There are many stories and characters that can be adapted and reinterpreted for modern audiences and social awareness. We can reboot a show like Kung Fu to be about Asian culture, not stealing and appropriating from it. We can adapt the myth of Medusa from that of a woman punished for her own sexual assault to a symbol of empowerment. But there are some characters that are best left in the vault of history, and as of this week, Warner Brothers animation tacitly acknowledged that Pepe Le Pew is one of them.
Yesterday it was reported the Monsieur Le Pew’s scenes were cut from Space Jam: A New Legacy, although they had been filmed (well, the live-action part had at least). According to Deadline, this move was not in response to a widely circulated March 3 New York Times opinion piece by columnist Charles M. Blow that called attention to Pepe Le Pew for normalizing rape culture specifically, but was left on the cutting room floor some time ago after a change in directors. Blow’s column certainly renewed the debate and discussion around Pepe, however. The Space Jam scene reportedly involved Pepe hitting on a human character played by Greice Santo and her in turn slapping him away and pouring a drink on him. Then LeBron James was meant to teach Pepe about consent. As Deadline writes, “Pepe then tells the guys that Penelope cat has filed a restraining order against him. James makes a remark in the script that Pepe can’t grab other Tunes without their consent.”
Santo, who has been outspoken about standing up against sexual harassment, was disappointed to hear the scene was cut. “This was such a big deal for Greice to be in this movie,” her spokesperson told Dateline. “Even though Pepe is a cartoon character, if anyone was going to slap a sexual harasser like him, Greice wished it would be her. Now the scene is cut, and she doesn’t have that power to influence the world through younger generations who’ll be watching Space Jam 2, to let younger girls and younger boys know that Pepe’s behavior is unacceptable.”
Given Pepe’s history, however, the filmmakers were likely right to cut the scene, and there’s no reason that Santo’s involvement and the same vital lesson about consent could not be worked in otherwise. Yes, it may have made a long-overdue point to Pepe, but lampshading it doesn’t mean we wouldn’t have ended up with the same element in this new movie as all other Pepe Le Pew cartoons have attempted to do in years past—trying to render sexual harassment and rape culture as something “funny” or humorous in nature.
Beyond the Space Jam cut, there’s no intention to include the cartoon Skunk in any of the many properties Warner Bros. is working on with Looney Tunes characters. And that’s perfectly fine. Because Pepe Le Pew is not just gross, but his schtick has always been boring too. The skunk who is constantly chasing female characters despite their fleeing from him is something we can leave gathering dust and cobwebs.
While it may have worked on a level to have a scene where Pepe Le Pew finally learns about consent, it’s also a good call to leave him in the past. In the hierarchy of Looney Tunes as a whole, Pepe Le Pew ranks pretty low because he’s a one-joke character and that “joke” is that he’s the walking embodiment of rape culture. I remember watching his cartoons as a kid and, as far as I can recall, they’re all the same: he thinks that a cat, Penelope, is a skunk, and stalks her in the name of “romance,” but she’s repulsed by his smell (and also the stalking).
The entire idea of Pepe Le Pew is just awful when you think about it and his whole thing comes down to that one “joke” of relentlessly pursuing someone who wants nothing to do with him. One rapey, repetitive, gross joke. So yeah, let’s go ahead and relegate him to the animal control van of history. I’m not saying delete his old cartoons, though I really will never feel a need to watch them, but there’s no need for new ones simply for the sake of “nostalgia,” or to introduce him to a younger audience in a new film.
Pepe isn’t the only problematic Looney Tune by a long shot. Several Bugs Bunny and “Merrie Melodies” cartoons were racially offensive, and in recent years there has been renewed attention and criticism of the “Censored Eleven” shorts from the Warner Bros. catalog, withheld from syndication since 1968 because of their racist content. Across studios, early cartoons too often sold racism as humor. Speedy Gonzales and his cartoon shorts were also held back decades ago for their negative stereotyping of Mexicans. But it seems as though that character as far as we know will be in Space Jam: A New Legacy. This despite controversy and some very not helpful comments from his movie voice actor, Gabriel Iglesias, about cancel culture after Blow’s column blasted the character as “a corrosive stereotype.”
Right now, many media companies, especially those like Warner Brother and Disney, have huge back catalogs they are putting on streaming services. These mega-studios are trying to reconcile their extremely dated and often extremely problematic content with updated modern expectations and widespread anti-racism and anti-sexual assault movements. In some cases, they are holding back episodes or entire movies (see: Song of the South) from the public for good reason. The same happened last week when the estate of Dr. Seuss decided not to publish old books with racist elements. These companies aren’t erasing these things from the past—they are saying we don’t need them going forward.
The world does not need more Pepe Le Pew. We need to rely less on “nostalgia” overall in our media landscape and focus on new, exciting stories created by people with big ideas whose ideals and demographics reflect the world we live in. Because growing and changing doesn’t just mean reassessing the past, it means building something new for the future.
(image: Warner Brothers)
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