Guys i've already reviewed the reboot of Wacky Races so I thought lets review the original series and it's spin-offs but for this week i'm just tackling the original series the spin-offs will follow in the following weeks so racers start your engines here is my review of the original Wacky Races.
For those that didn't know there was a show called Wacky Races before the reboot the show aired in 1968 and ran until 1969 with only one single series to it's name spanning seventeen episodes with each episode having two separate Wacky Races but what's interesting is the fact it was only cancelled because parents groups thought it was to violet even tho kids see alot worse in Scooby-Doo! this is the one that got canned.
The set up for the show is eleven wacky racers race to see who is the world's wackiest racer and set up alone makes this better then the reboot because they actually feature racing and the race doesn't stop so the show can have a plot and that's what Wacky Races should be racing and nothing else and unlike the reboot there's alot of racers and the show makes good use of all of them.
The series starred Paul Winchell as Dick Dastardly , Private Meekly and Clyde the leader of The Ant Hill Mob , Don Messick as Muttley, Professor Pat Pending, Gravel Slag, Little Gruesome, Ring-a-Ding (also a member of the mob) and Sawtooth , Daws Butler as Rock Slag, Big Gruesome, Red Max, Sergeant Blast, Peter Perfect and Rufus Ruffcut , John Stephenson as Luke and Blubber Bear , Janet Waldo as Penelope Pitstop and Dave Willock as The Narrator.
In all honesty I loved Paul Winchell as Dastardly in this series he's so evil and yet at the same time you want to see him win at least one race and unlike the reboot which gives Dick a British accent here he speaks American and it suits him better then a British accent does. There's not really much more I can say about the rest of the cast that hasn't all ready been said because of how legendary the voice actors are but I will say I really did think that The Narrator was played by someone from the racing world and was sad to see that was not the case.
The animation was done by Hanna-Barbera with the famous duo of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera directing and producing every episode of the show and I have to say that for me at least the animation wasn't that good I get that they made shows on the cheap but even so the animation seen in this show isn't there best work and I noticed alot of animation errors as well and not just in the early episodes either they were through out the whole series I honestly lost count of how many times Muttley's ears were colored wrong.
What this show does really well I thought was it focused more on Dastardly and Muttley the villains of the show I don't think there's been a show before it or since that had the villains get more focus then the heroes and because of that those two are the most developed out of all the characters but sadly for me tho the least developed is Penelope Pitstop at the most she gets a sentences worth of dialog in must of the episodes and that's it and I think that's because when they were making the show she was seen as an after thought and her character and car were created because the makers thought the show needed a female driver oh and by the way her official creator is Iwao Takamoto who's a legendary character designer.
People who talk about this show often talk about Dick Dastardly being capable of winning and it's true he is actually a good racer once you stop and think about it he often starts out last and yet works his way up to first place the only reason he doesn't win is because he stops to do his tricks which even after they've failed he still tries to work his way back into the race that takes alot of skill and I have to give him credit for that.
The show was written by Larz Bourne , Dalton Sandifer , Tom Dagenais and Michael Maltese I think that the all of the stuff Micheal wrote was largely ignored because I didn't find the show to be that funny and I know Micheal is a very funny writer I can easily see someone who's seeing this show for the first time laughing alot but I grew up with the show and I didn't find it that funny for some reason altho I have to say that I did enjoy the puns those were freaking funny as was sassy Dastardly and the show is very entertaining.
I have to talk about Penelope some more because I feel like she is such a product of the times she is the most feminine driver out of the cast of the characters , she always needs help from someone and her cars gadgets or beauty products now you could say that's part of her character and you'd be right to say that but at the same time if this version of the character was made today people would be calling the makers of the show sexist.
Now since the show's main goal was to find the world's wackiest racer I think it's fair to assume that the racer with the most wins would be that racer so i'm here to tell you who the top three wackiest racers or tied for number three with a total of eleven points it's The Ant Hill Mob and Penelope Pitstop and number two it's Rufus Ruffcut and Sawtooth with a total of thirteen points and beating them by one single point it's The Slag Brothers.
It wouldn't be a review of Wacky Races without talking about the cars I really liked the cars in the show they each suited there driver or drivers perfectly and each of the cars are just as Wacky as the people behind the wheel and I have to say that my personal favorite car belonged to the person with the best name on the show the Convert-a-Car driven by Professor Pat Pending the car can do anything the episode or scene requires it to do and I love the play on the Patent Pending.
Overall this was a really entertaing show and I generally didn't know who was going to win each race and while I do enjoy the reboot I think that this is the better version so for me the show gets a 7 out of 10.