The Time Bugs Bunny Saved Duck Dodgers. Twice.
Ask any fans of classic Looney Tunes to list their favorite theatrical shorts and it’s nearly guaranteed that Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century (1953, directed by Chuck Jones and written by Michael Maltese) will be included in there somewhere. Animation guru/historian Jerry Beck of CartoonBrew.com gave it the #4 slot in his 1994 book, The 50 Greatest Cartoons, and of course it made the cut again in Beck’s 2010 compilation, The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons. And if that still doesn’t convince you and you’re up to the task, try counting how many times Duck Dodgers is mentioned when Jerry asked for feedback in compiling his “100 Greatest” list. In 1980, Warner Bros produced the first of three sequels, Duck Dodgers and the Return of the 24½th Century (again with Jones directing and Maltese writing). And in 2003, Duck Dodgers deservedly got his own TV series, jointly produced by Warner Bros Animation and Cartoon Network. What many Looney Tunes fans may not know is that there was another sequel