It's usually pretty easy to trace back the origins of a character.
You just flip through history until you find their first appearance.
But for Bugs Bunny, that history is a little more complicated.
Bugs doesn't have a specific creator.
He's a character created by a committee.
You see, unlike the rest of the Looney Tunes characters, Bugs Bunny doesn't have any one definitive origin.
You have to break up the roots of the character in stages.
One of the earliest instances of a Bugs Bunny-like character in appearance
was in the 1938 short "Porky's Hare Hunt,"
a remake of Tex Avery's "Porky's Duck Hunt" which first introduced Daffy Duck.
Here, the Bugs Bunny prototype is more or less insane, due to him being a reskinned Daffy.
The name came about in 1939, scribbled on a model sheet by Charlie Thorson as "Bug's Bunny"
note the possessive apostrophe
in reference to Ben "Bugs" Hardaway
the director of "Porky's Hare Hunt" and one of the several artists involved in the creation of Bugs Bunny.
Then, in 1940, the character was handed over to Tex Avery, Bob Givens, and Mel Blanc.
Who together would shape the attitude and personality of the Bugs Bunny we know today.
Bugs represented the collective talents of some of the best creators in the business.
And throughout the years, he would be passed around an incredible roster of artists
like Friz Freleng, Bob Clampett, and Chuck Jones.
Each tweaking and refining the traits of what would become one of the most iconic cartoon characters of all time.
He's up there with characters like Superman in terms of sheer longevity and pop cultural endurance.
But he doesn't seem like a character from the 1940s.
His anarchic, gender-bending, wise-ass personality is pretty progressive even by today's standards.
And he's aged so well because he isn't locked into any one specific pool of relatability.
Something like the Flintstones can be revived again and again, but that Honeymooners era sitcom approach
doesn't really get well with a modern audience.
Bugs, on the other hand, can work in any situation because he's incredibly versatile.
And that's why he's appeared in more films than any other cartoon character in history.
He's about as frequently used in film as Sherlock Holmes, Hitler, or God.
And Bugs' adaptability comes from his personality
which is a mishmash of traits from D'Artagnan, Rex Harrison, and Dorothy Parker
but he isn't an imitation of anyone else, like how Yogi Bear is a very blatant imitation of Art Carney.
And that's important when trying to make a character stand out.
A kid mimicking Bugs Bunny is mimicking Bugs Bunny, not Clark Gable or Groucho Marx
because those influences never turn into caricature.
Bugs is immediately identifiable because of his attitude, his voice, but most importantly, his movement.
Characters don't move like Bugs Bunny.
Bugs: Well, shut my mouth and call me Cornpone, if it ain't the little ol' South
There's very little expression in modern animation at the same budgetary tier as Looney Tunes.
Hands at the waist, feet together, static posing... There are a lot of limiting factors to blame for that.
Certain character designs don't even allow for that sort of dynamic expression
but it's that movement that really brings out the personality.
Chuck Jones: Now, to define character animation, you have to go to "The Three Little Pigs"
which was the first cartoon that was made, and it was made in 1933.
It was three characters that looked alike, acted differently
and you could define them by the way they move or what they look like.
And then, all of a sudden, we realized that we had on our hands a method of communication which could establish character.
Kristian: And rather than animating on ones like Disney,
Warner Bros. chose to animate on twos to get fluid motion while keeping the budget relatively low.
"Ones" meaning one frame per image, "twos" meaning two frames per image.
Animating on twos makes the images less smooth but snappier
which benefits the fast-paced slapstick style of comedy.
And Chuck Jones very often used a technique called smear posing
using a series of abstract smeared shapes for the in betweens to get from one key frame to another
to simulate that smooth motion.
The movement wasn't always realistic, but it was believable.
Charles Solomon: That's why the ballet moves in "What's Opera, Doc?" are so well executed.
As caricatured and as absurd as it is, when Bugs does his fish dive into Elmer's arms
he lands with perfect port de bras, his limb placement is all impeccable.
Kristian: There's an elegance in that animation that's accentuated by the live orchestra
and Looney Tunes' use of classical music.
Rossini's "William Tell Overture"
Bugs as Leopold Stokowski conducting a tenor through his aria
and to this day, I still hear "Ride of the Valkyries" as "Kill the Wabbit"
Bugs: Kill the wabbit?
Bugs Bunny was a very important figure in my childhood.
And despite Bugs being the corporate mascot for Warner Bros., he didn't fade into that role.
He's always very much been a character of his own.
Disney and Mickey are synonymous with each other.
Mickey's a more recognizable icon, but it's dissolved into that logo.
He's put up on a pedestal to be tame and inoffensive, which gives him that element of international appeal
while Bugs is a hardline New Yorker: brash, rude, defiant – unmistakably American
which adds another layer to that cultural barrier.
Mickey's the better T-shirt, but Bugs makes you laugh; he's an entertaining character
not just the face of a corporation.
He's effortlessly cool, always in command in the face of all danger, yet somehow still the underdog.
You always root for him even though you know he's gonna win
'cause he can kick your ass dressed as Scarlett O'Hara.
Bugs is who you want to be, nobody wants to be Mickey Mouse.
[Playing] [Tyler, The Creator and Toro Y Moi - Hey You]