Jerry Beck, who has been consulting with Warner Home Video on their Looney Tunes DVD releases, has given a few details on what we can expect in the future. Up first are the two single-disc releases in April, which are part of the new “Looney Tunes Super Stars” line, of Bugs Bunny: Hare Extraordinaire and Daffy Duck: Frustrated Fowl. The decision to halt the multi-disc “Golden Collection” line of titles was more of a money concern. Warner Bros. can move far more single discs than the higher-priced sets. So consumers would be more inclined to pick up a disc of 15 animated shorts for $13.99 than shell out $40 for a four-disc collection. Though, doing the math, the Golden Collection is cheaper in the long run. But it’s the act of forking over that money all at once is what holds back many purchases.
Besides the two April releases, Beck says “more are in the planning stages to be released this year.” What I take from that is that we can expect some more around October or November. So if the April releases have 15 shorts each, with two more we’ll have a total of 60 animated shorts, which is the same number that we’ve come to expect from the Golden Collections. Well there you go – breaking it up does make it more enticing for consumers to pick them up. When posed the question on his blog if there were any plans to release the Looney Tunes on Blu-ray, Jerry responded, “Yes, there are plans for a Blu-ray release of Looney Tunes.” But he could not comment on any details at this point.
All I know is that I commend Jerry Beck and all the work he’s done to help get these shorts on DVD. As he puts it, “it’s my goal, and Warners goal, to release all the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies short on DVD eventually.”
Source: Cartoon Brew
