Zipping Along

The life of a predator isn't what it's cracked up to be! He must be up to his eyeballs in debt to Acme (or has a sizable source of funds), his medical bills equally large and for what? A singular lack of success in catching one bird! I say give up, get a pizza and take up stamp collecting. Great fun and worth watching. Recommended.

Chuck Jones's 'Zipping Along', the fourth cartoon in the Road Runner series, is notable for how it increases the relationship between the Coyote and the audience. The gags are hit and miss, ranging from hilarious (the mouse trap gag is still among my favourites) to dull (the bomb and the kite) or genuinely weak (the double "meep meep" from the Road Runner and the dust he leaves behind). However, the reaction shots of the Coyote are all priceless and there are many more of them than in the opening trio of cartoons. His endearingly defeated glances to the audience are capable of turning a weak gag into a hilarious one. For example, the nonsensical joke with the giant magnet and the TNT is improved 100% by the extremely brief look of horror the Coyote shoots our way a millisecond before the explosion. It's the tiniest piece of animation but it's monumentally effective. There are numerous little moments like that all the way through 'Zipping Along', considerably heightening its enjoyment factor. It's also notable for the fact that it is the first Road Runner cartoon not to close with the Coyote being hit by a vehicle which the Road Runner is on board. He is hit by a vehicle at the finale and we do hear a "meep meep" afterwards but it doesn't come from the Road Runner!

The forth pairing of Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner is still good and features many gags that work, including grenades, mousetraps, a giant kite, a bigger magnet, and even hypnosis. Of course none of these work, but they make for a hilarious cartoon. Man I love that coyote's work ethic. This animated short can be seen on Disc 2 of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 2. It also has a little 11 minute featurette "Behind the Tunes - Crash! Bang! Boom!: The Wild Sounds of Treg Brown" that I'll get more into in the listing for that on this site.

My Grade:A+

The story is somewhat unexceptional, and the pacing is a little uneven here, but there is much to enjoy. The Roadrunner is a good character, but I have always found Coyote the better of the two, he makes all these traps but he never gets that bird.

The animation is very nicely done with good backgrounds and character features, the music is also good, not generic or annoying and the gags all work from the giant kite with the bomb, the magnet, various mousetraps and falling telephone poles. Predictable maybe, funny absolutely!

Overall, for the Roadrunner and Coyote's fourth pairing, it works very well. It isn't a classic, but I enjoyed it, and I do think it is worth watching. 8/10 Bethany Cox

More of Wile E. Coyote - aka Road-Runnerus Digestus - trying to get Road Runner - aka Velocitus Tremendus - and always ending up getting himself. Probably the best gag here is the hypnotism trick; it's almost hypnotic to watch (of course, in this sense it won't lead you to do what Wile E. ends up doing!).

So, maybe "Zipping Along" doesn't really add anything new to the cinematic landscape, but it's always great to see what happens to WEC. It just goes to show that the more you try to harm others, the more you get harmed.

And what was with that train at the beginning?