Edgar Allan Pooh
. . . as the Looney Tunes folks vainly try to warn America against one of their own former starlets, who used his Democratic Term as President of the Screen Actors Union for a stepping stone into the White House. (As BUNNY HUGGED opens, Bugs is employed by wrestling pretender "Ravishing Ronald," an unmistakable allusion to the POTUS occupying our Seat of Government between Jimmy Carter and Poppa Bush.) Yes, America, the rise of a turncoat Dem with NO qualifications other than popularizing a demeaning two-word catch-phrase on a third-rate TV show is NOT "unprecedented," as so many uneducated media pundits have claimed this month. Before Trump shilled his steaks in the middle of a victory speech, "Ravishing Ronald" Reagan was pushing Borax Soap during breaks on TV's WAGON TRAIN show. (As with THE APPRENTICE, some poor Schlub was fired--literally--at the end of most WAGON TRAIN episodes.) As Arnold Schwarzenegger proved, you don't need to be an authentic American to be Gubernator of California (or even be able to pronounce this state's name). This fact makes Trump equally as unqualified as Ravishing Ronald to eat jelly beans in the oval office. Hopefully, Mrs. Trump's astrologers will be equally adept as Nancy Reagan's in Ruling America. Otherwise, we're in for a bumpy ride.
TheLittleSongbird
Good Bugs Bunny cartoon, if a little predictable,and not as well paced, plus I am sorry to say but the stitching scene did not work for me. That said, the climatic scene is funny, and Bugs is still his outlandish self.The animation is nice and detailed, the music is good as always, the story is fine and the voice characterisations from Mel Blanc, a truly brilliant voice actor, are spot on. Also good are the writing and a vast majority of the sight gags. However, as I have said already, it is predictable, somehow I knew that Bugs would win in the end and the pace was rather uneven.Overall, not a favourite of mine I admit but I do recommend it. 7/10 Bethany Cox
phantom_tollbooth
Chuck Jones's 'Bunny Hugged' is a moderately amusing sequel to the superior 'Rabbit Punch'. In that cartoon Bugs Bunny had found himself in the boxing ring, in this one it's the wrestling ring. Pitted once again against The Crusher (hey, in cartoon land a rabbit and a hare are the same thing so it follows logically that so are a boxer and a wrestler!), Bugs spends the whole first half of the cartoon getting viciously pummeled. When he finally breaks out the heckling as his means of beating the physically undefeatable Crusher, 'Bunny Hugged' picks up a little. The jokes are fairly standard and too much faith is placed in The Crusher's dopey reactions to being clobbered but overall its adequately entertaining if largely uninspired stuff. The climactic gag, however, is one of the worst and least funny closing images of any Warner cartoon I can think of. I'm not a huge fan of 'Bunny Hugged', then, but it's an decent time passer and never sinks to the levels of tedium of, say, 'Big Top Bunny'.
Lee Eisenberg
Almost half a century before everyone got really obsessed with wrestling, that carrot-chomping rascal engaged in it...with a vengeance. After belligerent wrestler The Crusher clobbers a challenger, Bugs Bunny quickly enters the fray. At first, The Crusher has the upper hand, but of course Bugs has some tricks up his sleeve. Some of Bugs' antics seem a little risqué, especially for 1951, but there's nothing offensive here. These sorts of cartoons are the REAL definition of "family fun". As Chuck Jones once noted: "Bugs Bunny does what most of us would like to do, but don't have the nerve to do." Splendid.
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