''Rocket Squad'' is a 1956 Warner Bros. ''

Merrie Melodies ''Merrie Melodies'' is an American animated series of comedy short films produced by Warner Bros. starting in 1931, during the golden age of American animation, and ending in 1969. Then some new cartoons were produced from the late 1970s to the ...

'' cartoon directed by

Chuck Jones Charles Martin Jones (September 21, 1912 – February 22, 2002) was an American animator, director, and painter, best known for his work with Warner Bros. Cartoons on the '' Looney Tunes'' and '' Merrie Melodies'' series of shorts. He wrote, pro ...

. The short was released on March 10, 1956, and stars

Daffy Duck Daffy Duck is an animated cartoon character created for Leon Schlesinger Productions by animators Tex Avery and Bob Clampett. Styled as an anthropomorphic black duck, he has appeared in cartoon series such as ''Looney Tunes'' and ''Merrie Mel ...

and

Porky Pig Porky Pig is an animated character in the Warner Bros. ''Looney Tunes'' and '' Merrie Melodies'' series of cartoons. He was the first character created by the studio to draw audiences based on his star power, and the animators created many criti ...

as futuristic space cops who patrol the

Milky Way Galaxy The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...

. The police officers of the film are sued for

false arrest False arrest, Unlawful arrest or Wrongful arrest is a common law tort, where a plaintiff alleges they were held in custody without probable cause, or without an order issued by a court of competent jurisdiction. Although it is possible to sue ...

, and the film ends with their imprisonment.

Plot

In this futuristic setting,

is Sgt. Joe Monday and narrator of the story. His partner, Det. Schmoe Tuesday (

), and himself are returning from a routine investigation of a 712-malicious mischief ('School children blew one of the rings off of

Saturn Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine and a half times that of Earth. It has only one-eighth the average density of Earth; h ...

. When will parents learn to keep

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

out of their children's reach?') in the

Big Dipper The Big Dipper ( US, Canada) or the Plough ( UK, Ireland) is a large asterism consisting of seven bright stars of the constellation Ursa Major; six of them are of second magnitude and one, Megrez (δ), of third magnitude. Four define a "bowl" ...

area, when they receive a call from the police chief. They return to headquarters and await the police chief's call ('10:52: Back at the old desk, waiting for a call from the Chief. Half a cop's life is spent in waiting. 10:53: the Chief called.'). The police chief is down on his knees as he practically begs Daffy to pursue the Flying Saucer Bandit. Daffy consents to take the case, and the police chief kisses his feet. Sgt. Monday and Det. Tuesday then report to the scene of the crime. The crime robots are already there picking up clues to aid Daffy and Porky in their ability to identify the Flying Saucer Bandit. They return to the station with a bag of clues, and empty them into the Univac clue machine, which pops out what appears to be a computer

punch card A punched card (also punch card or punched-card) is a piece of stiff paper that holds digital data represented by the presence or absence of holes in predefined positions. Punched cards were once common in data processing applications or to di ...

. The punch card is loaded into a

player piano A player piano (also known as a pianola) is a self-playing piano containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism, that operates the piano action via programmed music recorded on perforated paper or metallic rolls, with more modern im ...

, which plays out the song "

Mother Machree ''Mother Machree'' is a 1928 American silent drama film, directed by John Ford, based on the 1924 work ''The Story of Mother Machree'' by Rida Johnson Young about a poor Irish immigrant in America. Rida Johnson Young had invented Mother Machre ...

", identified by Daffy. They proceed to the George 'Mother' Machree file where they begin their pursuit of the Flying Saucer Bandit. Daffy describes him as "A criminal ''so'' clever, he had never been suspected of anything!" They learn that the Flying Saucer Bandit is at a restaurant ordering a sandwich, to which they hurry because he is known as a 'notoriously fast eater'. Upon arriving, they realize they have missed the bandit, and continue their chase ('1:07: He left the Blast-Inn. 1:08: We arrived at the Blast-Inn. Our deductions later proved that we had missed him by one minute. 1:09: We set out in pursuit.'). Porky and Daffy are in hot pursuit of 'Mother' Machree when they lose him in a smog bank over Los Angeles. Porky points out a smog cloud flying away, when they pull up and tell Machree to come out, to which Daffy mentions that he has an elaborate alibi already cooked up. It turns out that Machree is innocent, evident by his "I didn't do nothin'!" alibi. Because of this, Daffy and Porky are sentenced by the Ultra Superior Court to twenty years in prison for

(thirty years actually, as Porky states so afterwards).

Production notes

''Rocket Squad'' is a futuristic parody of the television shows '' Dragnet'' and '' Racket Squad''. Daffy and Porky's characters first names put together are 'Joe Schmoe' (Sgt. ''Joe'' Monday and Det. ''Schmoe'' Tuesday ("He always follows me," declares Joe.) Much of the imagery, particularly entering the police station and the evaporators, is reused from Jones' previous short, ''

Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century ''Duck Dodgers in the th Century'' (spoken as "twenty-fourth-and-a-half") is a 1953 Warner Bros. '' Merrie Melodies'' cartoon directed by Chuck Jones. The cartoon was released on July 25, 1953, and stars Daffy Duck as space hero Duck Dodger ...

''. Among the names appearing on the buttons of the Criminal Detector Set are John Burton Jr.,

Tedd Pierce Edward Stacey "Tedd" Pierce III (August 12, 1906 – February 19, 1972) was an American screenwriter and voice actor of animated cartoons, principally from the mid-1930s to the late 1950s. Biography Pierce was the son of a stockbroker, Samue ...

, C.M. Jones,

Mel Blanc Melvin Jerome Blanc (born Blank ; May 30, 1908July 10, 1989) was an American voice actor and radio personality whose career spanned over 60 years. During the Golden Age of Radio, he provided character voices and vocal sound effects for comedy r ...

, Norman Moray and

Eddie Selzer Edward Selzer (January 12, 1893 – February 22, 1970) was an American film producer and publicist who served as head of Warner Bros. Cartoons from 1944 to 1958. He served in the US Navy and fought as a Golden Gloves boxer. He won a boxing exhibi ...

, all of whom had a hand in the making of the cartoon (Moray was a key executive with The Vitaphone Corporation, Warner Bros'. short-subject division). Porky and Daffy losing the Flying Saucer Bandit in a smog bank over Los Angeles is in reference to Los Angeles being considered the Smog Bank Capital of the world in the early to late 1950s. This cartoon has been shown (in clips) on the PBS special ''Chuck Jones: Extremes and Inbetweens—A Life in Animation'' as part of the section about Jones using Porky and Daffy in cartoon shorts that parody popular film and television show genres of the era.

References

External links

*
The Cartoon at AOL Video
{{Chuck Jones 1956 films 1956 animated films 1950s police films Merrie Melodies short films Warner Bros. Cartoons animated short films Short films directed by Chuck Jones Daffy Duck films Porky Pig films Films scored by Milt Franklyn Films based on television series 1950s parody films 1956 short films 1950s fantasy films 1956 comedy films 1950s Warner Bros. animated short films Films produced by Edward Selzer Films set in Los Angeles Films about police misconduct 1950s English-language films

Plot

Production notes

See also

References

External links