated worlds, but they mostly dwell in computer/video games.

Red Dead Redemption has great distance-blur and thunderstorms I like better than real ones.

Personally, I like new Sherlock and Cthulu stories--Conan Doyle and Lovecraft weren't the best writers in the world, after all. Would you really turn down a Neil Gaiman Holmes mystery?

Tom Trumpinski

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Y'know, the "hypernatural" looks of a lot of 3D CGI is why they keep making cartoons with talking animals....

[gridlore.livejournal.com]

Pepe LePew was the overly romantic skunk.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

I can't say this one does. You get some interesting perspective-y bits, the action is *just* as funny (I had to *seriously* stifle to avoid disturbing my noise-sensitive cube-mate), and the final gag ... well, I've never seen the Fourth Wall ... done... like that before. Yeah, ok. It's not Pens and Inks and One Cel At A Time The Way G-d Intended It Dammit. But hell, even I finally went all-digital a couple weeks ago, retiring my last film camera in favor of a used-but-still-reasonably-hi-zoot DSLR. And for my generation, I'm decidedly Old Skool.

It may not be the *media* of the old stuff, but it still carries the *message*.

Speaking of which... Tom? get it right! Beep Beep is a VW car horn. My old pal the Road Runner, my hero since I can remember watching cartoons, makes an entirely different sound:

MEEP MEEP! PBPBPBPBPBBPBPT! *POW!* (and don't forget the little bassoon bit at the end... (rewatches...) LIKE THEY DID!!! ARGH!)

TANJ.

(Moral of the story: You can muck around with changing media, but you gotta get the little details right, or you're gonna piss off your fans! Tom, you I can forgive - WB? ARGH! They should know better!)

[roman-mclaze.livejournal.com]

I agree with both Tom T and TANJ. This was a Looney Tunes cartoon that happened to use CGI, and which took advantage of some of the fun opportunities that medium allows. Unlike say, Space Jam, nobody was rendered "hip" to appeal to the cool kids. Coyote is still a nigh-invulnerable Fail Machine. RR is still amused by the whole thing. Nobody is returning Physics' calls.

It had the right soul, and thus all is well with mine.

[misterseth.livejournal.com]

As long as they didn't use anything from 'Loonatics Unleashed', I'm happy.

[realinterrobang.livejournal.com]

I disagree; it looked like crap, as all CGI does -- it's all too perfect and shiny and airless and bright. Take away those odd flat deconstructionist backgrounds and you screw it up quite a lot.

[palenoue.livejournal.com]

You sound like the people who insist all science fiction is crap, or all fantasy is crap, or all (insert your personal favorite area of fandom here) is crap. If you don't like it there's no need to insult everybody who does.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

+1. CGI is a tool, it's a medium; it's neither better or worse than any other tool or medium -- it's what you do with it. And in a world with Avatar, Jurassic Park, and the entire studio output of Pixar, I really don't think the "all CGI looks like crap" line works.

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

I'd imagine a lot of people would be pretty astonished about much of a lot of modern films are CGI. Huge vast swathes of the Lord of the Rings movies were filmed in a green box the size of some living rooms, for instance.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Ah, but I read many of the comics in the 60s and 70s, and the Road Runner was clearly named Beep Beep. Can't remember what his family was named. (Yes, he had a family, a wife and three kids who I imagine WB thought would become at least as popular as Huey, Dewey and Louis. Not so much.) However, potato, po-tah-toe.

[banjoplayinnerd.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure two of his kids were named Toot and Auga, because at one time we had a couple of turtles named after them. I thought they were nephews, though; I don't remember the wife or a third kid at all.

[his-spiffyness.livejournal.com]

I've been thinking Warner Brothers needed to do something like this with the Looney Toons. Ever since Ice Age introduced Scrat, it was clear the spirit of Chuck Jones was still alive in animation.

[palenoue.livejournal.com]

There's another one out there, "Fur of Flying."

http://www.vimeo.com/19272529

[r-caton.livejournal.com]

just showed as a black, silent rectangle to me :(

[markbernstein.livejournal.com]

"Fur of Flying" seemed a little off (A cactus to the crotch joke? Really?), but "Coyote Falls" was actually pretty good. I liked the progression.

[siliconshaman.livejournal.com]

Actually, pretty sure they used a similar joke in one the classic ones. [Coyote was being dragged along the ground sitting down, legs out in front of him and ran into a cactus patch. We didn't see him get hit, but the Cactii flew up in the air.]

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

That certainly felt like one of the original ones.

[bayushisan.livejournal.com]

Very good :) It had all the feel of the original toons.

[hms42]

THanks, Tom. I needed that.

[mouser.livejournal.com]

Immediate thoughts were "BLASPHEMY!"

Post-initial watch: It seems kinda off.

Realization: Wait a second. THEY'RE MAKING NEW ROADRUNNER CARTOONS!!!!!!

[capplor.livejournal.com]

There's a reason I don't bungee jump.

[tcgtrf.livejournal.com]

There's a third feature in 3D from the same folks called "Rabid Rider" with Wile E. using an Acme Segway. It was shown as the precursor to "Yogi Bear" and is not yet legitimately available on the 'Net.

Tom T.

[sdelmonte]

The look is pretty good. I am two minds about seeing classic @d drawn animation reborn as CGI. But this at least feels true to the original in look.

The story? Let's be honest. Is there much that can be done with the Coyote that hasn't been done before? What we get is some pretty good gags and a nice end, and some new PoVs, but not much more. But I don't really expect more. Of the old Road Runner shorts, only a few are truly great.

It's worth noting that the writer on this is animation veteran Tom Sheppard, whose credits include Pinky and the Brain and Freakazoid!

[r-caton.livejournal.com]

Loved it. Be wonderful in 3D!

[banjoplayinnerd.livejournal.com]

I was all prepared to be up in arms that Warner Brothers was doing CGI Road Runner cartoons, Chuck would not have approved, blah blah blah . . . and then laughed myself silly, just like I used to when I was five.

As for those who decry CGI, well, there were people who were sure talkies were the work of the Devil too.

[wildcard9.livejournal.com]

So here is my impression after finally seeing this for the first time:

Does Wile E. Coyote look right? YES!
Does the Roadrunner lool right? YES!
Are the situations correct for a Roadrunner cartoon? YES!!

Folks, we have a winner here!! Getting the look of the characters right was VERY important. Just as important was the feel of the cartoon story. Both key elements are there. I don't care that it is not an exact copy of the hand drawn animation I grew up with, I didn't expect it to be. But it was as darned close as it could be, and that is what I cared about.