In May of 2023, Warner Bros. released a collection of classic cartoons on Blu-ray through their boutique Warner Archive label that was directly aimed at serious enthusiasts. That set, “Looney Tunes Collector’s Choice: Volume 1,” was pure gold for animation fans, featuring 25 cartoons that had never been released on DVD or Blu-ray in remastered form.
The positive response from lovers of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and Porky Pig led to three more volumes, each collecting 25 new shorts that were meticulously restored and presented in exquisite transfers.
Now, Warner Archive is continuing their mission with “Looney Tunes Collector’s Vault: Volume 1,” a set that continues the label’s previous work and expands on it. “I decided that instead of releasing a Volume 5 with the same curation criteria we would expand to 2-disc collections,” film historian George Feltenstein, who oversees the Warner Archive label, told IndieWire.
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“The idea was to expand the variety of classic cartoons offered by letting the first disc continue the mission of what we had established with the Collector’s Choice releases — 25 cartoons not previously available on DVD or Blu-ray in remastered form as part of a WB classic collection,” he said. “However, the addition of the second disc would contain 25 cartoons that have been available in standard definition on DVD, but had yet to be included remastered in High Definition on a Blu-ray disc.”
Among the newly included cartoons are several fan favorites and rarities, including choice selections by legendary director Chuck Jones. Feltenstein said that choosing favorites is difficult since he, in collaboration with animation historian Jerry Beck, selected all the cartoons, but he has particular fondness for the 1945 Jones short “Hare Conditioned.” In this hilarious cartoon, Bugs Bunny faces a threat from a department store manager who wants to get Bugs stuffed in the taxidermy department.
“Most of the Warner Bros. animation directors had their take on Bugs, but Jones’ work with the character just seemed to get better and better over the years,” Feltenstein said. “This is a relatively early Jones/Bugs cartoon, but it has been a favorite since childhood.” Feltenstein also points to Jones’ 1948 Daffy Duck short “Daffy Dilly” as a treasure that exhibits Daffy’s evolution under Jones’ direction.
“I had the pleasure of meeting Chuck Jones late in his life, and we spoke at length about his work at Warner Bros.,” Feltenstein said. “He once told me — and I assume he told this to many — that Bugs Bunny, for him, represented the kind of individual we aspire to be, and that Daffy Duck was the individual we are afraid we’re really more like. I thought his statement was quite brilliant.”
In choosing the cartoons for the Warner Archive collections, Feltenstein and Beck — who have been collaborating on the programming of classic animation releases going back to the laserdisc era — asked themselves what the fans would want, which isn’t difficult since they’re fans themselves. In addition to the Jones shorts, other highlights in the vault collection include Friz Freleng’s “Each Dawn I Crow” (1949) with Elmer Fudd from 1949, and “The Goofy Gophers,” which was released in 1947.
“‘The Goofy Gophers’ features the screen debut of the characters ‘Mac and Tosh,’ who appeared in several successive cartoons, but this was their introduction to the big screen,” Feltenstein said. “It was allegedly started by legendary animator Bob Clampett, but the balance of the work was taken over by Arthur Davis after Clampett’s sudden departure from the studio.”
In addition to his work on the Warner animation collections, Feltenstein oversees a wide array of releases from the studio’s live-action catalogue, often putting out pristine releases of classics as well as cult favorites and idiosyncratic oddities. Recent months have seen new Blu-rays of titles as varied as the criminally underrated Ryan Reynolds/Amy Smart comedy “Just Friends,” Vincente Minnelli’s visually stunning melodrama “The Cobweb,” and the blaxploitation gem “Melinda,” just to name a few.
“We are usually working on several dozen releases at any given time, in various stages of production,” Feltenstein. “This requires very close coordination with other departments, so we can make sure that our efforts are synchronized with the company’s dedication to preservation efforts.” Right now, the Warner Archive Collection is the only studio-based “boutique” label, dedicated to what physical media collectors want most, and Feltenstein takes his role as curator seriously.
“There are many factors that go into what can get released, and what is still waiting,” Feltenstein said. “We also have various groups of die-hard enthusiast consumers who each want to make their voices heard loudly about what they want to see released. We’re listening, and our goal is to try and please all the different fan factions.”
Ultimately, Feltenstein’s work is complicated but his mission is simple: to get as much of the Warners library released from the vaults and onto the shelves of home viewers. It’s a mission he’s been on for over 16 years that has now yielded several thousand releases; given how strong the company’s recent releases have been, here’s hoping there are thousands more to come.
