Bonkers (American TV series) explained

Theme Music Composer:Randy Petersen
Kevin Quinn
Country:United States
Language:English
Num Seasons:1
Num Episodes:61 + 4 (extra compilations) half-hour episodes
List Episodes:List of Bonkers episodes
Producer:
  • Robert Taylor (Lucky Piquel episodes)
  • Greg Weisman
  • Duane Capizzi and Bob Hathcock (Miranda Wright episodes)
Runtime:22 minutes
Company:Walt Disney Television Animation
Inspired By:Who Framed Roger Rabbit by Jeffrey Price
Peter S. Seaman
Creator:Jay Lender
Larry Latham
Greg Weisman
Duane Capizzi
Robert Hathcock
Richard Trueblood
Len Smith

Bonkers is an American animated television series and a spin-off short series called He's Bonkers which mainly aired in Raw Toonage.[1] The show originally aired from September 6, 1993 to February 23, 1994 after a preview of the series aired on The Disney Channel from February 28 to June 6, 1993. The 9 episodes of the Disney Channel preview aired in October 1993 in the original syndication.[2] [3] The original syndicated run was available as part of the programming block The Disney Afternoon.[4] Reruns of the show continued in syndication until 1996 and were later shown on Toon Disney until late 2004.

Premise

The premise of the series was that Bonkers D. Bobcat, an anthropomorphic bobcat who was a popular cartoon star, had washed out of show business and became a cop. He was made the junior partner of Detective Lucky Piquel, a grim and ill-tempered human who hates toons. Throughout the series, the pair work together to solve crimes in the Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, region. Bonkers repeatedly tried to win Piquel's praise, but usually just ended up ruining missions with his antics.[5] Said goofy antics would often prove to save the day.

After multiple episodes of working with Bonkers, Piquel was given an FBI job in Washington, D.C., and with great glee was finally able to leave Bonkers, but finally realized that after all the time spent hating working with Bonkers he had grown to love him. He took along the police radio, the light, Toots and Fall-Apart Rabbit.[6] At the end of the "Lucky" episodes, Bonkers was given a new partner, the attractive cool-headed Officer Miranda Wright. Although also human, she was far more patient and tolerant of his antics than was Piquel. With Miranda, Bonkers was more the brunt of the slapstick.

The syndication order would newly add in the premise that Bonkers had new adventures and cases with Lucky Piquel, making Fall-Apart and the other toons of the Toon Division appearing again. (episodes from November 1993 to February 1994)

Episodes

See main article: List of Bonkers episodes.

Characters

Bonkers D. Bobcat

Bonkers D. Bobcat (voiced by Jim Cummings) is an overly energetic and hyperactive cartoon anthropomorphic bobcat that works in the Toon Division of the Hollywood PD[7] and was once a big name cartoon star from the “He’s Bonkers” shorts (mainly in Raw Toonage except the first short “Petal to the Metal”) for Wackytoons Studios. He was fired due to his show being bumped out of first place in the ratings. He was introduced to law enforcement when he unknowingly saved cartoon celebrity Donald Duck from a park mugger (mostly due to the help of officer Lucky Piquel) and was given full credit for the mugger's capture.

For his actions, he received the Citizen of Valor award by the Chief of Police, Leonard Kanifky. Bonkers, while soaking in the praise, told the chief about how his experiences starring in police cartoons helped in the capture of the mugger. Chief Kanifky mistook his fictional roles as real life, worldwide police accounts and, thinking that Bonkers would be a benefit to the police force, asked if the former cartoon star would like a job working for the Hollywood PD, which Bonkers accepted because of his recent unemployment from Wackytoons Studios. Bonkers then requested Lucky as his partner, and the two established the beginning of the Toon Division. When Bonkers first came home to Lucky's house, he was treated as a sort of adopted son to Lucky.

Although Bonkers means well, he usually messes up cases for his fellow officers due to his lack of experience in law enforcement and his wild, exaggerated, cartoony nature. He even tells Lucky at one point that he is not good at logical police thinking because he is a toon. Not only does Bonkers make a design change between the 'Lucky' and 'Miranda' episodes, his personality is slightly tweaked as well. Despite being a police officer, Bonkers is unarmed. However, he still carries a badge.

In the 'Miranda' episodes, he's portrayed as a rather clumsy, somewhat foolish character who ends up being the show's punching bag. In the Lucky episodes, he's less of a buffoon and more of an Inspector Clouseau-type, in control of himself (though still hyperactive), and carries an extensive knowledge about the toon and their behavior, which is an asset on cases dealing with rogue toons (Lucky would very rarely acknowledge this, although he knows it deep inside). The joke is his lack of law enforcement experience and procedure is still his "Achilles' heel".

Supporting characters

Piquel family

Wright family

Los Angeles Police Department officers

Recurring civilian characters

Recurring antagonists

Production

The series played 65 episodes, as part of The Disney Afternoon.[8] They were not created in chronological order: The "Miranda" episodes were actually produced first, excluding the two-part series premiere, which featured Piquel and Bonkers meeting for the first time.[9] This discrepancy becomes evident when observing the look of the main character in both sets of episodes. In the Raw Toonage shorts, Bonkers was orange with one brown spot, golf-club-like ears, and an undone tail. When the Lucky Piquel-era episodes (produced by Robert Taylor) were made, the character had a major overhaul: skinnier ears, two black spots on each his tufts, black Tigger-like stripes on his tail, and a different uniform. The Miranda Wright-era episodes (produced by Duane Capizzi, Robert Hathcock & Greg Weisman) use Bonkers's original look from Raw Toonage. The series also occasionally featured episodes of "cartoons" from Bonkers's pre-police actor days, all lifted from the Raw Toonage series. The two-part premiere can be seen to show the reason for the difference in appearance as he mostly appears with his Black Dot Lucky design, but when he goes into makeup, his sweater is put on, and when his head re-appears, his spots have turned brown, then his ears are 'puffed' up. While this works for explaining the two designs in context, New partners does not show or explain why he then decided to use his 'make up' version for every day.

The Raw Toonage shorts were an after-thought of production.[10] While Bonkers was in pre-production, the Raw Toonage team headed by Larry Latham produced 12 "He's Bonkers" shorts. These shorts were, in the context of Bonkers, explained to be some of the shorts Bonkers made at Wackytoons Studios before he was fired. The animated short entitled Petal to the Metal was originally shown in theaters in 1992 before the feature movie 3 Ninjas,[11] while the rest were shown on the program Raw Toonage. In syndication, the shorts were collected into four full episodes with fillers of new material in between.

Meanwhile, Duane Capizzi, making his producing debut, was brought into the fold and teamed with animation veteran Robert Hathcock and charged with making 65 episodes (a full season's worth in syndication). The episodes theoretically would feature Bonkers with Wright as his partner. These episodes came back from overseas animation studios looking less than spectacular, causing considerable concern at Disney. Ultimately, the original team was replaced, and a team headed by Robert Taylor came in. Only 19 of the original-order shows survived to air; they are what is known as the "Miranda Wright episodes" of Bonkers. Nine of these episodes were aired on The Disney Channel during the first half of 1993 as a preview for the series,[3] before its syndicated premiere in the fall. The 19 Miranda Wright episodes are shown toward the end of the series in the official continuity. Greg Weisman (co-creator of Disney's Gargoyles) worked on the Miranda episodes, and Bonkers's relationship with Miranda inspired Goliath's relationship with Elisa Maza.

Taylor threw out the old premise of the show. He replaced it with the Lucky Piquel scenario, but his episodes were revised and established to occur before the original episodes. 42 episodes of the "Piquel Era" were made, including one (New Partners on the Block), which attempted to bridge the gap between the two somewhat contradictory storylines.

The series was long incorrectly rumored to have originally been intended as a Roger Rabbit spin-off series which ended up being scrapped due to licensing issues from Amblin Entertainment, with Bonkers being created instead. However, in 2008, Greg Weisman, who was a writer on the series, denied this. While confirming that the title character was inspired by Roger, and the Toontown concept had also been influenced by the film, Weisman insists that Bonkers was always meant to be his own character.[12]

The syndicated version of the series (which omits several of the original episodes that survived first-run) was last seen on Toon Disney until late 2004.

The series became available to stream on Disney+, upon its launch on November 12, 2019.

New Partners on the Block

"New Partners on the Block" was a transition episode that showed how Bonkers went from having Lucky Piquel as a partner to having Miranda Wright as his newest partner. The episode was much like the pilot episode/movie "Going Bonkers", using the CGI rain and bringing back the characters that were associated with Bonkers, those characters being Fawn Deer, Jitters A. Dog, and Grumbles Grizzly and, unlike the pilot, had more speaking and screen time.

At the end of the episode, Bonkers, along with Miranda and Lucky, capture the main villain, bomber Fireball Frank and rescue FBI agent Tolson in the process, making Bonkers and Miranda a team and giving Lucky a job as an FBI agent in Washington, D.C. Piquel. His family Dyl (wife) and Marilyn (daughter), Fall-Apart Rabbit, Toots and Brodrick the toon radio all subsequently relocated to Washington, D.C., allowing them to be written out of the show.

This episode was removed from rotation in the United States after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing due to its bombing/terrorism plot, and was consequently never rerun on Toon Disney, even before Disney's stricter censorship policies following the September 11 attacks. Another 3 episodes, "Fall Apart Bomb Squad", "Witless for the Prosecution", and "The Stork Exchange", were also never shown on Toon Disney for similar reasons. However, three of those episodes have been rerun in Europe (especially in Italy). In addition, those three episodes are available to stream on Disney+.

Home media

Bonkers was released on three VHS tapes and Betamax tapes in 1994 by Walt Disney Home Video, each containing no more than two episodes. They include the following:

VHS titles Episodes Release date
Going Bonkers "Going Bonkers" (Parts 1 and 2) 1994
Basic Spraining "Basic Spraining"
"Is Toon Fur Really Warm?" 		1994
I Oughta Be in Toons "I Oughta Be in Toons"
"Weather or Not" 		1994

Streaming

The series is available to stream on Disney+ in the U.S. since its November 12, 2019 launch.

Other appearances and references

There is a possible reference to Bonkers in the 9th episode of the twelfth season, "HOMR", at 3:06, in which a cardboard cutout of an orange cat alongside other cartoons in a police uniform appears briefly.

Video games

The series inspired three video games. The first, titled Bonkers, is a platform game by Capcom, released for the Super NES in October 1994.[13] [14] In the game, Bonkers must retrieve three items stolen from a museum.

An action game by Sega, also titled Bonkers, was released in 1994 for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. It consists of four mini-games in which Bonkers attempts to apprehend criminals from the series.

The third game, , was published for the Game Gear in 1995, followed three years later by a Brazilian-only release on the Master System. In the game, Bonkers sets out to rescue Lucky and several toons who have been captured.

External links

Notes and References

  1. Book: Perlmutter . David . The Encyclopedia of American Animated Television Shows . 2018 . Rowman & Littlefield . 978-1538103739 . 87–88 .
  2. Book: Leszczak . Bob . Single Season Sitcoms of the 1990s: A Complete Guide . 2018 . McFarland . 978-1-4766-3198-1 . 26 . 26 February 2020 . en.
  3. The Disney Channel Magazine, Vol. 11, no. 2, February/March 1993: pp. 28, 34.
  4. Book: Erickson . Hal . Television Cartoon Shows: An Illustrated Encyclopedia, 1949 Through 2003 . 2005 . 2nd . McFarland & Co . 978-1476665993 . 151–153.
  5. Web site: TV REVIEW: 'Rangers', 'Bonkers!' Not Top Kiddie Fare. Los Angeles Times. October 3, 1994. September 20, 2015.
  6. Web site: Korkis. Jim. September 18, 2019. Do You Remember Bonkers?.
  7. News: Moore . Scott . The Voices . The Washington Post . 1993-08-29 . 2015-09-20.
  8. Book: America Toons In: A History of Television Animation – David Perlmutter – Google Books . 2014-03-18 . 9781476614885 . 2015-09-20. Perlmutter . David . McFarland .
  9. Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: Web site: Cosmo. January 30, 2020. The Cartoon They Didn't Want You to See - How Disney Went Bonkers. YouTube. live. October 16, 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20211016132803/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-kqJrxgWUY&ab_channel=Cosmo . 2021-10-16 .
  10. Book: Perlmutter . David . America Toons In: A History of Television Animation . 2014 . McFarland . 978-1-4766-1488-5 . 275 . 4 March 2020 . en.
  11. Hicks, Chris. 1992-08-07. Movie Review: 3 Ninjas . Desert News, via desertnews.com, retrieved on 2007-08-29.
  12. Web site: ASK GREG ARCHIVES. Station Eight: A Gargoyles Fan Site. January 14, 2018.
  13. 1994 . Bonkers preview . GameFan . United States . 2 . 10 . 97.
  14. ProReview: Bonkers. GamePro. 64. IDG. November 1994. 164.

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