Bully for Bugs

Bully for Bugs is a 1953 Looney Tunes short directed by Chuck Jones.
== Plot ==
Burrowing his way to the Coachella Valley for the "big carrot festival therein", Bugs Bunny surfaces in the middle of a bullring during a bullfight between Toro the Bull and a very nervous matador, who is being jeered by the crowd for fleeing from the bull. Bugs famously declares he "shoulda make a left toin at Albuqoique". As he asks the frightened matador for directions, the matador escapes into the stands, leaving Bugs to fend for himself against Toro. After irritating the bull by slapping at him for "steaming up [his] tail," Toro rams the rabbit out of the bullring. As Bugs is hurtled into the air, he mutters his famous line, "Of course you realize, dis means war," before landing miles away.
Toro takes his applause for claiming his latest victim, but it is short-lived because Bugs re-enters the bullring in matador garb. Bugs defeats Toro using an anvil hidden behind his cape. While Toro is still dazed from his collision, Bugs makes the bull follow the cape to the tune of "La Cucaracha" up to a bull shield where his horns pierce it. Bugs hits and bends the horns like nails and makes fun of Toro using puns ("What a gulli-bull, what a nin-cow-poop"), not knowing that the bull can detach his horns and strike back. 
While Toro sharpens his horns, Bugs interrupts him by placing an elastic band around the horns and using it as a giant slingshot to smack him in the face with a boulder. Toro charges back at Bugs. Bugs then returns, this time in a large sombrero doing a little dance and slapping Toro on the face to the tune of "Las Chiapanecas". Toro tries to punch him twice but is slapped each time. Bugs dances more and then disappears under the sombrero, but not before pinching Toro's nose.
While Toro once again and angrily sharpens his horns, Bugs has prepared a booby trap for the bull, composed of a double-barreled shotgun hidden behind the cape. Toro charges towards the cape, and somehow the shotgun previously in Bugs' hand enters Toro's body and stops at his tail, firing a bullet from one of Toro's horn when he flicks his tail (and the shotgun) on the ground. Now having the upper hand, Toro chases Bugs shooting at the hare, but the bull eventually runs out of bullets. Toro "reloads" by swallowing several "elephant bullets" (with explosive heads), but when he attempts to test-fire, he instead explodes, gun and all.
Bugs taunts Toro once again by calling him, among other things, an "ultra maroon," but realizes that he is cornered by the bull behind barred gates. Awaiting certain death (he writes a will and says his last prayers), Bugs miraculously opens the gates like a garage door, sending Toro out of the bullring and into the horizon. Furious, Toro runs back to the bullring, not anticipating that Bugs has laid axle grease, a ramp, and some platforms on the bull's path. The grease and ramp send Toro airborne over some glue, a sheet of sandpaper, a protruding matchstick, and a barrel of TNT which explodes when Toro flies by. Still in the air and dazed, Toro finally crashes into a wooden bull shield.
With the unconscious bull's hindquarters sticking out of the shield, the victorious Bugs holds up the cape with the words "THE END" etched on it.
== Caricatures ==
* Groucho Marx - "Of course you realize this means war!"
== Availability ==
Lt bbwa.jpg|(1985) VHS Bugs Bunny's Wacky Adventures
Lt bbwa beta.jpg|(1985) Beta Bugs Bunny's Wacky Adventures
BUGS BUNNY WINNER BY A HARE.jpg|(1993) LaserDisc Bugs Bunny: Winner by a Hare: 14 of Bugs Bunny's Best
Lt collection bugs bunny.jpg|(1996) VHS Bugs Bunny
FROM HARE TO ETERNITY.jpg|(1998) VHS From Hare to Eternity
BigTopBunny VHS.jpg|(1998) VHS Looney Tunes Presents: Bugs Bunny: Big Top Bunny (Europe)
Bumper2000.jpg|(2000) VHS Mil-Looney-Um 2000 - Bumper Collection
I Love Tweety - Volume 1.jpg|(2001) DVD I Love Tweety: Volume 1
515P04M6R6L. AC .jpg|(2003) VHS Bugs Bunny
LT Golden Collection 1.jpg|(2003) DVD Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 1, Disc One (low pitched, 1998 dubbed version without dubbed notice)
Lt cbobb.jpg|(2003) DVD Looney Tunes Collection Best of Bugs Bunny
Lt best kfc 2.jpg|(2005) DVD The Best of Looney Tunes (KFC) Volume 2
Lt spotlight 7.jpg|(2009) DVD Looney Tunes Spotlight Collection: Volume 7, Disc 1
Lt 3sdt.jpg|(2010) DVD 3 Spooky DVD Treats
Bugs Bunny - Wasically Wabbit Front Cover.jpg|(2011) DVD Looney Tunes Super Stars' Bugs Bunny: Wascally Wabbit (low pitched, 1998 dubbed version without dubbed notice)
Lt bbot bb.jpg|(2011) DVD Bugs Bunny
LTPC Volume 3 Cover.png|(2014) Blu-ray Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 3, Disc One (re-restored, low pitched)
LT Platinum Collection VOL 3 DVD Cover.png|(2014) DVD Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 3, Disc One (re-restored, low pitched)
Looney Tunes Bugs Bunny Golden Carrot Collection.png|(2020) DVD Looney Tunes Bugs Bunny Golden Carrot Collection, Disc 1
=== Streaming ===
Lt boomerang.jpg|Boomerang App (2017 - )
Lt itunes.jpg|iTunes ( - ) (restored)
lt hbo max.jpg|HBO Max Latin America / Brazil (2021 - 2024)
lt max.jpg|Max Latin America / Brazil (2024 - )
== Censorship ==
* The version of this short shown on ABC's The Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show cut the following violent parts:
** The bull swallowing a box of bullets after getting a rifle stuck inside him and gaining the ability to shoot through his horns.
** The entire end where the bull slides up a greased ramp, gets glue brushed on his underside, gets sandpaper stuck to his glued underside, and passes by a match, which lights a fuse attached to a giant keg of dynamite, and blows the bull up was cut so severely that all that was shown was the bull going up the greased ramp and crashing into the wall, with Bugs covering his butt with a cape that reads, "The End".
* CBS' version shown in the 1970s and 1980s as part of The Bugs Bunny and Road Runner Show left in the part where the bull swallows bullets to try and reload the rifle inside him (only to blow up), but cut the end gag with the greased ramp-glue-sandpaper-match-lit fuse-barrel of TNT like ABC did. Unlike ABC, CBS showed the bull sliding up the greased ramp and getting glue and sandpaper on his underside, but cut the match, lit fuse, and barrel of TNT and instead cut to the bull hitting the wall.http://www.intanibase.com/gac/looneytunes/censored-b.aspx
== Notes ==
* The music from scene of Bugs makes the bull follow the cape is called "La Cucaracha".
* The music from scene of Bugs dances provoking Toro is called "Las Chiapanecas".
* This cartoon was used in The Bugs Bunny Road-Runner Movie. It was introduced by Bugs to demonstrate the problem he has with animators never telling the difference between a rabbit and a mole, especially whenever he ends up not taking the left turn at Albuquerque.
* Clips of this cartoon were also used in "Mexican Cat Dance" and Bugs Bunny's Easter Special.
* When Bugs first pops out of the tunnel, there is a sign in the stands: SALOS SENOR DEGORD. This is possibly a reference to background artist Philip DeGuard.
* The scene where Toro runs into the anvil hidden behind the cape was used in an old Cartoon Network bumper with the anvil being replaced by a solid dark bluish gray brick with the 1992-2004 logo engraved into it.
* The conception of this cartoon came about when Eddie Selzer randomly appeared in the writer's office to announce that there were to be no bullfighting cartoons made because he claimed bullfights weren't funny. Chuck Jones and Mike Maltese, dumbfounded from witnessing this, began to make a bullfight cartoon immediately.
== Gallery ==
BullyforBugsCredits1.png
BullyforBugsCredits2.png
Bully For Bugs Lobby Card.PNG|Lobby card
Screenshot 2021-01-17 at 5.33.41 PM.png|Lobby card
2862196030010367626S600x600Q85.jpg|Toro annoying Bugs by "steaming up his tail"
Bully for bugs-1.png|"Stop steamin' up my tail! What're ya tryin' to do, wrinkle it?!"
ModelBull.jpg|Toro's model sheet
1953 - Bully for Bugs 01.jpg|Toro spots the matador
== References ==
Category:Bugs Bunny Cartoons
Category:Cartoons directed by Chuck Jones
Category:Shorts
Category:1953
Category:Looney Tunes Shorts
Category:Bullfighting Cartoons
Category:Bugs Bunny Chuck Jones
Category:Cartoons written by Michael Maltese
Category:Cartoons with music by Carl W. Stalling
Category:Cartoons with backgrounds by Philip DeGuard
Category:Cartoons with characters voiced by Mel Blanc
Category:Cartoons with orchestrations by Milt Franklyn
Category:Cartoons with film editing by Treg Brown
Category:Cartoons with sound effects edited by Treg Brown
Category:Cartoons produced by Eddie Selzer