Well, Just You Wait! (1969–2017) User Reviews

Nu, Pogodi!

[plutonyum · 10/10 · 27 January 2005]

I recently saw an episode of "Nu, Pogodi!" on a local multicultural TV station, & found it to be hilarious, ironic, & enigmatic. This resulted in my buying the complete collection on DVD. Many people attempt to compare this to the "Road Runner/Coyote" series or to "Tom & Jerry." While the basic premise is the same (hungry Wolf is chasing Hare), this series is far different from what Americans are accustomed. Wolf usually is smoking a cigarette (which usually adds to his situation), has a beer belly, & even consumes alcohol to the point of intoxication; this is all shown right on screen.

Another factor which differentiates "Nu, Pogodi!" from other cartoons, is that the background music isn't orchestrated for the cartoon series, but rather popular Russian/contemporary songs are incorporated. You will hear popular music from the time that particular cartoon was made (18 were made from 1969--1993). Wolf will be chasing Hare in an episode from the late 1970s, while a disco tune is playing; another episode from 1984 contains techno/pop music from that particular time period. The visual effects are set to the music, which allows for some comical moments!

Most cartoons (or any story, for that matter) follow the view of the protagonist (hero) & how that character resorts to escape or rescue. "Nu, Pogodi!," however, follows it from the view of the antagonist, Wolf, & allows himself to show how inept he is at obtaining his goal. Whereas the Coyote is presumed to be sober while chasing the Road Runner, Wolf has displayed otherwise, & his intoxication only adds to his ineptitude.

As an American who does not know any Russian, I did not find the language barrier to be any problem; there is very little dialogue uttered in "Nu, Pogodi!" All one needs to know to understand this series are the following: "Zayats" means "Hare", "Volk" means "Wolf," & "Nu, Pogodi" means "Just you wait, I'll get you," in Russian. This makes up for over 90% of the dialogue in the series.

I would rate this a 10 out of 10; it is a definite must-see!

Excellent thing!

[raitism · 10/10 · 19 July 2001]

So I think everybody here will agree with me that these are the one of the very best animation films ever made in Soviet Union. So if you are understanding Russian language I can recommend to see them!

While there are only two main heroes in all series - Wolf and Hare this is amazing work of Soviet times animation masters. In fact these series are a little bit similar to Tom and Jerry series. Only they are not so much pain for bad hero - Wolf.

The greatest Russian cartoon ever

[werdnak · 10/10 · 20 January 2002]

This is the greatest cartoon to ever come out of USSR. It is similar to Tom and Jerry, and you don't even need to understand Russian to enjoy this great feature. Problem is finding any of it here in America...If anyone knows where I can get it, please email me.

Funny in a childish but smart way

[sunlion · 28 January 2004]

Cartoon IS funny. One comment said that the "Roadrunner" was the "Nu pogodi!" creators aim. It was not. And anyone who thinks that unnoying loud bird blowing someone up again and again and agonizingly again in exactly the same manner until you have a kneejeark reaction is funny, should simply go back to kindergarten. I presume that the commenter was from Moscow, which makes the comment even more bizzarre. "Nu pogodi!" is meant for children. And made in Soviet times, when children were allowed to have their childhood. Trey were not required at the youngest age to watch swashbuckling and syrupy soap-opera kissing in cartoons and films made for kids by people who don`t know how to make films for kids and make just watered-down versions of adult products "with all the good stuff cut out". In "Nu pogodi!" the wolf is not actually a predator, but a hooligan, a schoolyard bully, an older and stronger type that likes to push around younger and the weaker. The use of the music is very appropriate and makes the cartoon sometimes histerically funny. The idea is to make fun, not to glare with sadistic anticipation how someone gets hurt endlessly, and when someone do get hurt in "Nu pogodi!" it is noted and calls for sympathy. People who made the cartoon are professionals at working for children audience, and their natural kindness and talent was put into this cartoon, even if inspired by some other Western work, but entirely capable of standing by itself and to get the highest points for being a good, non-aggressive comedy with kind humor.

Cartoon from my childhood

[mail-3839 · 10/10 · 12 April 2007]

You have to be Russian to truly appreciate this cartoon series. I first saw these cartoons up to episode 5 on 8mm film no sound. I still have these films around (although damaged from time) from 1974 when I left the Soviet Union for good. You have to understand that these cartoons were made from behind the iron curtain. Soviet cartoon making technology was far behind the US, and US cartoons were not available to Soviet artists for comparison. How could they be available if the soviet government made it a point to spread propaganda that Communist life is the USSR was better? Besides the adventures in the chase for the rabbit you see nostalgic elements of Russian urban, and suburb life. You see things like the electric troly buses, public drinking dispensers for carbonated water with one public glass that is washed prior to use, the 1982 Olympics and Russia's enthusiasm with good sportsmanship, typical soviet beaches, and attitude by hoodlums towards the law. Where else can you find a children's cartoon where the bad wolf smokes cigarettes, drinks beer while eating dried salted fish, steals and vandalizes property? One can't help but fall in love with both the hero and villain. I recently purchased the DVD of all 18 classic episodes 13 of which I waited 25 years to see and now with sound. I plan to have my kids watch these cartoons before they find the remote control to the TV so they too can appreciate what life was like for Russian children in the Soviet union.

Nu Pogodi Is A MUST WATCH!

[matthew-shats · 10/10 · 16 August 2014]

There is not much to be said about this series, it is just great all around, some may say it is a Russian version of Tom and Jerry but these series are completely different, just because there are two characters that want to kill each other doesn't mean that its the same. The first time I saw this TV show is when I was about 5 years old, 18 year s old now and I can still laugh at episode 1 even with its "old fashioned" jokes. I would suggest that if you're interested in watching this series, stopping at the 18th episode because I personally think that the series went down hill from there, I only recently found out about a new episode made in 2006 and I felt that they tried to take the glory of the 1969 series and make it funny but new. Yeah they failed. Overall I think you would be an idiot to miss an opportunity to watch this amazing series.

The Soviet Era Classic

[denis888 · 8/10 · 25 September 2006]

If you lived in the former Soviet Union and were a child, the this cartoon series, Nu Pogodi - Just You Wait - is a vivid and the brightest recollection of that time. Please, do not take it so seriously. Surely, this is a carbon copy of Tom & Jerry series, with Wolf and Hare taking their places. Surely, there are far too many cases of open violence and poor Wolf's mishaps. But, this is just a lightweight entertaining for kids, just a brisk breezy show biz work. Music is all the time very good. The sample selection is so fitting and precise that almost all Russians who ever saw a single episode of this cartoon will immediately associate this or that melody with this work only. Good, funny and light work.

A good cartoon to watch if you're russian or not

[frogdude-69914 · 10/10 · 25 November 2023]

I started to watch this cartoon in December 2022, and I can tell that this became one of my favorite cartoons in a short time. The animation is smooth and better than american animation in the 1960s (at that time, the animation in the US was very lazy. See Yogi bear, the Flintstones and pretty much all american cartoons of thr 1960s and you will see what im talking about), the characters are well designed, the soundtrack is catchy, the plot is very simple (it's like Tom and Jerry or Roadrunner and Wile E Coyote, where a bad guy tries to catch a good guy but he always fails). And theres almost no dialogue, as the wolf just says "Nu Zayats, nu pogodi!" English: "Well, Hare, just you wait!" But theres dialogue when the wolf and the hare sing (see episode 8, and 15 to see what im talking about). Overall: this is a good cartoon and I recommend it.

Classic

[deamona · 10/10 · 25 November 2023]

This show was a staple in communist/early post-communist Czechoslovakia where I grew up. It was the Easter Bloc's answer to Tom and Jerry, and holds up remarkably well even by today's standards.

The animation and character design are great, and it's truly refreshing to watch today when most kids' shows are saccharine sweet, politically correct garbage with obnoxious main characters and incompetent bumbling villains.

The Hare is your classic hero: sweet and friendly, washes regularly, has clean clothes. The Wolf is awesome, though. He has tattoos and drinks alcohol, he smokes, he's dirty and he beats people up. Even a little child can figure out which one is the good guy and which one is the bad guy. The show doesn't need to beat you over the head with moral conundrums and lame life lessons like your average Disney Junior production.

A great cartoon to watch if you're Russian or not (I'm not Russian, but I discovered this amazing cartoon)

[watermelonv-13956 · 9/10 · 10 February 2024]

So I began to watch this cartoon in December 2022, and I instantly loved it. So, the cartoon is about a wolf trying to eat a hare, but he always fails. At the end of each episode, the wolf says: "nu Zayats, nu pogodi!" Which translates to "well hare, just you wait!" This cartoon has very little dialogue, usually interjections like the hare's laughs or the wolf's grunts. The animation is very smooth, I mean it looks like it was an American cartoon made in the late 1930s to early 1950s. The characters are well designed and the world-building is good. The series consists of 16 episodes, which is really ashaming to me because I would have really liked Soyuzmultfilm to produce more. Well, there are episodes 17 to 22, but that's not what I'm talking about. I really wanted to see the wolf and the hare going to the zoo, in the jungle, in space or in Antarctica. Plus I think I would have scripts for more episodes. Also, this cartoon is very underrated, it's only known in Russia, former countries of the USSR, and eastern Europe. Anyways, I recommend this cartoon. I rated it 9/10 because I wanted to see more episodes like I said, watching the same 16 episodes over and over is boring, plus I watched the 16 episodes so many times that I can straight up play them in my head.

One of the best cartoons of the Soviet Union, even the best.

[jack_o_hasanov_imdb · 7/10 · 9 August 2021]

One of the best cartoons of the Soviet Union, even the best.

My childhood was fun with "Tom and Jerry" and "Nu Pogodi".

We were happy when we heard the song "Cip Cip Cucelerim", which was a song in Azerbaijani language and was known to everyone at that time.

The BEST Soviet cartoon!

[HerosCooking · 10/10 · 10 April 2024]

You heard that right! I grew up watching this series like daily. I have to say that "Nu, pogodi!" is one of the best cartoons of all time and a MUST watch for kids and everyone.

The episodes are so amazing and they have the two good voice actors: Anatoli Papanov and Klara Rumyanova. The music is appropriate for the series and it has wonderful humor! Until like episode 18 the series is the best in my opinion, but the 19th and 20th episodes are enjoyable as well with good voice actors and decent animation, though I still recommend the older ones.

Overall the series is amazing and people will enjoy this cartoon series with joy! Highly recommending it, so if you want to then it's worth to watch!

A very primitive, agonizingly slow Roadrunner facsimile

[titov · 2/10 · 19 May 2003]

How exactly the "Nu, pogodi!" series has retained any following at all in the age of universal cassette access remains a mystery. It would seem a foregone conclusion that if you take a Roadrunner cartoon-- *any* Roadrunner cartoon-- and show it to a devotee of the "Nu, pogodi!" films, some sort of Dramatic Epiphany will take place before your eyes ("So *this* is what they were trying to do!").

But perhaps we're actually talking about two different phenomena altogether. For although both series feature exactly the same continuing "plot" throughout all episodes (big bad animal chases smaller, cleverer/luckier good animal), the difference in the execution of this concept could not be more marked: the Pogodi series is amateurishly drawn, animated in haphazard and ill-connected sequences, and moves at a pace that could only engage a very early pre-schooler. Which may be the key to its puzzling popularity, one thinks-- hey, who doesn't remember one's early cartoons fondly?-- until one recalls that Soviets of *all ages* loved (as do many Russians *now*) this meandering, lumpy and almost entirely wit-free series. The considerable acting skills of Anatolii Papanov-- a genuine star of the Soviet cinema-- are squandered altogether on the wolf's voice, as the character is never given a clever line to deliver.

Again, pick a Roadrunner cartoon, *any* Roadrunner cartoon: within 30 seconds the viewer is involved with and amused by Wile E. Coyote in ways that the well-intentioned creators of "Nu, pogodi!" simply could not conceive of. The Soviet series is not a *bad* cartoon, in the sense that it is actively harmful. It is simply inert.

An interesting cartoon

[nemotz · 4 February 2006]

As a child I saw this cartoon, together with Bugs Bunny, Tom and Jerry etc. Some would say that it is a copy of other cartoons but I say, watch it and you'll change your opinion. A different context, together with funny setting offer an insight in the recent history of the Soviet Union. It has nothing to do with politics but just with pure fun.

I highly recommend it to everyone; I recently saw some of the 18 episodes. They are all top notch with a heavy cultural background ranging from folklore to contemporary 70s to 80s music.

A counterpart of American cartoons, it offers a most interesting point of view in the history of animation.

"Hare, just you wait!"

[ackstasis · 3 June 2007]

Probably inspired by the American "Tom and Jerry" and "Roadrunner and Wile E. Coyote" cartoons, the Russian animated series "Nu, pogodi!" features the smoking, beer-gutted, rebellious Volk (wolf) and his futile attempts to capture and eat the innocent young Zayats (hare). The first cartoon of the series was released in 1969, the second in 1970 and the series continued for sixteen episodes until the death of Anatoli Papanov, the voice of the wolf, in 1987. In 1993, two more episodes were produced featuring archived samples of Papanov's voice.

Though the cartoons are in Russian, dialogue within the films is scarce, rarely stretching beyond the wolf's trademark "Nu, zayats, nu pogodi! / Hare, just you wait!", which he utters every time his plans fail, and which you'll pick up on very quickly. Each ten-minute episode takes place in a different setting, and the wolf attempts to utilise the current situation to capture the hare (voiced by Klara Rumyanova) and presumably make a good meal out of her. Alas, these attempts are almost always in vain, with the hare constantly outsmarting the desperate wolf, either deliberately or inadvertently. Just like in your typical 'Roadrunner' cartoon, our sympathies are split between the characters – we certainly don't want the young innocent hare to be devoured, but we do feel sorry for the wolf as his endeavors fail miserably time after time.

I'm yet to see all the episodes in the series (I've really just started, in fact), but I'm enjoying it immensely, and each adventure brings forth something different and exciting. Somewhat uniquely, 'Nu, pogodi!' often sets its story to the tune of popular pop hits from the era in which it was made, so approximate dates of release can be pinpointed for any given episode based purely on the music selection. I also uncovered an interesting piece of trivia about the series. Initially, Russian singer/actor Vladimir Vysotsky was cast as the voice of the wolf, but Soviet cinema authorities did not give the studio their approval to use him, as he was not popular amongst the Communist party elite. As we know, Anatoli Papanov went on to become the voice of the wolf, though the cartoon's producers possibly included a slight tribute to Vysotsky by playing a sample of his well-known "Song about a Friend" ("Pesnya o Druge" in Russian) at the very beginning of the first episode.

Great cartoon for all ages!

[[e-mail] · 13 February 2005]

As a native Russian who hasn't seen the series since childhood, I recently bought a DVD of all 18 episodes. I am happy to note that the cartoon remained exactly as I recall it - smart, funny, well animated, and even the Soviet-era themes felt fresh in that retro-modern way. I showed it to some of my friends, and they found it hilarious and not hard to understand at all. I admit that a bit of humour is always added through the lyrics of the pop-songs, which could be lost on a non-native speaker. The content of the series is also closer to the Tom and Jerry cartoons (Roadrunner??? Are you kidding me?), but smarter. I would highly recommend it to anyone as an example of fine and original film-making.

legendary

[Vincentiu · 11 September 2014]

legendary series for many children from East Europe, it was a phenomenon, than, a lovely memories source. a wolf and a hair. adventures, humor, wise lessons and same promise. it is difficult to define it today because it was one of rare entertainment pillars in that period. but, after so many time, it seems be one of remarkable success of Soviet animation school. sure, not very high but seductive for simplicity of stories, not remarkable for drawing but useful for its moralistic humor. a series who remains, for many of its viewers, more than interesting. because, like Tom and Jerry, it has the rare gift to be answer to basic questions of an age. and because it is an admirable work.

legendary

[Kirpianuscus · 6 June 2017]

it is the only word who could, in decent way, define it. because, for generations of children, it was the event. the confrontation between hare and wolf. the adventures. the humor. the classic "Nu , pogodi" as ingredient of backyard games. and this ball of memories did it unique. not the best, maybe, not the great series. but unique. because it has charm and beautiful gags and innocence of its public from yesterday. because the wolf is more than the bad guy but a sort of classmate, rude, not very smart but, in its essence, an misunderstood. and the hare - it is the hero with subtle and convincing traits. so, a legendary series.

Funny + Violent = I Love it

[edlanda · 5 February 2006]

My family speaks Russian, So I have no problems understanding this movie. For those who don't know Russian, let me tell you what this cartoon is about. This cartoon is about a Volk (in English, wolf) that always chases this Zayits (in English, bunny) and they always get into wacky, hilarious adventure. In one episode the wolf chases the bunny into the hall of mirrors. The bunny shuts the lights and the wolf smashes all the mirrors looking for the bunny. Then he finds his ears, but as the lights are turned on he realized that he accidentally grabbed the angry manager. The manager throws him out. That left me laughing like crazy. If you love Russian comedy style movies, then watch "Nu Pogodi!" (1969).