Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies Comics #1
Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies Comics #1 marks the first time Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, and Elmer Fudd appeared in comic book form, transplanting four of Warner Bros.' most enduring animated personalities into a new medium just as they were reaching the height of their theatrical popularity. The issue also introduced the original comic-book pairing of Sniffles the Mouse with the human child Mary Jane, a strip that would become a long-running feature of the series. By launching a title that ran for over two decades under Dell and eventually continued through Gold Key and Whitman, this debut effectively created the template for licensed funny-animal comics in the Golden Age and proved the commercial and narrative viability of adapting theatrical cartoon shorts into sequential art storytelling.
In "The Wild Hare," a 1941 Dell comic adventure, Mike and his crew find themselves in a wild predicament after capturing a rare roonga and PP&P, only to deliver them to a king whose throne is threatened by a rogue rock from a prison hut. Chaos erupts when Mike seizes the moment to declare himself ruler, sparking a breakout as Cap and the crew arrive on the scene. With the roonga mysteriously reappearing on their return trail, the chase—and the laughs—continue. Written and illustrated by Win Smith, this early Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies comic features the artist’s distinctive style on every page, with a cover by Win Smith.
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The issue was produced by Western Printing and Lithography and published under the Dell label — the standard arrangement for Dell's licensed titles of this era, where Western handled editorial and production while Dell distributed. The primary creative force was Chase Craig, a former animator at both Warner Bros. (where he worked in the story unit under Tex Avery) and Walter Lantz Productions, who was recruited by Western to write and draw the bulk of the first issue. Craig authored more than half the issue's contents, including the Sniffles and Mary Jane strip, reportedly naming the Mary Jane character after a woman who would later become his wife. The Bugs Bunny story was drawn by Win Smith, a Canadian-American animator who had previously served as the second lead artist on the original Mickey Mouse newspaper comic strip in 1930 — lending the issue a remarkable pedigree of early animation-to-comics talent.
Trivia · 8 facts
- First comic book appearances of Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, and Elmer Fudd, making it the debut issue for the core cast of the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies theatrical shorts in print form.
- Also marks the comic book debut of Sniffles the Mouse alongside the newly created character Mary Jane, and of Pat, Patsy, and Pete.
- The issue's lead Bugs Bunny story, 'The Wild Hare,' was scripted by Chase Craig and adapted from the 1940 Merrie Melodies cartoon 'A Wild Hare' — the same short generally credited as Bugs Bunny's definitive screen debut.
- The 'Porky's Hired Hand' story adapted the 1940 cartoon of the same name and features Freddy Fox as an antagonist attempting to raid Porky's henhouse.
- Primary writer/artist was Chase Craig, a former Warner Bros. and Walter Lantz animator tapped by Western Printing and Lithography to launch the series; the Bugs Bunny story was drawn by Win Smith, notable for having been the second artist on the Mickey Mouse newspaper comic strip in 1930.
- The issue was produced under the Dell/Western Publishing partnership, in which Western handled editorial and production and Dell served as the distributor and publisher of record — the same arrangement behind most major licensed comics of the era.
- The series ran 165 issues under the 'Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies Comics' title before being shortened to simply 'Looney Tunes' in 1955, continuing to issue #246 in 1962, after which Western carried the characters forward under the Gold Key imprint.
- The issue is 68 pages, full color, with a cover price of ten cents, and features Bugs Bunny and Porky Pig on the cover.
Cast · 9 characters
Full credits
Full plot ⚠ may contain spoilers
▸ Reveal full plot — may contain spoilers
Mike captures a roonga and PP&P. He delivers them to the king. The pot is put on to boil. Pete pitches a rock from the portal of the prison hut, beaning the king. Mike stages a coup d'etat, declaring himself king. The gang escapes in the chaos as Cap and the crew arrive. On the trail back, the rare roonga appears!
Plot details indexed by the Grand Comics Database (CC BY-SA).