Zip 'N Snort

Zip N' Snort is a 1961 Warner Bros. cartoon in the "Merrie Melodies" series featuring Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner.

Plot

The credits are shown, and the coyote's Latin name ("Evereadii Eatibus") is among them. The camera then zooms to the left to show Wile E. Coyote pointing at the words and then himself. The Road Runner then pulls up behind him and beeps, sending the Coyote into the air. The Road Runner's name is shown ("Digoutis-Hot-Rodis") before he moves off stage, leaving a dust cloud for Wile E. to land in. The chase starts, and the Coyote slowly gains on his opponent until the Road Runner dodges off the road, leaving Wile E. at the mercy of an approaching bus. The Coyote kicks up a pothole and turns the other way, successfully outrunning the bus. However, as he taunts the bus, he runs directly off a cliff. As Wile E. hurtles towards the left, he pokes his tongue back in and points worriedly at the void below him. Then, he slams into a mountainside and soon suffers gravity.

The Road Runner pulls up to the top of the mountain that Wile E. ran into and beeps to get the coyote's attention. Fueled by rage, the Coyote climbs the mountain, but soon falls back down. His second climb causes the entire edge of the mountain to fall as the Coyote scrambles to the top. Wile E. climbs to the top of the precipice and prepares to chase the Road Runner, but eventually realizes he's on his way down. He can only wince in puzzlement before hitting the ground a third time.

A simple plan - simply loading himself into a bow - leads to a simple denouement: running into the wood instead of going towards the bird.

Rather than face the Road Runner directly, Wile E. uses a grenade mounted on top of a model airplane to take out the Road Runner from above. However, when he sets the propeller in motion, only the propeller flies into the air. The Coyote soon figures out the situation and throws the entire model airplane into the air, but the grenade "still" remains in the air, spinning behind the Coyote before exploding.

Returning to simplicity, Wile E. uses a wedge to throw a large rock, but it results in self-squashing.

This time, Wile E. lays out iron pellets covered with bird seed for the Road Runner to eat, while laying in wait on a high cliff with a magnet on a fishing line. However, the magnet attaches itself to a power line, electrocuting the Coyote and causing his nose to flash like a light bulb.

The Coyote then attempts to load a cannon, but as he pounds in the cannonball with a stick, the cannon fires the two items out of it, with the Coyote still hanging on to the stick. Gravity results, and Wile E. and the stick land into the ground, to be pounded down by the cannonball.

Wile E. now lies in wait on top of a cliff with a cannon as the Road Runner munches on more birdseed. The Coyote turns the cannon downwards as he goes to light the fuse, but the cannon falls off its mount, taking the Coyote down with it. He rolls himself off to the right and finds the cannon facing him. Wile E. gropes downwards to escape the cannon's fire, but the cannon faces him again. Wile E. sighs and soon realizes the inevitable, and is then swallowed by the cannon. The Road Runner moves out of the way as the cannon (with the Coyote inside) hits the ground. Then the cannon fires, sending it back up to its mount, which also causes the precipice to break and to fall back down on the Coyote.

Hoping to out-corner his rival, Wile E. greases his feet with axle grease and glides across the mountaintop, but soon sees the edge of the cliff. With no alternative, he grabs onto a saguaro and gets speared by its spines. Now, he can spot the Road Runner's trajectory and leaps off down the mountain slope, but instead of stopping in the middle of the road, he continues down the mountain and drops off it...and then onto the power lines seen earlier. Wile E. surfs these with no way to stop himself, but when he reaches the ground, he moves directly onto a railroad track, complete with an approaching train! Fortunately, before it hits the Coyote, he moves onto a side track.

Wile E. points happily at the receding train, but now sees he's going into a tunnel with another train coming out of it! Wile E. strokes himself against the wind, barely keeping pace, and then the camera pans up to show the train is labeled: "NEW YORK EXPRESS / "NON STOP". The camera cuts up again to the Road Runner in the conductor's compartment, apparently enjoying the prospect of chasing his opponent 2,500 miles across the United States.

Censorship

*The ABC version shortens the part where Wile E. gets electrocuted by the fishing rod after the magnet attaches itself to a power line.

ee also

*Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies filmography (1950-1959)