A CHRISTMAS PRESENT!

After years of waiting, the Flip The Frog Complete Series Blu-Ray discs from Thunderbean Animation Shop have finally been released and I just received my copy, as a Christmas present from me to myself!

WIKIPEDIA describes Flip the Frog as follows:

Flip the Frog is an animated cartoon character created by American animator Ub Iwerks. He starred in a series of cartoons produced by Celebrity Pictures and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1930 to 1933. The series had many recurring characters besides Flip, including Flip's dog, the mule Orace, and a dizzy neighborhood spinster.

Ub Iwerks was an animator for the Walt Disney Studios and a personal friend of Walt Disney in 1930. After a series of disputes between the two, Iwerks left Disney and went on to accept an offer from Pat Powers to open a cartoon studio of his own, Iwerks Studio, and receive a salary of $300 a week, an offer that Disney was unable to match at the time.

Iwerks was to produce new cartoons under Powers' Celebrity Pictures auspices and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The first series he was to produce was to feature a character called Tony the Frog, but Iwerks disliked the name and was subsequently changed to Flip.

The character eventually wore out his welcome at MGM. His final short was Soda Squirt, released in August 1933. Subsequently, Iwerks replaced the series with a new one starring an imaginative liar named Willie Whopper.

 Flip became largely forgotten by the public in the ensuing years, but the character would make a small comeback when animation enthusiasts and historians began digging up the old Iwerks shorts. And finally, now in 2023, the complete Flip The Frog cartoons are available on Blu-Ray discs and ready to be enjoyed by all of us who remember them fondly.

My son Ricardo's 50th Birthday!

Here are just a few highlights from those fifty years:

 

            

AND MORE TO COME!

THE NEW LAUREL & HARDY BLU-RAY!

FROM AMAZON:

A world premiere for all the Laurel and Hardy fans!

Deluxe 2-disc Blu-ray Edition

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy first appeared on film together in 1921, after an initial period in their careers spent apart. The two would formally team up in 1927 and found success by following a simple comic formula that displayed the hilariously ambitious and anarchic qualities of their joint personality. Laurel & Hardy: Year One, The Newly Restored 1927 Silents, as proudly presented by Flicker Alley and Blackhawk Films, offers fans new and old the rare opportunity to observe the evolving partnership of the slapstick comedy team that would reach enormous popularity. Featuring all new restorations sourced from

best available materials contributed by archives and collectors around the world restored by Blackhawk Films and Lobster Films in Paris, this comprehensive deluxe Blu-ray 2-disc collection features thirteen extant films produced in 1927 and two additional films from before they were officially a team.

It includes new scores from some of the best silent film composers working today, such as Neil Brand, Antonio Coppola, Eric le Guen, and Donald Sosin. Arthur Stanley Jefferson for a time understudied Chaplin in England and the US, meanwhile Oliver Norvell Hardy was a talented actor in comedies and melodramas, yet neither had reached the status of movie star.

It became clear upon their merging together that their contradictory physiques and personalities complimented each other perfectly. The team would go on to produce numerous projects together that reached wide acclaim, eventually becoming nearly unanimously considered by film critics, scholars, and movie fans alike, the funniest comedy duo in film history.

THE HUCKLEBERRY HOUND SHOW!

On this day in 1958, The Huckleberry Hound Show premiered in syndication! It's what put Hanna Barbera on the map creating characters we all know and love like Yogi Bear, Hokey Wolf, Pixie & Dixie & Mr. Jinx, and of course Huckleberry Hound lasting 3 seasons ending in 1961. 

I remember the excitement and anticipation at the news of  The Huckleberry Hound Show premiering back in 1958. I was 7 years old when I first saw the inimitable Huck Hound coming out of the circus door after the Kellogg's rooster knocked.  The cartoons were quite different from all the others I had seen up until then, when the regular cartoon TV fare consisted of full animation cartoons from the 20s, 30s, and 40s. To me, the look, design, stories, music and overall atmosphere was something else and I became hooked watching every cartoon show churned out by the Hanna-Barbera animation factory.  Up until Jonny Quest started the downhill fall into formulaic, unfunny shows and non descript characters, that is.

Ah, but the Huckleberry Hound Show was something else! My childhood was so much happier with this

old hound and his pals coming at my screen every week! Delightful memories I will always treasure!

With Wee Willie.

The complete Season One of The Huckleberry Hound Show was released on a DVD set several years ago but the Second and Third Seasons are yet to see the light of day! Why? Big mystery that probably has to do with copyright holders and, um, like that type of things, yuh know.