Elmyra Duff
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Elmyra Duff is a female human fictional character from the 1990 series Tiny Toon Adventures based superficially on her name derivative, Elmer Fudd. 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). Notably, Elmyra's last name, Duff, is "Fudd" pronounced backwards. Curiously, at least once Elmyra was shown to be bald like her inspiration, and wear a wig.
At Acme Looniversity, Elmyra's mentor and favorite teacher at school was Elmer Fudd.
This danger is balanced by her complete and utter gullibility. 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. Her abject stupidity is pocked with occasional instances of cleverness, and her character is toned down as needed.
Elmyra looks sweet and somewhat dumb, 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 and Tyrone the Turtle.
In all her incarnations, Elmyra has been voiced by Canadian actress Cree Summer.
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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.
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 stared 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.
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.
Image:Peatb.jpg 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").
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. Since the same teams created both Tiny Toons and Batman it's plausible the resemblance is intentional.
Status
Elmyra, along with the rest of the shows she appeared in, is no longer being animated. There is currently (as of 12/12/05) a petition to bring back Elmyra's original series, Tiny Toons.