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Inki is the lead character in a series of Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies short films by director Chuck Jones.
Inki is a little African boy who usually dresses in a simple loincloth, armband, leg band, earrings, and a bone through his hair. He never speaks, and his usual pastime seems to be hunting jungle creatures.
The character was designed by Charles Thorson.[1] The plot of the cartoon focuses on little Inki out hunting, oblivious to the fact that he is being hunted himself by a hungry lion. As such, it is very similar to "Little Hiawatha", a Silly Symphonies cartoon Thorson worked on in 1937. Technically, he was originally created for the Merrie Melodies series, as all his cartoons prior to "Caveman Inki" were issued as part of that series. Thus, he is one of the few characters to initially be exclusive to the Merrie Melodies series in the Leon Schlesinger era prior to the full conversion to color, alongside Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd and his prototype Egghead, and Sniffles.
Also central to the series is a minimalist and expressionless minah bird. The bird hops in time to Felix Mendelssohn's "Fingal's Cave Overture", disregarding any obstacles or dangers. The minah bird, shown as nearly almighty, appears randomly in the films, always intervening against the other characters. Occasionally, the bird's intervention benefits Inki by stopping his pursuers. Inki then tries to thank the bird, but the latter ends up dissing Inki too.
According to Chuck Jones, the first Inki short was hated by New York and Leon Schlesinger but loved by audiences and exhibitors, which caused Schlesinger to request one more short featuring the character.[2] He mentioned that the cartoons starring Inki baffled both Walt Disney and himself, and he never figured out why the character was beloved.[3]
Chuck Jones retired Inki by his own decision in 1950, as he never fully understood why the character was a hit with audiences. He also retired other Disney-inspired characters, like Sniffles. In fact, it is unusual that Inki had the longest career span among all of Jones' Disney-inspired early characters (having a career span of nearly ten years, despite only having five cartoons within that timeline), having been retired the last (in 1950), in contrast to his other Disney-inspired characters such as Sniffles and the Curious Puppies, which had shorter career spans (Sniffles: 8 years [1939-1946], Curious Puppies: 3 years [1939-1942]) and were retired in the 1940s.
Chuck Jones says that Inki was "just a boy" and was not meant to be a stereotype, and he explains that he grew up sensitive to the feelings of minorities, so he would not make fun of them in his work.[4] Although the character was never intended as a derogatory stereotype of Africans, he was usually perceived that way. As a result, his cartoons are hardly shown on American television nowadays, have not seen widespread home media release outside of The Golden Age of Looney Tunes LaserDisc series, and Inki himself has not reappeared in future Looney Tunes projects since his final appearance in "Caveman Inki" (1950). However, none of his cartoons are part of the Censored Eleven.
Filmography[]
"The Little Lion Hunter" 
"Porky's Ant" 
- "Inki and the Lion"
- "Inki and the Minah Bird"
- "Inki at the Circus"
- "Caveman Inki"
References[]
- ā Lehman, Christopher P. (5 August 2019). Chuck Jonesā Inki. Cartoon Research.
- ā Barrier, Michael (1999). "Warner Bros., 1941-1945", Hollywood Cartoons: American Animation in Its Golden Age. Oxford University Press, page 441. ISBN 978-0195167290.
- ā Barrier, Michael; Spicer, Bill (1971). An Interview with Chuck Jones. Funnyworld No. 13.
- ā Cohen, Karl F. (2004). "Censorship of Theatrical Animation", Forbidden Animation: Censored Cartoons and Blacklisted Animators in America. McFarland & Company, page 54. ISBN 978-0786420322.