(First Ever) Bugs Bunny - Porky's Hare Hunt.

Released this day 80 years ago.
Porky's Hare Hunt is a 1938 animated short movie directed by Ben "Bugs" Hardaway and Cal Dalton, which starred Porky Pig as a hunter whose prey is Happy Rabbit - later to become known as Bugs Bunny. The rabbit's hyperactive personality and laughing voice provided by Mel Blanc predated 1940's "Knock Knock" which introduced audiences to Woody Woodpecker, created for the Lantz studio by Hardaway after his departure from the Leon Schlesinger/Warner Brothers studio.

Plot
Several rabbits are eating carrots and ruining crops. Another rabbit warns them to evacuate. Soon, Porky and his dog meet this rabbit and try to outwit him in the forest. Porky and the rabbit get in a long, long fight and soon the hare thinks he has won the war that is over. Porky however finds the rabbit and he doesn't have any brainstorms to protect him. The rabbit shows Porky a photo of himself and of how many children he has with his wife.

While Porky attempts to shoot down and procure the rabbit, he befalls to an inundation of quick-witted gags as the rabbit asks Porky: "Do you have a hunting license?" As Porky reaches for his pocket to obtain the document within sight of the hyper-hare, he suddenly snatches it out of Pork's grasp, rips it in two and remarks: "...well you haven't got one now...hoohoohoohoohahahahah..hoo hoo hoo ha ha ha!" and makes a getaway by twisting his ears as though they were a helicopter propeller and flies away. Ultimately, the rabbit wins in the end with Porky ending up in the hospital from injuries sustained in the ill-fated attempt to catch his game.

Notes
The first appearance of the prototypical version of Bugs Bunny. He is barely recognizable compared to his more familiar later form. Bugs' first official appearance would come two years later in "A Wild Hare".
The "Do you have a hunting license?" gag was revived (but modified) in the 1953 short "Duck! Rabbit, Duck!" where Bugs Bunny asks Elmer Fudd, "Do you have a fricasseeing rabbit license?"
The prototype is seen chewing on a carrot, the only time he is.
This cartoon also introduces the rabbit repeating a well-known Groucho Marx line for the first time that would become part of Bugs Bunny's lexicon. The exact wording, in this first appearance, is "'Course you know that this means war!" The proto-Bugs' rendering in this cartoon is a direct impression of Groucho, including dropping the trailing "r" of "war".

Directed By: Ben Hardaway
Cal Dalton (uncredited)

Produced By: Leon Schlesinger

Released: April 30, 1938

Series: Looney Tunes

Story: Howard Baldwin

Animation: Volney White

Rod Scribner (uncredited)
Layouts:
Backgrounds:
Film Editor: Treg Brown
Voiced By: Mel Blanc

Music: Carl W. Stalling

Starring: Porky Pig
Happy Rabbit