Droopy (Droopy, Master Detective)

Created by Tex Avery and Rich Hogan

“Hello, all you happy people.

Created by Tex Avery and Rich Hogan for MGM for cartoon shorts back in the forties, DROOPY was the slow-walking, slow-talking, seemingly indestructible and certainly unflappable bloodhound who somehow always seems to get his man (or woman) (or wolf). Since he first appeared, in the eight-minute short Dumb-Hounded (1943) as a one of the prison bloodhounds assigned to track down an escaped wolf, the monotoned mutt has taken on many roles, playing a cowboy, a butler, a knight, a barista, an heir, a scuba diver, a circus acrobat and even making a a cameo as an elevator operator in 1988’s big screen Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

So it was only a matter of time before he became a private eye. After all, he already had law enforcement experience, having played cops, deputies and even a Mountie in Northwest Hounded Police (1946). But his biggest sustained bout of crimefighting would come in Droopy, Master Detective (1993-94), a Saturday morning cartoon which cast Droopy and his son Dripple as vaguely noirish private detectives.

Or at least what usually passes for vaguely noirish private detectives in cartoons. In most episodes, there are fedoras and trench coats, over-sized magnifying glasses, and suitably shabby offices (heavy on Venetian blinds and old fashioned telephones) where these “private eyes” meet clients, including  various sultry (for kids) femme fatales. The intention is almost always to spoof the genre, though any spoofing is usually limited to the usual visual tropes.

And of course this is Saturday Morning Cartoonland, so everything is flexible and up for grabs, depending on script requirements. Droopy and Dripple might be space detectives rocketing around the cosmos chasing rogue aliens in one episode or referred to as Elliot Droopness and Son in another, while their cases included superhero yarns (trying to bring arch criminal Babyman to justice), westerns (rounding up notorious desperado Butch McWolf in the Old West) and  cock-eyed Sherlockania (Sherlock Droopy, sporting a deerstalker’s hat battling arch-nemesis Professor Wolfiatity in Queen Victoria’s bedroom).

Wolves, of course, are the frequent villains (Tex Avery!), but this being a Hanna-Barbera production, it’s a far cry from the wild surreal and off-kilter antics of the original Avery classics, and was simply mass-produced, rather toothless fodder for non-discerning kids.

Still fun, but oh, what it might have been…

TELEVISION

• DROOPY, MASTER DETECTIVE | Watch it now!
  (1993-94, FOX)
  13 episodes
  26 Droopy, Master Detective shorts
  Based on characters created by Tex Avery and Rich Hogan
  Writers: Jim Ryan, Don Jurwich, Stewart St. John, Arthur Alsberg, Don Nelson, Neal Barbera, Sandy Fries, Jerry Eisenberg, Bruce Morris, Tony Craig
  Directed by Bruce Morris
  A Hanna-Barbera Production
  Starring Don Messickas DROOPY
  and Charlie Adler as DRIPPLE
  Also starring Teresa Ganzel, Frank Welker, William Callaway, Phil Hartman, Dana Hill, Nancy Cartwright, Edie McClurg, Sally Struthers, Rob Paulsen, Arte Johnson, Tony Jay, Jane Wiedlin,  Tim Curry, June Foray, David L. Lander, Dick Gautier, Kath Soucie, Chuck McCann
  Each episode featured two Droopy: Master Detective cartoons and one featuring Screwball Squirrel.
  • SEASON ONE
  • “Droopy’s Deep Sea Mystery” (September 11, 1993)
  • “Droopy and the Case of the Missing Dragon” (September 11, 1993)
  • “The Babyman Bank Heists” (September 18, 1993)
  • “The Deep Space Chase” (September 18, 1993)
  • “Round ‘Em Up Bub” (September 25, 1993)
  • “The Case of the Snooty Star” (September 25, 1993)
  • “The Monster Mob” (October 2, 1993)
  • “Sherlock Droopy” (October 2, 1993)
  • “Queen of the Mutant Weirdo Vampires” (October 9, 1993)
  • “Shadowman and the Blue Pigeon” (October 9, 1993)
  • “Dueling Detectives” (October 16, 1993)
  • “Sherlock Droopy Gets Hounded” (October 16, 1993)
  • “Droopy and the Cyberdolts” (October 23, 1993)
  • “Hey! Where’s Arnold?” (October 23, 1993)
  • “Auntie Snoople” (October 30, 1993)
  • “Mushu McWolf” (October 30, 1993)
  • “Return of the Yorker” (November 6, 1993)
  • “Mighty McWolf” (November 6, 1993)
  • “Sheep Thrills” (November 13, 1993)
  • “The Maltese Fossil” (November 13, 1993)
  • “Deep Swamp Droopy” (November 20, 1993)
  • “Hogs Wild” (November 20, 1993)
  • “The Case of Pierre le Poulet” (November 27, 1993)
  • “Alligator Droopy” (November 27, 1993)
  • “Primeval Prey” (December 4, 1993)
  • “Battle of the Super Squirrels” (December 4, 1993)

FURTHER INVESTIGATION

• “Oh mama, I got dem cosmic anthropomorphic P.I. blues again…”
  Going to the dogs, the cats and worse.
• See Ya in the Funny Pages
  P.I. Spoofs & Callouts in Cartoons and Comic Strips.

Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.