Looney Tunes & Merrie Melodies: collect them all!

<<<Classic!

 

I know it was limited due to the end days of laser disc, but I have never even seen the fifth volume of The Golden Age, despite having the first four.

 

I did find it on VHS, though.

Amazon.com: Golden Age of Looney Tunes, Vol. 5: Chuck Jones [VHS]: Golden Age of Looney Tunes: Movies & TV

EDIT : Found the whole set (5 discs) on Amazon.

Amazon.com: The golden age of looney tunes 5 disc set (laserdisc): Movies & TV

 

@seed_drill Though it's not *just* the 5th disc, is the Laserdisc set I posted as the 2nd link what you were looking for?

 

No, that's Volume One, which contains five discs. I'm unsure if the VHS with Sniffles(?) on the cover is the same thing or not.

 

Ah, I see. Sorry about that.

I see from past eBay auctions that if Volume 5 is included, the set sells for $240-300. Ouch.

I did discover an in-depth review of it which you might find interesting ; Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume Five - Animated Views

 

I have not seen I Love To Singa in at least a few years now.

 

You might want to set up an eBay alert for it. That's how I landed a couple of rare pieces. You'll have to be patient, though. These tend to show up once every couple of years or so from what I've seen.

Good luck!

 

That's a big favorite of mine...

 

You piqued my curiosity there for a moment because I thought only the first set had been released on VHS.

MGM/UA released five separate multi-disc Laserdisc sets. The fifth of these, which consisted primarily of Merrie Melodies without the major starring characters, is the rarest, probably because (1) it was likely available for a short time before the Laserdisc window closed and (2) it lacked a lot of "A-list" material.

The Amazon link above is for the first volume (a five disc set). There was one "non-PC" cartoon included in the first run which was removed on later pressings, so buyer beware.

 

Was the VHS tape link I posted relevant or another dead-end?

 

#1 in my book.

 

There has been some confusion in this thread concerning "The Golden Age of Looney Tunes" laserdisc and VHS tapes. Hopefully, this will clear things up:

The main format for the series was laserdisc. Since LDs were aimed more at movie buffs and collectors than mass-market VHS tapes, the idea was to put out all of the pre-1948 WB cartoons that Turner had control of at the time (all except the infamous Censored 11).

To that end, there were five multi-disc sets on LD. Volumes 1-4 each have five discs, while Volume 5 has four discs.

Volume 1 had two pressings (more on this a bit later). Volume 5 was released towards the end of the laserdisc era, and has consequently become the rarest and most collectible.

A year or two after the LD releases had begun, MGM/UA Home Video reissued the first set on VHS tapes. Because the LD set has a total of 10 sides, the VHS set had 10 tapes.

The 10-tape VHS collection was released as a big slip-cased set, and also as individual tapes. (Which is why "Volume 5" of the VHS tapes matches side 5 of the first LD collection. It has nothing to do with the fifth LD set, which was actually released years later.

When the first LD set was originally compiled by Jerry Beck, he could put on any of the Turner-controlled cartoons he wanted – apart from those 11 now-evil nasties.

He chose a wide variety of important cartoons, but was also able to sneak in a wartime propaganda film ("Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips") that hadn't been on the list of banned cartoons.

Since the LD set was aimed at collectors on a niche format, there were no problems with the wartime-era cartoon being sold.

But, once the VHS tapes were released (a long time after the fact), someone got upset, complained to MGM/UA, and both the tapes and LDs were modified to remove the offending content. (The cartoon "Racketeer Rabbit" replaced "BBNTN", even though the information sheet inside the LD set was never modified.)

So, there are two versions of the first LD set out there – one with BBNTN, and one without. ("Racketeer Rabbit" is on a later LD set as well, so its appearance on the reissued GAOLT-Vol.1 is a double dip.)

Phew.... a very long-winded way to say the 10-volume GAOLT VHS set matches just the first GAOLT LD collection.

 

I would love to get a restored (or at least improved) version of Sunday Go To Meetin Time one day, as well as Coal Black. Love the music in those.

 

I believe (though someone else can confirm or unconfirm) it represents part of the first laserdisc set.

(EDIT: Michelle66 explained it, see above.)

The VHS tapes had two versions. One was "one side to a tape" like described above. There was another version with five longer tapes. I rented one at a local video store back then.

What I don't understand is, if they were going to release "Nips The Nips," why wasn't it on the Wartime Cartoons compilation? They left it off of that set, where it would have made sense and had historical context, then instead put it on a more general comp called "Bugs Bunny By Each Director." What a great idea!

 

Guess what I just heard in a Verizon FIOS commercial? The song from Barber Of Seville! It was also in a commercial for Era as well.

 

What you're attempting to do has already been done. Seek the dark corners of the internet...

Derek

 

I remember Jerry Beck stating (either online, but more likely at an animation event I had attended back in the mid 90's) that "BBNtN" was pretty much snuck on to the GAoLT set. It was done as inconspicuously as possible as to prevent the furor that subsequently occurred when the VHS tape was eventually released.

Laserdisc was a niche format and things regularly came out under the radar. And since it was before the internet got big (so no online discussion), the higher-ups at MGM/UA likely had no idea what was even out on LD.

I'd wager it wasn't on the wartime collection as that was designed as a VHS release, which would have attracted more attention.

The thing is, there are a ton of other cartoons throughout the entire GAoLT collection that will never see modern release due to race issues and the like.

But, Jerry Beck was right. Nobody had squawked about that one cartoon when it was only out on LD. Putting it on VHS drew attention to the entire GAoLT project, which likely also prevented titles from the Censored 11 from getting released on later sets.

As for longer tapes, I didn't know about that. I do remember the memo that came down while I was working part time at a WB Studio Store to pull both Volume 7 and the complete VHS set from the shelves. (I was the only one there who really knew the cartoons and had to explain to the other staff what the furor was all about.)

 

That would have been painful. Did you grab a few copies before they were pulled?

I believe the longer tapes were for some kind of special edition, possibly Columbia House or something.

 

I always liked that one: The only time I ever seen it was when a local independent station used to show WB cartoons in the afternoon... Haven't seen it in probably close to 30 years now! ( I don't own any of the WB animated shorts on DVD, but need to fix that...)

Even though I watched the WB stuff that aired on that station, the ones I remember most are the ones that would have been aired on "The Bugs Bunny/Roadrunner Show" on Saturday mornings when I was a kid...

 

Nope. Didn't buy any of them. I was firmly in the LD camp by then and saw no point in spending money on stuff I already had on disc.

Besides, this was pre-eBay. There was no real avenue for reselling them at the time.

But, we had a bunch of those tapes cluttering up the stock room until we were told how to get rid of them.

 

Ah, thanks for reminding me!! This is why I actually own the first LD set, because when I got it, those were all $200 items. However, my friend who is a big Bugs Bunny collector had to upgrade his set when he found out his version didn't have BBNTN, so he sold the "Racketeer Rabbit" version to me for relative peanuts (I think it may have cost me $25).

Which also reminds me, he was always after the one Bugs Bunny cartoon he hadn't found which I am pretty sure is called "Which Witch is Which?" Has that one surfaced anywhere?