Elmyra Duff
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Elmyra Duff
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| Elmyra, full of love, having snared Buster. | |
| First appearance | Regular on Tiny Toon Adventures since the series premiere "The Looney Beginning". |
| Voiced by | Cree Summer |
| Background Information | |
| Aliases | "The oaf" |
| Pets | Furrball, various captured animals, Pinky and the Brain |
| Friends | Montana Max (boyfriend, originally unofficial because, at first, he didn't like her; however, in "Prom-ise Her Anything", Monty softened up a tinge and admitted that he really did like her), Rudy Patootie (another unofficial boyfriend who doesn't like her) |
| Rivals | Patty Ann ("cousin", actually Brain in a mechanical suit) |
| Catch phrases | The nicknames she gives for her pets; "I want to hug you and squeeze you into itty-bitty pieces!" |
Elmyra Duff is a female human fictional character from the 1990 series Tiny Toon Adventures based superficially on her name derivative, Elmer Fudd ('Elmyra' being a female form of 'Elmer' and her last name, 'Duff', as 'Fudd' pronounced backwards). She is quite young and obsessed with animals and cute things, usually causing great discomfort or serious injury to potential pets from her overenthusiastic affection. This is in contrast to Elmer, who despite being well armed with actual intent to violence, is unable to pose a threat. The two share a distinct similarity in that both hunt animals; while Elmer hunts them for sport, Elmyra hunts them to love them to death (sometimes literally). Curiously, at least once, Elmyra was shown to be bald like her inspiration, and wearing a wig.
Elmyra strongly resembles a younger version of the feminized Elmer Fudd from the 1946 cartoon The Big Snooze, in which Elmer underwent a nightmare in which Bugs Bunny liquefied him and transformed him into a shapely female.
At Acme Looniversity, Elmyra's mentor and favorite teacher at school was Elmer Fudd.
This danger is balanced by her complete and utter gullibility. Her abject stupidity is pocked with occasional instances of cleverness, and her character is toned down as needed. Her end tag, correspondingly, is "Let the show begin!." Buster Bunny and Babs Bunny explain in the series' pilot that Elmyra is a pushover — unlike Montana Max — but that they needed nominal "villains" to pitch their series. This is a nod to the original Looney Tunes, in which Yosemite Sam (the basis for Montana Max) was created due to the fact that Elmer Fudd was seen as too easy and mild-mannered to be an effective enemy for Bugs Bunny.
Elmyra looks sweet and somewhat dumb (In one episode it shows that mayonnaise has a higher IQ than her), but her hair bow is decorated with a small gerbil skull, which may hint at her sinister side.
One of the animals in her vast menagerie is Byron Basset, a near-gelatinous basset hound who appeared sporadically on Tiny Toons and drew most of his humor from his odd appearance, although he starred once in his own cartoon. In contrast to her other pets, Byron seems to feel a grudging love for his owner despite her clumsiness. Less enthusiastic pets have included several of the regular cast, including Buster, Furrball, Fifi Le Fume (who was shown to be captured by Elmyra in "Out of Odor"!), and Tyrone the Turtle. All of them escaped Elmyra in "Hare Today, Gone Tomorrow" (which aired before "Out of Odor", but took place afterward).
One of the few characters that Elmyra doesn't think are cute and cuddly is Hamton J. Pig, for she thinks he's a dirty pig in need of a good bath, which is ironic, because Hamton is obsessed with cleanliness and dislikes filth and bad odors.
In all her incarnations, Elmyra has been voiced by actress Cree Summer.
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[edit] The Duffs
As the character of Elmyra was popular among the show's viewers, the creators decided to give her character two entire episodes later in the series. The family, which had been previously unmentioned, appeared in two episodes, "Take Elmyra Please" and "Grandma's Dead." Soleil Moon Frye voiced Elmyra's eldest sister, Amanda; Matt Frewer was her frazzled inventor father. As these episodes featured none of the rest of the regular Tiny Toons cast, other than Furrball, they may have been a test to see if Elmyra's character could get her own spin-off series, centered around her family. Elmyra's dad is a spaced-out inventor whose inventions either succeed, fail, or are used in another purpose. Elmyra's mom is patronizing and doesn't pay too much attention to her children's behavior, save for her baby son who demonstrates incredible strength, a cause of concern. Elmyra's brother, Duncan, thinks he's a superhero and usually winds up saving Elmyra every time she gets in trouble. Amanda is the typical version of a teenage girl and is embarrassed by her family's behavior. They also have a dimwitted nurse who shows superhuman strength at some times.
Also of note in these episodes is the introduction of the character Mr. Skullhead. Mr. Skullhead was created by Elmyra's imagination from the small skull she wears as a hair ornament. He starred in his own show, The Mr. Skullhead Show. The character later appeared regularly on the show Animaniacs as the central character in a skit called "Good Idea, Bad Idea," in which Mr. Skullhead and the various members of his family would meet violent deaths.
[edit] Spin-offs
Though Animaniacs was not technically a follow-up to Tiny Toons, several of the characters from Tiny Toons made cameos. The most notable of all of these is Elmyra's in the short "Lookit the Fuzzy Heads." Believing the Warners were dogs, Elmyra chased Yakko, Wakko, and Dot out of Dr. Scratchansniff's office and through the city, until finally the three tricked Elmyra into following Mindy, which resulted in Elmyra continually getting hurt (not to mention saving Buttons the trouble of the pursuit). In a way, this ending was especially appropriate in that Mindy and Elmyra were similar characters. Both are young girls who love their pets but are oblivious to the pain they inflict upon them.
Elmyra later acquired newly-homeless Pinky and the Brain in a short-lived series in 1998 — notable only for the Christopher Walken-esque madman who was pursuing the two mice for his own world domination plans. Although she has essentially the same personality, her character on Pinky, Elmyra, and the Brain is different from her character on Tiny Toon Adventures in several ways: she goes to school with other human kids rather than her Tiny Toons co-stars, and she harbors an unrequited crush on a boy who isn't Montana Max. (This other boy does not return her affections either.) A running gag here is that Elmyra continually washes Brain's mouth whenever he says either something that she would find offensive or merely scientific jargon that she can't understand (she calls it "naughty-waughty potty talk"). Curiously, Pinky and the Brain had earlier made a cameo as two of Elmyra's caged pets in the Tiny Toons Spring Break special.
[edit] Other connections
Elmyra bears a passing resemblance to the character Baby Doll, who was created especially for Batman: The Animated Series. Indeed, both are young girls who can be alternately sweet or destructive (of course, while Elmyra is an animal lover who means well, Doll is a murderous, vindictive psychopath). Since the same teams created both Tiny Toons and Batman it's plausible the resemblance is intentional.
