Stupor Duck

Stupor Duck is a 1956 Warner Bros. Looney Tunes animated short directed by Robert McKimson.[1] The short was released on July 7, 1956, and stars Daffy Duck in a Superman spoof.[2] The voices were performed by Mel Blanc and Daws Butler; Butler — who voiced the narrator and the newspaper editor — was uncredited.

Stupor Duck
Lobby card
Directed byRobert McKimson
Additional director:
Friz Freleng (uncredited)
Produced byEdward Selzer (uncredited)
Story byTedd Pierce
Additional story:
Michael Maltese (uncredited)
StarringMel Blanc
Daws Butler
(uncredited)
Narrated byDaws Butler (uncredited)
Music byMusical direction:
Carl Stalling
Orchestra:
Milt Franklyn (uncredited)
Animation byTed Bonnicksen
Keith Darling
Russ Dyson
George Grandpré
Harry Love (special animation effects)
A.C. Gamer (additional special animation effects - uncredited)
Layouts byRobert Gribbroek
Additional layout:
Hawley Pratt (uncredited)
Backgrounds byRichard H. Thomas
Additional background:
Paul Julian (uncredited)
Color processTechnicolor
Distributed byWarner Bros.
The Vitaphone Corporation
Release date
July 7, 1956 (US)
Running time
7 min (one reel)
LanguageEnglish

Synopsis

Daffy Duck is cast as Stupor Duck and his alter ego, Cluck Trent. The cartoon begins as a parody of the opening to The Adventures of Superman, which-after introducing Stupor Duck as a "Strange being from another planet"-shows Stupor Duck being:

  • "Faster than a bullet" (a cork fired from a toy pop gun)
  • "More powerful than a speeding locomotive" (a recycled clip from Hare Trigger)
  • "Able to leap the tallest building" (the depicted tall building called the "McKimson Associates" building [sic], with Stupor Duck's cape catching on the flagpole at the very top, causing Daffy to nearly choke)

After the parodied introduction, the film proceeds to the story:

Mild-mannered newspaper reporter Cluck Trent, taking a break from writing, overhears a conversation coming from his editor's office. The one-sided conversation is from a villain on a "corny soap opera" the editor is watching on TV. The unseen soap's villain calls himself "Aardvark Ratnik," a Russian-accented terrorist bent on world domination. Ratnik supposedly threatens widespread destruction (though his demands are never heard); his first line, after a maniacal laugh, is "You cannot stop me, Mr. Newspaper Editor!", which leads Cluck to the erroneous conclusion that Ratnik actually exists, his threats are serious, and that stopping him is a job for Stupor Duck. Cluck runs to the broom closet to change into his alter-ego (after an errant change into a witch's costume, and then a minor adjustment to Stupor Duck's shoulder pads) and begins his search for the non-existent antagonist.

One by one, Stupor Duck spots "examples" of "Aardvark's" supposed work and, before tackling each one, bellowing his battle cry, "THIS is a job for STU-U-U-POR Duck!". His search includes:

  • A skyscraper being destroyed. Stupor Duck pushes the building back upright, not knowing it was to be demolished and replace with a new city hall; he is punched out by the site foreman ("Then the lights went out all over the world!").
  • A sinking ship, which was actually a submarine conducting war games. Stupor Duck pulls the sub back to the surface and is first shot by its deck gun; when he dares "Ratnik" to try that again, Stupor Duck is promptly blown up and sunk by one of the sub's torpedoes.
  • A dynamite charge at the base of a railroad trestle as a train runs over it. It turned out to be a Warner Brothers location shoot. Stupor Duck grabs the dynamite and heads skyward, and is blown up {off-screen} by the unknowing explosives expert. The expert is abruptly showered with black feathers as the "S" shield from Stupor Duck's costume softly lands in his hand; a featherless and disgruntled Daffy walks up and grabs the shield saying, "I'll just relieve you of that, if you don't mind".
  • Lastly, Stupor Duck hears a siren while unknowingly flying over government testing grounds. He spots what he believes to be an armed warhead, but is actually a government moon rocket. Right after Stupor Duck lands on the nose cone to try to stop it, the rocket launches into space, leaving behind Stupor Duck's costume in its wake.

As the rocket hurtles skyward, two rock climbers see it and shout "Up there in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's STU-U-UPOR Duck!" The final shot is of the now-naked Daffy screaming, still clinging to the rocket for dear life at it streaks toward the moon.

Availability
  • VHS- The Stars of Space Jam: Daffy Duck
  • VHS- Looney Tunes Collectors Edition: Porky and Daffy
  • DVD- Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 5, Disc 1
  • Also the first wish in Daffy Duck's Fantastic Island, except at the end, the rocket sends him back to the island, where he limps over to and inadvertently kicks the wishing well with the leg he was limping on.
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References
  1. Beck, Jerry; Friedwald, Will (1989). Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons. Henry Holt and Co. p. 288. ISBN 0-8050-0894-2.
  2. Lenburg, Jeff (1999). The Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons. Checkmark Books. pp. 60–62. ISBN 0-8160-3831-7. Retrieved 6 June 2020.
Preceded by
Rocket Squad		 List of Daffy Duck cartoons
1956		 Succeeded by
A Star Is Bored
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