Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Daffy Duck, Troubadour



It hasn't been the best Fall TV season; in fact, it's been one of the worst in recent memory. But one of the bright spots is The Looney Turnes Show, a crazy attempt to take the Looney Tunes characters and put them in a Sitcom.

I'll let you think about that for a minute.

[eating carrot in nonchalant way while waiting, not unlike a certain cool-as-hell Bunny....]

Sounds crazy, right?

Somehow it works - and if you had any love for Buggs and crew I recommend it whole-heartily. (new episodes are on Cartoon Network Tuesdays at 8, but they rerun the episodes all the time, so just check for it).

One of the biggest revelations has been Daffy Duck. I never realized with a sociopath he is. All the Looney Tunes characters have mental health issues (I'm working on a list of them for a column), but Daffy takes the cake. his pathological narcissism is so all-encompassing it's almost inspiring.

Which makes what happened on tonight's episode all the more fascinating.


One of the really cool things the Looney Tunes Show does is 1 minute music videos as they are going to commercial. The songs are sung by various Looney Tunes characters but are not necessarily related to the plot of that week's episode.


So, last night the video section had Porky Pig asking how you know you're in love.  Daffy Duck  supplies the answer, singing a ballad while playing the piano.

I can't tell you how strange this is.  After all the episodes of Daffy totally focused inward - to hear him tenderly explain Love was....well, it was something.

The song starts off slowly and then gets brisker as the lyrics get ever more...bizarre.  I would much rather show you the video, but I have been unable to find it anywhere. (Even finding the lyrics was impossible. I had to write them down myself while listening to the song - which took endless rewinding and pausing - and then like 9 kinds of idiot I didn't save the notepad document and my computer crashed shortly thereafter. It took me forever to track them down again, as by then I had deleted the episode.)

Anyway, I don't have the video, so you'll have to bear with me.  The Song is funny enough that you should get the jist of it.

The crazy part - as bugnutz insane as this song is - Daffy essentially gets it right.  This IS what being in love is like. [Some of my spelling is off because I have tried to re-create how Daffy draws out the words.





"That's How You Know You're In Love"
(Written and performed by Daffy Duck and uknown background singer(s))

[slowly, Daffy at the piano, half singing, half talking, the way lounge singers sometimes do - and Porky standing right next to him]

How do you know when you're in love?
Well, you came to the right frie-end. 
Love is like an ice cream sundae - 
That you think is never gonna eh--ennd. 
Love make you feel all ting---gell-ly, light-headed and pretty, 
Just like a.....700-foot robot that's invading a city....

[aside - spoken]
Porky: uh, uh...Robot?
Daffy: Exactly

[uptempo]
But you're not an evil robot -
You're a robot looking for love. 
But there's not a lot of giant 700 foot robots around....to love. 
So you glue a bunch of smaller robots together 
And make one big super robot, 
And you and your robot go out to brunch, 
And by the end of brunch you're in love. 
Trust me, that's exactly what it's like to be in love.


Then you and your robot lover destroy the entire Schenectady Turnpike, 
'Cause you're doing a robot love-dance and you don't care what it looks like. 
And when the armies of the world come to fight you, you get into your spaceship, 
And you tenderly embrace while you fly into space, 
'cause Earth's not ready for your giant robot love. 

That's how you know you're love.
[unknown voice] (Find yourself a robot to love)
That's how you feel when you're in love.

[at this point Porky and Daffy have some back-and-forth that I didn't get copied down. Basically Porky can't understand what Daffy is trying to say, so Daffy offers a completely different helpful analogy.]

It's just like you're merman, that's 700 feet tall, 
And you're looking for a lady merman, to love.



[aside - spoken]
Porky: Don't you mean Mermaid?
Daffy: Don't interrupt



But the ocean is a massive place, 
And there's not a lot of lady mermen, 
So in order to increase your chances 
You travel to the Undersea Merman Mall
That's where fish and mollusks go to find love. 
And you find a female merman who is working at a kiosk
Selling cellphone covers and personalized key chains. 
Your hand brushes one of her tentacles and she just melts inside.
The manager gets insanely jealous 
And stabs you with his trident and you're dead. 
[unknown voice] (Stabs you with his trident and you're dead.)
That's how you know you're in loooooooove!


Daffy - who knew!  Every once in awhile, he just gets it.  As crazy as this song sounds - that's exactly what it's like!!!




UPDATE!

November 19

I finally found the video so you can watch it for yourself!  I did a good job of describing, if I do't say so myself. 











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