Maybe a year ago? @maz-z and I started working out an idea for a comic we had, an Animaniacs parody of Gravity Falls called Gookie Falls. My art is the ugly phone doodles, hers are the cute pencil sketches.
We never got around to working on it again but we completed the rough plot concept so in honor of the reboot I guess I’ll go ahead and show it off if anyone is interested:
GOOKIE FALLS
Wakko and Dot are visiting their Young Uncle Yakko, or Yunkle Yak, for the summer. Yunkle Yak likes to use them for cheap labor in his Whacky Shack, a comedy prop, gag and magic supply store in the woods just outside of Gookie Falls. Dot makes a remark about cheap labor and Disney toy production, Yakko acts suspicious telling her to shush, that mouse has ears everywhere. He moves a Mickey product on the shelf so that it faces the wall. Dot makes herself and Wakko matching cute ponchos [even though it’s summer] because she is a charming, creative, free spirit. Business is slow, because as Yunkle explains, the townspeople wouldn’t recognize humor if it jumped up and bit them in the funny bone. Wakko gets bored and goes exploring in the woods where he trips over a root and face plants into a rock that is actually a disguised button. It opens a hollow, metal tree which reveals a diary with a four fingered hand on the cover and the roman numeral 2. Inside the book there are comedy tips, sight gags, and jokes, as well as historical facts about Gookie Falls.
The book says the town was once a popular comedy hub, so Wakko decides to go looking for the descendants of the comedians named in the book. As the mystery sibs seek out the different comedians’ and their descendants, they keep getting shoo’d away nervously, as if the people are all hiding something. Dot and Wakko decide to pester one of them in classic Animaniacs fashion until they reveal a network executive took over the whole town and hired the censors to run the police department. But no one knows who runs the town or why. Wakko decides to put on a comedy show at the shack using the jokes and gags from his diary, to attract customers.
While that’s going on, Dot discovers Yunkle is hiding a large device under the shack, she blackmails him for a night on the town. The cops come and shut down Wakko’s comedy show because it is illegal. Dot and Yunkle take off for a night on the town, but Wakko has just learned from the cops there is only one legal comedy show in Gookie Falls so the 3 of them head off to the Comedy Hut. The MC of the Comedy Hut is the very unfunny Giddy Plotz. After the Warners watch the boring comedy show, Plotz tries to convince Dot to become an actress. Wakko discovers that Plotz owns the rights to everything in the town and has been using the cops to shut down all competition for the comedy hut. Yunkle declares him their new special friend and they ruin his next performance and reveal his secret to the audience. The townspeople boycott Plotz’s establishments. Plotz vows vengeance on the Warner family. He wanted to shut down Yunkle Yak’s Whacky Shack for years but through some legal loophole, Yunkle has been able to sell comedy merch.
Plotz uses the ancient book, “Guide to the NOW conglomerate management and corporate warfare” to summon an other worldly mind sweeping creature. We see a triangular being with the dialect of Tommy Wiseau sitting in an easy chair when a portal opens and begins ringing like an old phone. “Oh I’m being summoned hah? Probably just [Infowars guy] wanting to play catch with my football again.” He gets up and pats a pug dog, “hi doggie, bye” only to be pounced and hog tied by another triangular creature. “Sorry Bucko, I’ve got big plans for Gookie Falls and I’ve been waiting a long time for this chance to get a deal with Plotz.” He stuffs the first triangle in his own closet and passes through the portal with a silly, crazy laugh. Buck, or Bucky as he insist Plotz call him, makes a deal to sweep Yunkle Yak’s mind for any dirt plotz might use against him, for the price of Plotz’s silly willy flag pin-NO! For a favor which will be disclosed at a later time. Plotz agrees. Wakko and Dot spot Bucky sneaking up on a sleeping Yunkle and they grab ahold of him by the ankles as he leaps into Yunkle’s mind. Once inside they see a chaotic landscape of hidden trap doors and holes leading to Yunkle’s memories. Wakko finds out about the device hidden under the shack. “Oh yeah that… he also has a diary like yours.” Dot mentions casually to an annoyed Wakko. They fight Bucky off, smashing him, which reveals he is mechanical. Pinky and the Brain climb out of Bucky, revealing that he was an elaborate plot to take over Gookie Falls, and then the world. They exit Yunkle’s mind and as the mice walk away Brain warns, “We’ll be watching you!”.
Yunkle Yak wakes up to an accusing Wakko who demands to know about the device and diary. He offers Wakko his volume of the diary if he’ll just stop asking questions. He says it’s grown up stuff and shoos the two sibblings out the back door to play in the spooky woods alone. Before they can take off, Ralph and Scratchy arrive to arrest Yunkle for selling movie props without a permit, and double parking. Dot insists they prove his innocence but when she sees his parking job she states, “There’s no excuse for that, take him away.”
Wakko reads Yunkle’s diary looking for clues. He finds a hunter’s map that leads them to an abandoned rabbit hole next to a tree with an old calendar on it. He wipes away the dust to reveal the words “DUCK SEASON”. Dot is confused, “But if this is here then…” “Gookie Falls is where Warner Brothers used to film their old Looney Toons cartoons!” The mystery sibs gather the townspeople to show them their findings. The people boo Plotz for burying their history, but he’s no where to be found.
Meanwhile Yunkle is breaking out of jail in an epic fashion. Each time his watch beeps the town flashes different colors, some even grayscale. People behave out of character when this happens, they’re zanier, some even vote green party. The Warners all race home to find Plotz in their basement with the device. He’s standing in front of a huge portal in the shape of the WB shield pressing buttons on a panel when a button pops up on it’s own. The Warners knock him over before he can press it. He warns Wakko that the portal will transform everyone in the town into someone else entirely, and it would be perminant. He reveals his own, third diary and connects the 3 diarys to reveal an image of the portal with a warning written on it. Wakko is angry at Yunkle who looks sad [mimic Stan’s pose], “Are you even our Yunkle?” Yakko peels off his five o’clock shadow to reveal he is their long lost third mystery sib. “You gotta trust me, everything I’ve done was for the sake of comedy.” Dot hams up the drama of wether or not she should press the button. A faceless arm from off screen hands her an Oscar, she strolls away satisfied. Yakko’s watch beeps like crazy, the countdown is up, a huge light flashes and everyone floats awkwardly in the air. For a brief moment they look like pencil sketches [shinji ikari floats by muttering about how his boundries determine his reality] suddenly they flop to the ground. A mysterious figure emerges from the portal. “Who is that” asks Wakko. Yakko answers him, “The author of the diaries.” The figure removes his goggles and hood to reveal, “Bugs Bunny”. Plotz faints. The Warners look on for a moment in stunned silence when suddenly out pops a boastful, hammy Daffy Duck, “TA-DA!!!” “…Who is that?” Wakko and Dot ask in unison. Annoyed, Daffy stomps angrily back into the portal. Bugs gives a little shrug toward the Warners. The townspeople remember who they are and their careers as former comedians and cartoon comedy stars.
A new Warner Brothers animation studio is built on Gookie Falls, Termite Terrace 2.0. Plotz is sent packing. Porky Pig pops halfway out of the portal, “That’s all folks!”
