While timeless comedy certainly exists, it is scarce due to the often reactive nature of the medium, and that apples even more to standup comedy. Culture and tastes change faster and faster as time goes on, and many entertainers of yesteryear are expressing frustration that they can’t keep up. Jerry Seinfeld, age 70, recently blamed “wokeness” and “over-sensitivity” on his lack of popularity among teenagers. Now, an even older pantheon of stars is blaming politics for their waning popularity.
Many of the Looney Tunes characters, once the apex of comedy, are vocally blaming left-wing political agendas and not the inevitable march of time on the fact that they are no longer in the spotlight. Here is every major Merry Melodies star ranked by how disproportionately they blame the “woke movement” on the fact that they don’t get leading roles anymore.
21. Penelope Pussycat
As one of the few female characters in the Looney Tunes roster, Penelope had a rough go of things in the old days. In her autobiography, she detailed encounters with a Merry Melodies A-lister who would coerce her into painting a stripe on her back so he could more easily pretend they were the same species and make unwanted sexual advances at her. She never named him, fearing retribution, but her description of her abuser as “that smelly French bastard” leaves little to the imagination.
20. Tweety Bird
Though canonically male, Tweety Bird has been at least trans-coded ever since 1952’s “Ain’t She Tweet.” They’ve actually been able to maintain relevance and be discovered by a new generation of fans on, you guessed it, Twitter.
19. Road Runner
In a 2019 interview, Tucker Carlson asked Road Runner if he felt that the radical left-wing Hollywood agenda was killing comedy, to which the bird replied “Hmeep hmeep” and ran away. His politics are hard to pin down.
18. Witch Hazel
On cancel culture: “Today’s young people need to spend less time being outraged online and more time boiling in my cauldron, TE-HE-HE-HE-HE!”
She’s also a huge fan of J.K. Rowling, but only in recent years, so it has nothing to do with the popular book series about witches she wrote. Troubling.
17. Granny
Granny’s shtick was being old and out of touch in the 1950s, so you can imagine how poorly her politics have aged. She might not be aware that gay marriage is legal, or that being gay is legal, or like, even a thing. Her last college stand-up tour was a trainwreck.
16. Henery Hawk
This angry little guy has managed to maintain an audience in the one place that would have him, the far-right infotainment sphere. He can be frequently heard on The Joe Rogan Experience hawking his all-chicken diet guide and insisting that just about anyone you don’t like is in fact a chicken.
15. Michigan J. Frog
Okay, we SWEAR Michigan J. sounded off to us about how woke culture is destroying the entertainment industry and rotting this country from the inside out but whenever we try to get him to do it in front of anyone else he just says “ribbit” and we look like we’re crazy.
14. Buddy
Remember Buddy? Of course you don’t nobody does. Even other Looney Tunes don’t remember Buddy. Anyway, he’s a Nazi now.
13. Porky Pig
“It’s like you c-c-can’t say a-a-a-anything anymore b-because of the li-li-ali-woke satanist Hollywood agenda.”
12. Speedy Gonzales and Slowpoke Rodriguez
These two can be heard on any podcast that will have them griping about how sensitive audiences have become. They consider themselves victims of cancel culture, which is bold talk for mice that were revealed to not even be real Mexicans. There’s no excuse guys.
11. Sylvester the Cat
“There was a time in this country when men went to war and cats could be lifted off the ground by the smell of pies cooling on windowsills. Now we have safe spaces and pronouns. Sufferin succatash, what happened?!”
10. Tasmanian Devil
Given the amount of mudflaps and Walmart t-shirts he can be seen on you would think Taz leans fully right, but he considers himself more a freethinking independent. “The way I see it, the internet has radicalized both sides. The left and the right are both as crazy, and both just as likely to make me spin around all crazy and destroy everything in my path. Not a popular opinion for a guy trying to find work in Hollywood, but hey, I gotta be me.”
9. Lola Bunny
As a more recent addition to the Looney Tunes roster brought on deliberately in the interest of female representation you would think Lola was a progressive, but she pulled a full Gina Carano fast. She’s currently in talks to become the spokesbunny for the NRRA, the National Riffle Rabbit Association.
8. Elmer Fudd
His Twitter bio reads “Be vewy vewy quiet, I’m owning libwals, hu-hu-hu!” Elmer is anti-vax, pro-Trump, and has frequently stated that John Voight and James Woods are the only guys working in Hollywood he trusts.
7. Marvin the Martian
Marvin has never been the most versatile actor in the world, but he still insists that his trouble finding work these days is entirely due to politics.
“Today, to work in Hollywood, you’re expected to think a certain way and to promote a certain agenda. I’ve never understood that. I don’t see how taking a stance against global warming makes someone a good actor. In my day a casting agent would never turn you down simply because you planned on blowing up the Earth.”
6. Daffy Duck
His latest Netflix special “Rabbit Season, Cuck Season” is his lowest watched to date, and it’s not hard to see why. He just doesn’t have it anymore. He spends half the time slapping his knee and wadding around the stage to let everyone know how funny his jokes are, and he just won’t let up on trans people, he keeps doubling down. Somehow his latest tour sold out in 8 minutes.
5. Foghorn Leghorn
We’re not sure what kind of reaction this antebellum-loving deep south rooster was expecting touring college towns in 2024 but needless to say he was not well received. In a now-viral stand-up clip, he can be seen being booed at the Brooklyn Knitting Factory after a tasteless pronouns joke fell flat, stammering “I say I say that’s a JOKE now you liberal Yankee CUCKS!” before storming off the stage.
4. Wile E. Coyote
Wile E. Coyote was never quite as smart as he thought he was, which makes him a perfect pea in Ben Shapiro and Jordan Peterson’s pod. In a recent viral video, he can be seen holding a wooden sign that reads “Sorry liberals, there are only two genders” but then he realizes he’s standing on thin air and flips the sign around to read “Thanks Obama” before plummeting to the bottom of a gorge.
3. Bugs Bunny
His frequent cross-dressing in the ’40s and ’50s gave him a brief queer icon status, but that was undercut when he called Kevin Spacey’s accusers “stinkers and maroons” on social media. Since the backlash over those remarks Bugs has only gone further down the right-wing rabbit hole, claiming he can’t work in comedy anymore because his material is “too edgy for the wokes.” It’s unclear how Mr. Bunny thinks his “left turn at Albequrque” routine is offensive to liberals or why it was ever funny in the first place, but that’s his read. He is currently in talks with Jerry Seinfeld to produce a movie about the invention of carrots.
2. Yosemite Sam
Take a wild guess where this fucker was on January 6th, 2021. Yeah, Yosemite got taken in by the QAnon crowd, the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, you name it. Once they took his guns away for the HBO MAX reboot something just snapped in the guy. Let’s just say he’s calling people things a little harsher than “varmint” these days.
1. Pepé Le Pew
How this guy and Bill Maher still have careers is beyond us.