Dastardly and Muttley in Their Flying Machines

Did You Know?

• Each 22-minute episode contained two Dastardly & Muttley stories, one Magnificent Muttley story, and two or three short Wing Dings.
• The complete series was released on Blu-ray on June 30, 2026.

Plot

Set in Germany, Dick Dastardly and Muttley, the villains from Wacky Races, serve as flying aces in World War I-styled aeroplanes as members of the Vulture Squadron. Their mission is to stop a messenger pigeon named Yankee Doodle Pigeon from delivering top-secret messages to an opposing army. The squadron also includes Klunk, an inventor who communicates through unintelligible sounds and facial contortions, and Zilly, a panicky pilot who translates for Klunk and frequently attempts to desert.

Each story follows a similar pattern: the Vulture Squadron sets out to trap the pigeon, beginning with Zilly trying to escape and being retrieved by Muttley, followed by Klunk introducing a plan involving planes equipped with his latest contraptions. The plan inevitably fails due to flaws or mistakes, causing the planes to crash, collide, or explode. As they fall from the wreckage, Dastardly calls for help, and Muttley assists only if Dastardly agrees to give him medals.

Even when Muttley helps, Dastardly rarely lands softly. The General periodically calls Dastardly to demand results, often disbelieving him and grabbing him by the nose or mustache through the phone. Yankee Doodle Pigeon always escapes, leaving the squadron in backfiring predicaments. In a contemporary comic book series, Dastardly and Muttley succeeded in capturing the pigeon three times: once with falling ice cubes (finding only moths in the satchel), once by salting its tail (finding a jigsaw puzzle reading "Sucker!"), and once by hypnotizing the pigeon during a truce to make it a traitor.

References in popular culture

The theme song was covered in 1995 by psychobilly group the Reverend Horton Heat, who combined it with the Jonny Quest theme for the album Saturday Morning: Cartoons' Greatest Hits. Hip-hop duo Madvillain name-check the characters in their song "Accordion" from Madvillainy. In the 2007 BBC Robin Hood episode "Lardner's Ring," the Sheriff of Nottingham shouts "We must catch the pigeon! Catch the pigeon NOW!" mimicking Dastardly's delivery.

Other appearances and renditions

Yankee Doodle Pigeon and Klunk appear in the 2021 animated series Jellystone!, with Klunk voiced by Fajer Al-Kaisi and Jim Conroy. Yankee Doodle Pigeon appears stuffed and mounted in Dick Dastardly's quarters in the 2020 animated film Scoob!. Mumbly and Dread Baron, who resemble Muttley and Dick Dastardly, appear in Hanna-Barbera's Laff-A-Lympics in 1978 due to licensing issues; Dread Baron is later revealed as Dick Dastardly's brother in the comic books.