Looney Tunes Platinum Collection Volume 2.

Just a quick reminder that Warner has released the second volume of the Looney Tunes Platinum collection on Blu-ray. The three disc set again contains fifty classic shorts, fully restored in pristine condition and presented in HD for the very first time. Needless to say it comes with a huge amount of special features, including extensive audio commentary tracks by Michael Barrier and John Kricfalusi, Bob Clapmpett, Eddie Fitzgerald, Kali Fontecchio and Greg Ford. The set also comes with a 28 page booklet filled with archival material, written by our good friend Jerry Beck.

While the first two discs contain 25 Looney Tunes shorts each, the third disc (which is not included in the regular DVD release) features some great classic material. Included are shorts from the 1930's, featuring Bosko, the Talk-Ink Kid, like 'Sinkin' in the bathtub', Warner's very first theatrical short, directed by Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising. It also contains eleven more Tex Avery directed shorts, like 'Red Hot Riding Hood' (with the famous sequence animated by Preston Blair) and 'The Blitz Wolf''. Too bad these shorts were not restored and are therefor presented in Standard Def on the Blu-ray set. But maybe that's something for the future.

The fifty Looney Tunes shorts are presented in non-chronological order and were produced between 1938 ('Porky in Egypt' and 'Porky in Wackyland' directed by Bob Clampett and 'Porky's Hare Hunt' directed by Ben Hardaway) and 1959 (Friz Freleng's 'Mexicali Shmoes').

Above: Porky meets all kinds of crazy and then some, looking for the infamous last Dodo bird in 'Porky in Wackyland' (left), with animation by Norman McCabe and Izzy Ellis. (remade in color in 1949 as 'Dough for the Do-Do'). Right: Porky (and his camel) again go nuts later that year looking for Egyptian mummy's, but finding not much else then a pretty vivid Mirage, in 'Porky in Egypt'.

Among the collection of restored shorts are also all three cartoons from Chuck Jones' Bugs Bunny 'hunting trilogy': 'Rabbit Fire'(1951), 'Rabbit Seasoning' (1952, above) and 'Duck! Rabbit, Duck!' (1953, below). In these shorts, Bugs and Daffy try to outsmart each other, hoping to convince Elmer what kind of hunting season it really is, Duck or Rabbit! (images compiled by me from different takes).

The compilation also features valuable restored versions of the Oscar nominated shorts 'A Wild Hare' (Bugs Bunny cartoon from 1940 that lost to Rudolph Ising's 'The Milky Way'), the 1957 Speedy Gonzalez short 'Tabasco Road', (lost to the Sylvester/Tweety short 'Birds Anonymous', from Warner's 'Merrie Melodies') and 'Mexicali Shmoes', also a Speedy Gonzalez short (lost to John and Faith Hubley's 'Moonbirds' in 1959).

All in all, a great collection of classic shorts that have been painstakingly restored in High Definition, something that obviously must have taken quite some time and a whole lot of love. Great job guys! For a complete list of all shorts and features go here.

Happy Thanksgiving!

To celebrate thanksgiving, I thought it would be fitting to post this classic Bugs Bunny/Elmer story from December 1943. It was featured in the 26th issue of the 'Looney Tunes-Merrie Melodies' comic series, published by Dell Comics from 1941 to July/September 1962. A giant 246 issues were published in total. Western continued the title from 1975 to 1980 under their 'Gold Key' imprint, but the earlier Dell books still taste best! Enjoy your dinner everybody and have a great weekend!

Warner releases Looney Tunes on Blu-ray.

Today Warner released the first volume of their Looney Tunes Platinum collection on Blu-ray! Fans who have enjoyed the 'Golden Collection', which also had all the shorts collected in six volumes of 4 disc sets,released between 2003 and 2008, will finally be able watch Warner's classic cartoons in high def! The first Volume of the new 'Platinum Collection' contains three discs carrying 50 classic shorts, 11 behind the scenes featurettes. The third disc has five hours worth of the extra content and nine extra cartoons. You can choose bteween the standard digibook and an Ultimate Collector's edition featuring all kinds of extra gadgets (see above). In January next year Warner will also release their first volume of the 'Showcase' editions, which are single disc editions, with 25 cartoons each.

The shorts collected on the first Volume are from 1936 - 1966, directed by Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng, Bob Clampett and Arthur Davis, Robert McKimson and Tex Avery (unfortunately only one short by Avery this time around, the early 'I Love to Singa' from 1936).

Among the many great cartoons are the celebrated Academy Award winning 'For Scent-imental Reasons' from 1949 feauring Pepe Le Pew and 'Speedy Gozales' from 1955. It also has the 1957 Chuck Jones short 'What's Opera, Doc? considered by historians as 'the best cartoon of all time' (according to Jerry Beck's book), the runner up is also featured in this volume: 'Duck Amuck' from 1953, again directed by Jones. Both were inducted into the National Film Registry, the first one in 1992, the second one in 1999.







Opening background by Irv Wyner from the 1955 award winning short 'Speedy Gonzalez' directed by Fritz Freleng (click to enlarge). What a great example of showing character through conflict: on one end the 'Ajax' cheese company (guarded of course, by Sylvester the cat) and on the other end, the Mexican border and the mice! This short was only the second appearance of Speedy. He started out in the 1953 short ''Cat-Tails for Two'. Animation by Gerry Chiniquy, Ted Bonnicksen and Arthur Davis on a script by Warren Foster (he would later work for Hanah-Barbera on 'Yogi the Bear and 'the Flintstones').

Above and below: In 'What's Opera Doc' Elmer Fudd chases Bugs Bunny while they're both singing to classical music. Directed by Chuck Jones this 1957 short plays like Disney's 'Fantasia' on steroids and is loaded with georgeous colorfull backgrounds by Philip DeGuard.










Below: Breaking the 'fourth wall' in Chuck Jones' 'Duck Amuck' from 1957. Daffy fights the scriptwriters and animators of this short, the scenery and in the end himself while the final scene reveals Bugs as the creator. Animation work by Ken Harris, Ben Washam and Lloyd Vaughan.

The extra's contain a pencil test from Chuck Jones' television special 'How the Grinch stole Christmas' from 1966 while the extra nine shorts feature a.o. Daffy Duck as Duck Dodgers in 'Return of the 24 1/2th Century' from the Thanks-for-giving 1980 TV special and 'The Fright before Christmas' from Bugs Bunny's 'Looney's Christmas Tales' TV special from 1979. There are a couple of cartoons that were never released before and a lot of shorts are digitally restored and now have perfect quality, presented in their original format.