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* AttackOfThe50FootWhatever: ''KingSizeCanary''
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* AttackOfThe50FootWhatever: ''KingSizeCanary''''WesternAnimation/KingSizeCanary'' features a giant canary, dog, cat, and mouse (the latter two ending up planet-sized) who have consumed a miracle plant growth formula.
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* Attackofthe50FootWhatever: ''KingSizeCanary''
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* Attackofthe50FootWhatever: AttackOfThe50FootWhatever: ''KingSizeCanary''
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* ILoveToSinga
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* ILoveToSingaWesternAnimation/ILoveToSinga
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* AcceptableTargets: The Mother-In-Law.
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* AcceptableTargets: The Mother-In-Law.ObnoxiousInLaws (invoked and parodied).
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* AcceptableTargets: The Mother-In-Law.
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* NamelessNarrative: Many Tex Avery cartoons feature one-time characters whom Avery never bothered to give a name. This includes many anonymous cats, dogs and mice and even the infamous wolf character who, despite being a recurring character, always remained TheNameless.
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* Chris Columbus Jr.: Mentioned working on the lengty cannon scene, possibly directed it.
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* Chris Columbus Jr.: Mentioned working on the lengty lengthy cannon scene, scene; possibly directed it.
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* Porky's Garden
* I Wanna Be A Sailor
* I Wanna Be A Sailor
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* Porky's Garden
Garden PublicDomain.
* I Wanna Be ASailorSailor PublicDomain.
* I Wanna Be A
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* Hamatuer Night
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* Hamatuer NightNight PublicDomain.
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* A Day At The Zoo
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* A Day At The ZooZoo PublicDomain.
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* The Early Worm Gets the Bird
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* The Early Worm Gets the Bird
Bird PublicDomain.
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* Haunted Mouse
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* Haunted MouseMouse PublicDomain.
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* Hollywood Steps Out
* Porky's Preview
* Porky's Preview
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* Hollywood Steps Out
Out PublicDomain.
* Porky'sPreviewPreview PublicDomain.
* Porky's
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* All This and Rabbit Stew: One of the CensoredEleven, and the only one featuring a major LooneyTunes character (Bugs Bunny)
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* All This and Rabbit Stew: One of the CensoredEleven, and the only one featuring a major LooneyTunes character (Bugs Bunny)Bunny)PublicDomain.
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Tex Avery is widely considered the original cartoon gag-man, famous for [[WildTake wild takes]], BreakingTheFourthWall and [[BornInTheTheatre medium conventions]], and stretching every joke to its [[CrossesTheLineTwice comedic limit]]. Sure, there were gags in cartoons before Tex, if you are particularly tickled by [[LadyPlayYourMandolin a fox]] in BlackFace being [[LiteralAssKicking smacked on the ass by stuff]]; but it was Tex's arrival at [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Warner Bros.]], and his hand-picked staff of animators and directors, that defined what we now call TheGoldenAgeOfAnimation.
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* HelpingGrannyCrossTheStreet: In ''Droopy's Good Deed'', rival Spike tries to thwart Boy Scout Droopy by dressing in old-lady drag, pulling this trope, and kicking Droopy into the path of a trolley. It backfires, of course.
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While Avery's career in theatrical animation began and ended at the WalterLantz studio, it's his six years at Warners and twelve-year tenure with MGM that made him a revered figure to animation buffs. His filmography produced several milestones: Tex directed the first Daffy Duck short, "PorkysDuckHunt" (1937) and the first "true" BugsBunny cartoon "AWildHare" in 1940, creating with them The KarmicTrickster and [[ScrewySquirrel Screwball]] character tropes; his MGM variations of these characters, Droopy and Screwy Squirrel respectively, have had similar longevity, as has the risqué "RedHotRidingHood" series.
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While Avery's career in theatrical animation began and ended at the WalterLantz Creator/WalterLantz studio, it's his six years at Warners and twelve-year tenure with MGM that made him a revered figure to animation buffs. His filmography produced several milestones: Tex directed the first Daffy Duck short, "PorkysDuckHunt" (1937) and the first "true" BugsBunny cartoon "AWildHare" in 1940, creating with them The KarmicTrickster and [[ScrewySquirrel Screwball]] character tropes; his MGM variations of these characters, Droopy and Screwy Squirrel respectively, have had similar longevity, as has the risqué "RedHotRidingHood" series.
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* All This and Rabbit Stew: One of the CensoredEleven.
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* All This and Rabbit Stew: One of the CensoredEleven.CensoredEleven, and the only one featuring a major LooneyTunes character (Bugs Bunny)
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* AbsurdlyLongLimousine: Done in a lot of shorts. Often the gag would be further reinforced with a secretary or switchboard operator at the halfway point of the limousine. Another favorite gag would be the limo bending around corners to conform to the street.
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* AbsurdlyLongLimousine: Done in a lot of shorts. Often the gag would be further reinforced with a secretary or a 1940s female switchboard operator at the halfway point of the limousine. Another favorite gag would be the limo bending around corners to conform to the street.
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* BadHumorTruck: A [[IncrediblyLamePun "Good Rumor"]] ice cream truck, often getting robbed by the BigBad of the short, is a frequent RunningGag.
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* BadHumorTruck: A [[IncrediblyLamePun "Good Rumor"]] ice cream truck, often getting robbed by the BigBad of the short, or blown up is a frequent RunningGag.common running gag.
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* DerangedAnimation: Particularly in the cartoon "The Cat That Hated People."
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* ExecutiveMeddling: Avery left Warner Bros. for MGM after Leon Schlesinger forced him to cut the ending of the Bugs Bunny short "The Heckling Hare," which contained an OverlyLongGag of Bugs Bunny and Willoughby the dog falling off cliffs.
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* ExecutiveMeddling: Avery left Warner Bros. for MGM after Leon Schlesinger forced him to cut the ending of the Bugs Bunny short "The Heckling Hare," which contained an OverlyLongGag of Bugs Bunny and Willoughby the dog falling off cliffs. No one knows exactly why the second fall was cut. Some sources say it was to censor Bugs' line, "Hold on to your hats, folks! Here we go again!", which was, at the time, the punchline to an obscene joke. Others say that Leon Schlesinger did not want audience members to think that they killed off Bugs Bunny.
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After taking a newspaper class, I find photos that are not facing the text off, so I change it . . .
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* AbsurdlyLongLimousine: Done in a lot of shorts. Often the gag would be further reinforced with a secretary or switchboard operator at the halfway point of the limousine.
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* AbsurdlyLongLimousine: Done in a lot of shorts. Often the gag would be further reinforced with a secretary or switchboard operator at the halfway point of the limousine. Another favorite gag would be the limo bending around corners to conform to the street.
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* AbsurdlyLongLimousine: Done in a lot of shorts. Often the gag would be further reinforced with a secretary or switchboard operator at the halfway point of the limousine.
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-- ''TheSimpsons'', "The Day the Violence Died" (1996)
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-- ''TheSimpsons'', ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', "The Day the Violence Died" (1996)
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* Attackofthe50FootWhatever
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* Attackofthe50FootWhateverAttackofthe50FootWhatever: ''KingSizeCanary''
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** "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"
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** "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"go?" (Borrowed from the film version of ''OfMiceAndMen'')
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* ValuesResonance: "TV of Tomorrow" contains much commentary on television that mostly rings true today, such as a family life (literally) based around the TV set, a man keeping his face glued to the screen in the living room as his wife drags his body into the kitchen (only pulling his outstretched head in to eat his dinner), and a lack of variety in programming (then with Westerns as opposed to reality TV of today).
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* ValuesResonance: "TV of Tomorrow" contains much commentary on television that mostly rings true today, such as a family life (literally) based around the TV set, a man keeping his face glued to the screen in the living room as his wife drags his body into the kitchen (only pulling his outstretched head in to eat his dinner), and a lack of variety in programming (then with Westerns as opposed to reality TV of today).
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** The book the old coot is reading in ''Literature/WhoKilledWho'' is titled "Who Killed Who (From the cartoon of the same name)."
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** The book the old coot is reading in ''Literature/WhoKilledWho'' ''WesternAnimation/WhoKilledWho'' is titled "Who Killed Who (From the cartoon of the same name)."
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** The book the old coot is reading in ''WhoKilledWho'' is titled "Who Killed Who (From the cartoon of the same name)."
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** The book the old coot is reading in ''WhoKilledWho'' ''Literature/WhoKilledWho'' is titled "Who Killed Who (From the cartoon of the same name)."
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->'''Bart Simpson''': You invented Itchy? The ''Itchy & Scratchy'' Itchy?\\
'''[[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed Chester Lampwick]]''': Sure. In fact, I invented the whole concept of cartoon violence. Before I came along, all cartoon animals did was play the ukulele. I changed all that.\\
-- ''TheSimpsons'', "The Day the Violence Died" (1996)
Tex Avery is widely considered the original cartoon gag-man, famous for [[WildTake wild takes]], BreakingTheFourthWall and [[BornInTheTheatre medium conventions]], and stretching every joke to its [[CrossesTheLineTwice comedic limit]]. Sure, there were gags in cartoons before Tex, if you are particularly tickled by [[LadyPlayYourMandolin a fox]] in BlackFace being [[LiteralAssKicking smacked on the ass by stuff]]; but it was Tex's arrival at [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Warner Bros.]], and his hand-picked staff of animators and directors, that defined what we now call TheGoldenAgeOfAnimation.
Tex's attitude was that cartoons could and ''should'' do ''anything'': Avery and his crew were among the first in Hollywood to realize cartoons (and movies) were ''just'' old enough to have established expectations in its audience, which could be [[PlayingWithATrope played with, teased out, or simply destroyed]].
For this wiki's purposes, his cartoons are the first of their medium to recognize tropes and gleefully subvert them: radioland had probably beaten him to HappilyEverAfter, but visual tropes like the SpinningPaper, the IdeaBulb, the RebusBubble and ChainedToARailway were still alive and well before Avery's boys at Termite Terrace got their hands on them. "I wanted the audience to know ''I knew'' they were out there," he later said, referring to some of his earliest gags, like animated hairs in the projector or [[BornInTheTheatre silhouetted audience members]] disrupting the action (and occasionally being shot dead).
While Avery's career in theatrical animation began and ended at the WalterLantz studio, it's his six years at Warners and twelve-year tenure with MGM that made him a revered figure to animation buffs. His filmography produced several milestones: Tex directed the first Daffy Duck short, "PorkysDuckHunt" (1937) and the first "true" BugsBunny cartoon "AWildHare" in 1940, creating with them The KarmicTrickster and [[ScrewySquirrel Screwball]] character tropes; his MGM variations of these characters, Droopy and Screwy Squirrel respectively, have had similar longevity, as has the risqué "RedHotRidingHood" series.
Understudy BobClampett in many ways continued his mentor's work (not surprisingly, to a similar undoing). If Tex modernized the cartoon gag, it was Clampett who modernized the old "squash and stretch" animation techniques, shaping and accelerating them to the limits of abstraction. Clampett directed the first Tweety short, "A Tale of Two Kitties" in 1942.
Oh, and did we mention he has [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynTnc7N7DsA his own theme song]]?
See TexAveryMGMCartoons for information on the short subjects he made there.
'''NOT''' to be confused with ''The Wacky World of Tex Avery'', which was a "[[InNameOnly Homage]]" to the original cartoons. [[FanonDiscontinuity And the less said about it, the better]]. [[spoiler:Too late for that; ''TheWackyWorldOfTexAvery'' has already been said!]]
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[[folder: Non-MGM Filmography]]
!1930
* The Singing Sap: An OswaldTheLuckyRabbit short. First cartoon where he is credited as an animator.
!1933
* Confidence: Another Oswald Rabbit short where he is credited as an animator.
!1934
* Chris Columbus Jr.: Mentioned working on the lengty cannon scene, possibly directed it.
!1935
* Towne Hall Follies: Directed it, but was uncredited.
* Quail Hunt: Directed it, but was uncredited.
* Golddiggers of '49. First credited director work.
!1936
* The Blow-Out
* Plane Dippy
* I'd Love to Take Orders From You
* Page Miss Glory
* ILoveToSinga
* Porky the Rain Maker
* The Village Smithy
* Milk and Money
* Don't Look Now
* Porky the Wrestler
!1937
* Picador Porky
* I Only Have Eyes For You
* PorkysDuckHunt
* Uncle Tom's Bungalow: One of the CensoredEleven.
* Ain't We Got Fun
* WesternAnimation/DaffyDuckAndEgghead
* Egghead Rides Again
* A Sunbonnet Blue
* Porky's Garden
* I Wanna Be A Sailor
* The Sneezing Weasel
* Little Red Walking Hood
!1938
* The Penguin Parade
* The Isle of Pingo Pongo: One of the CensoredEleven.
* A Feud There Was
* Johnny Smith and Poker-Huntas
* Daffy Duck in Hollywood
* Cinderella Meets Fella
* Hamatuer Night
* The Mice Will Play
!1939
* A Day At The Zoo
* Thugs with Dirty Mugs
* Believe It Or Else
* Dangerous Dan Mcfoo
* Detouring America
* Land of the Midnight Fun
* Fresh Fish
* Screwball Football
* The Early Worm Gets the Bird
!1940
* Cross Country Detours
* The Bear's Tale
* A Gander at Mother Goose
* Circus Today
* AWildHare
* Ceiling Hero
* Wacky Wild Life
* Of Fox and Hounds
* Holiday Highlights
!1941
* The Crackpot Quail
* Haunted Mouse
* Tortoise Beats Hare
* Hollywood Steps Out
* Porky's Preview
* The Heckling Hare
* Aviation Vacation
* All This and Rabbit Stew: One of the CensoredEleven.
* The Bug Parade
* The Cagey Canary
!1942
* Aloha Hooey
* Crazy Cruise
!1942 (Speaking of Animals series, that he made for Paramount)
* Speaking of Animals Down on the Farm
* Speaking of Animals In A Pet Shop
* Speaking of Animals In The Zoo
!1942-1955: Filmography for these cartoons can be found on TexAveryMGMCartoons page.
!1954
* I'm Cold: Second in the ChillyWilly series of shorts.
!1955
* Crazy Mixed-Up Pup
* The Legend of Rockabye Point. Third Chilly Willy short.
* Sh-H-H-H-H
[[/folder]]
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!!His cartoons provide examples of:
* AccordionMan
* AndCallHimGeorge: The line "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?" is used a lot in "Of Fox and Hounds", "Lonesome Lenny" and various George and Junior cartoons.
* AmusingInjuries
* AnnoyingLaugh: Screwy Squirrel
* AnvilOnHead
* AshFace
* Attackofthe50FootWhatever
* BadHumorTruck: A [[IncrediblyLamePun "Good Rumor"]] ice cream truck, often getting robbed by the BigBad of the short, is a frequent RunningGag.
* BloodlessCarnage
* BornInTheTheatre: Definitely a favorite of Tex's, from characters running off of the film they're printed on, to yelling at members of the movie theater audience, to pulling stray hairs out of the theater projectors, to passing the boundary of the Toon universe where Technicolor ends.\\
\\
Tex virtually created this trope and changed cartoon comedy period in the scene of ''Porky's Duck Hunt'' where Daffy throws Porky's dog onto the ground (when it was supposed to be the dog fetching Daffy), after which Porky takes out a notepad and stammers "Hey! '''''That''''' wasn't in the script!"
* TheBully: Screwy Squirrel
* ButterFace: Several cartoons use this gag.
* CartoonBomb
* TheCatCameBack: Droopy's Stock and Trade.
* CatchPhrase:
** "Silly, isn't it?"
** "You know what? I'm happy!" - Droopy
** "You know what? That makes me mad." - Droopy
** "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"
** "You know, if he does that one more time to me in this picture, I'll kill myself."
* CouldntFindALighter: At the end of "One Droopy Night", Droopy keeps the dragon he defeated to light his cigars.
* CranialEruption
* DerangedAnimation: Particularly in the cartoon "The Cat That Hated People."
* DrippingDisturbance: {{Invoked}} by the rabbit in "Doggone Tired", as one of the tactics to keep the hunting dog awake at night.
* ExecutiveMeddling: Avery left Warner Bros. for MGM after Leon Schlesinger forced him to cut the ending of the Bugs Bunny short "The Heckling Hare," which contained an OverlyLongGag of Bugs Bunny and Willoughby the dog falling off cliffs.
** His shorts suffered less ExecutiveMeddling at MGM; however, he was forced to change a lot of scenes from ''RedHotRidingHood'' as per the Hays Code, who balked at a lot of the gags that were deemed too racy for the general public at the time (The Wolf's sexual reactions to Red were toned down [and one scene of The Wolf having body heat steam escape his collar was considered too risque to be shown in the 1940s] and the end [[spoiler:with the horny grandmother forcing the Wolf into marrying her and the Wolf taking his half-human, half-lupine children to the nightclub to see Red]] were the scenes that gave the censors the most grief and the scenes said to still be around, thanks to a special version that was seen by American soldiers overseas during World War II).
* EyePop: Tex Avery invented this.
* FurIsClothing: Many of his cartoons employ this. One famous example, though it isn't fur, was a cartoon he did at Warner Bros. which was a parody of a nature documentary, in which a lizard shedding its skin gets on its hind legs and does a striptease dance while removing it, [[RotoScope rotoscoped]] off a real stripper.
* GettingCrapPastTheRadar and CensorDecoy: Avery and his animators would occasionally put some risqué jokes in their cartoons. In order to get this stuff passed the censors they combined it with some outrageously risqué stuff that would never get passed. As they expected the outrageously risqué stuff was never used, but some of the milder stuff now DID get greenlighted, simply because it looked more innocent in comparison.
** The little duck in "Lucky Ducky" gets out of his egg shell by performing a parody of a striptease act.
*** The lizard in "Cross Country Detours" also sheds her skin like a stripper. A CensorBox was put in just before things got interesting.
* GravityIsAHarshMistress
* HardHead
* HelloNurse: Another trope Tex Avery helped codify.
* HeroesWantRedheads: Wolves do, too.
* HeWentThatWay: "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"
* HollywoodHealing
* {{Homage}}: The 1997 syndicated show ''The Wacky World of Tex Avery,'' a DIC series which was allegedly patterned after Tex's classic cartoon style. It stars a cowboy [[NamesTheSame named]] "Tex Avery." It wasn't well-received.
* IFellForHours: Tex pulled this off in the BugsBunny short "The Heckling Hare", though the ending he originally wanted to do (having Bugs and his canine foil fall off yet another cliff) was cut short, prompting him to leave Warner Bros. for MGM.
* IKissYourHand: Almost always led up to some sort of gag.
* InteractiveNarrator: "Red Hot Riding Hood" begins this way, with the Wolf, Red Riding Hood and Granny complaining about doing the same story the same way every time. Tex created this trope in the 1937 WB cartoon ''The Village Smithy,'' and conversely, the character talking back at the narrator.
--->'''Blacksmith:''' Listen, chief! Take it easy. We got plenty o' time...this cartoon ain't half over yet!
* IronButtmonkey: Most of the antagonists.
* KarmicTrickster: A core trope for Bugs Bunny, the most famous example.
* LandInTheSaddle: One cartoon has a cowboy try to jump onto his horse repeatedly, only to miss every time. Eventually he moves the horse to the place where he keeps landing and tries again, only to land where the horse originally was.
* LiteralAssKicking
--> '''George''': "Junior...bend over."
* LongNeck: Certain characters have an expandable neck.
* LoveCanMakeYouGonk: Men would often bug out and even literally turn into wolves at the sight of an attractive woman.
* LoveMakesYouCrazy: In one short even ''Droopy'', who generally is '''not''' known to do this sort of thing, begins whistling, slamming his head against the table and taking bites out of a nearby wooden post after receiving a kiss from Red.
* MediumAwareness: Many times the cartoons characters in Avery's shorts knew they were in a cartoon. This exchange from "The Early Bird Dood It," as the worm and bird pass by a movie billboard with the lobby card of the very cartoon they're in:
-->'''Bird:''' Hey! I hear that's a pretty funny cartoon.
-->'''Worm:''' Well, I sure hope it's funnier than ''this'' one!
** The book the old coot is reading in ''WhoKilledWho'' is titled "Who Killed Who (From the cartoon of the same name)."
** In "Big Heel-Watha" the title character while walking on his toes says to the audience "Heh heh, in a cartoon you can do anything!"
* MeatOVision
* NoFourthWall: Fourth what? Never heard of it.
* NonFatalExplosions: Which more often than not would result in a [[ValuesDissonance blackface gag]].
* OverlyLongTongue: Several characters whenever they are surprised or excited.
* PantyShot: Red in ''Wild And Wolfy''; the girl flea in ''What Price Fleadom''; the ice skater in ''Land Of The Midnight Fun.''
* PepperSneeze
* PieInTheFace
* PinPullingTeeth
* PowderTrail
* RelaxOVision: Parodied in "Cross Country Detours":
-->'''Narrator:''' Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please. The next scene is quite gruesome, so for the benefit of the children in the audience, we'll split the screen -- the left side for grown ups, the right for the children. For the grown ups, a hideous Gila monster. For the children, [[TastesLikeDiabetes a presentation]].
* RoadRunnerVsCoyote
* RunningGag - Some of these cartoons have running gags that result in a surprising twist at the end. A recurring one is a sign that pops up saying, "[Adjective], isn't it?"
* ScoobyDoobyDoors
* SelfDeprecation: Tex had a habit of lampshading his own corny gags as early as his first MGM cartoon, ''Blitz Wolf''.
* ScrewySquirrel: [[TropeNamer duh]].
* {{Sexophone}}: Whenever an attractive woman struts onto the scene. Always the same riff too.
* ShoutOut:
** ''Film/TheMask'' had several direct shout outs to Tex Avery's cartoons, including several [[WildTake Wild Takes]], the main character morphing into a wolf and howling at a female performer, and early in the movie the main character can even be seen watching "Red Hot Riding Hood."
** 1939's WB short ''Thugs With Dirty Mugs'': Eddie G. Robbemsome stops counting his money long enough to do an impersonation of radio personality Fred Allen for us.
* SquashedFlat
* TakeThat:
** In Screwy Squirrel's first cartoon where he beats up a cute little Disney-esque squirrel after asking him what the cartoon the [[TastesLikeDiabetes cute squirrel]] was starring in was going to be about, afterwards [[NoFourthWall breaking the fourth wall]] to say, "You wouldn't have liked the cartoon anyway." One can assume it's a TakeThat at the cutesy cartoons coming out in the 1930's by Disney and at MGM's own ''Happy Harmonies'' series.
*** Then at the end, the cute squirrel comes back, declaring that his cartoon "Would've been cuter!" He gets [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomped]] again by Screwy, his pursuer, [[ItMakesSenseInContext and their doppelgangers]].
** "Blitz Wolf" is one large take that at AdolfHitler.
** Some of the final theatrical shorts also took shots at competing mediums. In one Droopy cartoon, the villainous cattleman can't get any of the other cowboys in town to help him chase Droopy (a rival sheepherder) because they're all at the saloon watching a western on a TV set, causing the villain to curse, "Lousy Television!" Another short ended with the antagonist declaring that if his latest plan to catch Droopy failed, he'd quit the cartoon and "Go on television!".
** Tex would zigzag this, doing a TakeThat to himself in "The Car Of Tomorrow," deliberately putting out an extremely corny visual gag (the "seal-beam headlights" with two seals coming out of the headlight domes) and letting the narrator feel the pain for us--his hand comes in, scribbles the scene out with a pencil and groans "Oh, no!"
* ThatMakesMeFeelAngry: The basis for Droopy's CatchPhrase. ("You know what, I'm happy" delivered in complete deadpan.)
* UnintentionalPeriodPiece: Sometimes you have to know a bit about the 1940s before you can get some of the humor.
* VisualPun: Taken to the extreme in "Symphony in Slang".
* WartimeCartoon: Many of his WWII-era cartoons qualify, "The Blitz Wolf" being the one that dealt with WWII directly.
* WildTake: TropeCodifier
* WolfWhistle: Tex's cartoons are known for this.
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->'''Bart Simpson''': You invented Itchy? The ''Itchy & Scratchy'' Itchy?\\
'''[[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed Chester Lampwick]]''': Sure. In fact, I invented the whole concept of cartoon violence. Before I came along, all cartoon animals did was play the ukulele. I changed all that.\\
-- ''TheSimpsons'', "The Day the Violence Died" (1996)
Tex Avery is widely considered the original cartoon gag-man, famous for [[WildTake wild takes]], BreakingTheFourthWall and [[BornInTheTheatre medium conventions]], and stretching every joke to its [[CrossesTheLineTwice comedic limit]]. Sure, there were gags in cartoons before Tex, if you are particularly tickled by [[LadyPlayYourMandolin a fox]] in BlackFace being [[LiteralAssKicking smacked on the ass by stuff]]; but it was Tex's arrival at [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Warner Bros.]], and his hand-picked staff of animators and directors, that defined what we now call TheGoldenAgeOfAnimation.
Tex's attitude was that cartoons could and ''should'' do ''anything'': Avery and his crew were among the first in Hollywood to realize cartoons (and movies) were ''just'' old enough to have established expectations in its audience, which could be [[PlayingWithATrope played with, teased out, or simply destroyed]].
For this wiki's purposes, his cartoons are the first of their medium to recognize tropes and gleefully subvert them: radioland had probably beaten him to HappilyEverAfter, but visual tropes like the SpinningPaper, the IdeaBulb, the RebusBubble and ChainedToARailway were still alive and well before Avery's boys at Termite Terrace got their hands on them. "I wanted the audience to know ''I knew'' they were out there," he later said, referring to some of his earliest gags, like animated hairs in the projector or [[BornInTheTheatre silhouetted audience members]] disrupting the action (and occasionally being shot dead).
While Avery's career in theatrical animation began and ended at the WalterLantz studio, it's his six years at Warners and twelve-year tenure with MGM that made him a revered figure to animation buffs. His filmography produced several milestones: Tex directed the first Daffy Duck short, "PorkysDuckHunt" (1937) and the first "true" BugsBunny cartoon "AWildHare" in 1940, creating with them The KarmicTrickster and [[ScrewySquirrel Screwball]] character tropes; his MGM variations of these characters, Droopy and Screwy Squirrel respectively, have had similar longevity, as has the risqué "RedHotRidingHood" series.
Understudy BobClampett in many ways continued his mentor's work (not surprisingly, to a similar undoing). If Tex modernized the cartoon gag, it was Clampett who modernized the old "squash and stretch" animation techniques, shaping and accelerating them to the limits of abstraction. Clampett directed the first Tweety short, "A Tale of Two Kitties" in 1942.
Oh, and did we mention he has [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynTnc7N7DsA his own theme song]]?
See TexAveryMGMCartoons for information on the short subjects he made there.
'''NOT''' to be confused with ''The Wacky World of Tex Avery'', which was a "[[InNameOnly Homage]]" to the original cartoons. [[FanonDiscontinuity And the less said about it, the better]]. [[spoiler:Too late for that; ''TheWackyWorldOfTexAvery'' has already been said!]]
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[[folder: Non-MGM Filmography]]
!1930
* The Singing Sap: An OswaldTheLuckyRabbit short. First cartoon where he is credited as an animator.
!1933
* Confidence: Another Oswald Rabbit short where he is credited as an animator.
!1934
* Chris Columbus Jr.: Mentioned working on the lengty cannon scene, possibly directed it.
!1935
* Towne Hall Follies: Directed it, but was uncredited.
* Quail Hunt: Directed it, but was uncredited.
* Golddiggers of '49. First credited director work.
!1936
* The Blow-Out
* Plane Dippy
* I'd Love to Take Orders From You
* Page Miss Glory
* ILoveToSinga
* Porky the Rain Maker
* The Village Smithy
* Milk and Money
* Don't Look Now
* Porky the Wrestler
!1937
* Picador Porky
* I Only Have Eyes For You
* PorkysDuckHunt
* Uncle Tom's Bungalow: One of the CensoredEleven.
* Ain't We Got Fun
* WesternAnimation/DaffyDuckAndEgghead
* Egghead Rides Again
* A Sunbonnet Blue
* Porky's Garden
* I Wanna Be A Sailor
* The Sneezing Weasel
* Little Red Walking Hood
!1938
* The Penguin Parade
* The Isle of Pingo Pongo: One of the CensoredEleven.
* A Feud There Was
* Johnny Smith and Poker-Huntas
* Daffy Duck in Hollywood
* Cinderella Meets Fella
* Hamatuer Night
* The Mice Will Play
!1939
* A Day At The Zoo
* Thugs with Dirty Mugs
* Believe It Or Else
* Dangerous Dan Mcfoo
* Detouring America
* Land of the Midnight Fun
* Fresh Fish
* Screwball Football
* The Early Worm Gets the Bird
!1940
* Cross Country Detours
* The Bear's Tale
* A Gander at Mother Goose
* Circus Today
* AWildHare
* Ceiling Hero
* Wacky Wild Life
* Of Fox and Hounds
* Holiday Highlights
!1941
* The Crackpot Quail
* Haunted Mouse
* Tortoise Beats Hare
* Hollywood Steps Out
* Porky's Preview
* The Heckling Hare
* Aviation Vacation
* All This and Rabbit Stew: One of the CensoredEleven.
* The Bug Parade
* The Cagey Canary
!1942
* Aloha Hooey
* Crazy Cruise
!1942 (Speaking of Animals series, that he made for Paramount)
* Speaking of Animals Down on the Farm
* Speaking of Animals In A Pet Shop
* Speaking of Animals In The Zoo
!1942-1955: Filmography for these cartoons can be found on TexAveryMGMCartoons page.
!1954
* I'm Cold: Second in the ChillyWilly series of shorts.
!1955
* Crazy Mixed-Up Pup
* The Legend of Rockabye Point. Third Chilly Willy short.
* Sh-H-H-H-H
[[/folder]]
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!!His cartoons provide examples of:
* AccordionMan
* AndCallHimGeorge: The line "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?" is used a lot in "Of Fox and Hounds", "Lonesome Lenny" and various George and Junior cartoons.
* AmusingInjuries
* AnnoyingLaugh: Screwy Squirrel
* AnvilOnHead
* AshFace
* Attackofthe50FootWhatever
* BadHumorTruck: A [[IncrediblyLamePun "Good Rumor"]] ice cream truck, often getting robbed by the BigBad of the short, is a frequent RunningGag.
* BloodlessCarnage
* BornInTheTheatre: Definitely a favorite of Tex's, from characters running off of the film they're printed on, to yelling at members of the movie theater audience, to pulling stray hairs out of the theater projectors, to passing the boundary of the Toon universe where Technicolor ends.\\
\\
Tex virtually created this trope and changed cartoon comedy period in the scene of ''Porky's Duck Hunt'' where Daffy throws Porky's dog onto the ground (when it was supposed to be the dog fetching Daffy), after which Porky takes out a notepad and stammers "Hey! '''''That''''' wasn't in the script!"
* TheBully: Screwy Squirrel
* ButterFace: Several cartoons use this gag.
* CartoonBomb
* TheCatCameBack: Droopy's Stock and Trade.
* CatchPhrase:
** "Silly, isn't it?"
** "You know what? I'm happy!" - Droopy
** "You know what? That makes me mad." - Droopy
** "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"
** "You know, if he does that one more time to me in this picture, I'll kill myself."
* CouldntFindALighter: At the end of "One Droopy Night", Droopy keeps the dragon he defeated to light his cigars.
* CranialEruption
* DerangedAnimation: Particularly in the cartoon "The Cat That Hated People."
* DrippingDisturbance: {{Invoked}} by the rabbit in "Doggone Tired", as one of the tactics to keep the hunting dog awake at night.
* ExecutiveMeddling: Avery left Warner Bros. for MGM after Leon Schlesinger forced him to cut the ending of the Bugs Bunny short "The Heckling Hare," which contained an OverlyLongGag of Bugs Bunny and Willoughby the dog falling off cliffs.
** His shorts suffered less ExecutiveMeddling at MGM; however, he was forced to change a lot of scenes from ''RedHotRidingHood'' as per the Hays Code, who balked at a lot of the gags that were deemed too racy for the general public at the time (The Wolf's sexual reactions to Red were toned down [and one scene of The Wolf having body heat steam escape his collar was considered too risque to be shown in the 1940s] and the end [[spoiler:with the horny grandmother forcing the Wolf into marrying her and the Wolf taking his half-human, half-lupine children to the nightclub to see Red]] were the scenes that gave the censors the most grief and the scenes said to still be around, thanks to a special version that was seen by American soldiers overseas during World War II).
* EyePop: Tex Avery invented this.
* FurIsClothing: Many of his cartoons employ this. One famous example, though it isn't fur, was a cartoon he did at Warner Bros. which was a parody of a nature documentary, in which a lizard shedding its skin gets on its hind legs and does a striptease dance while removing it, [[RotoScope rotoscoped]] off a real stripper.
* GettingCrapPastTheRadar and CensorDecoy: Avery and his animators would occasionally put some risqué jokes in their cartoons. In order to get this stuff passed the censors they combined it with some outrageously risqué stuff that would never get passed. As they expected the outrageously risqué stuff was never used, but some of the milder stuff now DID get greenlighted, simply because it looked more innocent in comparison.
** The little duck in "Lucky Ducky" gets out of his egg shell by performing a parody of a striptease act.
*** The lizard in "Cross Country Detours" also sheds her skin like a stripper. A CensorBox was put in just before things got interesting.
* GravityIsAHarshMistress
* HardHead
* HelloNurse: Another trope Tex Avery helped codify.
* HeroesWantRedheads: Wolves do, too.
* HeWentThatWay: "Which way did he go, George? Which way did he go?"
* HollywoodHealing
* {{Homage}}: The 1997 syndicated show ''The Wacky World of Tex Avery,'' a DIC series which was allegedly patterned after Tex's classic cartoon style. It stars a cowboy [[NamesTheSame named]] "Tex Avery." It wasn't well-received.
* IFellForHours: Tex pulled this off in the BugsBunny short "The Heckling Hare", though the ending he originally wanted to do (having Bugs and his canine foil fall off yet another cliff) was cut short, prompting him to leave Warner Bros. for MGM.
* IKissYourHand: Almost always led up to some sort of gag.
* InteractiveNarrator: "Red Hot Riding Hood" begins this way, with the Wolf, Red Riding Hood and Granny complaining about doing the same story the same way every time. Tex created this trope in the 1937 WB cartoon ''The Village Smithy,'' and conversely, the character talking back at the narrator.
--->'''Blacksmith:''' Listen, chief! Take it easy. We got plenty o' time...this cartoon ain't half over yet!
* IronButtmonkey: Most of the antagonists.
* KarmicTrickster: A core trope for Bugs Bunny, the most famous example.
* LandInTheSaddle: One cartoon has a cowboy try to jump onto his horse repeatedly, only to miss every time. Eventually he moves the horse to the place where he keeps landing and tries again, only to land where the horse originally was.
* LiteralAssKicking
--> '''George''': "Junior...bend over."
* LongNeck: Certain characters have an expandable neck.
* LoveCanMakeYouGonk: Men would often bug out and even literally turn into wolves at the sight of an attractive woman.
* LoveMakesYouCrazy: In one short even ''Droopy'', who generally is '''not''' known to do this sort of thing, begins whistling, slamming his head against the table and taking bites out of a nearby wooden post after receiving a kiss from Red.
* MediumAwareness: Many times the cartoons characters in Avery's shorts knew they were in a cartoon. This exchange from "The Early Bird Dood It," as the worm and bird pass by a movie billboard with the lobby card of the very cartoon they're in:
-->'''Bird:''' Hey! I hear that's a pretty funny cartoon.
-->'''Worm:''' Well, I sure hope it's funnier than ''this'' one!
** The book the old coot is reading in ''WhoKilledWho'' is titled "Who Killed Who (From the cartoon of the same name)."
** In "Big Heel-Watha" the title character while walking on his toes says to the audience "Heh heh, in a cartoon you can do anything!"
* MeatOVision
* NoFourthWall: Fourth what? Never heard of it.
* NonFatalExplosions: Which more often than not would result in a [[ValuesDissonance blackface gag]].
* OverlyLongTongue: Several characters whenever they are surprised or excited.
* PantyShot: Red in ''Wild And Wolfy''; the girl flea in ''What Price Fleadom''; the ice skater in ''Land Of The Midnight Fun.''
* PepperSneeze
* PieInTheFace
* PinPullingTeeth
* PowderTrail
* RelaxOVision: Parodied in "Cross Country Detours":
-->'''Narrator:''' Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please. The next scene is quite gruesome, so for the benefit of the children in the audience, we'll split the screen -- the left side for grown ups, the right for the children. For the grown ups, a hideous Gila monster. For the children, [[TastesLikeDiabetes a presentation]].
* RoadRunnerVsCoyote
* RunningGag - Some of these cartoons have running gags that result in a surprising twist at the end. A recurring one is a sign that pops up saying, "[Adjective], isn't it?"
* ScoobyDoobyDoors
* SelfDeprecation: Tex had a habit of lampshading his own corny gags as early as his first MGM cartoon, ''Blitz Wolf''.
* ScrewySquirrel: [[TropeNamer duh]].
* {{Sexophone}}: Whenever an attractive woman struts onto the scene. Always the same riff too.
* ShoutOut:
** ''Film/TheMask'' had several direct shout outs to Tex Avery's cartoons, including several [[WildTake Wild Takes]], the main character morphing into a wolf and howling at a female performer, and early in the movie the main character can even be seen watching "Red Hot Riding Hood."
** 1939's WB short ''Thugs With Dirty Mugs'': Eddie G. Robbemsome stops counting his money long enough to do an impersonation of radio personality Fred Allen for us.
* SquashedFlat
* TakeThat:
** In Screwy Squirrel's first cartoon where he beats up a cute little Disney-esque squirrel after asking him what the cartoon the [[TastesLikeDiabetes cute squirrel]] was starring in was going to be about, afterwards [[NoFourthWall breaking the fourth wall]] to say, "You wouldn't have liked the cartoon anyway." One can assume it's a TakeThat at the cutesy cartoons coming out in the 1930's by Disney and at MGM's own ''Happy Harmonies'' series.
*** Then at the end, the cute squirrel comes back, declaring that his cartoon "Would've been cuter!" He gets [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomped]] again by Screwy, his pursuer, [[ItMakesSenseInContext and their doppelgangers]].
** "Blitz Wolf" is one large take that at AdolfHitler.
** Some of the final theatrical shorts also took shots at competing mediums. In one Droopy cartoon, the villainous cattleman can't get any of the other cowboys in town to help him chase Droopy (a rival sheepherder) because they're all at the saloon watching a western on a TV set, causing the villain to curse, "Lousy Television!" Another short ended with the antagonist declaring that if his latest plan to catch Droopy failed, he'd quit the cartoon and "Go on television!".
** Tex would zigzag this, doing a TakeThat to himself in "The Car Of Tomorrow," deliberately putting out an extremely corny visual gag (the "seal-beam headlights" with two seals coming out of the headlight domes) and letting the narrator feel the pain for us--his hand comes in, scribbles the scene out with a pencil and groans "Oh, no!"
* ThatMakesMeFeelAngry: The basis for Droopy's CatchPhrase. ("You know what, I'm happy" delivered in complete deadpan.)
* UnintentionalPeriodPiece: Sometimes you have to know a bit about the 1940s before you can get some of the humor.
* VisualPun: Taken to the extreme in "Symphony in Slang".
* WartimeCartoon: Many of his WWII-era cartoons qualify, "The Blitz Wolf" being the one that dealt with WWII directly.
* WildTake: TropeCodifier
* WolfWhistle: Tex's cartoons are known for this.
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