Wacky Races

WACKY RACES
Made by: CBS/Hanna Barbera
Shown on: BBC?
Years shown: 1968 onwards

In my opinion, Wacky Races was the finest creation of this incredibly prolific animation partnership, due to its fantastic inventiveness, and despite the fact that every episode had pretty much the same plot-line. The cartoon was inspired by Blake Edwards’ film, The Great Race (1965), which saw a band of unconventional characters, including Jack Lemmon, Natalie Wood and Tony Curtis, competing in a 1920s car race.

The same characters took part in the Wacky Races every episode - a bit like a rally or Formula 1 circuit - and there was a radar on the screen every so often, supposedly showing the progress of the competitors (to see them going backwards was not unusual.) The whole thing was superbly narrated in rhyming couplets by Dave Wilcox.

So who were those drivers?

• Peter Perfect: The vain Mr Perfect had the most implausibly square jaw, drove the Turbo Terrific, and was sweet on Penelope Pitstop, whom he loved second only to himself.

• Sergeant Blast & Private Meekly: This military duo drove the Army Surplus Special, which could act as a tank, steamroller, or any other heavy-duty vehicle.

• Lazy Luke & Blubber Bear: Luke was an idle redneck who was so lazy that his Arkansas Chuggabug was just his veranda on wheels, complete with a stove for an engine. His co-driver was Blubber Bear, and the slightly odd thing was that Blubber had the only seat (a rocking chair), so Luke sat on his lap. That kind of thing is probably legal in Arkansas.

• The Ant Hill Mob: This was a gang of Chicago mobsters led by Clyde, who were all midgets and who rode in the Bullet-Proof Bomb. They were nice guys really, and were particularly concerned that Penelope Pitstop came to no harm.

• Red Max: Modelled on the Red Baron, Red Max rarely achieved success in the Wacky Races, partly because his Crimson Haybailer was one of the worst cars on the circuit - even worse than the Arkansas Chuggabug.

• The Gruesome Twosome: Big Gruesome looked like Frankenstein’s monster, and L’il Gruesome was a miniature Dracula, and together they drove the Creepy Coupe. It had gothic candles for headlights, and could be fuelled by ghost, snake or dragon power.

• Professor Pat Pending: This mad professor drove the drearily-named Convert-a-Car, which should have won every week because it could transform into pretty much anything, but Pending always managed to botch it up somehow.

• Penelope Pitstop: The southern belle of the race circuit dressed entirely in pink and drove the pristine Compact Pussycat. Her maxim was “neatness counts”, and her car had various modifications to allow her to re-apply her make-up without veering off into a ditch. Penelope always managed to get into jeopardy, frequently enough to warrant her own spin-off cartoon too, The Perils of Penelope Pitstop (1969).

• The Slag Brothers: Slag of course means something different in the US, referring to scree and ash, rather than these boys’ private lives. Rock and Gravel Slag were two dopey-looking cavemen who drove the Bouldermobile, for which, presumably, they had to invent the wheel.

• Dick Dastardly & Muttley: The fabulous villain of the piece, Dick Dastardly had a curly moustache, pointy facial features, and the catch-phrase “drat and double drat!”, whenever one of his fiendish schemes fell apart (i.e. always.) He was accompanied by Muttley, his canine sidekick (the dog in The Great Race was called Motley), with a trademark snicker - he couldn’t care less whether Dastardly won, and actually gained most amusement from it all backfiring. Dick Dastardly would go to any lengths of cheating in order to win, and he would often sabotage Penelope Pitstop’s chances, knowing that ninety per cent of the other drivers would screech to a halt to help her. The following year, Dick and man’s best friend got their own gig, in Dastardly & Muttley and their Flying Machines.

SQUARE EYES RATING: 9/10

(Thanks to www.comedy-zone.net for the borrowed pic)