Roller Coaster Rabbit

“Roller Coaster Rabbit,” Disney’s 1990 “Maroon Cartoon” (shown before “Dick Tracy”), reunites Baby Herman (April Winchell and Lou Hirsch), Roger (Charles Fleischer), and Jessica Rabbit (Kathleen Turner) in a funny, fast-paced homage to the Hollywood cartoons of the ‘40s and ‘50s.

Roger has become a little smarter, if not brighter, rabbit. When Mom (Winchell) tells him to watch Baby Herman while she has her palm read at a carnival, he begs her not to leave him in charge. Remember what happened last time? However, Mom nicely persuades him: “You’ll do it or it’ll be rabbit stew for dinner!” Predictably, chaos occurs the minute she turns her back.

Charles Solomon said in his review, “The film combines the lavish look of Disney’s early “Silly Symphonies” with the slapstick lunacy of the best Warner Bros.’ cartoons. The action is similarly madcap but during the ‘40s, director Rob Minkoff and his crew never could have gotten away with that one anatomically suggestive gag about a huge bull and a balloon. They’ve also tucked in a few inside jokes: A faded poster in the background reads “See the Little Mermaid!””

“Tummy Trouble,” the first Roger Rabbit short, dove the audience into a chaotic realm where the hilarious antics never let up. “Roller Coaster Rabbit” is funnier because it’s more intelligently paced.

Solomon noted, “Instead of bombarding the audience with nonstop gags, the cartoon gradually accelerates to its no-holds-barred climax, a hair-raising ride on a roller coaster that makes Magic Mountain’s Viper look like a playground slide. A combination of drawn and computer animation gives this sequence a dizzying realism that will have the more timorous members of the audience clutching their seats.”

At the time, “Roller Coaster Rabbit,” looked to be the last cartoon for Roger Rabbit until the sequel to “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” was released, which doesn’t look like it will happen now. Solomon pointed out, “In a recent telephone interview, Walt Disney Studios Chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg said: “We have a couple of ideas for other cartoons we’re working on, but we haven’t decided whether or not to continue producing them--that’s something we have to decide with Amblin.””

This short is not available on Disney+, but you can find it on YouTube. If you enjoyed the first Roger Rabbit short, then I recommend you see this one. You will enjoy this one thoroughly, I promise you. This is for all Roger Rabbit fans.

Tomorrow I will look at a comedy that is good, but probably will be another film I won’t be rewatching, in “Disney Month 2025.”