Pepé Le Pew is an animated character from the Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons, introduced in 1945.

[1] Although initially a feature character with his own series of shorts, Pepé has drawn increasing criticism as treating the harassment of clearly unwilling women as a subject of humor.

In a role-reversal, the 1949 short For Scent-imental Reasons ended with an accidentally painted blue (and now terrified) Pepé being pursued by a madly smitten Penelope (who has been dunked in dirty water, leaving her with a ratty appearance and a developing head cold, completely clogging up her nose).

Penelope locks him up inside a perfume shop, hiding the key down her chest, and proceeds to chase the now-imprisoned and effectively odorless Pepé.

This cartoon is notable for not only diverging from the Pepé/female-black-cat dynamic, but also rather cheekily showing that Pepé likes to be beaten up, considering the wildcat thrashes him numerous times.

Animation producer Eddie Selzer, who was then Jones' bitterest foe at the studio, once profanely commented that no one would laugh at the Pepé cartoons.

Jones wrote that Pepé was based (loosely) on the personality of his Termite Terrace colleague, writer Tedd Pierce, a self-styled "ladies' man" who reportedly always assumed that his infatuations were reciprocated.

In the French version, the voice of "Pépé le putois" was dubbed by François Tavares, using a heavy Italian accent in a vocal caricature of Yves Montand.

Pepé appeared with several other Looney Tunes characters in Filmation's 1972 made-for-TV special Daffy Duck and Porky Pig Meet the Groovie Goolies.

In another episode, titled "Stop and Smell Up the Flowers", Pepé Le Pew is shown to be good friends with a baby Gossamer.

He also made a short cameo appearance with Penelope Pussycat in the Merrie Melodies segment "Cock of the Walk" sung by Foghorn Leghorn.

In "Gribbler's Quest," Pepé Le Pew is shown to be in the same group therapy with Daffy Duck, Marvin the Martian, and Yosemite Sam.

Pepé appeared in Looney Tunes: Rabbits Run, voiced again by Jeff Bergman, as the head of a major perfumery for whom Lola wants to create a signature scent.

Pepé also appeared in New Looney Tunes (formerly called Wabbit), voiced by Eric Bauza, in the role of a James Bond-like secret agent.

[9] Gabriel Iglesias, voice of Speedy Gonzales in Space Jam: A New Legacy, said that he could not say that he ever saw the character in a negative light and that growing up watching the original cartoons, he said that it was just from a different time.

[11] In March 2021, as a result of controversy surrounding the character, Pepé Le Pew was reported to be removed from modern Warner Bros. projects until further notice, starting with Space Jam: A New Legacy.

[14] In October 2010, it was reported that Mike Myers would voice Pepé Le Pew in a feature-length live-action/animated film based on the character, although no information about this project has surfaced since.

[15] In July 2016, it was revealed at San Diego Comic-Con that Max Landis was writing a fully-animated Pepé Le Pew feature film for Warner Bros.[16] The movie was cancelled due to sexual assault allegations against Landis in 2017, and a report that the character has not yet been planned to appear in future Warner Bros. productions leaves the feature film in doubt.