Looney Tunes Golden/Platinum Collections

[Daniel]

Looking at the list again, "Little Orphan Airedale" is not a Friz Freleng it's a Chuck Jones. Porky and Charlie are comedy gold!

[Ben]

Collectors Choice contents:

Tons of hare-raising fun in one wild collection! From deep inside the Warner Bros. Vault comes an anthology chock full of animation gold! Restored, remastered and uncut, the shorts in Looney Tunes Collector's Choice Volume 1 have been carefully selected for discerning fans. Enjoy the finest and funniest golden-era cartoons with the brilliance of high-definition audio and video. These treasures feature A-listers like Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Sylvester the Cat and Porky Pig, just to name a few. Even better, included among these 20 shorts are classics that have never before been released on home video. Whether you grew up with them or you're introducing them to a new generation, these timeless and iconic characters will keep fans of all ages young at heart.

This collection contains the following 20 animated short subjects: BEANSTALK BUNNY - Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck & Elmer Fudd (1954, Chuck Jones), THE BEE-DEVILED BRUIN - The Three Bears (1949, Chuck Jones), CATCH AS CATS CAN - Sylvester (1947, Arthur Davis), CRACKED QUACK -Daffy Duck & Porky Pig (1952, Friz Freleng), DAFFY DOODLES - Daffy Duck & Porky Pig (1946, Robert McKimson), DOGGONE CATS - Sylvester (1947, Arthur Davis), THE FOXY DUCKLING - (1947, Arthur Davis), A FRACTURED LEGHORN - Foghorn Leghorn (1950, Robert McKimson), GREEDY FOR TWEETY - Tweety & Sylvester (1957, Friz Freleng), HIP-HIP-HURRY! - Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote (1958, Chuck Jones), HIS BITTER HALF - Daffy Duck (1950, Friz Freleng), HOT ROD AND REEL - Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote (1959, Chuck Jones), LITTLE ORPHAN AIREDALE - Porky Pig and Charlie Dog (1947, Friz Freleng), A MOUSE DIVIDED - Sylvester (1953, Friz Freleng), PLOP GOES THE WEASEL - Foghorn Leghorn (1953, Robert McKimson), STOOGE FOR A MOUSE - Sylvester (1950, Friz Freleng), TALE OF TWO MICE - Babbit & Catstello (1945, Frank Tashlin), TWO GOPHERS FROM TEXAS - Goofy Gophers (1947, Arthur Davis), THE UNRULY HARE - Bugs Bunny & Elmer Fudd (1945, Frank Tashlin) & WHAT'S BREWIN' BRUIN? - The Three Bears (1947, Chuck Jones).

Yeah, Warners' blurb still has the Freleng/Jones mixup on Airedale, but thats a pretty nice mix of star character and non-series shorts, and a few one/two shots. Hot Rod And Reel!

[James]

I am glad that I too bought the set, though as Rand knows had to send it via James as Amazon wouldn’t send it direct to the UK for the sale deal...So I’m not sure of my # yet...

Just came in today! Yours is numbered 6152

[Ben]

Right back near the start of the run…how random!

[Daniel]

Jerry blogged about the set.

[Ben]

I think it’s just one disc?

I love that all these years after meeting to work on the MGM boxsets of LaserDisc yore, it's George and Jerry putting these kinds of things together again.

As for more Avery, George himself has said on a past podcast or interview that the intention is to do a last volume, which might also include some extra cartoons and a couple of fixes to the volume he wasn’t around to oversee, so there’s still hope there.

[Daniel]

More answers from the comments section:

Is the cut ending of Catch as Cats Can included or still lost forever?

Is it lost forever? Hopefully not. All I can say is the original ending is not in the Warner film vaults – and the cartoon was always released that way, with an abrupt fade out (not unlike The Heckling Hare). The version of Catch As Cats Can on this blu ray is from the original nitrate successive exposure negative – and is otherwise unedited.

Will any of the Blue Ribbon cartoons have their original titles restored? I sure hope so.

There are Blue Ribbon titles on some of the cartoons on this disc – these cartoons were scanned off the original successive nitrate negatives in Warner’s vaults. When original 35mm elements with the original titles are found – we affix them. No one is more disappointed than I when those titles can’t be found.

It’s great that some original titles (I’m talking about cartoons beyond this blu-ray collection ) are found on 16mm prints – sometimes black & white 16mm prints, sometimes on damaged and usable 35mm prints – but for Warner’s restoration purposes, we can’t use them. That said, anyone with original titles on 16mm (or 35mm) prints that have not been restored to Warner cartoons on physical media, should contact me about them. I’m hoping (some day) to do a bonus documentary on lost “original titles” for a future “Collector’s Choice”.

My only question is bonus features. Does this set have any bonus features, or did they have to be dropped? Nonetheless, I’ll be pre-ordering this set.

There were no bonus features planned for this release. Budget tightening at the studio… but we hope to eventually add bonus features on future releases.

Considering this set has the remaining Three Bears shorts, was there any consideration to finish off the filmographies of more characters?

Getting out complete restorations for all the short-run characters was a priority when we were doing the Platinum Collections. As for now, all I’ll say is: It’s still a priority.

That would make a great documentary!

[EricJ]

The complete Three Bears? Refresh my memory (oh, wonder who'll do THAT... ), where was "Bear Feat"?

And wait, Catch had a "lost ending"? Thought the punchline was supposed be "Ah, there's nothing like vitamins..."
(I mean, it's not an abrupt puzzling fadeout like "The Stupid Cupid", that even the commentary admitted Warner doesn't know anymore.)

[Daniel]

There was a scene cut before theatrical release where the camera pans over to the backyard showing Crosby parrots tombstone reading "came in before his horse".

"Bear Feat" resides as a HD bonus feature on Chain Lightning.

[droosan]

It'd be very helpful if WBHV (or I guess WA, now) could provide a database of which LT/MM/M-G-M cartoons they've released as individual bonus features -- along with which movies contain the short.

I mean, I know they're 'easter eggs' .. but I don't wanna have to search too hard to find 'em all (or at least, just the ones I'd want)..!

[Randall]

At least the LT/MM ones largely showed up on LT discs, too. But a few of those MGM bonus cartoons were real surprises.

[droosan]

I've always loved Little Buck Cheeser, which is a bonus on WBHV's Captains Courageous DVD (for .. some reason..? )

Looks like Wikipedia does provide info for M-G-M Happy Harmonies cartoons that are released as bonus features.

There's more available than I'd thought!

[Randall]

And I didn't realize that the Happy Harmonies laserdisc set had only 17 of 37 Happy Harmonies! Man, I love that set. But this makes me want to track down more of the cartoons.

[Ben]

I knew the MGM/UA LD set didn’t have *all* the Happy Harmonies, but I didn’t realise how many it didn’t have! I always thought it was just a handful, maybe like an extra disc's worth, but that sounds like they could have got an entire Vol 2 out of it.

(I tried looking at Droo's Wiki link, but it just brings us back to this thread!? )

I’m sure someone somewhere has a list of "cartoons as extras" on some forum or other. Or maybe do a search for certain cartoon titles…usually they come up with somewhere that says if it’s available on disc, whatever that disc is.

[droosan]

I fixed the link above .. apparently, I'd failed to paste the Wikipedia URL into the bbcode tag. Since there was no destination, the tag made a hyperlink .. but 'redirected' to here.

Sorry about that, chief.