Mad as a Mars Hare

Plot

This cartoon begins with Marvin the Martian observing the planet Earth from Mars through a telescope. He is examining a rocket launch that is taking place. As he watches, the rocket takes off from Earth and soon appears to be heading straight towards him. Indeed, the rocket ploughs right through his observatory and once a shaken Marvin gets himself up, he says to the audience "I'm not angry, just terribly, terribly hurt!" Soon enough, the rocket lands on Mars, and a reluctant Bugs Bunny exits it. It is quickly apparent that he is the only occupant and he has been lured onto the rocket by a carrot and then sent to Mars as what Earth considered an expendable “astro-rabbit.”

Bugs immediately claims Mars as his own (using a metal carrot with a flag inside which plays Yankee Doodle), in the name of Earth. However, Marvin does not agree with this and decides that he will not allow Bugs to take his planet away from him. After a failed attempt to disintegrate the rabbit with his disintegrating pistol (which resulted in Marvin getting disintegrated himself and going off to be re-integrated; "Being disintegrated makes me very angry! [huff, puff] Very angry indeed!"), Marvin gets his Time-Space Gun and intends to project Bugs forward into time so he can use him as a useful but harmless slave. However, when Marvin zaps Bugs he realizes too late that he had the gun in reverse, so Bugs is reverted into a huge and muscular Neanderthal Rabbit, who immediately grabs Marvin and crushes him with just one hand; Marvin goes off to be regenerated again, while saying: "Well, back to the old electronic brain!" (a possible reference to Hare-Way to the Stars). Bugs then breaks the fourth Wall while speaking to the audience about how when he gets back to Earth old Elmer Fudd and the rest of the hunters are due for a big surprise before eating the metal carrot.

Availability

"Mad as a Mars Hare" is available on the Bugs Bunny: Hare Extraordinare DVD. However, it was cropped to widescreen. It is also being shown fully screened on the Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume 1 Blu-ray box-set. It later became available on the DVD edition of the collection.