Wile E. Coyote > Roadrunner

Something about that bird I never liked.

I was into Big Bird, sure, but most of the animated fowl of my youth? I could not stand. Woody the Woodpecker? Obnoxious. The crows from Dumbo? Racist. Tweety? Ew, baby voice! The swallows from “Cinderella”? Forgettable (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you’re proving my point).

Which is likely why I always rooted for Wile E. Coyote in his desert-based dust ups with RoadRunner. It wasn’t just that I found the RoadRunner’s limited vocabulary – “Beep, beep!” — unimpressive, there was something else about that scraggly coyote that drew me in.

I can’t condone his lust for violence, that’s not where we vibe. But there’s this repeating visual gag that happens almost every episode. Coyote gives chase to RoadRunner who, predictably, outruns him. The coyote chases after his bird of interest right off the edge of a cliff. RoadRunner is fast enough to race right along to the other side, or at least out of the frame where we assume the bird has arrived safely, again, on solid land.

But the coyote, pauses, recognizes his dire circumstances and plummets downwards, his body left in shambles by the fall, bruised and bandaged.

But it’s in that moment when he’s chasing after what he wants with such single-mindedness that, that, that — You know the feeling right? You ever wanted something so bad that the impossible is made possible, as if actual air molecules are transforming to sustain you, hold you aloft. Until…

Doubt brings you down.

It’s not just speed that allows the roadrunner to race off into a future the coyote cannot follow into. It’s clear from the setup that if the coyote had never paused, had never looked down, had never seen his feet there over thin air, he’d continue to speed forward unaware and moments closer to wrapping his spindly fingers around his most deeply held wants.

They say look before you leap but maybe you should avert your eyes instead.