Uber's predecessor, Hoppy.
Bart: Ewww! It's not like in cartoons!
Homer: Yeah. There's a lot more mucus.
Homer: Yeah. There's a lot more mucus.
Many works like to feature exotic animals, and nothing is a cooler way to introduce a weird beast than by using it for transportation. One unusual class of mammals with natural potential for transport are marsupials - after all, they come with their own pockets. And every so often, a character gets the bright idea of using that potential, and climbs into the pouch of a fast-moving pouched creature, typically a kangaroo. A few short hops later, character is safely at their destination, ready to resume the plot.
In cartoons, this trope very often overlaps with Pelican Package Pouch as the kangaroo can chauffeur several people around and practically store an entire wardrobe in their pouch, often carrying everything but that one item they need.
Given that a marsupial's pouch is something like an incubator for its embryonic infants much of the time, and is very rarely empty of young, this trope means Artistic License – Biology. Extra discredit if the marsupial is supposed to be male: the pouch is part of the female reproductive suite. In truth, trying to ride in a kangaroo's pouch would get a much... squickier result.
Even if the kangaroo is indeed female and not carrying young, unless the intended passenger is a small Talking Animal itself, there just wouldn't be room to hitch a lift. And, if they are small enough to fit, the rider won't be able to get out unless the kangaroo allows it: mother roos can constrict the pouch's entrance to restrain unruly joeys.
Compare with Boxing Kangaroo and Kangaroos Represent Australia. Compare Horse of a Different Color and Fur Is Clothing. Sister trope to Protection in Mouth, for another way creatures can hide another inside them physically.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- While there are no kangaroos in Pokémon the Series per se, there are Kangaskhan. They are much larger and exclusively female. In an episode of the anime, they adopt and raise a human child who could easily fit inside the pouch. Furthermore, as seen in the end of the episode, the pouch could fit the child, his birth parents, and a baby Kangaskhan, with room to spare. Kangaskhan are officially depicted as 7'03'' in size, but the Kangaskhan leader in this episode was easily 15 to 20 feet tall to pull that feat off.
- Pikachu's origin story in Pokémon Journeys: The Series has him being adopted as a Pichu by a loving Kangakhan mom. Unfortunately, he and the baby become too big to occupy the pouch together and end up slowing the Kangaskhan down. Realizing this, the future Pikachu ends up leaving one night when the Kangaskhan mom and baby are asleep, and sets out to survive on his own.
- Lupin III and his right-hand man, Jigen, use this in at least one episode to make their getaway. Because how else would the world's greatest thief make a grand escape in Australia?
Comic Books
- The Cartoon History of the Universe, when talking about the spread of Cro-Magnons throughout the world, shows a map including, in Australia, a woman riding in a kangaroo's pouch. The kangaroo looks a bit puzzled about this.
- Disney Ducks Comic Universe: In "Adventure Down Under", Donald and his nephews take a trip to Australia and are hired by a local rancher to hunt down "Mournful Mary", a kangaroo pestering his crops. Mary is big and mean, but she takes an unexpected liking to Donald, treating him like one of her own young. After she has saved their lives, they intervene to stop the rancher from shooting her, and offer to use the reward money to transport her out of Australia and back to Duckberg. On the steamer ride back to the States, Mary insists on giving Donald a ride in her pouch several times a day. He doesn't mind, except for the funny looks he gets from the other passengers.
Comic Strips
- A panel in The Far Side features Hannibal's first attempt at crossing the Alps. It involves his men riding kangaroos along the narrow ledges (with predictable results).
- Pearls Before Swine had Rat do this in an attempt to conserve energy.
Films — Animation
- Dot and the Kangaroo (and its sequels) has a whole song about it. The mother kangaroo had lost her baby, thus leaving her pouch empty and she is elated to have Dot ride in it because it reminds her of the feeling of having a child.
The best fun in the world/ And I tell you it's true/ Is to ride in the pouch of a red kangaroo.
- Minions: In their search of England, the Minion clan makes a short trip in kangaroo pouches when they reach Australia.
- Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire: During the "Gotta Go" musical number, Scooby rides in a kangaroo's pouch for a short time, only to be pushed out by her joey.
Films — Live-Action
- In the children's movie Napoleon (1995), the title puppy is given a ride through the Australian outback in a kangaroo pouch.
Literature
- Subverted in Alan Dean Foster's Day of the Dissonance when the intelligent kangaroo has a large, powerful, ill-tempered kangaroo genie living in her pouch.
- In an Encyclopedia Brown story, a kid tells a bunch of stories about his travels around the world in order to secure membership in some sort of club only for Encyclopedia to claim he's lying his ass off. The "male kangaroo with marsupial pouch" mistake is one of the many errors in the kid's stories.
- Sterling Lanier's The Unforsaken Hiero: Subverted. Giant kangaroos are used as mounts in D'alwah, but people ride on their backs with highly specialized saddles.
- In Winnie the Pooh, Rabbit kidnaps Roo by dropping Piglet into Kanga's button-up pouch when she isn't looking (they're about the same size, so she just thinks Rabbit put Roo in for her). Piglet doesn't enjoy the ride at all.
- In Deltora Quest, Dread Mountain, the heros meet a small number of creatures called the Kin, large, winged, intelligent creatures whom were hunted to near extinction by the Gnomes and Grey guards respectively. After rescuing one of their young three of the largest of the Kin volunteer to fly the characters to the titular mountain in their pouches.
- In The Pride of Parahumans, Aniya is a "rescue-taur" type parahuman with opossum genes and an airtight pouch on her lower body that can fit most humans or parahumans in case one's helmet breaks while on a spacewalk.
- A variation in Whispering In The Wind by Australian author Alan Marshall, where the hero is assisted by Greyfur the kangaroo whose pouch is a Bag of Holding.
Live-Action TV
- The Goodies: When the Goodies start their own pirate postal operation, Graham says he's ordered several hundred kangaroos for parcel post delivery. This is an early indication that he's going loony.
Music
- This
early 90s song by a Dutch children's choir.
Video Games
- Played straight in ARK: Survival Evolved with the Procoptodon, which is capable seating 2 riders, one on it's back and another in the pouch, and not only that, it can also help baby dinosaurs imprint by putting them in it's pouch. Possibly even exaggerated since both males AND females have this pouch.
- Played straight in The Legend of Zelda: Oracle Games with Ricky the kangaroo, who appears to be male. Of course, like all anime and Japanese game kangaroos, he wears boxing gloves.
- Yoshi's Island DS: Some levels have a section where Yoshi must ride in a kangaroo's pouch. These sections are often littered with coins and other collectables.
- Averted in Bomberman; in games where Louie is present, Bomberman rides on his back.
- In Mega Man X7, one Maverick Boss, Vanishing Gungaroo, is based on a joey, and he uses a Mother Kangaroo-like Ride Armor, the cockpit being on its pouch.
- Much like in the anime; when you allow a Kangaskhan to follow you in Pokémon Let's Go, Pikachu! and Eevee!, your partner will snuggle in the pouch beside the joey. The player character avoids this by hitching a ride on her shoulder instead.
- Tekken: Starting in Tekken 5, Rodger Jr rides through the tournaments in the pouch of his unnamed mother as he searches for Rodger. Justified since he is a kangaroo joey.
Web Animation
- Happens in the infamous ''Dr. Rabbit's World Tour'' as seen in many YouTube Poops. And somehow the kangaroo hops all the way from Australia to the United States without breaking a sweat...
- in Starshine Carly, Jean-Luc from Bluey is riding in a kangaroo’s pouch. The video is here.
Webcomics
- Justified with Adrian and her son Ali in A&H Club as they're anthropomorphic kangaroos. After the timeskip Adrian starts using her pouch to carry a notepad while waitressing.
- In Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures Jyrras is a kangaroo rat, his mother is a kangaroo and considerably larger than him. Guess where he hides when he gets scared.
- Erfworld: The nation of Jetstone uses "cloth golems" — large, animated plushies — as heavy war machines. The so-called "Tankeroos" are used as mounts with this technique; justified, since they're custom-built for this purpose.
- Faux Pas references this trope (and the differences in roo gender) here.
- Not so much a kangaroo as a vaguely feline marsupial alien but in Last Res0rt Jigsaw's Robot Buddy Gangrel usually hides in her pouch, where she also keeps a Bag of Holding.
- VHV: Rumbah of both genders have marsupial pouches. Butter had a pocket dimension enchantment tattooed onto hers and Mia's kids (who are nearly her own size) like to ride in it, as has Cresta (who's even bigger than her).
Web Original
- In Orion's Arm, Siberoos are kangaroo-Siberian tiger splices that were engineered as rescue animals in polar regions. Females can carry passengers and keep them warm at the same time.
Western Animation
- Captain Flamingo: Max briefly hides himself inside of a kangaroo's pouch at the end of "Bunny Run". Although, he admits that it didn't really smell that good when he was there inside.
- Courage the Cowardly Dog: In "The Transplant", several people, including Eustace, are mutated into kaiju-size kangaroo hybrids. Naturally, Eustace carries out this trope with his wife Muriel.
- One episode of Danger Mouse had DM and Penfold being given a pouch ride by a male kangaroo. Due to the Cosgrove Hall animators sometimes being forgetful when it came to DM and Penfold's size, they were about human size in this part.
- In The Fairly OddParents! episode "Nega-Timmy", the Bad Parent Hunter, a parody of the late Aussie Steve Irwin, a.k.a. the Crocodile Hunter, rides in a kangaroo's pouch at the start of his show.
- The Flintstones: Hoppy frequently carries Bamm-Bamm and Pebbles in this manner, as depicted in the page image.
- Futurama: Bender's Game'' had orc spear-throwers riding in giant war-kangaroo pouches. A baby kangaroo was hanging around with the orcs in the pouch.
- Garfield and Friends: "Sound Judgement" features Nermal hiding in a kangaroo's pouch at the zoo. While fishing him out, Garfield does a Rummage Fail showing off several more items stashed inside.
- George of the Jungle (2007): At the end of "Ape Ruth", two kangaroos (both male) convince George and Ape to compete in a pouch race, with the pair riding in each of their pouches.
- A 1980s Gumby episode, "Kangaroo Express", had an Australian equivalent to the Pony Express, where kangaroos carry small parcels across Australia in their pouches. Thanks to Gumby's portable Shrink-a-Dink device, Gumby and his friends can ride in one of the kangaroos.
- House of Mouse: In the end of "The Stolen Cartoons", Pete manages to hide briefly inside Kanga's pouch as Mickey is chasing him because of stealing the titular cartoons.
- In one episode of Jackie Chan Adventures, Jackie Chan and Kid Sidekick Jade try to claim the Monkey talisman, one of the twelve talismans that grants the user to change themselves and others into the shape of any animal. A series of shape changing shenanigans occur between the heroes and Valmont's mooks, until Chan is accidentally transformed into a kangaroo and Jade into a rabbit. After beating up the villains in his kangaroo form, he puts rabbit-Jade in his pouch and tries to make a jumpy getaway. Considering that in a later episode, Jade used it again to transform herself into a maned lion, the talisman presumably alters gender as well.
- James the Cat: In "Neighbours", Frieda takes Fennimore home to his parents by putting him in her pouch and hopping over the garden wall. She's also used her pouch to rock Fennimore to sleep (unsuccessfully) in "Pa Rat's Problem", keep a baby bird out of James' grasp in "Sums", and store Dennis before handing him to James in "Friends".
- Johnny Bravo: After getting stranded in an Australian wildlife park, Johnny gets adopted by a mother kangaroo, who puts him in her pouch when the herd moves, much to his annoyance. He actually fits fine, despite being an adult human who is a good deal more muscular than average, his main problem is that the jumping makes him carsick.
- Laff-A-Lympics: One episode features a kangaroo race as the last event. Subverted because the only entrant to ride his kangaroo's pouch is Mumbly, who uses a mechanical kangaroo instead of a real one, which isn't against any rules.
- Looney Tunes:
- In the cartoon Daffy Duck Slept Here, Daffy claims that he has an invisible kangaroo named Hymie. Porky doesn't buy it, so Daffy climbs up on an invisible pouch and his disembodied floating head is seen bouncing all over the room. Even so, Porky still doesn't buy it.
- Bugs Bunny gets "adopted" by a kangaroo in one episode who insists he ride in her pouch — which has a zipper on it.
- My Big, Big Friend: Bongo gives these to Matt from time to time.
- Puppy Dog Pals: Bingo and Rolly hop in the pouches of two Kangaroos in the episode "Bob's Boomerang".
- Rocko's Modern Life:
- The show's intro begins with the titular character as a baby being carried in his mother's pouch before falling out and being aged up by a sentient clock. (Fittingly, he's a wallaby.)
- In "Unbalanced Load", the episode where Rocko goes to the laundromat, the washer he's using becomes unbalanced and starts hopping away, and he has to subdue it. It continues hopping along with him on it in this fashion, until he takes a baseball bat and destroys it.
- Schoolhouse Rock!, "Rufus Xavier Sarsaparilla." The titular character gains a pet kangaroo and rides around this way.
- The Simpsons
- Deconstructed in "Bart vs. Australia", Bart and Homer try to escape an angry mob by riding in a kangaroo's pouch but soon discover that, unlike cartoons, real kangaroos have mucus in their pouches and can't accommodate anything bigger than their joeys.
- "Halloween Of Horror": Among the stalls at the massive Halloween party Bart misses out on is a pen for Kangaroo pouch rides.
- Also deconstructed in Family Guy. Peter climbs into the pouch of a kangaroo, but the poor kangaroo can barely move.
Peter: Look at me Lois, I'm Roo! Come on ma, let's go watch Pooh trick the bees outta their honey by pretending he's a rain cloud. *the kangaroo collapses in exhaustion*
- Dulcy and Ord are both dragons with marsupial-esque pouches, which they've used to carry their friends on multiple occassions.
- In the Snooper and Blabber short "Hop to It", the jewel thief Slippery Sydney rides in the pouch of Matilda, his pet kangaroo.
- Widget the World Watcher: In the episode "Widget's Walkabout", the title character transforms into a kangaroo and invites one of his friends to ride in his pouch.
- In The Wild Thornberrys, a kangaroo once allows Eliza to travel this way as a favor. It's a little more realistic since Eliza is shown crammed in the very tiny pouch.
- Work It Out Wombats!: Played with in the episode "Game Changer." Duffy, a kangaroo, is carrying her daughter Louisa in a baby seat type-thing. This pouch is obviously not located in her body.
- The World of David the Gnome: David once rode in a kangaroo/wallaby like creature. (Of course, with a six-inch-tall gnome, this makes more sense than most examples here.)
Real Life
- Joeys often accidentally do this with unrelated kangaroos, as kangaroos are surprisingly bad at recognising their own kids. Mums check their kids' identities by a sniff test, but if a predator comes they don't have time to verify and simply let the joey in for a mutually beneficial quick escape. By the time they're safe, they smell enough like the mother to pass a future sniff test, providing a quick and easy adoption method.
- Although there have been no real-life incidents of humans riding in marsupial pouches, the extinct Diprotodon (a sort of giant wombat) had a backward-facing pouch large enough to carry an adult human. A fossil discovery has placed this creature in the spotlight.