The Woody Woodpecker Movie

 

The Woody Woodpecker Movie-Details before script writing.

                I’ve seen plenty of cartoon characters become movie characters from super-tough industrial-strength superheroes like The Incredible Hulk and Superman, to spooky, sinister freak shows like Batman (In his distorted image) and Spawn, to benign clowns like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck, to obnoxious comedians like Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. I strongly believe that the reason Hollywood keeps doing movies like that is because they don’t have any better ideas to come up with, rather than they actually want to display a cartoon character accurately from its basic origins to audiences who have probably never even heard about them before. Either way, Hollywood, as you’ve no doubt seen, has a habit of only USING a cartoon character as a member of their script. To them, it doesn’t have to be accurate just so long as it gets all the drooling kiddies all hopping up in their seats, the adults grinning and thumbs-upping, and the teenagers going “Dude!”. I mean (Ha, Ha,) who really cares, right? I DO!!!! I mean, seriously, what’s next? Popeye the sailor man becoming some dirty spy who kills a base full of armed guards after eating spinach? Well, I certainly don’t mean to make those same kinds of mistakes. As a researcher and self-proclaimed expert on the subject of cartoons, I would do my best to make a feature-length storyline that is as accurate as possible to the subject and still as entertaining as possible. Anyway, the subject of this movie script is a well-known pop-culture cartoon by the name of Woody Woodpecker.

                In order to write an accurate and appropriate storyline, I would need to know a lot about Woody Woodpecker, so here’s what I DO know about him: Woody Woodpecker was created by Walter Lantz as his most famous and possibly greatest animated character ever. The ones who came up with Woody Woodpecker also came up with popular Looney Tunes characters Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, which helps to explain why Woody is hyperactive and zany even for a cartoon character. Woody Woodpecker was created during a time when cartoons were mainly shown in theatres, and therefore had to be of a decidedly higher quality than they are now. To be more precise, Woody Woodpecker came out in 1942, a year after another one of Walter Lantz’s recurring cartoon characters, Andy Panda. When Woody Woodpecker first came out, he wasn’t as cute as the red-headed bird most of us remember during, say… the eighties? In fact, according to what I heard, when he first came out, the producers initially thought he was the ugliest thing they had ever seen. However, Woody easily won their approval with madcap routines and general screwiness. Throughout the years, he became cuter and more streamlined. Woody Woodpecker first premiered during an Andy Panda cartoon, and most assuredly outlasted him in terms of popularity.

                As for the character Andy Panda, he was inspired by the first panda brought to America at the zoo. Andy Panda began as a cute little bear cub who got into mischief, often without realizing it. In other words, he was kind of a black and white teddy bear version of Dennis the Menace. Andy Panda’s enemies were a set of “Pygmy Panda Hunters”, who wanted to hunt him down to put him in a zoo. In one cartoon (Possibly the last one involving the pygmy hunters), Andy got a magic wand in the mail that brought him into direct conflict with the witchdoctor of the pygmy tribe. The pygmy hunters were small, savage black characters who didn’t make sense, especially for hunting a panda, but I’d say they were funny and creative enough characters. Anyway, the focus of these cartoons changed to Andy and his parents being more modernized and his father being anger prone and more than a little accident prone, but still trying to be a good father. Sometime after the introduction of Woody Woodpecker (Whom, I think, at that time, was meant to be merely a flavor of the week character) Andy Panda’s cartoons shifted to Andy starring in cartoons as either a stooge-like character or a minor character altogether. In either case, he exhibited a quiet and neutral personality which was a sharp contrast to Woody Woodpecker. In his early cartoons, he seemed to be portrayed as a negro personality, but since then, his personality has been changed to a white character.

                Andy Panda was an anthropomorphic giant panda, but in both the cartoons where he was a cub and the cartoons when he starred solo (I think he was supposed to be an adult, but I can’t really be sure) he was short and cute just like Porky Pig or Mickey Mouse. Later on, Andy Panda changed considerably in terms of appearance and personality (Not that he displayed a great sense of personality) to more-or-less a ripoff of Mickey Mouse. By this, I mean he had big black ears like Mickey, he had a high-pitched voice like Mickey, he had a lovable dumb dog, he wore shoes and pants without a shirt, he was mostly black but wore white gloves, and in his last animated feature, he also had a stereotypical girlfriend (Which, as we all know, means a female clone of the main character with a sassy, saucy personality.) who looked suspiciously like Minnie Mouse! From what I’ve read, that was the last animated cartoon of Andy Panda because the studio shut down afterward for a time and when it reopened, the cartoons were discontinued. However, Andy Panda continued on in comics and comic books with a costar named Charlie Chicken. Charlie Chicken seems like just a regular sidekick character like Donald Duck is to Mickey Mouse. I have seen only one cartoon involving Andy Panda with this Charlie Chicken (Who, by the way, is a rooster and not exactly a chicken), in which Andy Panda was trying to kill and eat Charlie Chicken for a meal on meatless Friday.

                Andy Panda starred in many cartoons, including at least two Academy Award nominated cartoons and at least two cartoons costarring with Woody Woodpecker. This makes it all the more ironic that he had very poor self-expression ability and was altogether lost to the winds of animated history. But, enough about Andy Panda. Woody Woodpecker was always a trouble-maker, and therefore has had many enemies over the years. In the earliest cartoons, he was annoying a policeman, and then he was bugging a walrus with a Swedish accent who would later be referred to as Wally Walrus (Real original, huh?), after that, he was given an enemy that actually WANTED to hurt Woody. Of course, I’m referring to Buzz Buzzard, a cheating, swindling bully who often tries to trick Woody out of cash. Also, a villain seen more than once in his cartoons was a wolf, and in some of his first cartoons, he had a fox costar. Later on, when Woody moved from the theatres to his own cartoon show, he had at least two other recurring enemies including a cranky woman called Ms. Meany, and an alligator with a Southern accent named Gabby. As for Woody’s goals, he wasn’t the type to always go out of his way to help or save others.

                Woody Woodpecker is not only totally crazy, but also very lazy. He’s the type of guy who spends a lot of time and hard work just trying to avoid the work he’s supposed to be doing. Another common goal of his has been to get food. This is also a common goal among other cartoon characters of the past, one example of which is Felix the Cat. Mooching and begging, and occasionally cheating to get food doesn’t seem like a very good goal, but if you think about it, it’s innocent in a way that someone who’s really hungry does need to eat, and it’s inconsequential enough to not have to think about it enough. In any case, Woody Woodpecker drives his enemies crazy and usually hurts them a lot in a comical they-get-hurt-but-they’re-never-really-injured sort of way. His laziness and apathy about hurting people, not to mention a maniacal laugh all makes Woody very unlike a cartoon hero, but he’s been quite popular, so he must be doing SOMETHING right. In addition to food, Woody seems quite interested in baseball, driving around in a beat-up old car, touring various areas and of course, pecking holes in wood. In a remade 1999 to 2002 version of his show, Woody showed that he was Scottish and that he really liked golfing and watching the Highland Games.

                In addition to having a lot of enemies and some very quirky goals, Woody has also had some friends. Woody’s first recurring character costar was, of course, Andy Panda, but in a television cartoon show, it was revealed that he had at least two other friends, one of which was a guy with a cane who was kind of hard to identify and I don’t know his name. The other one was a recurring character with his own cartoons, at least three of which had Woody Woodpecker as a cameo guest star. I’m talking about Chilly Willy the penguin. It was indicated that Chilly Willy was only meant for one cartoon, but the creators clearly thought he had more potential. In his first cartoon, Chilly Willy was a cute little penguin who was freezing his little tailfeathers off, and really wanted to warm up in an arctic ship. A guard dog on duty wouldn’t let the penguin in during the captain’s absence. However, eventually, after downing some brandy, the dog unplugged a cork in the ship, causing it to sink. Chilly Willy had to swim through a gusher and plug the hole. He won the captain’s approval, and became the ship’s new mascot, with full heater privileges. In some of his first cartoons, Chilly Willy retained this formula of thwarting the Saint Bernard to try and get warm, but eventually had the dog and a polar bear as his friends and seemed quite at home in the arctic. His appearance also changed to something obnoxiously cute.

                In addition to these, Woody also had three other friends, including his girlfriend, Winnie Woodpecker, and his niece and nephew Knothead and Splinter. Winnie Woodpecker, strangely enough, was only seen once during all of Woody’s theatrical cartoons, as far as I know, and I have no evidence to suggest that she was anywhere near a regular guest star in the cartoon series that followed. However, according to my sources, Youtube included, Winnie Woodpecker was featured as Woody’s girlfriend. From what I could tell, Winnie Woodpecker wore clothes just as often as Woody did, though in everything I’ve seen with Winnie Woodpecker, Woody was clothed. Presumably, if he hadn’t been wearing a shirt or something, Winnie would still be wearing a skirt or a dress to show that she’s feminine. In the 1999 to 2002 cartoon show that followed, Winnie was a much more featured and recurring character, and seemed to be just as nutty as her boyfriend, or else very close. In the 1999 to 2002 cartoon show, Winnie looked like a female version of Woody Woodpecker and wore only a green skirt. Also, I don’t know the story with the comic book Winnie Woodpecker, but in her one theatrical cartoon, Winnie was a teenager of probably high school age, and undeniably had bosoms in addition to her retro-teenage attire. (She was sought not only by a teenage Woody, but also a teenage Buzz Buzzard) In her later animated version, she, of course had no such attributes.

                Then, we get to Knothead and Splinter. Two of Walter Lantz’s littlest super stars, Knothead and Splinter were first introduced in a Woody Woodpecker comic book, the plot of which I don’t know at the moment, but were then introduced in a theatrical cartoon called “Get Lost”, where they put a new twist on the classical story of Hansel and Gretel. The only other pre-nineties cartoon featuring only them that I am presently aware of is a cartoon called “Red Riding Hoodlum”, in which they put another twist on the story of (you guessed it.) Little Red Riding Hood. As for general descriptions and information, it was never, to my recollection, made perfectly clear whether Knothead was Woody’s nephew and Splinter was Woody’s niece, or whether it was the other way around, but it was always assumed that the former was correct. These woodpecker kids were definitely cute and they were each roughly half Woody’s size. Knothead wore a red bow tie, and Splinter wore a little black bow in her hair and a little green skirt. Their ages were never clear either, but judging strictly based on physical development  and voices of the characters, they looked and sounded about nine years old. In the 1999 to 2002 cartoon show, however, they looked and sounded considerably younger and less developed; probably about five or six, and Splinter had a pink bow in her hair and a pink mini skirt while Knothead wore no clothes and looked very much like a smaller version of his uncle! They also had more cartoons with just themselves where they drove adults like Buzz Buzzard and Wally Walrus crazy.

                Woody Woodpecker has also made quite an impact on our society as a whole. He has a balloon in the Thanksgiving Day parade, and a statue in a history of television museum, and he will always retain an important part in pop-culture history as well as being Walter Lantz’s most successful cartoon character. Still, the thing that audiences who have seen past cartoons, in theatres and on television, once and many times, will remember about this crazy featherduster is his maniacal laugh. “Ha-ha-ha-haaa-ha!” That laugh was actually made into a song during a cartoon entitled “The Wet Blanket Policy”, after his silent period. It was very catchy and it really still is. Anyway, the last seven or eight paragraphs has been to show how much I know about this Woody Woodpecker. I know a whole lot about him, but it’s just because I know a whole lot about a lot of different cartoon characters. I like to research cartoons in order to not be taken by surprise when the movie industry makes one into a movie, and to have enough information on a character and their series to make my own adventure starring that character. In my mind, that helps to keep them alive. I wish I could say having this abundant knowledge on cartoons helped me to enjoy their new series’ and movies, but it more often makes me more disappointed that they’re being bastardized.

                Anyway, enough of this fact-shoving. Time to get to what I’ve written this document to tell you about. The Woody Woodpecker movie will have elements like cartoon characters in the real world (Similar to what you may have seen in the Rocky and Bullwinkle movie), a new villain antagonist (In case you don’t know me, I’ll just tell you I’m good at creating villains.), hidden emotions, plenty of laughs and silliness, and perhaps most important, accuracy of the characters. What I have planned involves an additional character who is NOT a cartoon, that is to say a live-action character. Inspired in part by The Mask’s Stanly Ipkiss, character Ralph is an average nerdy doormat who seems to be a whole lot more interested in the world of cartoons than anything in reality, which is exactly what his lab-assistant girlfriend wants to break up for. Awkward Ralph is an out-of-work writer who wants to sell his latest script, The Woody Woodpecker Movie (No less) to a movie producer. Meanwhile, in the world of cartoons, our favorite red-feathered termite is facing his own set of problems. Woody Woodpecker’s cartoon show has years-since ended, and he and his predecessor/ roommate Andy Panda are looking to start their own cartoon show, at a television studio, but they’re out of luck.

                Woody’s girlfriend, Winnie Woodpecker is also out of luck getting her own cartoon show, as well as a few other members of the cast of Woody’s cartoon show. None of them want to retire yet. At the same time, one of the cartoons seeking their own show is an antagonist of Woody Woodpecker that I have completely made up named Ollie Owl. Ollie Owl is a snooty and egotistical anthropomorphic owl who hates laughter, and hasn’t laughed in, like twenty years. He’s applying for a job in horror and tragedy, but he gets rejected because he’s a cartoon animal and they’re supposed to be funny. (A fact that only serves to make him more annoyed) Ollie Owl comes into a villain lounge where some of the cartoon villains and monsters are less cliché than others. There, he tells the other villains a plan about making the home town into a villains-only cartoon show. The next day, Woody Woodpecker shows how bored he is with unemployment and the aspect of retirement. Unfortunately, he sets in motion a stunt that destroys most of the town. As a result, Woody is brought into court and banished from the city. After that, he is tricked by Buzz Buzzard into going through a portal into the real world. In the real world, Woody is made even more miserable as nobody seems to remember him or know he existed. He has no place to sleep, he has no money for food, and no job of any kind.

                There is a lot of thinking behind the whole extra-problems and sympathy thing. After all, one way or another, a movie audience pays to see emotion. The traditional hero is either a hero because they are especially kind and heroic and influential to the simple minds of the audiences, or else because they have had to put up with an overwhelming ordeal which the audience sympathizes with and makes the protagonist all the more heroic by surviving it. This, I have learned from watching Disney animated movies like Aladdin and The Hunchback Of Notre Dame, where the protagonists are outcasts in spite of a better nature hidden underneath. Woody Woodpecker certainly isn’t the type to rely on good behavior and heroics, and in point of fact, he hasn’t even shown that much better nature in his cartoons. The way I see it though, giving Woody a hard time will make him a little more likable. Anyway, while Woody is stuck in our human world, Ollie Owl is talking to the president of the television company, and arranging a show with the cast of Woody Woodpecker’s former show, along with some of the monsters and villains Ollie knew from the bar. The show is properly arranged and features meaningless drama and meaningless horror.

                At first, the new show demonstrates high ratings, but when those ratings begin to slip, Ollie blames Woody’s friends and then his enemies for bad acting. Wally Walrus foolishly tells Winnie Woodpecker, Andy Panda, Chilly Willy, and Knothead and Splinter about Ollie’s evil scheme and about the portal that let Woody into our world. Buzz Buzzard then lets them through the same portal into our world and they begin to search around for him. Meanwhile, down-on-his-luck Woody follows the sounds of one of his old cartoons to Ralph’s house, where he is, in fact, watching a Woody Woodpecker cartoon. Ralph can’t believe his eyes, and graciously welcomes Woody in, believing he’ll be famous if he can get the press to see he’s housing Woody Woodpecker. Woody loves the atmosphere of free food, free housing, television, and appreciation from a fan. In the cartoon world, ratings get so low that the president of the television company wants to drop the show. Ollie gets desperate and wants to introduce an entirely new cast of characters… and blast the old cast to hot, smoking ash! He finds out about Woody’s friends getting into the real world, and goes into the real world, along with a few other villains and monsters he knows.

                Eventually, Andy Panda gets to Ralph’s house (I’m thinking Knothead and Splinter might meet up there as well, but it seriously is an unnecessary addition.) and notices the great setup he’s got there. He nevertheless tries to convince Woody to come back home and stop Ollie from ruining his home world. During this speech, Ralph realizes for himself that some things are more important than cartoons. Woody is not swayed, and thinks it’s better to stay at Ralph’s house and “retire”. Andy leaves and wants to find Winnie, in hopes that she’ll be able to talk some sense into Woody better. Unfortunately, Ollie Owl and his goons have found and caught all of Woody’s friends and grab Andy as well, bringing them all back to the cartoon world. While Andy and Ralph are away, Woody thinks hard about his friends and family back in the cartoon world, but what really clenches it is when Woody turns on the T.V., and sees a commercial showing Ollie is going to destroy the entire cast of his former show. Woody Woodpecker then wants to get back home, and Ralph’s girlfriend can help them out with the project her lab is working on. Woody gets back to the cartoon world and saves his friends from being destroyed.

                Woody and his friends also defeats Ollie Owl, as well as his villain and monster minions, as well as destroying the set of Ollie’s show as well as a large part of the television company! Throughout all of this defeating, a lot of laughs are generated, and so are a lot of ratings. A television company president wants to make these characters into an all-new cartoon show. Also, at some point, Ollie is tickled with his own feathers and laughs for the first time in years and years. He realizes he actually LIKES comedy and takes a job at a kids’ show. Woody Woodpecker and his friends get their own cartoon show, and everyone in our world gets to know them. With this sudden rise in popularity, the movie producer gladly accepts Ralph’s script for the Woody Woodpecker movie, and Woody and his friends come into our world to celebrate with a wild party. The movie ends as Woody causes another small sort of disaster, and him doing his trademark laugh.