Customer Reviews

Tiny Toon Adventures - Season 1, Vol. 1

5 star:		(31)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I,ve waited for so long and it's finally here! The first volume of Tiny Toon Adventures on DVD! I remember Tiny Toon Adventures from my childhood back when I was a young lass. In case you are unfamiliar, Tiny Toons is about a second generation of young Toons who are kid-like versions of Looney Tunes. They attend a school called Acme Looneversity where the original Looney Tune characters are teachers. They teach Buster, Babs and the other Tiny Toons on how to become the 2nd generation of Toons and they earn a diploma of Lunacy when they graduate. If they're not at school, the young toons are out having adventures that are often parodies of popular movies, TV shows, comic books, etc. Tiny Toons like 80s and 90s cartoons and many other classics have true humor and absolutley none of the rotten toilet humor and idiocy that's in the horrible cartoons and animated films of today. Thanks to this and other DVDs, we can now have the classics with us forever. The humor in Tiny Toons is witty and often has parodies of popular TV shows and movies. This is one classic you may want to share with your family.

Tiny Toon Adventures began production when Warner Bros. reinstated its animation studio in 1980. It debuted in 1990 on Fox Kids and ended production in 1995. A major precedent was the success of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Tiny Toon Adventures is a witty show that often contained political and entertainment satire. Caricature versions of celebrities made frequent appearances, though were almost always voiced by imitators, and often appeared under parody names. Tiny Toon Adventures is a series that kids, teens and adults of all ages can enjoy.

This is defintely a recommendation for all DVD libraries.

Here's a list of the episodes per disc.

disc 1
The Looney Beginning
A Quack in the Quarks
The Wheel O' Comedy
Test Stress
The Buster Bunny Bunch
Her Wacky Highness
Hollywood Plucky
Journey to the Center of Acme Acres

disc 2
It's Buster Bunny Time
Stuff That Goes Bump in the Night
Looking Out for the Little Guy
Starting From Scratch
Citizen Max
Furball Follies
Hare Raising Night
The Acme Acres Zone

disc 3
Life in the 1990s
Rock n' Roar
Prom-ise Her Anything
Hare Today,Gone Tomorrow
Cinemaniacs
You Asked For it
Gang Busters
Wake Up Call of the Wild

disc 4 side 1
Buster and the Wolverine
You Asked For it part 2
Europe in 30 Minutes
The Wacko World of Sports
Rainy Daze
Fields of Honey
Sawdust and Toonsil
Spring in Acme Acres

Disc 4 side 2
Psychic Fun-Omenon Day
The Wild World of Elmyra
A Ditch in Time

Why Season 1 Volume 1?

Season 1 was odd with a whopping 65 episodes. Most likely it will be broken up into "Season 1 Volume 1" and "Season 1 Volume 2" DVD releases although Volume 2 hasn't been announced yet.

Fans are hoping the following will also be released on DVD:

Season 2 had 13 episodes

Season 3 had 20 episodes (which included the 30 minute "It's a Wonderful Tiny Toon Christmas Special" as an episode)

There were two hour long specials:
"Night Ghoulery"
"Tiny Toons Spring Break Special"

And a direct to video release:
"How I Spent My Vacation"

Picked up my copy today, and here's a rundown of my impressions of it.

The Bad: The packaging is terrible. Generic clipart drawn in that really kiddieafied style that was so common in the merchandizing back in the day

DVD Menus. Now, granted, the menus on the Animaniacs and P&TB sets were not fantastic, but they were not so hideous either. The TTA ones are just as simple as those, but instead of some nice new artwork, they are presented over a screencap from an episode.

Special Features: Well, there is only 1. The highlight of it is the introductory narration by Fowlmouth. Then, it gets into a pretty generic rehash of what was so great about the Looney Tunes. Spends about half its length on that without really saying all that much that we have not heard before. Granted, Bob Clampett's daughter had a lot to say, and she did basicly say that TTA was good, and sorta implied that her father would have liked it. (Take that, John K!) Then, it finally gets into how LT inspired various parts of TTA, but in a not very in depth way. There's some talk about how involved Steven Speilberg was, but again, nothing new about how it was said. And then, there was Tom Ruegger... I repeat my assessment that he's a modern day Leon Slessinger/Eddie Selzer. He may have some talent, but like his LT predecessors, he has NO CLUE about the show he produced. After going on at great length about how Looney Tunes were made for adults, he then goes on to say how they went out of their way to make Tiny Toons a show for little kids. Did he ever even *watch* his own show? Most annoying. Finally, there was NOTHING on the voice work. I hope there will be better features on subsequent sets.

Episode Order: Instead of arragining them in production order, which would put Hare Today Gone Tomorrow fist, they are arrainged in order of original airdate, meaning that The Looney Beginning is first. Along with this ordering are all the strange continuity errors that can be so confusing that viewing them in production order clears up nicely. (I wonder what this will mean for the Toons from the Crypt episode, which was never aired during the inital run, but only showd up when Nickelodeon got the show and aired them in production order.)

The Good: The episodes are unedited. This is a big one. For example, the extra costume when Buster is first drawn in The Looney Beginning and Sweetie's audition are right where they are supposed to be, instead of missing like they were for most of the shows syndicated run. There were even a couple of other very short clips in some of the epsiodes that I did not recognize, so it looks like we are getting an uncut set of episodes.

Now, don't get me wrong, the good far outweighs the bad. I am just dissapointed that this show, the one that really sparked the whole Silver Age of Animation at WB, and in my estimation, everplace else as well, deserved a better presentation than the one it got.

Hopefully some of these shortcomings will be corrected in subsequent sets.

But I tend to doubt it.

The Classic Animated Hit From Warner Brothers and Steven Spielberg, TINY TOON ADVENTURES is On DVD and Brings Fans Delight When It Came Out. Sure It's Only The First Half of Season One, But It's Still A Must-Buy For The Young and Old Alike.

Episodes Include:

The Looney Beging - Tiny Toon Adventures is Created By A Failed Animation Creator and The Carecters (Mainly Buster & Babs Bunny, No Realation) Are Introduced For The First Time. Ussualy I Don't Find A Certain Charm in The First Episode In A Series, But in All of Spielberg's Cartoons (Animaniacs, Freakazoid etc.) Always Seem To Succed In Every Way From Indroudition Carecters To Coming Up With A Great Plot Always Works on The First Episode. (5/5)

A Quack in The Quarks - Plucky Gets Captured By Tiny Green Duck-Like Aliens Who Later Get Captured By A Darth Vader-Like Villian and Buster, Babs, and Hamton Come To The Rescue. A Brilliant, Clever STAR WARS Parody. Certainly Not The Best, But Still Clever and Funny For Fans of TINY TOONS and STAR WARS To Be Very Pleased By. Clever Costuming is Provided as Well, Buster Bunny is Dressed Up Like HAN SOLO, Babs Bunny Dressed Up Like PRINCESS LIA, Hamton is Dressed Up Like R2-D2, and Plucky Duck is Dressed Up Like LUKE SKYWALKER. (5/5)

The Wheel O' Comedy - 3 Animated Shorts Are Presented in This Episode Staring, Elmyra Duff, Dizzy Devil, Montana Max, Furball, Bubs Bunny, Buster Bunny, and Pluky Duck. This is A Great Bunch of Shorts With The Best of The Bunch Being WIN, LOSE OR KERPLOWIE in Wich Montana Max Tries To Make The Host of The Game Show ''Win, Lose or Kerplowie'' To Make Him Win, But Montana Max Ends Up With A Hilarious Result. (5/5)

Test Stresed - 3 Animated Shorts Are Presented in This Episode That Star Pluky Duck, Shierly The Loon, Buster Bunny, Furball, Selverster, Lil' Seezzer, and Foul Mouth. Another Great Bunch of Shorts With The Best Being TO BLEEP OR NOT TO BLEEP in Which Foul Mouth (With The Help of Buster Bunny) Tries To Break His Swearing Habbit To Ask Shierly The Loon on A Date. (5/5)

The Buster Bunny Bunch - 3 Animated Shorts Are Presented in This Episode That Star Buster Bunny, Dizzy Devil, Babs Bunny, Arnold The Dog, and Shierly The Loon. This A Decent Batch of Cartoons With The Best Being BUFFED BUNNY in Which Buster Bunny Works Out To Impress Babs. (3/5)

Other Episodes:
-Her Wacky Highness
-Hollywood Plucky
-Journey To The Center of Acme Acres
-It's Buster Bunny Time
-Stuff That Goes Bump in The Night
-Looking Out For The Little Guys
-Starting From Scratch (A Parody of AMERCIAN TAIL)
-Citizen Max (A Parody of CITIZEN CANE)
-Hare Raising Night
-Furrball Folies
-Aceme Acres Zone (A Parody of TWILIGHT ZONE)
-Life in The 90s
-Rock 'N Roar
-Prom-ise Her Anything (My Favorite Episode in This Set)
-Hare Today, Gone Tomorrow
-Cinemaniacs
-You Asked For It (Part I)
-Gang Busters
-Wake Up Call of The Wild
-Buster & The Wolverine
-You Asked For It (Part II)
-Europe in 30 Minutes
-Wacko World of Sports
-Rainy Daze
-Fields of Honey
-Sawdust and Toonsil
-Spring in Acme Acres
-Psychic Funomenon Day
-Wid World of Elmyra
-A Ditch in Time

Overall Rating-5/5

As a huge Tiny Toons fan I waited many long years for this in anticipation they would release it with the same high quality and interesting extras and packaging as other Warner Brothers animation. See the Looney Tunes: Golden Collection, Vol. 1-4 series for how good WB can do when they put in the effort. This first Tiny Toons release apparently didn't warrant the same care, which is disappointing for us long-time fans as well as those willing to pay a premium for the 4 disc set.

There are precious few extras, disappointing for a series made in the heyday of the Amblin studio. The DVDs menus are just straight "click here" links - no animation, no sound effects - again, disappointing for such a thoughtfully animated and written series.

Last, the cartoons themselves. The DVD video transfer is amongst the worst I've seen for animation and in my DVD collection I have lots of examples for comparison. Dirt, weak color and a low-quality transfer make this really hard to watch, particularly when I have such fond memories of the series. The sound mix is good and the great classic cartoon orchestrations and sound effects come through well.

All in all, I hope this freshman effort has a stronger follow-on in subsequent entries in the series.

Tiny Toons were not younger versions of Warner Bros. famous Looney Tunes characters but in reality they were the next generation of cartoon stars. Developed by Steven Spielberg in conjunction with Warner Bros., Tiny Toons premiered in 1990, beginning in syndication and then moving to the Fox Kids network.

The opening toon is called "A Looney Beginning". Those familiar with Warners classic cartoons will recall that they often broke down that imaginary wall between fantasy and reality, mixing their characters with their real life creators. An animator (voiced by Steven Spielberg) is given until 9:00am the following day to come up with a new hit cartoon or else he's out of a job. He works feverishly creating and throwing away ideas until those ideas take on a life of their own in the form of Buster and Babs Bunny. Those two rascally rabbits actually end up as the real creators of Acme Acres and all its interesting characters including Plucky Duck, Hampton J. Pig, Dizzy Devil, and others.

These characters are all heavily influenced by Bugs, Daffy, Porky, Tazz, and the rest of the Looney Tunes cast. In fact, they are all instructors at Acme University, teaching their students how to be funny cartoon characters. Some of the more original characters in the series include the loud, abrasive, and obnoxious Montana Max (Based on Yosemite Sam), Elmyra Duff (a female version of Elmer Fudd), and Shirley the Loon.

The four disc set includes 35 episodes in all, roughly a third of the entire series run. While the show isn't as satirical and subversive as the classic Looney Tunes it does have its moments. Kids will love the show but won't get the gist of all of the inside jokes. Nothing is sacred as the writers lampoon politics, entertainment, sports, and just about everything else. "It's Buster Bunny Time" is a parody of the old Howdy Doody show. "Hollywood Plucky" features caricatures of celebs such as Jack Nicholson, Mike Tyson, Pee Wee Herman, Cher, the cast of Star Trek, and Batman in one of the most hilarious episodes of the first season.

The voice talent was outstanding throughout, upholding a long Warner Bros. tradition. While the Tiny Toons were certainly based on the Looney Tunes, each actor puts forth a tremendous effort to make their characters unique and not just a retread. Particularly impressive was the animation. While nothing might match the superior Warner Cartoons of the 1940s, the Tiny Toons were head and shoulders above the later Looney Toons and Merrie Melodies of the late 60s. The success of Tiny Toons reinvigorated the Warner Animation studio and paved the way for futures shows Like Batman: The Animated Series, Animaniacs, and Pinky and the Brain. Tiny Toons did an impressive job of holding up the long, proud lineage of Warner Bros. animation.

I enjoyed Tiny Toons very much when I was a kid, and I enjoy it just as much now that I'm in my twenties. It's very funny (complete with classic cartoon gags and breaking-the-fourth-wall humor) and very creative (the first episode, for example, shows Buster and Babs designing the cartoon themselves). If you have children, I recommend this cartoon to them; it's much better than the neutered, saccharine garbage that is the modern cartoon.

I don't know what the reviewer who said, "Dirt, weak color and a low-quality transfer make this really hard to watch," and gave it only three stars, was talking about. The pictures are great. Don't listen to this person. If you enjoyed this cartoon as a kid, there is no reason not to buy it.

I remember when this cartoon used to come on in the afternoons. I would rush home from school and catch every episode before doing my homework. Everything is exactly as I remembered. I definitely recommend this to everyone who still has love for toons.

I remember when this series first came out on weekday afternoons. I enjoyed it immensely and found lots of laughs and fun stories. Some of the humor is definitely dated to the early 90s, the culture and personalities of the day, but I think children, youths and adults can still find plenty to enjoy about it. This series was essentially the beginning of a string of animated hits from Warner Brothers during the 90s television animation revival, roughly coinciding with Disney's launch of a high-quality series of television animated programs. The writing and music were great, with some stories and characters more memorable than others. This first volume features some of the most classic episodes that I remember best and most fondly.

However, the transfers on this set are rather poor. Much poorer than those of Pinky and the Brain and Animaniacs volumes. They look like transfers from old syndication tapes, the picture being somewhat soft.

Also, during this early period WB was farming out the animation work all over the world. Most of the studios did good to very good work animating these programs. Unfortunately one studio seemed to get a disproportionate amount of the work during these early days and did an absolutely terrible job. Kennedy Cartoons animated and for all intents and purposes ruined large portions of these cartoons and even whole episodes. How can I describe how unappealing their animation was? Basically the guilty parties should be hunted down and punished. How in the world they could receive the model sheets, do their sorry excuse for animation, look at the two in comparison and not see that their product looked like absolute garbage is beyond me. The characters are consistently off model, with stupid "cigar-chewing" mouths, goofy hand posture, shuffling feet, look like they're squatting on the floor all the time, and bouncing incessantly. To see this worthless junk animated over the lavishly painted backgrounds of this series is a bit disconcerting. It's even more egregious, almost criminal, when Kennedy got their dirty mitts on classic characters like Elmer and Bugs for short segments, such as in "Fields of Honey". I remember tuning in for re-runs of this show after school. If I saw it was one of the episodes that looked like trash I'd just turn it off.

Mercifully Warner Bros got fed up with the crap Kennedy consistently produced and finally gave them the boot. Later seasons and later WB series didn't suffer the indignity of being animated by those no-talent hacks. Here's hoping for future volumes of this series that will feature better animated episodes on the whole and have even more fun memories.

I was waiting for the Tiny Toons Adventure release and when finally the day came i order it, and the delivery was fast, and of course i just saw all the episodes, i love it, i cant wait to get the season 2, the product that i receive was new, that's what i like from amazon.