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What is the difference between Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes?
Is there even a difference between these two classic cartoons?
As cartoon afficionados, a question we often find ourselves asking is "What is the difference between Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes?". Do some characters belong to one show versus the other? Is there even a difference at all - the cartoons look so similar! In the words of Pee-wee Herman: what's the significance? What does it mean? I don't know!
Have no fear, MeTV Toons is here and we have done the research. Let's explore the history of the two classic Warner Bros. cartoons and the subtle differences that distinguish them from one another.
Looney Tunes premiered first
Looney Tunes premiered in April 1930 with the short Sinkin' in the Bathtub. After the success of Looney Tunes, producer Leon Schlesinger pitched Merrie Melodies as a sister series and it later premiered in August 1931.
Merrie Melodies went color first
Both cartoons started off as black and white, but Merrie Melodies went into 2 strip and then 3 strip technicolor in 1934. Looney Tunes would later be transitioned to technicolor in 1942 and both series would switch to cinecolor in 1947.
Merrie Melodies started off as a failed live action series
While Leon Schlesinger was developing Looney Tunes to serve as advertisements for Warner Bros. music, Warner Bros. was also trying to create its own theater short series that would also highlight music recordings and sheet music. The series was called Spoonie Melodies and they were kind of like early music videos, but they were not popular. When the series ceased production in 1931, Looney Tunes was growing in success so Warner Bros. was willing to replace Spoonie Melodies with Schlesinger's animated Merrie Melodies.
Originally, both series had different production teams.
Hugh Harman and Rudolph Ising were the first animation team at Warner Bros. and under Schlesinger's supervision created Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies. While they originally worked as a team for both productions, they ended up splitting the work. Ising led the production on Merrie Melodies and Harman led the production on Looney Tunes.
The original focus of both series was to sell music.
One clause in the original contracts between Jack Warner and Leon Schlesinger was that each cartoon must contain at least the chorus of a song from a Warner Bros. feature film. For example, the Merrie Melodies short Katnip Kollege, featured songs from Over the Goal. The hope was that hearing the songs in the cartoons would encourage audiences to see the feature film or buy the record or even buy the sheet music. At the beginning, the cartoons were seen as a way to market the other Warner Bros. entertainment products.
Looney Tunes had regular characters, Merrie Melodies did not
At first, both series were mainly one-shot cartoons with no repeating characters, but then along came Bosko! Bosko was the first Looney Tunes character that was a real hit with audiences and earned repeat appearances in cartoons - in fact, Bosko starred in over 30 Looney Tunes shorts from 1930 until 1933 when Harman and Ising left Leon Schlesinger Productions over budget disputes. When they left, they took the rights to Bosko with them, leaving the studio in a popular character bind. Another character, Buddy, was tested to lesser success until a much more popular character graced the screen: Porky Pig. From then on, repeat characters lived in the Looney Tunes world, even though most Looney Tunes characters got their start in Merrie Melodies shorts. Bugs Bunny, Yosemite Sam, Foghorn Leghorn, Granny, Tweety, The Tasmanian Devil, Wile E. Coyote, the Road Runner, and more characters all began as Merrie Melodies characters.
Both cartoons end with "That's All Folks!"
In 1934, after Ising and Harman left, Schlesinger negotiated with them to retain the rights to Merrie Melodies and to the sign-off of "So Long, Folks!". Originally, Looney Tunes ended with "That's All, Folks!" and Merrie Melodies ended with "So Long, Folks!" but that changed in 1936 when Merrie Melodies switched to also using "That's All, Folks!". The only real difference between the two series' endings was that on Looney Tunes, occassionally Porky Pig would jump out and say his classic, stuttered "Th-th-th-that's all, folks!".
1940: Contract Change
Throughout the 1930s, Looney Tunes focused on character stories while Merrie Melodies focused on building shorts around music from the Warner Bros. Library. However, in 1940, the success of both series led to Warner Bros. dropping the music clause from the contract. This was fine for Looney Tunes, which only used the music because they had to, but for Merrie Melodies this led to more of an identity crisis. Animators quickly developed new characters for Merrie Melodies and this quick change directly led to the creation of Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny. However, with this breath of fresh air with new characters led to another problem: Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes looked and felt almost exactly the same and the two series began to feel blurred.
More cartoons leads to more confusion
Throughout the 1930s, animators were expected to make around 24 cartoons per year, or one Looney Tunes short and one Merrie Melodies short per month. Throughout the 1940s that number increased to around 36-40 cartoons (with the exception of 1944, the year Schlesinger sold the studio to Warner Bros. and Edward Selzer took over animation production). More cartoons per year meant the animators were jumping back and forth between Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, which meant that they often weren't sure which series they were creating a cartoon for. Regarding the confusion, director Friz Freleng once said "I never knew if a film I was making would be Looney Tunes or Merrie Melodies, and what the hell difference would it make, anyway?"
Conclusion
While Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies started out as fairly different cartoon series, their mutual and rapid rise to success led to the blurred lines and confusion we feel today. There were some small differences between the two series at the beginning, but by 1947 they were all but the same series with two different names.
