Part of the theme tune of the 1990s cartoon series Animaniacs has these words:
We're Animaniacs!
We have pay-or-play contracts.
We're zany to the max
There's baloney in our slacks.
I do not understand the meaning of that latter line. What makes matters worse is that some sources indicate that the line contains a double-meaning (innuendo) and I don’t understand that either.
I’m led to understand that baloney has two meanings: nonsense, and some kind of sausage. Slack, furthermore, has many possible meanings.
The on-screen imagery accompanying this line is the following:
This seems to take the line literally: they throw slices of baloney (the sausage) into Yakko’s slack (the textile oversize). But this makes no sense to me whatsoever.
So, my questions are:
- Why this particular type of sausage, why would anyone want to put sausage in their pants, and why is this funny?
- What is the innuendo/double-meaning that I’m missing?
Best Answer
Considering that the Animaniacs were a bit... Lunatic... I think they're just expressing that they are crazy, to the point of carrying baloney slices in their slacks?
Or maybe its innuendo lies on the fact that baloney is a slang for nonsense as you stated, and the only piece of cloth the character is wearing is a slack. So, that means they are full of nonsense, so that their clothes are filled with it.
The "funny" bit (if one could say it's funny) lies on the literal visual interpretation of the sentence, which the viewer gets confused as to think "no, it's not possible that this is literal, this HAS to have some hidden message". But they do it literally anyway.