Joe Molotov

I've recently gotten into golden age animation pretty heavily. Of course I'd see a lot it before as a kid, but it's only recently that I've come to realize how brilliant a lot of it is, or how beautiful the animation is.

I'm looking for theatrical shorts mostly. I've got The Looney Tunes Golden Collections, Popeye Vol. 1, The Complete Droopy, and a few of the Walt Disney Treasures. What are some other good collections? I've been wanting to check out some Fleischer Betty Boop and Superman, but there's a lot of public domain stuff out there with varying shorts and quality. What's the closest to definitive that I can get for either one of those?

I'd also like to learn some more of background information on the studios and animators involved. Looney Tunes and Popeye have pretty good special features, but are there any other DVDs that have in depth information like that? Or maybe there's a good book or two that I could check out on the subject.

bluetoast

Apparently the best quality Fleischer/Famous Studios Superman shorts are on the Superman DVDs from 2006. The Fleischer shorts are included on the 4 disc Superman The Movie DVD, and the Famous shorts are available on Superman II (I believe the Donner cut). Of course, these are also included in the respective box sets.

Also, be on the lookout for the 2nd volume of Popeye this summer!

As for books:

I borrowed this from the library not too long ago, didn't get through much of it, but it is in-depth. I plan on actually reading it at some point. As an aside, it was cool to have Michael Barrier write about some of the earliest animated shorts, and then be able to search for it on Youtube and actually see what he's talking about.

In addition, cartoonbrew is always a good source for things related to animation, including books.

Joe Molotov

Thanks, I'll be sure to check that out. And I'm definately looking forward to Popeye Vol. 2. I want to at least get the rest of the Fleischer Popeyes. I'm not sure if I'll pick up the last two volumes because I didn't really care that much for the later Famous Studio Popeyes, but I'm interested in the special features on this next volume that's supposed to detail the switch from Fleischer to Famous.

Nick Danger

I'm waiting for a good collection of Betty Boop cartoons. I have public domain edition which is almost entirely post-code. The three pre-code episodes are far superior. I looked around a bit on Amazon, and it looked like every DVD there pretty much included the same titles.

Chris Ferguson

I would also recommend the Woody Woodpecker collection. Volume 2 should be out in April.

peateargryphon

I would recommend the "Woody Woodpecker and Friends" collections. The bonus features aren't as meaty as the warner sets you've already mentioned (mainly just clips from the woody woodpecker show), but the first volume contains a great selection of shorts from the Lantz catalog, and a second volume is due out in April.

Volume 1
Volume 2

As for books, the book mentioned by bluetoast is probably the best resource out there. I own the book, and while Michael Barrier can be overly critical (even of cartoons he claims to like), he is fairly exhaustive in detailing the operations of the major studios during this time period. Leonard Maltin's book "Of Mice and Magic" is another good resource. This book hasn't been updated in quite some time, but that really isn't a problem since you're mainly interested in the Golden Age.

One of my favorite books is "Walt Disney's Nine Old Men and the Art of Animation" by John Canemaker. In my opinion, Canemaker does an outstanding job of balancing praise for the Nine Old Men, while not shying away from pointing out the flaws of each. I can't recommend this book highly enough.

Nine Old Men

jeffrosen

Paramount currently owns the rights to the Betty Boops, having acquired the Republic/ NTA library. They also own the old Terrytoons (Mighty Mouse) via the CBS library. Maybe they need to be pestered to release the last major cartoons to remain in the vaults....

Takeshi357

Aren't the Fleischer Superman cartoons also available individually? And I don't mean on public domain releases, I mean the same remastered versions that are on the Superman box sets. They did release them individually over here, at least.

peateargryphon

They are available separately in a couple of pretty decent releases (I've placed a link to the Amazon listing for the most recent one below), but the restoration job in the new Superman Ultimate Collection tops any standalone releases. If you're only interested in the cartoons, the release listed below is definitely a good way to go. If you want the best versions however, you'll either have to buy the Superman Ultimate Collector's Edition, or buy the four-disc version of Superman (9 cartoons on the fourth disc) and the two-disc version of Superman II (8 cartoons from the Famous Era on the second disc, along with a nice 12 minute documentary on the Fleischer/Famous shorts).

Fleischer Cartoons

bluetoast

This has been on my wishlist for some time, but your post now makes me want to order it as soon as I get my paycheck.

peateargryphon

If you do order it I hope you enjoy it, or else I'm going to feel guilty!

davidh777

Will the upcoming Warner "Academy Award" collections have stuff that's new to DVD?