Wacky Races (1968 TV series)


 * This article is about the 1968 TV series. For the 2010s reboot, see Wacky Races (2017 TV series).

Wacky Races is an animated racing comedy TV series produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions and Heatter-Quigley Inc. for CBS' Saturday morning children's programming. It ran from 1968 to 1969, airing 17 episodes. Despite only lasting one season, the characters continued to live on in different forms, with two equally as popular spin-offs, The Perils of Penelope Pitstop and Dastardly & Muttley in Their Flying Machines. Another TV series Yogi's Treasure Hunt also starred Dick Dastardly & Muttley as villains, while Blubber Bear guest-starred on The New Yogi Bear Show.

The series has been revived a couple of times by Warner Bros. Animation. In 2006, there was a five-minute pilot pitch called Wacky Races Forever, which acted as a sequel, but was not picked up. The second was a comparatively more successful reboot/quasi-sequel once again called Wacky Races, which lasted between 2017 to 2019 on the Boomerang SVOD service.

In 2016, DC Comics published their own take, called Wacky Raceland, taking a somewhat more realistic and much darker turn in comparison.

The entire series has also been released on DVD.

Music
The score was composed by Hoyt Curtin, who was credited as music director.

Cast

 * Paul Winchell as Dick Dastardly, Private Meekly and Clyde
 * Don Messick as Muttley, Professor Pat Pending, Gravel Slag, Little Gruesome, Ring-a-Ding and Sawtooth
 * Janet Waldo as Penelope Pitstop
 * Daws Butler as Rock Slag, Big Gruesome, the Red Max, Sergeant Blast, Peter Perfect and Rufus Ruffcut
 * John Stephenson as Lucky Luke and Blubber Bear
 * Dave Willock as Announcer