Search - Harvey Toons - The Complete Collection on DVD

Jerry Beck Sez

Jeff Kurtti | Glendale, CA USA | 10/27/2006

(1 out of 5 stars)

"Animation Historian and self-proclaimed Famous Studios fan Jerry Beck posted this on his excellent Cartoon Brew web site:

"Sony Wonder has just released a boxed set called Harveytoons: The Complete Collection. 'Harveytoons' was the generic name affixed to the 1950s Paramount/Famous Studio cartoons (featuring Casper, Baby Huey, Herman and Katnip, Little Audrey, Buzzy, etc.) when they were originally syndicated to television back in the 1960s, after Harvey Comics acquired the TV and non-theatrical rights to the library. Classic Media owns the collection today and authorized this new set. I haven't had time to review the whole set, but what we have here are 52 episodes of THE HARVEYTOONS SHOW, a program I formatted for Harvey Entertainment and Fox Kids back in 1998. Unfortunately, this set does NOT constitute 'the complete collection' under any condition. For a variety of reasons we did not incorporate the entire Harveytoon library into the original series. Certain cartoons (particularly the Screen Songs) are edited. The fact that their were 78 episodes should tip you off right there. Here's the list of the original Fox Kids series. Sadly the contents of the DVD set doesn't even match up to this list (for example, episode 52 on the DVD is actually #53 of the series).

"Oh, how I wish someone from Classic Media had consulted with me. For one, I would have made sure to include certain cartoons (like the politically incorrect Chew Chew Baby) and it would have been fun to create some bonus materials. The good news is that the cartoons look nice and clean, the cult classic La Petite Parade is included (episode #40 on the DVD) and they've restored the original Jackson Beck vocal tracks to Buzzy The Crow.""

What were they thinking??

W. Yorke | Valley Village, California United States | 11/13/2006

(1 out of 5 stars)

"First of all...this is NOT the complete collection. Secondly, the cartoons are butted together with hardly time for one to end before the next one begins. And lastly, there is no booklet, no listing, no menu of any kind on the DVD itself.
Very shoddy package of some very fine cartoons and characters. I hate to sound like an old-timer...but why do most people not care anymore about what they produce? How could you sign you name or be part of a team that worked on this very mediocre (at best) packaging, and walk out of work with any sense of pride?
Dramatic, I know, but fight the urge to be any part of mediocrity. Be proud to sign your name to anything you produce. No one should be proud of being any part of this packaging."

Basic Review From Stay At Home Mom New To Series

Dorrie Wheeler | 10/29/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Classic Media, Harvey and Sony Wonders have released Harveytoons-The Complete Collections. If you are old enough to remember these classic shorts you will be glad to finally own these classic cartoons on DVD. If you are new to the Harveytoons collection, you will enjoy yourself getting acquainted with the original Casper The Friendly Ghost, Wendy, Baby Huey, Katnip, Little Audrey and other characters.

The four discs included with the set are dual disc in nature, which means that DVD content is on both sides of the disc. What I found most frustrating about this set is that there is no booklet included. If I were a connoisseur of these classics shorts I wouldn't know which disc to start with or where to look for the episode I wanted to watch. So I just put the discs in and started watching cartoons.

Harveytoons are almost completely new to me, so please bear with my review. I have a vague memory of seeing these cartoons in syndication when I was three or four years old. Casper is probably the most well known of the HarveyToons characters. In the shorts featured on the set he has to deal with people being afraid of him sometimes. He can't understand why because after all he is a friendly ghost. In one short he goes to the zoo and befriends a baby elephant. The most interesting of the Casper shorts are when his naughty cousins are included in the episode. Katnip is another popular HarveyToons character. He is a mischievous feline. My son said some of the Katnip episodes reminded him of Tom & Jerry, I'm sure he was referring to the storyline because Katnip did have a mouse named Herman who was involved in many of his adventures.

The HarveyToons-The Complete Collections is pretty barebones. There is nothing that tells you how much content is on each disc. The title screens in between shorts includes episode credits. As someone new to the HarveyToons collection I found this one aspect rather frustrating. Sometimes I really didn't know what I was watching and then if I did find and episode that I liked I had to make a point to remember the episode number. In the episode selection menu the episodes are listed by number. A booklet would have been really handy as many of these shorts had names.

The picture quality is decent in my opinion as is the sound quality. This is an enjoyable collection but if you are a true connoisseur of the HarveyTunes Collection you may have some issues about the bare bones nature of the set. There are not bonus features included and nothing notes about the episodes being re-mastered. The set has a running time of 19 hours and includes 52 cartoon episodes. I enjoyed watching the set.
"

Great Material, lousy DVD set-up

Mr. Perfect | 06/27/2007

(3 out of 5 stars)

"First off, I want to say I was very glad to get these classic Harvey toons. They look great, color is great, toons are still great. What's really really lousy is that you can't get to any specific cartoons from the menu. Menu? That's a joke, practically speaking there isn't a menu. AND THIS IS MY MAJOR MAIN complaint. Horrible useless menu that doesn't list any, none, zero titles. There is no way to get to any individual cartoon because they're all hidden inside their repackaged versions of "Episode 1" Episode 2, etc. Each of the DVD "episodes" is a repackaged DVD version of an episode and each "episode" lists no individual cartoon titles. What does this mean? Let's say you want to watch a particular Little Audrey cartoon, or for that matter, ANY Little Audrey cartoon. Good luck, there's no way to find it, no listing, no titles, no nothing on the menu, no listing on the box itself, no identification of any cartoon title or where in the world in the multi-double-sided discs to find it. Disastrous DVD packaging because of the no menu style DVDs you get. Also a major complaint, is that the introduction music beginning for each cartoon, the theme music for each toon if you will, the Casper song, the Herman & Catnip song, etc. they're all cut off after about 5 seconds, you get no opening theme credits for each toon and no complete opening theme for each toon!!! One of my fondest memories of these toons is the theme songs used at the beginning of each toon, they're all chopped off after about 5 seconds, forget reliving these wonderful theme moments, they've been edited out. Also the Harvey Giant Jack in a box himself, the opening is a NEWLY created opening, NOT the original Harvey opening. The credits that run at the end of each supposed "episode" are also newly created, not original credits that originally appeared in the complete opening theme of each toon, not at the end of the so-called episode. IF THEY HAD ONLY LEFT WELL ENOUGH ALONE AND NOT RE-CREATED OPENINGS AND EDITED THEMES DOWN TO NOTHING AND RECREATED CLOSINGS AND MOST OF ALL IF THEY HAD INCLUDED A MENU WITH EACH TOON'S TITLE LISTED, this would have and could have been an excellent set. As it is, I am now re-recording the entire set, toon by toon and giving each separate toon on my own created menu a title so that in the future I'll use my own created discs that will have title menus that I can go to any specific cartoon I want. Classic Media, you really messed up on this one. By the way, they did a very nice job on their Mr. Magoo DVD set that is currently available. On their Mr. Magoo set there IS a menu the DOES include titles for each individual toon that allow instant access to specific toon. So it goes to prove that Classic Media can do the job right IF they want to. The key to success? DO NOT TRY TO IMPROVE AN ALREADY PERFECT PRODUCT WITH YOUR RE-CREATED BITS AND YOUR CHOPPING AND SLICING AND DICING CLASSIC THEMES. I am disappointed. One good note, the cartoons themselves look excellent, bright colors, accurate coloring, no fading, the picture itself is great looking."