The Blue Racer is a series of 17 theatrical cartoons about a fast blue snake having misadventures or trying to eat a Japanese Beetle.
The studio that animated it is De Patie Freleng Enterprises, except for two done overseas: "Aches and Snakes" at Australia's Filmgraphics studio, and "Little Boa Peep" at Spain's Pegbar Productions.
The Blue Racer provides examples of:
- Accessory-Wearing Cartoon Animal: The pilot short had Blue Racer wearing a bowler hat and a bow-tie (complete with a collar). This was dropped in subsequent cartoons.
- Amazing Technicolor Wildlife: The Blue Racer is a blue snake.
- Bears Are Bad News: An episode features a bear as an antagonist.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: The Japanese Beetle disappeared half-way through the series.
- Funny Animal: Crazy-Legs Crane
- I Know Kung Fu: The Japanese Beetle.
- The Rival/Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: The Japanese Beetle and Crazy-Legs Crane.
- Road Runner vs. Coyote: The basic plot is about the Blue racer attempting to catch and eat the Japanese Beetle. Interestingly, it's the hunter (a snake) who is the super-fast one, but this is still not enough for a significantly more intelligent prey (a beetle) who can do karate chops.
- Small Name, Big Ego: The Blue Racer has an impressive name that only literally corresponds to reality given that he may be very fast, but he is a failure in both his hunting and his family ways. It doesn't do a thing to diminish his smug attitude about being a great hunter, though.
- Spin-Off: The characters spun off from Tijuana Toads.
- Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: The Racer has the not-so-sympathetic motivation of trying to eat the Japanese Beetle and only devoting all his time and effort into this, while being otherwise a dead-beat husband and father.
- Villain Protagonist: Devouring a very polite, (more) intelligent, fellow animal out of egotism is the whole goal of the series and establishes the Blue Racer as a villain.
