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George Feltenstein of the Warner Archive joins the podcast for a review of Huckleberry Hound: The Complete Series Blu‑ray. We discuss why it’s a landmark restoration, how the team rebuilt the original Kellogg’s‑era broadcast experience, and play clips to remind you of the fun of this show. We also cover the Touche Turtle and Dum Dum Complete Series Blu-ray, then share big updates on Looney Tunes Collector’s Vault Vol. 2. This is an episode animation fans don't want to miss.
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Touche Turtle and Dum Dum: The Complete Series Blu-ray
Pre‑order link for Tom & Jerry Golden Era Anthology Collection Blu-ray
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Tim Millard (00:00):
Well I know there are a lot of animation fans out
there, and a lot of you enjoythese Anna Barbera releases from
the Warner Archive.
And George and I did not have achance to talk about a couple
of these.
So today we're going to talkabout Huckleberry Hound, the
complete series, Blu-ray, afantastic release.
And we're going to play you afew clips and things from that
release as well so you get asense of it.
(00:20):
And then we're also going totalk about Touche Turtle and Dum
Dum, the complete series, whichalso came out recently.
So a couple Hanna-Barberaseries that I think you'll enjoy
hearing our thoughts on those.
And then stick around becauseGeorge has a very important
update about Looney Tunes that Ithink many of you are going to
find very interesting and veryexciting.
(00:41):
So stick around for that aswell.
But uh there's been a fewmonths here where a couple
(01:47):
titles were released, amazingtitles, and we kind of just
never had a chance to get backto them because you literally
have had so many titlesreleasing each month, many of
them worth uh a lot of effortand uh podcasts on their own.
And so uh here we're finallygoing to get to Huckleberry
Hound, the complete seriesBlu-ray, and that released in uh
(02:09):
late August.
And my general take on this,George, is the episodes look
amazing.
They sound great, and when youconsider that there are 68
half-hour episodes meticulouslyrestored from these 4K scans of
the original 35 millimeternegatives, I think it's your
(02:31):
best animation collectionrelease of the year.
So far, that is, because wehave a big one coming up, but
I've never seen that one.
I think just because of thepure number of 68 half-hour
episodes, we're not talkingfive-minute cartoons, we're
(02:52):
talking full-length episodesthat you guys put together here.
So that's my likeout-of-the-gate.
I love this release, and Ithink it's fantastic.
Clip (03:03):
This is the big town.
Millions of folks live here.
My job for Titan.
Right now, I'm patrolling mybait in a squad car, ready to do
my duty.
Calling car 13, calling car 13,Officer Huffleberry, be on the
(03:25):
lookout for an escaped gorilla.
Description, male, Caucasian,seven feet tall, weight 350
pounds.
Answers to the name We Willy.
We Willy is reported in thevicinity of Maine and Broadway.
Proceed there immediately.
George Feltenstein (03:44):
Well, we're very proud of it.
Uh, it's become very popular.
You know, people still send meletters in the mail, like with a
stamp on it and an envelope.
Tim Millard (03:56):
Right, right.
George Feltenstein (03:57):
So many really, really nice letters,
particularly people who grew upwith Huckleberry Hound and never
got to see this version withKellogg's and the bumpers and
the bridges, because basically,for the last 60 years until we
started on this project, youcouldn't see them that way.
(04:20):
You couldn't see them as theywere originally aired.
And this was an enormousundertaking.
I've uh spoken about thatbefore, but I can't stress
enough how many of my colleaguesliterally were going through
little tiny pieces of film thatwere unidentified, hoping, well,
especially with the bumpers andthe bridges and the
(04:40):
commercials.
Well, does this picture matchthis sound?
And then to find out that thesound was uh had gone vinegar or
was not we couldn't play itback because the oxide was
peeling off the celluloid.
It just was almost three yearsof work and very, very difficult
(05:03):
for the people.
You know, I'm talking about it,I'm planning these things, I'm
marketing these things andworking, but I'm not actually
the person that receives a boxin from our Kansas storage
facility, has to open it up,look at everything.
There are dozens and dozens ofpeople involved in that part of
(05:27):
analysis, prep, uh evaluation.
It's very meticulous work thatneeds to be done, and nobody
paid attention to categorizingand inventorying these materials
properly.
So what was achieved byeveryone who worked on this
(05:49):
project can't be understated,and it is a real example of
teamwork.
Clip (05:56):
Okay, We Willy, I'ma fighting you in.
Now hold down there, uh Willy.
I gotta remember not to harm WeWilly.
(06:17):
Calling Car 13, OfficerHuckleberry, when you apprehend
the gorilla, remember no roughstuff.
You heard what the fella said wewelly.
Don't force me to use force.
I only drawed my pistol toscare him.
No monkey business, Willie.
(06:38):
Hold it, Willie.
That there's my pistol.
George Feltenstein (06:44):
There's a lot of false information out in
the uh ether, and none of it ismalintended.
But um Warner Brothers MotionPicture Imaging doesn't have a
preservation schedule.
They are not involved indeciding what is going to be the
people that work there do thework of scanning.
(07:05):
The people that work there docolor correction and they do
picture restoration and they doall sorts of amazing things, but
there's a whole other group ofpeople who actually analyze and
they work with me as well asothers to decide what are the
candidates for preservation thisyear and next year, and what
(07:29):
what what are we gonna do threeyears from now, and so forth and
so on.
So there are so many peopleinvolved.
The Huckleberry Hound projectstarted initially just in the
process of finding who owned alot of the music and how could
we clear it, because there werephysical recordings that
(07:51):
belonged to one company, thepublishing sometimes belonged to
another.
And as I mentioned before, whenwe talked about Huckleberry
Hound, the reason why there wasnothing beyond the first season
was not due to this internetrumor of low sales, it was due
to the fact that the musicclearance costs were enormous.
(08:15):
And so we had to clear themusic and actually go through
the logistics of clearing themusic before we could even start
on configuring the remasteringand then looking for the
elements.
And I'm giving the condensedCampbell's condensed soup
version of what that processwas.
Clip (08:37):
Pixie Dixie D-Um are the best of friends.
Pixie Dixie D-U are friendstill the end.
George Feltenstein (09:22):
After that was reruns.
You know, it's thrilling to putit all back together.
And almost everything in termsof the cartoons, they indeed did
come from 4K scans off thecamera negative.
The Yogi Bear segments had beencompleted earlier, so they look
a little different, but they'reokay.
But what we were able to dowith the rest and preserve the
(09:45):
grain structure and the qualityof the animation, people really
have looked at these and said,you know, made for television
animation got a lot cheaper inits look after Huckleberry Hound
and the early Anna Barberashows.
There was a lot of work thatwent into these cartoons and
(10:06):
these uh episodes, but uh youalso had veterans of the MGM
cartoon department and theWarner Brothers cartoon
department and other cartoondepartments, real uh layout
people and background people andanimators and voice artists all
coming together, and there's somuch talent represented in the
(10:29):
Huckleberry Hound show and thesegments with Hawk, Yogi, Pixie
and Dixie and Mr.
Jinx, and uh, of course, in thethird and fourth season, Hokie
Wolf and Dingling.
And the Kellogg's of it, whichhad been absent for 60 years, is
back, and you really get thatfull experience.
Clip (10:52):
Be sure and hang around for the next cartoon.
Don't miss it! It's one of yourfavorites.
Howdy, Pixie and Dixie! Hi,Huck.
Bye, Huck.
George Feltenstein (11:11):
The response to the set has just been
tremendous.
Well, and I'm very, verygrateful that the fans have come
out and supported this release.
That's paved the way for moreto come in the future.
Yeah.
So thank you to everyone whosupported the release.
And if you've been on the fenceabout buying it, please buy it.
Yeah.
(11:31):
I'll be very I'll I'll beshameless about it.
Yeah, we need people to supportthese releases so it can lead
to more.
Tim Millard (11:38):
Well, what we'll do today, George, and for those
who are watching on YouTube,we're gonna show you and so that
you can see how amazingly greatthese look and sound.
And for those of you who arelistening, um, we'll play clips
for you as well so that you cankind of get a feel for what it's
like to really have thesit-down fun of uh of these half
(11:59):
hour episodes.
But uh, before we get intothat, I wanted to say that the
first thing is you get you getthe box and this is very nice
packaging.
You get this nice uh box withthe three Blu-ray cases that are
holding the discs.
And uh the the first uh caseyou have season one in one case
(12:22):
with four discs, and uh on theback of the case you have the
episodes that uh are on on eachdisc.
And I know you don't alwayshave the opportunity to do this,
but on this release, thispackaging really wanted to call
that out because that's thefirst thing as a consumer is is
you back at the box.
You you and you really providedit nicely.
(12:43):
And because you have uh the thethree different Blu-ray cases
with uh just uh three discs forthe for the last season and then
four discs for the first uhthree seasons, they're well
protected and they sit in therevery nicely.
So I did want to just mentionthat before we get into the
actual episodes.
George Feltenstein (13:02):
That's that's incredibly important
because you won't, as long as Ihave anything to say about it,
you won't see a Warner Archiveproduct go out into the market
with packaging that is notconsumer friendly.
I will not stand for discs whenyou open up a case and they all
fall out.
Tim Millard (13:22):
It's it's like uh it's it's like Blu-ray Jenga,
you know, it's like they're allflying all over the place.
George Feltenstein (13:28):
I know I I have bought from other companies
various, you know, series andbeen very disappointed with the
packaging.
And I that was one thing Ireally fought hard for.
And that also sometimes makesus have to charge more for the
retail price.
I do think that for an 11-discset that has been put together
(13:50):
with such attention to detailthat it really is a good value.
Clip (13:55):
Uh-huh.
George Feltenstein (13:56):
Now, of course, I'm tainted because
we're charging uh at a listprice, we're charging five
dollars less than the list pricewas for the first Looney Tunes
Golden collection, which was sixdiscs and DVDs.
Of course, that was a differentworld back then.
But we're trying to keep theprices at a digestible form.
(14:19):
And for 11 discs with all ofthis incredible classic content
that is a tribute to Bill Hannaand Joe Barbera and all the
people that work for them, andpeople like Daws Butler and Don
Messick doing the voices.
It's nirvana for people whogrew up with vintage Hanna
Barbera.
Tim Millard (14:37):
Yep.
Well, after I enjoyed openingit and looking at the packaging,
George, I put it in my uhBlu-ray player, and how that
menu pops up, looks beautiful,and it makes it so easy to hit
play and start the episode.
But let's just take peoplethrough that experience a little
bit because it's not just aboutthe uh the cartoons, it's the
(15:00):
whole episode that youstructured together, which is
why I keep saying I think thisis such a fantastic release for
the year, because you yourecreate that experience.
We all think back when I sawthis.
And of course, I never saw itlike this because I saw it in
reruns and it was chopped up andyou know, and different things.
But to be able to experience itthe way it was originally
(15:22):
released, I love that fact,knowing that.
And let's just start with thevery first thing you see: a
cornflakes commercial.
Clip (15:31):
Okay, sign in.
Holly does it, how do you theaudience make it your
proposition?
Ready?
Yummy.
(16:24):
No matter how you look at it,it's the best of you, it's
morning.
Tim Millard (16:29):
I was amazed, George, how fantastic it looks
and sounds.
How did you get it such greatquality on that?
George Feltenstein (16:36):
Well, we were very fortunate because
after 1965, Hannah Barbera couldhave just said, uh, and they
did to some degree, oh, we don'tneed this anymore.
You know, Kellogg's is not thesponsor, Kellogg's is not
involved.
As I've said several times, andI'll repeat it again, unlike an
(17:00):
episode of let's say I'll doI'll just make it a F true,
where we have a camera negative,and it is, you know, it is an
original camera negative that'scut together like a motion
picture.
It has main titles, it hascommercials, it has the plot, it
has the end titles.
(17:20):
We did not have a full negativeof each episode of the
Huckleberry Hound show.
The segments were inventoriedindividually.
The little six-minute segments,the Huckleberry Hound segments,
the Pixie and Dixie segments,the Yogi Bear segments, the
Hokey Wolf segments.
That was it.
(17:41):
And then everything else had tobe dug for.
Uh main title, end title, andthe bridges and the bumpers, all
of which had different codeletters and numbers, and what
survived.
And I think I've joked on theextras with your audiences
(18:03):
before about that entry in ourinventory system, HB Bits and
Pieces, uh, where you go intoasset description and there's no
information.
You're just kind of rolling thedice.
So this is what my colleagueswho are in the trenches, this is
what they did.
And people who basically, liketheir parents weren't even born
(18:25):
when Huckleberry Hound was uhwas on the air, but everybody
got so into the project, therewas such an enthusiasm for it.
And the bottom line of it is inback of you, right now, I'm
looking at the box.
That box wasn't there a yearago.
We we we got there.
We were able to pull this off,and you really get to experience
(18:49):
the entertainment and also thesimplicity, the beautiful
simplicity of the era where youcould have kids join the Huck
Count Club and send in theirnickel.
Uh, and it was before therewere zip codes, you know.
So to that point, there werecertain commercials that were
saved in 35 millimeter form.
(19:11):
The cartoon segments themselveswere made in color because
Hannah and Barbera anticipatedthat colored television would
become more commonplace in thefuture.
They were not alone in thinkingthat.
In the early 50s, uh, Venturesof Superman, later series with
George Reeves, they were shot incolor when colored television
(19:35):
was still limited and embryonic,but they were thinking ahead to
the future.
There were other shows that wedon't own uh that were done that
way as well.
And so Hannah Barbera were wasthinking along those lines for
the cartoon segments, but theydidn't think about that and
saved money for the commercials.
(19:56):
They were all done in black andwhite.
And that's how the shows werebroadcast until probably a
couple of years in.
And there was a big change inhow Huckleberry Hound was
distributed around 1966.
That is when it was really upto the local station that got
(20:16):
the segments, and the maintitles were reanimated to
eliminate all references toKellogg's.
That may have been done evenearlier for International.
Um, there's no date on thatexact work, so I can't speak
with authority that that'sexactly when the titles were
changed, but they were changedfor later broadcasts, and that's
(20:41):
how people saw it.
And then eventually they werejust thrown together with the
USA Cartoon Express or theFantastic World of Hannah
Barbera.
And um, you know, unlikeScooby-Doo, who's had so many
incarnations for the last 55years, Huckleberry Hound kind of
(21:02):
faded from the publiczeitgeist.
It wasn't that the charactersweren't popular, but Hannah and
Barbera kept moving on andcreating new things.
And meanwhile, the reruns wouldtake care of themselves.
But I would say by themid-1970s, at least from my
perspective as a kid, theyweren't showing these cartoons
(21:26):
in daytime syndication, and theycertainly weren't part of
Saturday morning programming.
There was a little bit of moreinterest coming during the cable
television uh era of the 80s,on as mentioned the USA Network,
that was before CartoonNetwork.
But all of these differentmedia that presented the
(21:47):
Huckleberry Hound show, theyweren't presenting the
Huckleberry Hound show, theywere presenting segments.
And even the first season ofDVDs that came out 20 plus years
ago, they weren't the shows,they were just the segments.
Right.
So with the same problem withMcGillagorilla.
We, in putting these thingsback the way they were, this is
(22:08):
terribly important to me.
And I know it's terriblyimportant to the collector and
the consumer.
Because big surprise, I'm acollector, I'm a consumer, I
know what I want to get.
I don't want to see some, youknow, something that's been
fudged with.
But then you have the reality.
(22:29):
Oh, we don't have every bridge,we don't have every bumper, uh,
we don't have every commercial.
So that's why I put as muchlanguage as I could to try to
explain.
We could have gotten everysegment out and probably
smooshed it onto, let's say, youknow, eight discs or seven
(22:50):
discs, reduced our manufacturingcost, our mastering cost, but
then we wouldn't be doing whatthis set is about is presenting
almost in an archival manner,how this series played out over
four seasons in first runsyndication.
(23:12):
And that's what the set does.
Clip (23:15):
Every summer, thousands of pleasure-seeking tourists head
for the great outdoorplaygrounds of America.
And the favorite spot is thiswonderland of nature called
Jellystone National Park.
But while these eager beavermotorists are trying to get into
beautiful Jellystone Park, onerugged individualist is trying
(23:37):
to get out.
I have had it, Boo Boo! I'mgonna bust out of here! How
come, Yogi?
Every day it's the same oldthing.
Look at the bears, look at thebears, look at the bears! Hey,
pop! Look at the bears, look atthe bears, look at the bears!
George Feltenstein (23:55):
See what I mean, boo-boo?
Aside from the technical aspectand the historical aspect,
there's the entertainmentaspect.
And these cartoons are fun,they're not babysitter, kitty
fodder.
They were obviously meant todelight children.
I loved Huckleberry Hound whenI was a little kid, but it was
(24:21):
written with a certain level ofsophistication that adults could
enjoy it too.
And I think that even goes backto the influence of what Hannah
and Barbera were doing at MGMfor 18 years, making Tom and
Jerry cartoons.
They brought that samesensibility to their work, and
that's what led them toeventually get into prime time
(24:43):
with Flintstones and TopcatJetsons, and then you know,
things changed to anotherdirection with Johnny Quest and
the more action-orientedprograms.
But this is like the golden eraof the beginning of Hanna
Barbera, and if you grow up withit, it's an incredible part of
(25:03):
your nostalgia.
Clip (25:06):
We got a dandy cartoon coming up, but first, I'm aiming
to do a high dive from way uphere into that little old tank
way down there.
But you ain't seen nothing yet.
Will you see my cartoon?
George Feltenstein (25:25):
So I'm hoping that anyone who thought
that they might be interested inthe Huckleberry Hound show and
don't necessarily have thebackground of growing up with
it, that they would take achance and add this to their
collection.
Um, I don't think anybody whodoes that will be disappointed.
Yeah.
And uh of equal importance,this is a wonderful gift giving
(25:48):
item.
If you only limit yourcollectible gift giving items to
the fourth quarter, to theholiday time, it's gonna make
the rest of the year veryboring.
So throughout the year, we'vetried to have exciting releases
that people are gonna really be,you know, hungry for.
But Huggleberry Hound would bea great uh holiday gift for many
(26:10):
different uh groups anddemographics.
So consider it when you'reshopping.
Tim Millard (26:17):
It's just such a terrific release, and I I just
love the fact that the wayyou've put it together, whether
you grew up with it and you sawit uh in its original form, or
if you never saw it in thatform, now you can see it in its
original form, which is idealfor the collectors who want to
have that experience.
And to see it in HD.
(26:38):
I mean, it looks and soundsfantastic now.
So it's a terrific, terrificrelease.
Uh, you do have a few extras onthere at the end.
Those are nice to have, which Ithink probably were were they
on the DVD?
Yes.
Yeah.
So those are ported over, butyou know, it's just a fantastic
packaging.
It's a fantastic experience towatch and uh a great gift for
(27:00):
yourself or for someone else.
So it's a terrific release.
George Feltenstein (27:04):
Well, thank you.
And on behalf of everybody whoworked on it, they say thank you
too.
Tim Millard (27:38):
Well, you've had a lot of Hannah Barber releases
this uh year, but there was oneother one I wanted to talk about
here, and that's Two ShadeTurtle and Dum Dum, the complete
series Blu-ray release.
And that came out toward theend of September, so not too
long ago.
And this is a just a two-discrelease with all 52 episodes,
(27:58):
and they're newly remastered andrestored for Blu-ray.
So tell us a little bit aboutbringing this one together.
George Feltenstein (28:05):
Well, this was very challenging because uh
Touchet Turtle and Dum Dum werepart of a group of three
different uh individual seriesof uh cartoon segments that were
about five minutes or soapiece.
One was Wally Gator, one wasLippy the Lion and Hardy Har
(28:29):
Har, and the third was ToucheTurtle and Dum Dum.
And they were marketed tostations as the new Hanna
Barbera half-hour animatedcomedy show.
I don't remember exactly whatthe phrase was.
It was not a show that had abeginning, an opening, a host.
(28:52):
You know, that's the cool thingabout Huggleberry Hound is
actually the first animatedtelevision host.
You know, a few years later,Bugs Bunny would host the Bugs
Bunny show, uh, along with DaffyDuck and others.
But Huggleberry Hound was thefirst animated television host,
and he acted as the master ofceremonies for Yogi and Pixie
(29:15):
and Dixie and then Hokey Wolf.
And that kind of gave it asense of being organically
whole.
You know, even the end of theshow, or they make a reference
to, you know, tune in everyweek.
Uh it's in the lyrics of the ofthe song, you know, because it
(29:37):
like it makes you when you're alittle kid, like you don't want
it to end.
You love the show so much, andit's sad, you know, when the
show is over, but they'll beback next week.
Yeah, you know.
I think that you know, it'seither in in McGillagorilla or
Peter Potamus where there's thelittle curtain call, and like,
(29:57):
you know, goodbye, goodbye, butwe'll be back.
You know, it's that kind ofthing.
And and to some degree Huck waslike that too.
But it's um it's a really,really important piece of
television history, animationhistory, and most important,
it's great entertainment, it'sfun.
Yeah.
And we need fun right now.
Tim Millard (30:16):
That's right.
Well, uh y for those who aren'tas familiar with this one, you
have this crusading turtle,touche turtle, and he's got his
armored shell, he's got hismusketeer type hat, his trusty
sword, and dum dum as his uh notso bright squire, but it's
really fun.
The the banter between them,they make an entertaining team,
(30:37):
and uh, you know, each episodebeing around that five-minute uh
uh length or so, it reallykeeps a pace.
You know, you're watching anepisode, oh it's it's it's over
already, and you can just getright into the next one.
Love the song, uh, you know, somuch of the music for Hannah
Barbara, so wonderful.
Uh, you know, it just makes fora really entertaining
experience to watch these and toexperience them.
(31:00):
And this one, this release, uhGeorge, reminds me of the
previous ones this year in termsof it's just focusing on the
one show.
Right.
These have been fantasticreleases of each of the shows.
If you're a fan of the showitself, of course you want to
(31:21):
get it.
But if you're a fan of HannaBarbera and all of their uh
releases, it's fantastic the wayyou're packaging now in HD.
Get them individually, you canget them and collect them, and
you can watch them uh a fewepisodes or a whole bunch of
episodes.
Uh I I love it.
And the fact that so many ofthese have been released now,
(31:42):
George, in this uh the shortperiod of time, you could create
your own little evening by uhswapping some of these out.
But just to get back to the tothe touch turtle, it's it's just
a really fun release, and I'veenjoyed watching these episodes.
Clip (31:57):
Open up, you nasty oppressor.
You what do you want, youlittle pitsque?
Give back the money you stole,or I'll send you spinning.
How about my sending youspinning instead, huh?
Now just a hero pick andminute.
That looks like loads of fun.
(32:18):
Yes, you try and swell.
Touche touching yo yo yo islike to fun.
I'm spin me, you dumb, dumb,dumb you.
I guess I got carried away.
George Feltenstein (32:37):
You know, to put it in context, Hannah
Barbera after Huckleberry Hound,Yo Y Bear Show, Quick Draw
McGraw show, they came to themarket with something new.
But this was not meant to be ahalf hour with different
characters.
It was up to the local stationhow they wanted to program them.
(33:00):
And so you'd have in onemarket, they would put Touche
Turtle on, show two cartoons andhave a live host.
In another market, they mightput Touche Turtle on with Wally
Gator and Libby the Lion.
They may mix it up and putsomething in like Rocky and his
friends that are not HannaBarbera.
(33:20):
They had the flexibility to usethese in a different way.
They also were produced on muchlower budget.
These cartoons were all made in16 millimeter, not 35
millimeter.
So as a result, the originalsources are half the quality of
(33:43):
what you get with 35 millimeter.
To complicate things, many ofthe original camera elements did
not survive, and all we had wasprints.
So taking the calendar backabout 10, 12 years, when we were
released, we released Lippy theLion and Wally Gator on DVD,
(34:05):
and those were older masters.
They didn't look great, butthey were acceptable.
The Touche Turtle Masters wereunreleasable.
So for Touche, for Wally, forLippy the Lion, each one of
those individual segment cartoonseries, we went back to the
(34:29):
best original sources that wecould.
And uh we're talking aboutTouche Turtle and Dum Dum today,
but the others are coming.
And I think that's what'sexciting for the fans.
And for anybody who says thatthey don't see a difference
between Blu-ray and DVD, Irecommend a visit to the
optician.
Clip (34:50):
So stand clear, dum dum.
I have to resort to brute forceto smash that door down.
George Feltenstein (36:06):
The thing that I love the most about
Touche Turtle is his voice.
And that's because it was doneby a voice artist by the name of
Bill Thompson, probably mostfamous for his work on radio.
If you're a radio historian,which I'm really not, but he had
a huge career as a radio voiceartist, as did many people that
(36:28):
did cartoon voices at that time.
But most famously with classicanimation, he was the voice of
Droopy, the dog, who is, Ithink, a favorite character of
many people.
Because Tex Avery was behindthe creation of Droopy.
And uh you can hear it inTouche's voice, you can hear the
(36:50):
connection.
Yeah.
But I always loved this serieswhenever I could get to see it
when I was a kid, and now we putit together in a nice two-disc
set.
It's priced the same as aone-disc release, so we try to
bring a little extra value.
And as I said, the others arecoming, and there's a lot more
Hanna Barbera coming, but we wehave to space it out because we
(37:12):
are trying to please so manydifferent uh groups of fans who
all want their favorite kind ofthing.
And um, we're trying to be asuh equal to all the fan groups
as possible.
Tim Millard (37:27):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, that leads me into uh aquestion I had for you.
Some people are like, Oh,there's no animation in in
November.
And I thought uh maybe we couldtalk a little bit about what uh
is the future of Looney TunesCollector's Vault, because some
people were thinking maybe itwould be coming toward the end
(37:48):
of this year, and uh uh maybeyou can give us an update about
that.
George Feltenstein (37:53):
Well, uh this will be an opportunity to
clarify a lot of things.
Earlier in the year, and reallya year ago at this time, we
were working on Tom and Jerry,the Cinema Scope cartoon
collection.
And I thought that would bevery entertaining, it would be
reasonably priced, it would bereally fun to put on your 16 by
(38:15):
9 television and see thesecartoons in their original
aspect ratio because usuallytelevision broadcasts are either
cut off on the sides as a 16 by9185, or they're Panascan,
which is even more crazy.
So we got to do those cartoons.
(38:36):
There are 23 of them, and itwas a wonderful disc, and we
added three other cartoons thatHannah and Barbera worked on
during that period before theMGM Animation Studio was closed.
So that was released earlier inthe year.
Then our plan was in June, aswe did, to release the Looney
Tunes Collector's Vault, Volume1, with the first disc being
(38:58):
cartoons that had never been inremastered form as part of an
animation collection on DVD orBlu-ray, and then the second
disc being cartoons that hadbeen on DVD but had never been
part of an animation collectionremastered on Blu-ray.
And that was very well receivedby the fans.
(39:19):
People loved that.
Tim Millard (39:20):
Love it.
George Feltenstein (39:21):
That gave us an opportunity to plan
subsequent volumes, and the planwas for holiday time to have
the second volume.
Well, holiday time is almostupon us, and there is no sign of
Looney Tunes Collector's VaultVolume 2.
There's a reason, and thereason is just as we were
(39:48):
completing Collector's VaultVolume 1, and Tom and Jerry
Cinema Scope had been released,we had an opportunity.
And I uh gathered together withother colleagues here at the
company, they wanted tocollaborate with the Warner
(40:09):
Archive to do something big forTom and Jerry's 85th
anniversary.
So one of my colleagues herewho I will not name, so this
colleague is not besieged withletters and phone calls and
whatnot, but this colleaguesingle-handedly made it possible
(40:29):
for our Tom and Jerry GoldenEra anthology to contain all 114
Joe Barbera Bill Hannahproduced at the MGM Cartoon
Studio Theatrical Shorts, uncut,uncensored, Casanova Cat and
(40:50):
Mouse Cleaning, the CartoonsWhose Omission and Golden
Collection Volume 2 killed thatrelease.
All that's a thing of the past.
That's coming out at thebeginning of December.
But all the work that needed tobe done for that release made
us have to postpone the LooneyTunes Collector's Vault Volume
(41:13):
2.
But as we record this and asI'm speaking now, the first of
the two discs has just begun, Ibelieve, going into compression
and authoring.
There will be a release in thefirst part of 2026 of the
Collector's Vault Volume 2.
(41:34):
And I think the fans will bevery happy because among the
cartoons that have never beenremastered as part of a uh
animation collection, either onDVD or Blu-ray, there are going
to be some prize inclusions.
No, we're not releasing thosecontroversial cartoons, maybe
(41:57):
some other time, but there aresome cartoons that have been
notoriously absent that peoplehave really been asking for
that'll be part of that LooneyTunes release.
So the animation train is stillchugging up the hill, working
hard, all sorts of differentstuff going on right now that I
(42:18):
think is going to make the fansreally, really happy.
Makes me really happy becauseI'm a fan.
But the thing that gives me themost reward is getting
wonderful entertainment out ofour vault and onto people's
shelves in their home in nicepackaging with a beautiful
presentation.
They can own it, no one cantake it away from them.
(42:41):
And that's the beauty ofcollecting physical media.
Tim Millard (42:46):
Yeah.
Well, that's a Christmaspresent right there, uh, George,
letting us know that there isgoing to be a collector's vault
volume two, and it's going to besoon in uh in the earlier part
of 26, which is right around thecorner.
George Feltenstein (43:05):
Um 26, I do want to remind people that we
had a little snafu when weplanned the Collector's Choice
volume four and the collector'svault volume one, in that we
replicated a cartoon on bothcollections.
So I promised people at thetime, and we're fulfilling that
(43:26):
promise, that we'll have 26cartoons on disc one and 25
cartoons on disc two.
So it'll be a 51 cartooncollection.
And I think people are going tobe very happy with the variety
and span of chronologicalentertainment that the Looney
(43:50):
Tunes Collector's Vault Volume 2will provide.
And I'm hoping we'll be able toannounce what the cartoons are
before the end of the year.
I would really like to be ableto do that.
So I'm not pulling all thestrings to make things happen.
There's a lot of peopleinvolved in the process, but um
(44:14):
I'm pretty confident we'll beable to at least share the
titles as a little Christmasgift to people to let them know
what they have to look forwardto in 2026.
Tim Millard (44:25):
Right.
Well, that's fantastic.
And we'll just wrap up here,George, with the reminder.
Common Jerry Golden EraAnthology Collection is
releasing on December 2nd.
So those I know so many of youhave gotten your pre-orders in
for that, but if you haven't, umwe've got that here in the uh
the show notes here.
(44:46):
We'll have the pre-order linkfor that.
We'll obviously have uh the uhlinks to order the other titles
we've talked about today.
But this is a terrific uhupdate from you letting us know
that there's going to be a uhcollector's vault coming soon in
2026.
So thank you for letting usknow, George.
(45:06):
As always, I uh uh we're justso thankful that you keep the
listeners here of the extras uhuh up to date with all of these
great, great announcements.
George Feltenstein (45:16):
Well, and thank you, Tim, for giving me
the opportunity to be able toget the message out to the
people because I know howfrustrating it is when you're a
dedicated fan.
You want more, you want more.
And uh it's like the oldcommercials, you know, we will
sell no wine before it's time.
We can't release everythingunless it's as close to perfect
(45:40):
as possible.
And uh we're doing the best wecan.
We've got a lot of great moviescoming for the rest of the
year, and uh 2026 is shaping upto be very exciting.
So uh we have to thinkpositively, keep thinking the
good thoughts, and I thankeverybody for their support of
the Warner Archive Collection.
Tim Millard (46:03):
Well, I hope you enjoyed that conversation with
George.
It's always great when he givesus uh these little exclusive
updates that uh are here on theexpensive, so we always thank
him for that.
And it keeps us up to date sothat we're the first to know
many times, and we can letothers know, of course.
But uh, if you haven't yetsubscribed to the X-Bit, there
might be a reason to do sobecause George is always tough
(46:26):
time to do that.
If you'd like to pre-order orpurchase any of the titles we
talked about today, I didmention those called the podcast
show notes here.
So take a look for thosepicture pre-orders and
especially for that commentary.
So please cover tech new chiptiles.
By the way, sometimes there'sdelays for those two pre-order a
(46:47):
little later, so tell you toget your pre-order at your test,
early for the hold of the waterfor yourself or add safety.
And if you have not purchasedthe Huckleberry out, uh that
again is perfect to get foryourself date or add safety,
(47:08):
along with two digit adjunct.
As always, thanks forlistening.
Stay tight and test adoptplastic animation.
Well I know there are a lot of animation fans out
there, and a lot of you enjoythese Anna Barbera releases from
the Warner Archive.
And George and I did not have achance to talk about a couple
of these.
So today we're going to talkabout Huckleberry Hound, the
complete series, Blu-ray, afantastic release.
And we're going to play you afew clips and things from that
release as well so you get asense of it.
(00:20):
And then we're also going totalk about Touche Turtle and Dum
Dum, the complete series, whichalso came out recently.
So a couple Hanna-Barberaseries that I think you'll enjoy
hearing our thoughts on those.
And then stick around becauseGeorge has a very important
update about Looney Tunes that Ithink many of you are going to
find very interesting and veryexciting.
(00:41):
So stick around for that aswell.
But uh there's been a fewmonths here where a couple
(01:47):
titles were released, amazingtitles, and we kind of just
never had a chance to get backto them because you literally
have had so many titlesreleasing each month, many of
them worth uh a lot of effortand uh podcasts on their own.
And so uh here we're finallygoing to get to Huckleberry
Hound, the complete seriesBlu-ray, and that released in uh
(02:09):
late August.
And my general take on this,George, is the episodes look
amazing.
They sound great, and when youconsider that there are 68
half-hour episodes meticulouslyrestored from these 4K scans of
the original 35 millimeternegatives, I think it's your
(02:31):
best animation collectionrelease of the year.
So far, that is, because wehave a big one coming up, but
I've never seen that one.
I think just because of thepure number of 68 half-hour
episodes, we're not talkingfive-minute cartoons, we're
(02:52):
talking full-length episodesthat you guys put together here.
So that's my likeout-of-the-gate.
I love this release, and Ithink it's fantastic.
Clip (03:03):
This is the big town.
Millions of folks live here.
My job for Titan.
Right now, I'm patrolling mybait in a squad car, ready to do
my duty.
Calling car 13, calling car 13,Officer Huffleberry, be on the
(03:25):
lookout for an escaped gorilla.
Description, male, Caucasian,seven feet tall, weight 350
pounds.
Answers to the name We Willy.
We Willy is reported in thevicinity of Maine and Broadway.
Proceed there immediately.
George Feltenstein (03:44):
Well, we're very proud of it.
Uh, it's become very popular.
You know, people still send meletters in the mail, like with a
stamp on it and an envelope.
Tim Millard (03:56):
Right, right.
George Feltenstein (03:57):
So many really, really nice letters,
particularly people who grew upwith Huckleberry Hound and never
got to see this version withKellogg's and the bumpers and
the bridges, because basically,for the last 60 years until we
started on this project, youcouldn't see them that way.
(04:20):
You couldn't see them as theywere originally aired.
And this was an enormousundertaking.
I've uh spoken about thatbefore, but I can't stress
enough how many of my colleaguesliterally were going through
little tiny pieces of film thatwere unidentified, hoping, well,
especially with the bumpers andthe bridges and the
(04:40):
commercials.
Well, does this picture matchthis sound?
And then to find out that thesound was uh had gone vinegar or
was not we couldn't play itback because the oxide was
peeling off the celluloid.
It just was almost three yearsof work and very, very difficult
(05:03):
for the people.
You know, I'm talking about it,I'm planning these things, I'm
marketing these things andworking, but I'm not actually
the person that receives a boxin from our Kansas storage
facility, has to open it up,look at everything.
There are dozens and dozens ofpeople involved in that part of
(05:27):
analysis, prep, uh evaluation.
It's very meticulous work thatneeds to be done, and nobody
paid attention to categorizingand inventorying these materials
properly.
So what was achieved byeveryone who worked on this
(05:49):
project can't be understated,and it is a real example of
teamwork.
Clip (05:56):
Okay, We Willy, I'ma fighting you in.
Now hold down there, uh Willy.
I gotta remember not to harm WeWilly.
(06:17):
Calling Car 13, OfficerHuckleberry, when you apprehend
the gorilla, remember no roughstuff.
You heard what the fella said wewelly.
Don't force me to use force.
I only drawed my pistol toscare him.
No monkey business, Willie.
(06:38):
Hold it, Willie.
That there's my pistol.
George Feltenstein (06:44):
There's a lot of false information out in
the uh ether, and none of it ismalintended.
But um Warner Brothers MotionPicture Imaging doesn't have a
preservation schedule.
They are not involved indeciding what is going to be the
people that work there do thework of scanning.
(07:05):
The people that work there docolor correction and they do
picture restoration and they doall sorts of amazing things, but
there's a whole other group ofpeople who actually analyze and
they work with me as well asothers to decide what are the
candidates for preservation thisyear and next year, and what
(07:29):
what what are we gonna do threeyears from now, and so forth and
so on.
So there are so many peopleinvolved.
The Huckleberry Hound projectstarted initially just in the
process of finding who owned alot of the music and how could
we clear it, because there werephysical recordings that
(07:51):
belonged to one company, thepublishing sometimes belonged to
another.
And as I mentioned before, whenwe talked about Huckleberry
Hound, the reason why there wasnothing beyond the first season
was not due to this internetrumor of low sales, it was due
to the fact that the musicclearance costs were enormous.
(08:15):
And so we had to clear themusic and actually go through
the logistics of clearing themusic before we could even start
on configuring the remasteringand then looking for the
elements.
And I'm giving the condensedCampbell's condensed soup
version of what that processwas.
Clip (08:37):
Pixie Dixie D-Um are the best of friends.
Pixie Dixie D-U are friendstill the end.
George Feltenstein (09:22):
After that was reruns.
You know, it's thrilling to putit all back together.
And almost everything in termsof the cartoons, they indeed did
come from 4K scans off thecamera negative.
The Yogi Bear segments had beencompleted earlier, so they look
a little different, but they'reokay.
But what we were able to dowith the rest and preserve the
(09:45):
grain structure and the qualityof the animation, people really
have looked at these and said,you know, made for television
animation got a lot cheaper inits look after Huckleberry Hound
and the early Anna Barberashows.
There was a lot of work thatwent into these cartoons and
(10:06):
these uh episodes, but uh youalso had veterans of the MGM
cartoon department and theWarner Brothers cartoon
department and other cartoondepartments, real uh layout
people and background people andanimators and voice artists all
coming together, and there's somuch talent represented in the
(10:29):
Huckleberry Hound show and thesegments with Hawk, Yogi, Pixie
and Dixie and Mr.
Jinx, and uh, of course, in thethird and fourth season, Hokie
Wolf and Dingling.
And the Kellogg's of it, whichhad been absent for 60 years, is
back, and you really get thatfull experience.
Clip (10:52):
Be sure and hang around for the next cartoon.
Don't miss it! It's one of yourfavorites.
Howdy, Pixie and Dixie! Hi,Huck.
Bye, Huck.
George Feltenstein (11:11):
The response to the set has just been
tremendous.
Well, and I'm very, verygrateful that the fans have come
out and supported this release.
That's paved the way for moreto come in the future.
Yeah.
So thank you to everyone whosupported the release.
And if you've been on the fenceabout buying it, please buy it.
Yeah.
(11:31):
I'll be very I'll I'll beshameless about it.
Yeah, we need people to supportthese releases so it can lead
to more.
Tim Millard (11:38):
Well, what we'll do today, George, and for those
who are watching on YouTube,we're gonna show you and so that
you can see how amazingly greatthese look and sound.
And for those of you who arelistening, um, we'll play clips
for you as well so that you cankind of get a feel for what it's
like to really have thesit-down fun of uh of these half
(11:59):
hour episodes.
But uh, before we get intothat, I wanted to say that the
first thing is you get you getthe box and this is very nice
packaging.
You get this nice uh box withthe three Blu-ray cases that are
holding the discs.
And uh the the first uh caseyou have season one in one case
(12:22):
with four discs, and uh on theback of the case you have the
episodes that uh are on on eachdisc.
And I know you don't alwayshave the opportunity to do this,
but on this release, thispackaging really wanted to call
that out because that's thefirst thing as a consumer is is
you back at the box.
You you and you really providedit nicely.
(12:43):
And because you have uh the thethree different Blu-ray cases
with uh just uh three discs forthe for the last season and then
four discs for the first uhthree seasons, they're well
protected and they sit in therevery nicely.
So I did want to just mentionthat before we get into the
actual episodes.
George Feltenstein (13:02):
That's that's incredibly important
because you won't, as long as Ihave anything to say about it,
you won't see a Warner Archiveproduct go out into the market
with packaging that is notconsumer friendly.
I will not stand for discs whenyou open up a case and they all
fall out.
Tim Millard (13:22):
It's it's like uh it's it's like Blu-ray Jenga,
you know, it's like they're allflying all over the place.
George Feltenstein (13:28):
I know I I have bought from other companies
various, you know, series andbeen very disappointed with the
packaging.
And I that was one thing Ireally fought hard for.
And that also sometimes makesus have to charge more for the
retail price.
I do think that for an 11-discset that has been put together
(13:50):
with such attention to detailthat it really is a good value.
Clip (13:55):
Uh-huh.
George Feltenstein (13:56):
Now, of course, I'm tainted because
we're charging uh at a listprice, we're charging five
dollars less than the list pricewas for the first Looney Tunes
Golden collection, which was sixdiscs and DVDs.
Of course, that was a differentworld back then.
But we're trying to keep theprices at a digestible form.
(14:19):
And for 11 discs with all ofthis incredible classic content
that is a tribute to Bill Hannaand Joe Barbera and all the
people that work for them, andpeople like Daws Butler and Don
Messick doing the voices.
It's nirvana for people whogrew up with vintage Hanna
Barbera.
Tim Millard (14:37):
Yep.
Well, after I enjoyed openingit and looking at the packaging,
George, I put it in my uhBlu-ray player, and how that
menu pops up, looks beautiful,and it makes it so easy to hit
play and start the episode.
But let's just take peoplethrough that experience a little
bit because it's not just aboutthe uh the cartoons, it's the
(15:00):
whole episode that youstructured together, which is
why I keep saying I think thisis such a fantastic release for
the year, because you yourecreate that experience.
We all think back when I sawthis.
And of course, I never saw itlike this because I saw it in
reruns and it was chopped up andyou know, and different things.
But to be able to experience itthe way it was originally
(15:22):
released, I love that fact,knowing that.
And let's just start with thevery first thing you see: a
cornflakes commercial.
Clip (15:31):
Okay, sign in.
Holly does it, how do you theaudience make it your
proposition?
Ready?
Yummy.
(16:24):
No matter how you look at it,it's the best of you, it's
morning.
Tim Millard (16:29):
I was amazed, George, how fantastic it looks
and sounds.
How did you get it such greatquality on that?
George Feltenstein (16:36):
Well, we were very fortunate because
after 1965, Hannah Barbera couldhave just said, uh, and they
did to some degree, oh, we don'tneed this anymore.
You know, Kellogg's is not thesponsor, Kellogg's is not
involved.
As I've said several times, andI'll repeat it again, unlike an
(17:00):
episode of let's say I'll doI'll just make it a F true,
where we have a camera negative,and it is, you know, it is an
original camera negative that'scut together like a motion
picture.
It has main titles, it hascommercials, it has the plot, it
has the end titles.
(17:20):
We did not have a full negativeof each episode of the
Huckleberry Hound show.
The segments were inventoriedindividually.
The little six-minute segments,the Huckleberry Hound segments,
the Pixie and Dixie segments,the Yogi Bear segments, the
Hokey Wolf segments.
That was it.
(17:41):
And then everything else had tobe dug for.
Uh main title, end title, andthe bridges and the bumpers, all
of which had different codeletters and numbers, and what
survived.
And I think I've joked on theextras with your audiences
(18:03):
before about that entry in ourinventory system, HB Bits and
Pieces, uh, where you go intoasset description and there's no
information.
You're just kind of rolling thedice.
So this is what my colleagueswho are in the trenches, this is
what they did.
And people who basically, liketheir parents weren't even born
(18:25):
when Huckleberry Hound was uhwas on the air, but everybody
got so into the project, therewas such an enthusiasm for it.
And the bottom line of it is inback of you, right now, I'm
looking at the box.
That box wasn't there a yearago.
We we we got there.
We were able to pull this off,and you really get to experience
(18:49):
the entertainment and also thesimplicity, the beautiful
simplicity of the era where youcould have kids join the Huck
Count Club and send in theirnickel.
Uh, and it was before therewere zip codes, you know.
So to that point, there werecertain commercials that were
saved in 35 millimeter form.
(19:11):
The cartoon segments themselveswere made in color because
Hannah and Barbera anticipatedthat colored television would
become more commonplace in thefuture.
They were not alone in thinkingthat.
In the early 50s, uh, Venturesof Superman, later series with
George Reeves, they were shot incolor when colored television
(19:35):
was still limited and embryonic,but they were thinking ahead to
the future.
There were other shows that wedon't own uh that were done that
way as well.
And so Hannah Barbera were wasthinking along those lines for
the cartoon segments, but theydidn't think about that and
saved money for the commercials.
(19:56):
They were all done in black andwhite.
And that's how the shows werebroadcast until probably a
couple of years in.
And there was a big change inhow Huckleberry Hound was
distributed around 1966.
That is when it was really upto the local station that got
(20:16):
the segments, and the maintitles were reanimated to
eliminate all references toKellogg's.
That may have been done evenearlier for International.
Um, there's no date on thatexact work, so I can't speak
with authority that that'sexactly when the titles were
changed, but they were changedfor later broadcasts, and that's
(20:41):
how people saw it.
And then eventually they werejust thrown together with the
USA Cartoon Express or theFantastic World of Hannah
Barbera.
And um, you know, unlikeScooby-Doo, who's had so many
incarnations for the last 55years, Huckleberry Hound kind of
(21:02):
faded from the publiczeitgeist.
It wasn't that the charactersweren't popular, but Hannah and
Barbera kept moving on andcreating new things.
And meanwhile, the reruns wouldtake care of themselves.
But I would say by themid-1970s, at least from my
perspective as a kid, theyweren't showing these cartoons
(21:26):
in daytime syndication, and theycertainly weren't part of
Saturday morning programming.
There was a little bit of moreinterest coming during the cable
television uh era of the 80s,on as mentioned the USA Network,
that was before CartoonNetwork.
But all of these differentmedia that presented the
(21:47):
Huckleberry Hound show, theyweren't presenting the
Huckleberry Hound show, theywere presenting segments.
And even the first season ofDVDs that came out 20 plus years
ago, they weren't the shows,they were just the segments.
Right.
So with the same problem withMcGillagorilla.
We, in putting these thingsback the way they were, this is
(22:08):
terribly important to me.
And I know it's terriblyimportant to the collector and
the consumer.
Because big surprise, I'm acollector, I'm a consumer, I
know what I want to get.
I don't want to see some, youknow, something that's been
fudged with.
But then you have the reality.
(22:29):
Oh, we don't have every bridge,we don't have every bumper, uh,
we don't have every commercial.
So that's why I put as muchlanguage as I could to try to
explain.
We could have gotten everysegment out and probably
smooshed it onto, let's say, youknow, eight discs or seven
(22:50):
discs, reduced our manufacturingcost, our mastering cost, but
then we wouldn't be doing whatthis set is about is presenting
almost in an archival manner,how this series played out over
four seasons in first runsyndication.
(23:12):
And that's what the set does.
Clip (23:15):
Every summer, thousands of pleasure-seeking tourists head
for the great outdoorplaygrounds of America.
And the favorite spot is thiswonderland of nature called
Jellystone National Park.
But while these eager beavermotorists are trying to get into
beautiful Jellystone Park, onerugged individualist is trying
(23:37):
to get out.
I have had it, Boo Boo! I'mgonna bust out of here! How
come, Yogi?
Every day it's the same oldthing.
Look at the bears, look at thebears, look at the bears! Hey,
pop! Look at the bears, look atthe bears, look at the bears!
George Feltenstein (23:55):
See what I mean, boo-boo?
Aside from the technical aspectand the historical aspect,
there's the entertainmentaspect.
And these cartoons are fun,they're not babysitter, kitty
fodder.
They were obviously meant todelight children.
I loved Huckleberry Hound whenI was a little kid, but it was
(24:21):
written with a certain level ofsophistication that adults could
enjoy it too.
And I think that even goes backto the influence of what Hannah
and Barbera were doing at MGMfor 18 years, making Tom and
Jerry cartoons.
They brought that samesensibility to their work, and
that's what led them toeventually get into prime time
(24:43):
with Flintstones and TopcatJetsons, and then you know,
things changed to anotherdirection with Johnny Quest and
the more action-orientedprograms.
But this is like the golden eraof the beginning of Hanna
Barbera, and if you grow up withit, it's an incredible part of
(25:03):
your nostalgia.
Clip (25:06):
We got a dandy cartoon coming up, but first, I'm aiming
to do a high dive from way uphere into that little old tank
way down there.
But you ain't seen nothing yet.
Will you see my cartoon?
George Feltenstein (25:25):
So I'm hoping that anyone who thought
that they might be interested inthe Huckleberry Hound show and
don't necessarily have thebackground of growing up with
it, that they would take achance and add this to their
collection.
Um, I don't think anybody whodoes that will be disappointed.
Yeah.
And uh of equal importance,this is a wonderful gift giving
(25:48):
item.
If you only limit yourcollectible gift giving items to
the fourth quarter, to theholiday time, it's gonna make
the rest of the year veryboring.
So throughout the year, we'vetried to have exciting releases
that people are gonna really be,you know, hungry for.
But Huggleberry Hound would bea great uh holiday gift for many
(26:10):
different uh groups anddemographics.
So consider it when you'reshopping.
Tim Millard (26:17):
It's just such a terrific release, and I I just
love the fact that the wayyou've put it together, whether
you grew up with it and you sawit uh in its original form, or
if you never saw it in thatform, now you can see it in its
original form, which is idealfor the collectors who want to
have that experience.
And to see it in HD.
(26:38):
I mean, it looks and soundsfantastic now.
So it's a terrific, terrificrelease.
Uh, you do have a few extras onthere at the end.
Those are nice to have, which Ithink probably were were they
on the DVD?
Yes.
Yeah.
So those are ported over, butyou know, it's just a fantastic
packaging.
It's a fantastic experience towatch and uh a great gift for
(27:00):
yourself or for someone else.
So it's a terrific release.
George Feltenstein (27:04):
Well, thank you.
And on behalf of everybody whoworked on it, they say thank you
too.
Tim Millard (27:38):
Well, you've had a lot of Hannah Barber releases
this uh year, but there was oneother one I wanted to talk about
here, and that's Two ShadeTurtle and Dum Dum, the complete
series Blu-ray release.
And that came out toward theend of September, so not too
long ago.
And this is a just a two-discrelease with all 52 episodes,
(27:58):
and they're newly remastered andrestored for Blu-ray.
So tell us a little bit aboutbringing this one together.
George Feltenstein (28:05):
Well, this was very challenging because uh
Touchet Turtle and Dum Dum werepart of a group of three
different uh individual seriesof uh cartoon segments that were
about five minutes or soapiece.
One was Wally Gator, one wasLippy the Lion and Hardy Har
(28:29):
Har, and the third was ToucheTurtle and Dum Dum.
And they were marketed tostations as the new Hanna
Barbera half-hour animatedcomedy show.
I don't remember exactly whatthe phrase was.
It was not a show that had abeginning, an opening, a host.
(28:52):
You know, that's the cool thingabout Huggleberry Hound is
actually the first animatedtelevision host.
You know, a few years later,Bugs Bunny would host the Bugs
Bunny show, uh, along with DaffyDuck and others.
But Huggleberry Hound was thefirst animated television host,
and he acted as the master ofceremonies for Yogi and Pixie
(29:15):
and Dixie and then Hokey Wolf.
And that kind of gave it asense of being organically
whole.
You know, even the end of theshow, or they make a reference
to, you know, tune in everyweek.
Uh it's in the lyrics of the ofthe song, you know, because it
(29:37):
like it makes you when you're alittle kid, like you don't want
it to end.
You love the show so much, andit's sad, you know, when the
show is over, but they'll beback next week.
Yeah, you know.
I think that you know, it'seither in in McGillagorilla or
Peter Potamus where there's thelittle curtain call, and like,
(29:57):
you know, goodbye, goodbye, butwe'll be back.
You know, it's that kind ofthing.
And and to some degree Huck waslike that too.
But it's um it's a really,really important piece of
television history, animationhistory, and most important,
it's great entertainment, it'sfun.
Yeah.
And we need fun right now.
Tim Millard (30:16):
That's right.
Well, uh y for those who aren'tas familiar with this one, you
have this crusading turtle,touche turtle, and he's got his
armored shell, he's got hismusketeer type hat, his trusty
sword, and dum dum as his uh notso bright squire, but it's
really fun.
The the banter between them,they make an entertaining team,
(30:37):
and uh, you know, each episodebeing around that five-minute uh
uh length or so, it reallykeeps a pace.
You know, you're watching anepisode, oh it's it's it's over
already, and you can just getright into the next one.
Love the song, uh, you know, somuch of the music for Hannah
Barbara, so wonderful.
Uh, you know, it just makes fora really entertaining
experience to watch these and toexperience them.
(31:00):
And this one, this release, uhGeorge, reminds me of the
previous ones this year in termsof it's just focusing on the
one show.
Right.
These have been fantasticreleases of each of the shows.
If you're a fan of the showitself, of course you want to
(31:21):
get it.
But if you're a fan of HannaBarbera and all of their uh
releases, it's fantastic the wayyou're packaging now in HD.
Get them individually, you canget them and collect them, and
you can watch them uh a fewepisodes or a whole bunch of
episodes.
Uh I I love it.
And the fact that so many ofthese have been released now,
(31:42):
George, in this uh the shortperiod of time, you could create
your own little evening by uhswapping some of these out.
But just to get back to the tothe touch turtle, it's it's just
a really fun release, and I'veenjoyed watching these episodes.
Clip (31:57):
Open up, you nasty oppressor.
You what do you want, youlittle pitsque?
Give back the money you stole,or I'll send you spinning.
How about my sending youspinning instead, huh?
Now just a hero pick andminute.
That looks like loads of fun.
(32:18):
Yes, you try and swell.
Touche touching yo yo yo islike to fun.
I'm spin me, you dumb, dumb,dumb you.
I guess I got carried away.
George Feltenstein (32:37):
You know, to put it in context, Hannah
Barbera after Huckleberry Hound,Yo Y Bear Show, Quick Draw
McGraw show, they came to themarket with something new.
But this was not meant to be ahalf hour with different
characters.
It was up to the local stationhow they wanted to program them.
(33:00):
And so you'd have in onemarket, they would put Touche
Turtle on, show two cartoons andhave a live host.
In another market, they mightput Touche Turtle on with Wally
Gator and Libby the Lion.
They may mix it up and putsomething in like Rocky and his
friends that are not HannaBarbera.
(33:20):
They had the flexibility to usethese in a different way.
They also were produced on muchlower budget.
These cartoons were all made in16 millimeter, not 35
millimeter.
So as a result, the originalsources are half the quality of
(33:43):
what you get with 35 millimeter.
To complicate things, many ofthe original camera elements did
not survive, and all we had wasprints.
So taking the calendar backabout 10, 12 years, when we were
released, we released Lippy theLion and Wally Gator on DVD,
(34:05):
and those were older masters.
They didn't look great, butthey were acceptable.
The Touche Turtle Masters wereunreleasable.
So for Touche, for Wally, forLippy the Lion, each one of
those individual segment cartoonseries, we went back to the
(34:29):
best original sources that wecould.
And uh we're talking aboutTouche Turtle and Dum Dum today,
but the others are coming.
And I think that's what'sexciting for the fans.
And for anybody who says thatthey don't see a difference
between Blu-ray and DVD, Irecommend a visit to the
optician.
Clip (34:50):
So stand clear, dum dum.
I have to resort to brute forceto smash that door down.
George Feltenstein (36:06):
The thing that I love the most about
Touche Turtle is his voice.
And that's because it was doneby a voice artist by the name of
Bill Thompson, probably mostfamous for his work on radio.
If you're a radio historian,which I'm really not, but he had
a huge career as a radio voiceartist, as did many people that
(36:28):
did cartoon voices at that time.
But most famously with classicanimation, he was the voice of
Droopy, the dog, who is, Ithink, a favorite character of
many people.
Because Tex Avery was behindthe creation of Droopy.
And uh you can hear it inTouche's voice, you can hear the
(36:50):
connection.
Yeah.
But I always loved this serieswhenever I could get to see it
when I was a kid, and now we putit together in a nice two-disc
set.
It's priced the same as aone-disc release, so we try to
bring a little extra value.
And as I said, the others arecoming, and there's a lot more
Hanna Barbera coming, but we wehave to space it out because we
(37:12):
are trying to please so manydifferent uh groups of fans who
all want their favorite kind ofthing.
And um, we're trying to be asuh equal to all the fan groups
as possible.
Tim Millard (37:27):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, that leads me into uh aquestion I had for you.
Some people are like, Oh,there's no animation in in
November.
And I thought uh maybe we couldtalk a little bit about what uh
is the future of Looney TunesCollector's Vault, because some
people were thinking maybe itwould be coming toward the end
(37:48):
of this year, and uh uh maybeyou can give us an update about
that.
George Feltenstein (37:53):
Well, uh this will be an opportunity to
clarify a lot of things.
Earlier in the year, and reallya year ago at this time, we
were working on Tom and Jerry,the Cinema Scope cartoon
collection.
And I thought that would bevery entertaining, it would be
reasonably priced, it would bereally fun to put on your 16 by
(38:15):
9 television and see thesecartoons in their original
aspect ratio because usuallytelevision broadcasts are either
cut off on the sides as a 16 by9185, or they're Panascan,
which is even more crazy.
So we got to do those cartoons.
(38:36):
There are 23 of them, and itwas a wonderful disc, and we
added three other cartoons thatHannah and Barbera worked on
during that period before theMGM Animation Studio was closed.
So that was released earlier inthe year.
Then our plan was in June, aswe did, to release the Looney
Tunes Collector's Vault, Volume1, with the first disc being
(38:58):
cartoons that had never been inremastered form as part of an
animation collection on DVD orBlu-ray, and then the second
disc being cartoons that hadbeen on DVD but had never been
part of an animation collectionremastered on Blu-ray.
And that was very well receivedby the fans.
(39:19):
People loved that.
Tim Millard (39:20):
Love it.
George Feltenstein (39:21):
That gave us an opportunity to plan
subsequent volumes, and the planwas for holiday time to have
the second volume.
Well, holiday time is almostupon us, and there is no sign of
Looney Tunes Collector's VaultVolume 2.
There's a reason, and thereason is just as we were
(39:48):
completing Collector's VaultVolume 1, and Tom and Jerry
Cinema Scope had been released,we had an opportunity.
And I uh gathered together withother colleagues here at the
company, they wanted tocollaborate with the Warner
(40:09):
Archive to do something big forTom and Jerry's 85th
anniversary.
So one of my colleagues herewho I will not name, so this
colleague is not besieged withletters and phone calls and
whatnot, but this colleaguesingle-handedly made it possible
(40:29):
for our Tom and Jerry GoldenEra anthology to contain all 114
Joe Barbera Bill Hannahproduced at the MGM Cartoon
Studio Theatrical Shorts, uncut,uncensored, Casanova Cat and
(40:50):
Mouse Cleaning, the CartoonsWhose Omission and Golden
Collection Volume 2 killed thatrelease.
All that's a thing of the past.
That's coming out at thebeginning of December.
But all the work that needed tobe done for that release made
us have to postpone the LooneyTunes Collector's Vault Volume
(41:13):
2.
But as we record this and asI'm speaking now, the first of
the two discs has just begun, Ibelieve, going into compression
and authoring.
There will be a release in thefirst part of 2026 of the
Collector's Vault Volume 2.
(41:34):
And I think the fans will bevery happy because among the
cartoons that have never beenremastered as part of a uh
animation collection, either onDVD or Blu-ray, there are going
to be some prize inclusions.
No, we're not releasing thosecontroversial cartoons, maybe
(41:57):
some other time, but there aresome cartoons that have been
notoriously absent that peoplehave really been asking for
that'll be part of that LooneyTunes release.
So the animation train is stillchugging up the hill, working
hard, all sorts of differentstuff going on right now that I
(42:18):
think is going to make the fansreally, really happy.
Makes me really happy becauseI'm a fan.
But the thing that gives me themost reward is getting
wonderful entertainment out ofour vault and onto people's
shelves in their home in nicepackaging with a beautiful
presentation.
They can own it, no one cantake it away from them.
(42:41):
And that's the beauty ofcollecting physical media.
Tim Millard (42:46):
Yeah.
Well, that's a Christmaspresent right there, uh, George,
letting us know that there isgoing to be a collector's vault
volume two, and it's going to besoon in uh in the earlier part
of 26, which is right around thecorner.
George Feltenstein (43:05):
Um 26, I do want to remind people that we
had a little snafu when weplanned the Collector's Choice
volume four and the collector'svault volume one, in that we
replicated a cartoon on bothcollections.
So I promised people at thetime, and we're fulfilling that
(43:26):
promise, that we'll have 26cartoons on disc one and 25
cartoons on disc two.
So it'll be a 51 cartooncollection.
And I think people are going tobe very happy with the variety
and span of chronologicalentertainment that the Looney
(43:50):
Tunes Collector's Vault Volume 2will provide.
And I'm hoping we'll be able toannounce what the cartoons are
before the end of the year.
I would really like to be ableto do that.
So I'm not pulling all thestrings to make things happen.
There's a lot of peopleinvolved in the process, but um
(44:14):
I'm pretty confident we'll beable to at least share the
titles as a little Christmasgift to people to let them know
what they have to look forwardto in 2026.
Tim Millard (44:25):
Right.
Well, that's fantastic.
And we'll just wrap up here,George, with the reminder.
Common Jerry Golden EraAnthology Collection is
releasing on December 2nd.
So those I know so many of youhave gotten your pre-orders in
for that, but if you haven't, umwe've got that here in the uh
the show notes here.
(44:46):
We'll have the pre-order linkfor that.
We'll obviously have uh the uhlinks to order the other titles
we've talked about today.
But this is a terrific uhupdate from you letting us know
that there's going to be a uhcollector's vault coming soon in
2026.
So thank you for letting usknow, George.
(45:06):
As always, I uh uh we're justso thankful that you keep the
listeners here of the extras uhuh up to date with all of these
great, great announcements.
George Feltenstein (45:16):
Well, and thank you, Tim, for giving me
the opportunity to be able toget the message out to the
people because I know howfrustrating it is when you're a
dedicated fan.
You want more, you want more.
And uh it's like the oldcommercials, you know, we will
sell no wine before it's time.
We can't release everythingunless it's as close to perfect
(45:40):
as possible.
And uh we're doing the best wecan.
We've got a lot of great moviescoming for the rest of the
year, and uh 2026 is shaping upto be very exciting.
So uh we have to thinkpositively, keep thinking the
good thoughts, and I thankeverybody for their support of
the Warner Archive Collection.
Tim Millard (46:03):
Well, I hope you enjoyed that conversation with
George.
It's always great when he givesus uh these little exclusive
updates that uh are here on theexpensive, so we always thank
him for that.
And it keeps us up to date sothat we're the first to know
many times, and we can letothers know, of course.
But uh, if you haven't yetsubscribed to the X-Bit, there
might be a reason to do sobecause George is always tough
(46:26):
time to do that.
If you'd like to pre-order orpurchase any of the titles we
talked about today, I didmention those called the podcast
show notes here.
So take a look for thosepicture pre-orders and
especially for that commentary.
So please cover tech new chiptiles.
By the way, sometimes there'sdelays for those two pre-order a
(46:47):
little later, so tell you toget your pre-order at your test,
early for the hold of the waterfor yourself or add safety.
And if you have not purchasedthe Huckleberry out, uh that
again is perfect to get foryourself date or add safety,
(47:08):
along with two digit adjunct.
As always, thanks forlistening.
Stay tight and test adoptplastic animation.
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