Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		4.5
Audio		3.5
Extras		4.5
Overall		4.5

Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume One Blu-ray Movie Review

Fifty classic shorts and a slew of special features? Th... th... that's not all folks!

Reviewed by Kenneth Brown November 11, 2011

No, the first volume of the Looney Tunes Platinum Collection isn't a completist's chronological dream come true a la the first volume of the Tom & Jerry: Golden Collection. And no, you won't find every Looney Tunes short you may be hoping to reacquaint yourself with. But don't be so quick to grumble. The words "Volume One" carry a lot of promise, and the fact that the 3-disc set features "The Complete Marvin the Martian," "The Complete Tasmanian Devil," "The Complete Witch Hazel," "The Complete Marc Antony" and "The Complete Ralph Phillips" bodes well for future releases and bigger, badder fill-in-the-gap character treatments. (I'm already jazzed for whatever future volume inevitably gives us other complete character collections in anvil-dropping, eye-popping high definition.) As opening assaults go, the first volume of the Looney Tunes Platinum Collection functions as a greatest hits reel and a showcase of lesser known animated shorts; as a satisfying meal and as a tasty treat that leaves you hungry for more; as a strong standalone collection and as the first of many Looney Tunes releases. I'll be the first to admit perfection would be a chronologically arranged, 28-disc opera omnia, but we'll get there. One easily digestible volume at a time.

Kill the wabbit, kill the wabbit!

"Looney Tunes Platinum Blu-ray Collection Vol. 1 is intended for the Adult Collector and May Not Be Suitable for Children." So reads a small boxed blurb on the 3-disc set's back cover. I have plenty to say about that but, instead, I'll simply differ to my previous rant on the matter and try to stay on target. (For the record, the "adult" material in question primarily revolves around violence, smoking and drinking rather than racial stereotyping from a bygone age.) Thankfully, it shouldn't be too hard to keep focused. Looney Tunes was a childhood institution when I was growing up, and the nostalgia that's been pumping through my veins for the last twenty-four hours is about as thick and gooey as it's ever been. Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Yosemite Sam, Sylvester and Tweety, Pepé Le Pew, Foghorn Leghorn, Marvin the Martian, Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner, the Tasmanian Devil... and that doesn't even put a dent in the full Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies roster. Just thinking about the sheer number of iconic characters and classic pairings we've been given over the decades is enough to bewilder even the most astute animation historian, let alone this wide-eyed-pup-turned-middle-aged-father. As accomplishments in animation, filmmaking and entertainment go, it's nothing short of astonishing, and stands as a testament to all the blood, ink and paint Chuck Jones and his now-beloved brethren spilled to make it all possible.

Even fifty, sixty and seventy years later, there's an indescribably timeless energy pulsing within almost every Looney Tunes short, not to mention a cool, confident ease and flow fueling every rivalry, run-in and game of wits that erupts, unpredictably and hilariously, as Bugs and his fellow loons bound, bounce and careen across the screen. Has animation ever topped some of these indispensable moments? The expressiveness and fluidity, the piercing comedy and split-second slapstick, the flawless blend of music and deceptively simple animation, the side-splitting sight gags and deviously dual-edged laughs, the all-ages appeal, the unspoken genius of it all. Not to descend into hyperbole, but practically every short Volume One has in its Acme arsenal is as fun, funny and remarkable today as it was when it first took the public, young and old, by storm. My son, now seven, laughed as hard as I did, and both of us were laughing embarrassingly hard. When it was time to take a break, he begged for more and, truth be told, I wanted to give in. Eventually, my wife had to pry both of us away from the TV. (Stomachs were growling and dinner was getting cold.) Needless to say, with so many memorable characters, so many distinct personalities, and so many ways to alter, poke and deploy each one, it's no wonder the Looney Tunes gang remains such a childhood staple, even in the 21st century.

The fifty shorts featured on the first volume of the Looney Tunes Platinum Collection are as follows:

1.		Hare Tonic		26.		One Froggy Evening
2.		Baseball Bugs		27.		The Three Little Bops
3.		Buccaneer Bunny		28.		I Love to Singa
4.		The Old Grey Hare		29.		Katnip Kollege
5.		Rabbit Hood		30.		The Dover Boys at Pimento University
6.		8 Ball Bunny		31.		Chow Hound
7.		Rabbit of Seville		32.		Haredevil Hare
8.		What's Opera, Doc?		33.		The Hasty Hare
9.		The Great Piggy Bank Robbery		34.		Duck Dodgers in the 24 1/2th Century
10.		A Pest in the House		35.		Hare-Way to the Stars
11.		The Scarlet Pumpernickel		36.		Mad as a Mars Hare
12.		Duck Amuck		37.		Devil May Hare
13.		Robin Hood Daffy		38.		Bedevilled Rabbit
14.		Baby Bottleneck		39.		Ducking the Devil
15.		Kitty Kornered		40.		Bill of Hare
16.		Scaredy Cat		41.		Dr. Devil and Mr. Hare
17.		Porky Chops		42.		Bewitched Bunny
18.		Old Glory		43.		Broom-Stick Bunny
19.		A Tale of Two Kitties		44.		A Witch's Tangled Hare
20.		Tweetie Pie		45.		A-Haunting We Will Go
21.		Fast and Furry-Ous		46.		Feed the Kitty
22.		Beep, Beep		47.		Kiss Me Kat
23.		Lovelorn Leghorn		48.		Feline Frame-Up
24.		For Scent-imental Reasons		49.		From A to Z-Z-Z-Z
25.		Speedy Gonzales		50.		Boyhood Daze

Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume One Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

If Volume One's 1080p/AVC-encoded transfer is criticized, it will be for the nicks, scratches, scuffs, dirt, dust and marks that occasionally appear. However, each imperfection is inherent to the original source and animation cels, and has little or nothing to do with the tender, loving, restorative care Warner has afforded the various shorts. The Looney Tunes palette is alive and kicking, with bright colors, vivid primaries and inky blacks drizzled from the animators' pens. Every last detail and flick of the wrist is present and accounted for as well, and it holds up well under high definition scrutiny. (So long as your expectations are informed and reasonable.) Grain varies from short to short, sure. But such is the nature of the faithful-remastering game. Softness sometimes intrude but, once again, concerned parties should submit their complaints to the fifty to seventy-year-old source materials, not the encode itself, the remastering methodology or the studio's commitment to the project. Macroblocking, banding, aliasing, ringing and other eye-gougers are nowhere to be seen, and compression anomalies and other digital oddities simply aren't a factor. A select few shorts even come close to looking as if they were animated yesterday; no small feat considering that couldn't be farther from the truth. There is, of course, a filmic unevenness to the presentation that's especially noticeable when plowing from short to short in one sitting. That hardly qualifies as an issue, though, and doesn't detract from the otherwise meticulous remaster and impressive technical transfer. It doesn't get much better than this, Looney Tuners. Enjoy.

Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume One Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Volume One earns a serviceable 192kbps Dolby Digital Mono mix that captures the song, dance and scuffles of each short without a hitch. Would a lossless track have been more ideal? Undoubtedly. Would it have made a significant difference? I doubt it. Voices are clear, sound effects are crisp and clean, and the music is bright and playful. But the sound design is still fifty to seventy years old (minor crackling and hiss creep in from time to time), and it shows in the at-times thin-n-tinny tone and LFE-less tenor of the single-channel experience. None of it disappoints per se, but the mono mix doesn't really resonate or, honestly, register either.

Spanish audio is not available for "Bewitched Bunny" and "A Witch's Tangled Hare." German audio is not available for "Buccaneer Bunny," "The Old Grey Hare," "Rabbit Hood," "8 Ball Bunny," "A Pest in the House," "A Tale of Two Kitties," "Lovelorn Leghorn," "Bewitched Bunny" and "A Witch's Tangled Hare."

Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume One Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Thirty-seven audio commentaries, seventeen alternate audio programs, three documentaries, eleven featurettes, nineteen bonus shorts, a classy 52-page Digibook... what more could you ask for? If you said, "all of the above, plus a framed litho cel, a collectible character glass, a souvenir tin sign and an oversized box to stash it all in," be sure to add the Volume One Ultimate Collector's Edition to your cart. If you said, "every extra presented in high definition," well... we can't always get everything we want, now can we?

• Audio Commentaries (Discs 1-2): Twenty-three audio commentaries can be found on Disc One alone: "Baseball Bugs" with director Eric Goldberg, "Buccaneer Bunny" with Goldberg, "The Old Grey Hare" with filmmaker Greg Ford, "Rabbit Hood" with Goldberg, "8 Ball Bunny" with historian Jerry Beck, "Rabbit of Seville" with Goldberg, "What's Opera Doc?" with director Chuck Jones, writer Michael Maltese and layout artist Maurice Noble, "What's Opera Doc?" with historian Daniel Goldmark, "The Great Piggy Bank Robbery" with directors John Kricfalusi and Bob Clampett, "A Pest in the House" with writer Paul Dini, "The Scarlett Pumpernickel" with historian Michael Barrier and voice actor Mel Blanc, "Duck Amuck" with Jones and Barrier, "Robin Hood Daffy" with Goldberg, "Baby Bottleneck" with Barrier and Clampett, "Kitty Kornered" with Barrier, "Scaredy Cat" with Goldberg, "Old Glory" with Beck and ink-and-paint girl Martha Sigall, "A Tale of Two Kitties" with Barrier and Clampett, "Tweetie Pie" with Ford and director Friz Freleng, "Fast and Furry-ous" with Barrier, Maltese and sound editor Treg Brown, "Beep Beep" with Barrier, "For Scent-imental Reasons" with Barrier and Maltese, and "Speedy Gonzales" with Beck.
  
  Fourteen additional commentaries can be found on Disc Two (for a grand total of thirty-seven tracks): "One Froggy Evening" with Barrier, Jones, Maltese, Noble and layout artist Corny Cole, "The Three Little Bops" with Beck and voice actor Stan Freberg, "I Love to Singa" with Goldberg, "The Dover Boys at Pimento University" with Barrier, layout artist John McGrew and background artists Paul Julian and Gene Fleury, "Chow Hound" with Goldberg, "Haredevil Hare" with Barrier and background artist Pete Alvarado, "Duck Dodgers in the 24 1/2th Century" with Barrier and Noble, "Devil May Hare" with Beck, "Bewitched Bunny" with Goldberg, "Broom-Stick Bunny" with voice actor June Foray, "Feed the Kitty" with Ford, "From A to Z-Z-Z-Z" with author Amid Amidi, "From A to Z-Z-Z-Z" with Goldberg, and "Boyhood Daze" with Goldberg. Whew.
• Alternate Audio Programs (Discs 1-2): Music-Only Tracks are available for "What's Opera Doc?," "The Scarlet Pumpernickel," "Duck Amuck," "Robin Hood Daffy," "Speedy Gonzales," "One Froggy Evening," "The Three Little Bops," "Hare-Way to the Stars," "Ducking the Devil," A Witch's Tangled Hare," "Feed the Kitty" and "Boyhood Daze." Music and Effects Tracks are available for "Bewitched Bunny," "Broom-Stick Bunny," and "Feline Frame-Up." And, for a real treat, candid Vocal Tracks are available for "The Three Little Bops" with voice actor Stan Freberg and for "What's Opera Doc?" with voice actors Mel Blanc and Arthur Q. Bryan, complete with studio chatter and between-the-lines conversations, self-critiques and direction.
• Behind the Tunes (Discs 1-2, HD/SD, 95 minutes): Also on tap (as if there weren't enough already) are eleven behind-the-scenes featurettes. Eight are presented in SD: "Wagnerian Wabbit: The Making of What's Opera Doc?," "Twilight in Tunes: The Music of Raymond Scott," "Powerhouse in Pictures," "Putty Problems and Canary Rows," "A Chuck Jones Tutorial: Tricks of the Cartoon Trade," "The Charm of Stink: On the Scent of Pepe Le Pew," "It Hopped One Night: The Story Behind One Froggy Evening" and "Wacky Warner One-Shots." And three are presented in HD: "Mars Attacks! Life on the Red Planet with My Favorite Martian" "Razzma-Taz: Giving the Tasmanian Devil His Due" and "The Ralph Phillips Story: Living the American Daydream."
• A Greeting from Chuck Jones (Disc 3, SD, 4 minutes): Jones opens the set's third disc with a carefully prepared introduction, reflecting on the classic characters, unforgettable shorts, laughs and legacy of Looney Tunes.
• Documentaries (Disc 3, SD, 162 minutes): "Chuck Amuck: The Movie," a 51-minute 1991 Chuck Jones documentary from writer John Needham; "Chuck Jones: Extremes & In-Betweens, a Life in Animation," an 85-minute history of Jones' career, his foray into animation and his groundbreaking Looney Tunes work; and "Chuck Jones: Memories of Childhood," a more personal 26-minute doc by Peggy Stern that traces the origins of Looney Tunes all the way back to Jones' early years, dreams and inspirations.
• The Animated World of Chuck Jones (Disc 3, HD/SD, 86 minutes): An assortment of Jones-animated odds, ends and obscure little gems, many of them political in nature: "Point Rationing of Foods," "Hell-Bent for Election," "So Much for So Little," "Orange Blossoms for Violet" (the lone live-action short in the bunch), "A Hitch in Time," "90 Day Wondering," "The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics," "The Bear That Wasn't" and "Drafty, Isn't It?"
• Bonus Cartoons (Disc 3, HD/SD, 72 minutes): Fifty Looney Tunes shorts not enough for you? Disc Three offers nine bonus cartoons: "Fright Before Christmas" from Bugs Bunny's Looney Christmas Tales, "Spaced-Out Bunny" from Bugs Bunny's Bustin' Out All Over, "Duck Dodgers and the Return of the 24 1/2th Century" from Daffy Duck's Thanks-For-Giving Special, "Another Froggy Evening," "Marvin the Martian in the Third Dimension," "Superior Duck," "From Hare to Eternity," "Father of the Bird" and "Museum Scream." Only "Museum Scream" is presented in high definition, though.
• How the Grinch Stole Christmas Pencil Test (Disc 3, SD, 7 minutes): Rare work-reel footage from Jones' Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas. It seems out of place, but its inclusion is still appreciated.
• The Door (Disc 3, HD, 7 minutes): An animation/live-action hybrid short from 1968 that features two Native Americans and a healthy dose of none-too-subtle social commentary.

Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume One Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

They might be old, but don't count 'em out. Bugs, Elmer, Daffy and the rest of the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies gang still have plenty of pep in their step, even some fifty to seventy years later. It isn't everything every fan could want, but the Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume One is a great start to what promises to be a fantastic compilation of all things Looney and Merrie. Warner's Blu-ray release doesn't make many missteps either. Its lossy (but adequate) Dolby Digital mono track will no doubt raise a few eyebrows, but its true-to-the-source video transfer and heaps-upon-heaps of special features more than make up for any slight disappointment anyone feels. It isn't a glossy redux, it isn't a hyper-polished, grain-quashed mess; it's pure Looney Tunes fun for purists and kids of all ages.