Reddy's Rocket Rescue

One of Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera’s first hires when they (with silent partner George Sidney) opened their own studio in July 1957 was someone who hadn’t worked with them at MGM. It was a writer named Charlie Shows.

Charlie was a former police detective from El Paso who ended up working on, and/or creating, children’s TV shows in Los Angeles, including Time For Beany. He came up with KNBH’s Adventures of Patches, which starred Don Messick as the voice of Patches (Larry Harmon was Wacky Rabbit). In 1951, he was named honorary mayor of Sun Valley, California.

Long-time readers know I’ve been tough on Charlie. He loved rhymes and, to me, too many were really forced or hokey. But he was a good artist and when he worked on Ruff and Reddy, his dialogue comes across better because the series was aimed at younger kids.

(Side note: I give Charlie credit for the immortal words “I hate meeces to pieces.” Whether he came up with it, or Joe Barbera did, I honestly don’t know, but it sounds like something Shows wrote).

Mr. Shows peppers the 12th Ruff and Reddy cartoon, Reddy’s Rocket Rescue, with his (in)famous rhymes. Narrator Messick talks of “Professor Giz, the rocket whiz,” Ruff adds a “Gee whiz, Giz,” and Gizmo observes that “Redd is dead ahead” and to “stand by for a dizzy dive” as he and Ruff make the aforementioned rescue.



As usual, the cartoon starts with a close-to-30-second recap (with re-used animation) from the last episode, when the “whiz” shoots off Reddy’s propeller from his metal beany, and we see the plummeting pooch dropping to his doom.

The adventure continues with Gizmo using a “secret weapon.” It’s an ordinary toilet plunger. “It’s lucky the professor has a bag of tricks, ‘cause Reddy is falling like a bag of bricks,” narrator Messick exclaims. Gizmo proves to be an accurate shot.



Silhouette drawing.



Reddy is his usual belligerent self. “Put me down, you clown!” he gripes. “Oh, gee, Reddy,” responds Ruff, adding “What an attitude! Where’s your gratitude?” It’s no quirk. Reddy’s a jerk (See, Charlie? I can write that way, too).



“What happens to me shouldn’t happen to a dog,” is the episode’s ironic comment.

The troubles aren’t over. The Muni-Mula Air Force, their propellers moving in cycle animation, return. Gizmo uses his “super-secret weapon”—a package that reads “Do not open until Christmas” that has a Fourth of July cracker in it. The “noisy rascals” stare at the package. It explodes. End of Air Force. (Fourth of July? On Muni Mula?).



“You’re a whiz, Gizmo,” says Reddy. “Just call me ‘Giz’,” is the response in more of Shows’ sparkling dialogue.

The three decide to head back to Earth. But look! A mammoth meteor is heading toward them. Will it hit them? We’ll have to wait for the next episode.



Shows left Hanna-Barbera in 1958 to work for Larry Harmon on his Bozo the Clown TV cartoons, but was re-hired in the mid-1960s to craft stories and even lyrics for record albums starring the Hanna-Barbera characters in various tales. He certainly contributed to the studio’s legacy.

Two cues from Bill Loose and John Seely are heard in the background of this episode.

0:00 – No music – Title card.
0:06 – TC-219A CHASE MEDIUM (Loose-Seely) – Recap, Reddy pulled into spacecraft.
1:51 – No music – Reddy in the capsule complains about his treatment.
2:01 – TC-217A CHASE MEDIUM (Loose-Seely) – Muni Mulas fly in formation, end of cartoon.