Tooniversary: Lippy the Lion & Hardy Har Har (1962)

The last of the three features of 1962's Hanna Barbera New Cartoon Series was Lippy The Lion & Hardy Har Har, a comedy team similar in concept to Hokey Wolf and his sidekick, Ding-a-Ling, who debuted a year earlier on The Huckleberry Hound Show. I say similar because the common trait between Hokey & Lippy was that both were forever going from job to job, from one situation to another, and never progressing forward. Hardy (Mel Blanc) was a rare breed of hyena. He wasn't much for laughing, but rather was forever forelorn and worried about dire disaster pending. Lippy (Daws Butler) was the optimist, always beckoning when opportunity knocked.

Edit, 7/9/23: The video was deleted. In its place is a standard intro:

If Lippy & Hardy's voices are familiar to some, well, they are. Butler would recycle Lippy's voice into Peter Potamus just two years later. As for Hardy, Mel Blanc transferred his vocal mannerisms into Bedrock's teen harbinger of doom, Schleprock, on Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm.

As far as being "the most laughable, lovable pair by far", however, Lippy & Hardy actually weren't, if you went by ratings, since the series was cancelled after 1 season's worth of episodes. H-B tried to posit them as a funny animal version of Abbott & Costello, but it just didn't click with audiences. Of course, as we've previously documented, H-B would eventually obtain a license to do an animated Abbott & Costello series just a few years later.

Rating: B.