WB Archive Collection: Discs On Demand!

[Ben]

I think the nadir of the 90s toons was The Duxorcist, or whatever the one is where Daffy is a lounge singer in Mel Torme's voice. That was one of the first and I thought it was going to be so cool and fun to see Looney Tunes again, but it was such a dud. The later ones were much funnier, even though they was less zany than the classics.

Blooper Bunny is awesome though:

[droosan]

I was fortunate enough to see Blooper Bunny theatrically, at the World Animation Celebration in 1997. It got a huge audience reaction, and has long been my favorite 'modern' short cartoon featuring the characters.

As for it beating Pixar to the animated bloopers/retake shtick .. while true, the first instance of animated 'bloopers' that I recall seeing were the end titles for the wacky 1986 anime DTV The Supergal (aka "Maris the Chojo", in some releases).



It's almost certainly funnier if you watch the full version .. but this end title's playful mix of muffed 'stunts' (impossible in planned animation) and technical gaffes (like reversed cels, or items on the camera stand) was something very novel, at the time .. even if it was clearly inspired by Hal Needham's ending bloopers for Smokey And The Bandit or The Cannonball Run.

[Ben]

...themselves inspired by the slightly earlier Peter Sellers films Being There and Trail Of The Pink Panther, both of which were in tribute to him as he had just died, though outtake shows on TV, often featuring movie bloopers, were popular throughout the 1970s on the small screen.

That’s pretty fun to do stunts gone wrong in animation! Some pretty prescient ideas in that song, too!

[EricJ]

I think the nadir of the 90s toons was The Duxorcist, or whatever the one is where Daffy is a lounge singer in Mel Torme's voice. That was one of the first and I thought it was going to be so cool and fun to see Looney Tunes again, but it was such a dud. The later ones were much funnier, even though they was less zany than the classics.

That was "Night of the Living Duck".
The Duxorcist came from that 90's post-Roger Rabbit phase where new-generation Warner animators wanted to nudge us fellow cult-fans in the ribs with how many obscure references and one-shot characters they remembered (like a song about monsters' innn-teresting lives), and tried making that sultry Lauren-Bacall duck from "The Super Snooper" a central love-interest for Daffy.
Let's face it, the Roger Generation screwed up 90's-00's toon fans for good.

And as one old Urusei fan to another(?), my hat off to you, droosan, for remembering The Supergal, let alone the "outtakes".

[Daniel]

The lady duck in "The Duxorcist" is Melissa, while the one from "The Super Snooper" is The Body (or Femme Fatale). Very similar but two completely different characters. Also, "The Duxorcist" came out in 1987 a year before Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

[EricJ]

The lady duck in "The Duxorcist" is Melissa,

Oh, you mean Melissa from "The Scarlet Pumpernickel", who was Chuck's own callback from Daffy's airheaded beach date in "Muscle Tussle"? Yeah, they're easy to confuse.
And okay, so maybe Chuck's ego DID start it, as far back as "Duck Dodgers & the Return of the 24th-1/2th Century".

[Daniel]

Jerry Beck has revealed the back of the box.

[Ben]

No way that this doesn’t get a stand-alone release eventually.

[Daniel]

Amazon's price has gone up to $78.12! WBShop has it for $74.98. I'll continue to wait in hopes of a standard release. I'm in no real rush anyway.

[Ben]

It’s going up because it’s not selling well. Definitely look for a standard release.

[Daniel]

Flintstones will be released on October 13th and will be a 10 disc set. That doesn't sound too promising...

[gaastra]

Jerry beck said he had nothing to do with the flintstone blu ray set. Uh-oh.

More happy news he confirmed tex avery vol 2 is in the works!

[Ben]

Although, to be fair, I wouldn’t have expected Beck to be involved with Flintstones...? I mean, yeah, he’s the go-to guy for WB Animation, sure, and he knows a thing or two about Hanna-Babera. But whereas WB need help and advice on the cartoons and their history, the HB television series are mostly just repackagings of existing material, which WB put together back for DVD. So it’s not like he would have — or would need? — to have any input in the HB sets. Sure, it would be nice for them to have a full-time animation guru suggesting this or that for them along the way, but they’re not going to do that now and are way past doing anything other than repackaging material they can remaster quickly and keep churning out.

We're lucky to be getting these kinds of things on physical media at all at this point. Especially stuff like Tex! Now, the guys over at Warner Archive, on the other hand...not only do they know their stuff from way back in the VHS and then, mostly, the LaserDisc days, but they’ve worked together all that time, too, so they’re on the same page as to what they — and us fans — want to see, and how to see it!

[gaastra]

From blu-ray.com---

Jerry Beck today said on Stu's Show he had zero involvement with this and George Feltenstein had very minor involvement - he also implied it was George Feltenstein's project and then WHV took over because WAC could not afford a project this large. So some early episodes were restored by the WAC team possibly and will look different (better obviously) to the ones WHV restored.

Jerry Beck was made aware today that the teasers are missing, hopefully he might discuss this with some people with influence.

[Daniel]

Blu-ray.com, such a great site! Especially now that they are rid of a certain nuisance. If only our forum would follow suite...

I listened to it too. Very interesting. Wonder if the difference will be that noticeable.