Warner Bros. Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (WBEI), commonly known as Warner Bros. (WB), is an American filmed entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California and the main namesake subsidiary of Warner Bro ...

Looney Tunes ''Looney Tunes'' is an American media franchise produced and distributed by Warner Bros. The franchise began as a series of animated short films that originally ran from 1930 to 1969, alongside its spin-off series ''Merrie Melodies'', during t ...

'' animated cartoon short directed by

Friz Freleng Isadore "Friz" Freleng (; August 21, 1905May 26, 1995), credited as I. Freleng early in his career, was an American animator, cartoonist, Film director, director, Film producer, producer, and composer known for his work at Warner Bros. Cartoons ...

. The short was released on January 2, 1954, and stars

Tweety Tweety is an animated character, a yellow canary bird in the Warner Bros. ''Looney Tunes'' and '' Merrie Melodies'' series of animated cartoons. His characteristics are based on Red Skelton's famous "Junior the Mean Widdle Kid". He appeared in ...

and

Sylvester Sylvester or Silvester is a name derived from the Latin adjective ''silvestris'' meaning "wooded" or "wild", which derives from the noun ''silva'' meaning "woodland". Classical Latin spells this with ''i''. In Classical Latin, ''y'' represented a ...

. The voices were performed by

Mel Blanc Melvin Jerome Blanc (born Blank ; May 30, 1908 – July 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 come ...

. The title is a play on the phrase

dog pound An animal shelter or pound is a place where stray, lost, abandoned or surrendered animals – mostly dogs and cats – are housed. The word "pound" has its origins in the animal pounds of the agricultural communities, where stray livestock ...

. Similar in concept to '' Ain't She Tweet'', this cartoon features Sylvester in pursuit of catching Tweety, with a gang of bulldogs (including Hector) as the obstacles. ''Dog Pounded'' also marks the only use of

Pepé Le Pew Pepé Le Pew is an animated character from the Warner Bros. ''Looney Tunes'' and ''Merrie Melodies'' series of cartoons, introduced in 1945. Depicted as a French anthropomorphic striped skunk, Pepé is constantly on the quest for love and pursui ...

in a

-directed short (and the second time Pepé Le Pew has appeared in a cartoon that was not directed by

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

or a member from Chuck Jones' unit—the first being Arthur Davis' '' Odor of the Day'').

Plot

A destitute Sylvester rummages through trash in search of food. Nearly out of luck, the cat hears singing from atop a tall tree inside an enclosure, looks up, and sees Tweety. Eager for his supper, Sylvester rushes inside the enclosure, unaware that the enclosure is the city dog pound. Sylvester gets attacked and driven from the pound by an army of bulldogs, whose purpose in life seemingly is to protect Tweety from predators. Wanting to get by the dogs, Sylvester employs the following tricks, all of them failing: *Holding an umbrella for balance, the cat walks across a guide wire connecting a light pole and the tree. The dogs collectively blow a gust of doggie breath at their foe, causing Sylvester to lose his balance and fall into the waiting horde of dogs. *Digging a tunnel beneath the dog pound to get at the tree unnoticed and snatch Tweety. The dogs, already having anticipated this latest scheme, have dug their tunnel and waited for Sylvester to break through to their side. They attack Sylvester and chase him back to the tunnel entrance. Once out of the tunnel, he closes it with a shovel and forces the dogs back in. *A dog suit. The dogs startle their new "companion," causing the head to come loose, and Sylvester quickly tries to secure it before the dogs notice. However, either having already seen or never being fooled from the start, the dogs reject Sylvester (as a fake dog) and force him to flee. The cat temporarily gets away, but the city dog catcher quickly returns him to his "home" (and a further beating). *Sylvester tries to climb over the fence, but the wall knocks him to the ground as a dog comes on the outside. The dog goes back in, flipping the fence frame back and revealing Sylvester having been clobbered. *Mass hypnotism, which momentarily evens the odds; by staring at the dogs, Sylvester is able to freeze and paralyze the dogs in place. Sylvester easily grabs Tweety, who panics and helplessly yells to his protectors to rescue him. When Sylvester blurts out the secret to un-freezing the dogs (a police whistle), Tweety instantly provides one and begins to blow ... except Sylvester quickly sees that coming and places a glass over Tweety. But Tweety fights back by poking Sylvester's palm with a needle ... and breaking the dogs out of their trance. *Entering an empty dog pound, Sylvester tries climbing the tree ... only to discover the dogs waiting on the branches. *Blasting himself off in a rocket. The rocket shoots without him, and he is shown as furless. *A swing, which Sylvester hopes will allow him to swing harmlessly above the dogs to the tree. However, the swing's reach is too low, and the dogs manage to get at Sylvester ... who never returns to the outside. The final attempt nearly works: Painting a phony skunk stripe down his back to scare the dogs away. This plan works too well: just as he grabs Tweety and makes his getaway, he is intercepted by

, who mistakes Sylvester for a female skunk and tries to make love to him. While Sylvester tries to break free from Pepé's grasp, Tweety looks on and comments, "That puddy tat has turned into an awful stinker!" Pepé's high-pitched kissing sounds are heard just before the "That's all, Folks!" title card appears.

Reception

Animation writer Earl Kress writes, "By 1954 Tweety cartoons had become, if not exactly predictable, then at least formulaic. However, ''Dog Pounded'' is a very clever twist on the Tweety-Sylvester-Granny-Hector quadrangle."

References

External links

*
Nuance and Suggestion in the Tweety and Sylvester Series
- Written by Kevin McCorry {{Pepé Le Pew in animation Looney Tunes shorts Short films directed by Friz Freleng 1950s Warner Bros. animated short films Remakes of American films Films scored by Carl Stalling Animated films about cats Animated films about birds Animated films about dogs Pepé Le Pew films Tweety films Sylvester the Cat films 1950s English-language films American animated short films Films with screenplays by Warren Foster Films produced by Edward Selzer Hector the Bulldog films English-language short films 1954 animated short films