Dog Pounded is a Looney Tunes

Looney Tunes

Looney Tunes is a Warner Bros. animated cartoon series. It preceded the Merrie Melodies series and was Warner Bros.'s first animated theatrical series. Since its first official release, 1930's Sinkin' in the Bathtub, the series has become a worldwide media franchise, spawning several television...

animated cartoon short starring Tweety

Tweety

Tweety Bird is a fictional Yellow Canary in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of animated cartoons. The name "Tweety" is a play on words, as it originally meant "sweetie", along with "tweet" being a typical English onomatopoeia for the sounds of birds...

 and Sylvester

Sylvester (Looney Tunes)

Sylvester J. Pussycat, Sr., Sylvester the Cat or simply Sylvester, is a fictional character, a three-time Academy Award-winning anthropomorphic Tuxedo cat in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies repertory, often chasing Tweety Bird, Speedy Gonzales, or Hippety Hopper...

. Released January 2, 1954, the cartoon is directed by Friz Freleng

Friz Freleng

Isadore "Friz" Freleng was an animator, cartoonist, director, and producer best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros....

. The voices were performed by Mel Blanc

Mel Blanc

Melvin Jerome "Mel" Blanc was an American voice actor and comedian. Although he began his nearly six-decade-long career performing in radio commercials, Blanc is best remembered for his work with Warner Bros...

. The title is a play on the business dog pound

Animal shelter

An animal shelter is a facility that houses homeless, lost, or abandoned animals; primarily a large variety of dogs and cats.Parrots, for example, are the third most common pet owned by people...

.

Dog Pounded also marks the only use of Pepé Le Pew

Pepé Le Pew

Pepé Le Pew is a fictional character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons, first introduced in 1945. A French skunk that always strolls around in Paris in the springtime, when everyone's thoughts are of "love", Pepé is constantly seeking "l'amour" of his own...

 in a Friz Freleng-directed short (and the second time Pepé Le Pew has appeared in a cartoon that was not directed by Chuck Jones

Chuck Jones

Charles Martin "Chuck" Jones was an American animator, cartoon artist, screenwriter, producer, and director of animated films, most memorably of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts for the Warner Bros. Cartoons studio...

—the first being Arthur Davis's Odor of the Day).

Plot

A destitute, Sylvester through trash in search of food. Nearly out of luck, the cat hears singing coming from atop a tall tree inside an enclosure, looks up and sees Tweety. Sylvester, eager for his supper, rushes inside the enclosure ... unaware that the enclosure is the city dog pound. Sylvester gets attacked by an army of bulldogs, whose purpose in life seemingly is to protect Tweety from predators.

Wanting to get by the dogs, Sylvester employs the following tricks, all of them ending in failure:

• Holding an umbrella for balance, the cat walks across a guide wire connecting a light pole and the tree. The dogs collectively blow a gust of doggie breath at their foe, causing Sylvester to lose his balance and fall into the waiting horde of dogs.
• Digging a tunnel beneath the dog pound, to get at the tree unnoticed and snatch Tweety. The dogs, already having anticipated this latest scheme, have dug their own tunnel and wait for Sylvester to break through to their side.
• A dog suit. The dogs startle their new "companion", causing the head to come loose, and Sylvester quickly tries to secure it before the dogs notice. However, either having already noticed or never being fooled from the start, the dogs reject Sylvester(as a fake dog)and force him to flee. The cat temporarily gets away, but the city dog catcher quickly returns him to his "home" (and a further beating).
• Sylvester tries to climb over the fence, but the fence knocks him to the ground as a dog comes on the outside. The dog goes back in, flipping the fence frame back and revealing Sylvester having been clobbered.
• Mass hypnotism, which momentarily evens the odds; by staring at the dogs, Sylvester is able to freeze and paralyze the dogs in place. Sylvester easily grabs Tweety, who panics and helplessly yells to his protectors to kidnap him. When Sylvester blurts out the secret to un-freezing the dogs (a police whistle), Tweety instantly provides one and begins to blow ... except Sylvester quickly sees that coming and places a glass over Tweety. But Tweety fights back by poking Sylvester's palm with a needle ... and breaking the dogs' out of their trance.
• Entering an empty dog pound, Sylvester tries climbing the tree ... only to discover the dogs waiting on the branches.
• Blasting himself off in a rocket, the rocket shoots without him and he is shown furless.
• A swing, which Sylvester hopes will allow him to swing harmlessly above the dogs to the tree. However, the swing's reach is too low, and the dogs are able to get at Sylvester ... who never returns to the outside.

The final attempt nearly works: Painting a phony skunk stripe down his back to scare the dogs away. This plan proves to work too well: just as he grabs Tweety and makes his getaway, he is intercepted by Pepé Le Pew

Pepé Le Pew

Pepé Le Pew is a fictional character in the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons, first introduced in 1945. A French skunk that always strolls around in Paris in the springtime, when everyone's thoughts are of "love", Pepé is constantly seeking "l'amour" of his own...

who tries to make love to what Pepé believes is female skunk. Tweety looks on and comments that he "always knew that puddy tat was a stinker" as the cartoon fades out a high pitched kissing sound is heard just the "That's all Folks" title card appears.

External links

• Nuance and Suggestion in the Tweety and Sylvester Series - Written by Kevin McCorry