Bird Brained

Mr. Peebles gets a new lovebird for the pet shop and he leaves Magilla in charge to watch it, but the lovebird escapes the pet shop and Magilla goes after him.

Magilla Gorilla, Mr. Peebles, Lovebirds, Cop, Men In White Uniforms

Magilla spent his time languishing in the front display window of Mr. Peebles' pet store, eating bananas and being a drain on the businessman's finances. Mr. Peebles marked Magilla down considerably, but he was only ever purchased for a short time, typically by some thieves who needed the gorilla to break into a bank or by an ad company looking for a mascot for their new product. The customers always ended up returning Magilla, forcing Mr. Peebles to return their money. The only customer who was truly interested in obtaining the trouble-prone simian for good was a little girl named Ogee ("Oh Gee!"), who lamentably never had enough money.

Magilla Gorilla holds a special distinction for two reasons: First, Magilla (along with Peter Potamus) was one of the few cartoons to begin its run in syndication and then move to network television. Magilla Gorilla was picked up by ABC on January 1, 1966. Secondly, the show was one of the first to be created in conjunction with a toy company (Ideal Toys) in order to market character toys immediately. This series followed up on such Hanna-Barbera characters as Yogi Bear and Pebbles Flintstone, which had spawned successful Ideal lines of toys and games.

Magilla was voiced by veteran character actor Allan Melvin, best known as Sam the Butcher, Alice's long-time beau on The Brady Bunch.

Also of note is the fact that in its third year, when it was picked up by ABC (from syndication), Ricochet Rabbit and Droop-a-Long was switched with Breezly and Sneezly from Peter Potamus and his Magic Flying Balloon in an effort to promote the hippo's show, which was trailing in the ratings.