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Another [[Disney]] adventure cartoon from the ''era of the [[DuckTales (1987)|original ''DuckTales'']], '''''TaleSpin''''' era, this series transplants several characters from [[The Jungle Book (Disney film)|Disney's adaptation of]] ''[[The Jungle Book (novel)|The Jungle Book]]'' into a show about the golden age of seaplane travel, featuring [[Funny Animal|Funny Animals]]s. Essentially an animated ''[[Tales of the Gold Monkey]]'' - especially as one of the key locations is Louie's, an island bar ran by the titular monkey.
 
Baloo the bear is a seaplane cargo-for-hire operator from the port city of Cape Suzette in a time not unlike the 1930s. His twin-engine flying boat, the ''Sea Duck'', is his most prized possession, and he favors his freedom over all else, including paying his bills. When the bank forecloses on his debts, a young entrepreneur/lady bear/single mother named Rebecca Cunningham snaps up his business, his plane, and his home, and opens the "Higher-For-Hire" air cargo service. Rather than abandon his "baby" to her and whatever low-rent pilot she may hire, he stays on, working for the day when he can buy back the ''Sea Duck'' and be rid of her.
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Early on, he picks up a young stowaway, Kit Cloudkicker, who eventually earns the post of Baloo's navigator and sidekick. A daring barnstormer and aspiring pilot, Kit uses a collapsible airfoil to glide behind the ''Sea Duck'' on a line, and is responsible for much of the derring-do of the series in contrast to his overweight chum.
 
Although there's not any romance between Becky and Baloo, their relationship smacks more of [[Sibling Rivalry]] ([[Ship Tease|outside the odd subtle occasion]]). The two of them -- withthem—with Kit and Becky's [[Cheerful Child|adorable daughter Molly]] -- form—form a definite sitcom family dynamic, with the practical, strait-laced Becky faced off against her lazy, easygoing, roguish pilot.
 
Allies of the crew include Louie (the orangutan monarch from ''[[The Jungle Book (Disney film)|The Jungle Book]]'') who operates a seaplane truckstop of sorts out in the ocean that is Baloo's favorite hangout; and Wildcat, a seemingly slow-witted mechanic with incredible skills.
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* [[All There in the Manual]]: The short-lived comic series confirms Becky's {{spoiler|status as a widow}} and goes into some detail about Kit's life before linking up with Don Karnage.
* [[All Women Are Lustful]]: Louie's aunt, Louise in "The Ransom of Red Chimp", who is attracted to men with accents and goes after Don Karnage, and later her flying rival, a French pilot named Jacques Toujour.
* [[Animation Bump]]: To an extent, due to the animation being exported from six different ,<ref> The [[Walt Disney Animation Units]] in Japan and France, [[Sunwoo]] and [[Wang Film Productions]]. With help from [[Pacific Rim Animation]] (France, uncredited); and [[Tama Productions]], [[Jade Animation]] & [[Hanho Heung Up]] (Japan)</ref>, the style and quality varied to rather noticeable degrees on occasion. This was common with most Disney cartoons at this point.
** Some of the high points are in the four part pilot "Plunder And Lightning" and "Pizza Pie In The Sky", which were animated by Disney France.
* [[Anti-Villain]]: Shere Khan. Sure, he engages in [[Evil Plan|Evil Plans]]s from time to time and can be ruthless when he needs to, but he is genuinelly fond of the heroes and certainly has a conscience, and generally doesn't cross any lines that there's no going back from. Think [[Gargoyles|David Xanatos]], but nicer.
* [[Anthropomorphic Shift]]: From ''[[The Jungle Book (Disney film)|The Jungle Book]]''.
** Louie can be considered an inversion of sorts. He is given an anthropomorphic role and wears a human attire, though his design and proportioning is actually more hunched over and simian-like than his original ''The Jungle Book'' counterpart.
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* [[Badass Princess]]: Princess Lotta Lamour from "The Road to Macadamia". She's not afraid to confront her kingdom's [[Evil Chancellor]] ("Touch me and you're dust, buster!"), and during a fight she knocks out several of the chancellor's [[Mooks]] with a big mallet.
* [[Badass Spaniard]]: Don Karnage fancies himself as one of these, but invariably comes off as just buffoonish. (Interestingly, some fanfics based on this show not only have him play this trope straight, but also transform him into a psychologically tortured [[Anti-Villain]]). Note, though, that, while he may not be [[Badass]] per se, he's ''still'' [[Not So Harmless|very dangerous]].
* [[Barefoot Cartoon AnimalsAnimal]]s: Many characters, including Rebecca, Molly, Wildcat and Shere Khan in the main cast.
* [[Beary Funny]]: Baloo, Rebecca, Molly and Kit.
* [[Beleaguered Assistant]]: Kit sometimes is this due to Baloo's occasional idiocies and [[Jerkass]] tendencies. Rebecca and Baloo himself often play this trope as well, depending on who is [[Idiot Ball|leading the madness]].
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** [[Little Miss Snarker]]: Molly at times.
* [[Death Glare]]: Despite Rebecca's appearance, she actually has given Baloo a pretty scary one from time to time.
* [[Depending on the Writer]]: Both Baloo and Rebecca's personalities occasionally come off as erratic due to constantly passing off the [[Sanity Ball]] (eg. one can be completely gullible or arrogant towards a situation identical to one they were totally wary of in a previous episode). Their [[Not So Different]] tendancies also shift from episode to episode (sometimes Rebecca is Baloo's polar opposite, others they are borderline [[Distaff Counterpart|Distaff Counterparts]]s for each other).
* [[Determinator]]: In both a negative and positive sense, Baloo and Rebecca are very stubborn individuals, be it for [[Zany Scheme|Zany Schemes]]s or heroics. Rebecca is also shown to be very protective of Baloo, to the point of potential [[Heroic Sacrifice|self-sacrifice]]; Baloo, in turn, will go to great lengths to aid or protect her.
* [[Did Not Do the Bloody Research]]: In "Bygones", the English pilot Rick Sky actually says the word "Bloody".
* [[Diesel PunkDieselpunk]]
* [[Dirty Communists]]: Not explicitly said to be communist, but Thembria is obviously meant to be a stand in for the Soviet Union.
** In one episode, Baloo actually refers to the Thembrians as "commies."
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* [[Heroic Sacrifice]]: Baloo does this in the end of "Plunder And Lightning" where he {{spoiler|rams the Sea Duck into Don Karnage's lightning gun and destroys it along with his plane that he had just reclaimed ownership for.}}
** Rebecca also attempts this in "A Star Is Torn" by {{spoiler|driving an booby trapped plane that Baloo was intended to fly for a stunt. However, Baloo saves her in time}}. She also does so in "Save The Tiger" by {{spoiler|selling Higher For Hire to pay for ransom money after Baloo is supposedly kidnapped in Shere Khan's [[Xanatos Gambit]].}}
* [[Hero Insurance]]: Subverted hard, in that this is often the reason Baloo comes off just as penniless following his good deeds than beforehand, with him often being rewarded, ''and then charged'' for his rather hazardous acts of heroism. Depending on how neccessary his acts of destruction were, this can lead some of his clients to come off as [[Ungrateful Bastard|Ungrateful Bastards]]s.
* [[Homage]]: Thembria, the USSR [[Expy]], is populated by warthogs. Anyone remember ''[[Animal Farm]]?''
* [[Horrible Judge of Character]]: Rebecca occasionally takes deals from rather shifty clients to say the least.
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* [[Huge Guy, Tiny Girl]]: Considering Baloo's size, this is a given with most females on the show, but he and Rebecca are the most common example.
* [[Humanoid Female Animal]]: Kitten Kaboodle and Clementine Clevenger.
* [[Hurricane of Puns]]: Much like ''[[DuckTales (1987)]]'', everything original to the series has a name which has some level of punniness to it.
* [[If I Can't Have You]]: Done rather ridiculously in "Feminine Air", an episode where Baloo [[Wholesome Crossdresser|dresses as a woman]] in order to enter a females-only flying contest. One of his rivals is [[Sweet on Polly Oliver|so besotted with his female persona that he proposes]] and, when he's turned down, invokes this trope and starts trying to kill "her".
* [[Improbable Piloting Skills]]: Baloo is so good a pilot he can pilot a plane even if he has to resort to directly manipulating the control cables to a craft's flaps and rudder when the yoke was broke. Furthermore, in one episode, he was able to quickly learn how to fly a prototype helicopter, despite the fact that operating that kind of vehicle is a completely different (not to mention ''revolutionary'' for the 1930s) concept in aviation. And don't forget, he was able to successfully "pilot" a prototype ''jet engine'' merely by hanging on to it and tugging on it real hard. No wings, no rudder, no ''plane''. Just the engine. He even broke the sound barrier while riding it.
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** About half the cast fits this trope to an extent, even some of the more [[Closer to Earth]] characters can't help hamming it up at times.
* [[Laser-Guided Amnesia]]: "The Old Man and the Sea Duck".
* [[Laughably Evil]]: Don Karnage, who -- despitewho—despite nearly every one of his scenes being hilarious in some way (mostly due to the [[Funny Foreigner|funny accent]], eccentric antics, and [[Chewing the Scenery|a marked tendency to eat sets]]) -- is one of the most legitimately dangerous bad guys on the show.
** The show's entire [[Rogues Gallery]] counts to an extent, with the arguable exception of Shere Khan, (arguable due to the occasionally over-the-top extent his [[Comically Serious]] role is taken, as well as [[The Jungle Book (Disney film)|being based on a rather valid example]]).
* [[Leitmotif]]: Wildcat frequently has a quirky flute melody accompany many of his appearances. The ''[[Disney Afternoon]]'' OST disk also includes numerous one shot tracks that signalled different characters and locations.
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* [[Poor Communication Kills]]: The entire episode "Your Baloo's In The Mail" proves this.
* [[Positive Discrimination]]: Subverted. Despite being a female character of the strong independent business woman variety, Rebecca makes her fair share of mistakes, with her and Baloo getting roughly equal opportunities to play the [[Straight Man]] for each other.
* [[Punishment Box]]: Baloo stays at a Thembrian penal colony which he has mistaken for a fitness camp. He is frequently sent to what he calls a "solar powered sauna."
* [[Punny Name]]: All over the place--areaplace—area names like Cape Suzette (Crêpe Suzette), episode titles like "The Idol Rich" (The Idle Rich) and "The Sound and the Furry", and some major and minor characters' names.
* [[Putting on the Reich]]: The nation of Thembria resembles the Soviet Union.
* [[Ramming Always Works]]: How the {{spoiler|Lightning Gun from "Plunder and Lightning"}} was destroyed.
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* [[Reset Button]]: Baloo managed to save up enough money to buy back his plane a few times, but events would always conspire to put him back to work for Becky. On the other hand, after an early episode where Rebecca has trouble learning how to pilot a plane, a later story shows that she's learned a lot from Baloo and is now a capable pilot on her own.
* [[The Rival]]: Plane Jane and Ace London to Baloo.
* [[Rocket Ride]]: In "Mach One for the Gipper", Baloo flies a newly invented jet engine. No, not a plane with a jet engine--literallyengine—literally ''just'' the engine.
* [[Royals Who Actually Do Something]]: Princess Lotta Lamour helps Baloo and Louie save her kingdom from [[Evil Chancellor|Chancellor Trample.]]
* [[Rule of Cool]]: A general staple of the show, but most evident with Kit's airfoil. To be clear, it assumes a 8 year-old boy can hang on to a rope behind an airplane (travelling at a minimum of 150 &nbsp;mph), while coordinating a piece of metal below his feet.
* [[Ruritania]]: Thembria.
* [[Sanity Ball]]: Thrown around frequently, usually between Baloo, Rebecca or Kit for a [[Straight Man and Wise Guy]] scenario.
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* [[Tickle Torture]]: Don Karnage does it to Kit in "Polly Wants a Treasure".
* [[Took a Level in Jerkass]]: Baloo is often shown to act more [[It's All About Me|selfish]] and [[Small Name, Big Ego|egotistical]] than his original ''[[The Jungle Book (Disney film)|The Jungle Book]]'' interpretation (albeit [[Depending on the Writer]] and balanced by [[The Ace|his role]] [[Knight in Shining Armor|in some]] [[Papa Wolf|other episodes]]).
* [[Total Eclipse of the Plot]]: In "The Time Bandit".
* [[TV Genius]]: Rebecca, in contrast to [[Book Dumb]] but streetwise Baloo, has an MBA and is refined in terms of social inequity, but is a borderline [[The Ditz|Ditz]] in terms of the outside world.
* [[The Unfair Sex]]: The show plays a variation of sorts, with a recurring plotline involving either Baloo or Rebecca falling in love with [[Romantic False Lead|a new cast member]] and generally disregarding the other character's attempts to bail them out of the problems their "[[Bitch in Sheep's Clothing|love interest]]" is causing them. Despite the similar tone and extent for many of these instances, Rebecca tends to be played as a lot more sympathetic in her cases (eg. [[Tear Jerker|"Her Chance To Dream"]], "Molly Coddled") than Baloo (eg. [[What an Idiot!|"A Star Is Torn"]]).
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{{quote|'''Don Karnage:''' Fools! Surely they would not be so stupid as to attack the ''Iron Vulture''! ''(Ship rocks with impact)'' ...They are more stupid than I thought!}}
** Also in "Polly Wants a Treasure"
{{quote|'''Ignatz:''' We gotta get Kit outta there before one of those idiots [the pirates] sets off Captain [[Punny Name|Juan Toomanie]]'s ''big'' trap!
'''Baloo:''' ''(leaning backwards)'' Relax, that would take somebody ''really'' dumb.
''(the stalagmite he's leaning against falls back with a click)''
'''Ignatz:''' ''([[Insufferable Genius|Long-suffering sigh]])'' Right again, Baloo. }}
* [[Wholesome Crossdresser]]: Baloo as "[[Punny Name|Tan-Margaret]]" in "Feminine Air".
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* [[With Friends Like These...]]: Used a fair few times, usually with [[Loveable Rogue|Baloo]] or [[Control Freak|Rebecca]].
* [[World of Funny Animals]]
* [[World War OneI]]: Part of the Squadron of Seven's [[Backstory]] in "Bygones".
* [[Wronski Feint]] / [[Aerial Canyon Chase]]: Baloo's main defense against attackers in the air since his cargo plane is unarmed.
* [[Xanatos Gambit]]: Shere Khan always finds some measure of victory even in defeat - even in plots ''that don't involve him''.
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[[Category:The Great Depression]]
[[Category:Western Animation]]
[[Category:TaleSpin]]
[[Category:The Disney Afternoon]]
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