Saturday Morning Cartoons 1970s Volume 2 – DVD Review

Saturday Morning Cartoons 1970s Volume 2 includes a collection of 21 episodes from various cartoons on two discs.  Disc One features Help! It’s the Hair Bear Bunch, The New Adventures of Gilligan, Sea Lab 2020, Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan, Shazzan and Yogi’s Gang. Disc Two features The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour, Valley of the Dinosaurs, The Tom and Jerry/Grape Ape Show, The Banana Splits Adventure Hour, Inch High Private Eye and The New Adventures of Batman and Robin (featuring the voices of TV’s original Batman and Robin, Adam West and Burt Ward).  This DVD collection will also include newly created enhanced content featuring Shazzan.

Another DVD set that I can sit down with my kids and enjoy.  Being a ’70s baby, I grew up on some of these cartoons, and it really brought me back to days before DVRs existed.  What we adults sometimes call “the good ole days.”  What happened in those days was that you needed to make sure you got up early enough on a Saturday morning to watch everything that you wanted, and if two shows you liked happened to be on at the same time, you were just out of luck.  Oh, yeah, you also needed a full bowl of some sugar-coated cereal and some comforatble pajamas to make the morning to complete.  While watching this set, I was reminded of some shows that I had long since forgotten, shown some shows that I do not even remember, and then watched some shows I wanted to make sure my boys had the benefit of seeing.

“Keep Your Keeper” – Help! It’s The Hair Bear Bunch – These bears were so funny, and I love how Hair Bear and gang were so human.  They had an awesome cave that had all the amenities (better than most houses), plus they could do amazing magic things like riding a make-believe motorcycle.  Best part of this show is the interaction between Hair Bear and the zoo keepers.  You have 3 bears all with distinct personalities and then two zoo keepers who are totally different as well.  I cannot even tell you how awesome the interaction between all the characters are; that is what makes this show.  Plus the bear has a huge afro.  Sometimes we even get some interaction with the rest of the animals in the zoo.  Probably my favorite show on the 2 DVDs.  My kids loved it, as well.

“Off Limits” – The New Adventures of Gilligan – If Hair Bear and his Gang was my favorite show of the 2 DVDs, this was probably the show that I had really forgotten about watching when I was younger.  I like all things Gilligan, so I did enjoy watching this show, as well, especially with that little monkey that they used.  Something about Ginger’s hair color annoyed me even as a child, but the little monkey that Gilligan had was kinda cool.  They could also do a bit more than the live action show in terms of crazyness. 

“Deep Threat” – Sea Lab 2020 – Did not like it then, still do not like it.  Just not my type of show.

“The Mardi Gras Caper” – The Amazing Chan and The Chan Clan – I liked the show, but this is one of those times where the animation is so bad it is actually distracting to the show.  Lots of characters going on with the Chan Clan, but Mr Chan was just so smooth, and he could pretty much solve any crime.  Super Smooth.  Oh, the band scenes:  did not like them so much, either. 

“The Living Island” – Shazzan – Make sure you check out the extra piece about Shazzan, but I always liked Shazzan’s style.  He wasn’t out-and-out mean, but this guy did not take any sort of back-talk.  He was funny and also darn powerful, which made it interesting for the writers to come up with something to really work with.  The kids who found the rings, Chuck and Nancy, need to return them to their rightful owner, as that was the one thing Shazzan could not do.  Also the kids could only summon them if they put the rings together, so if they get seperated it is a problem.  How cool was Kaboobie the magical flying camel? His voice is also awesome. 

“Mr. Bigot” – Yogi’s Gang – This is the one with Yogi’s Ark, so we get all of Yogi’s gang, but was a bit on the cheesy side.  I watched it, but there were other shows I would rather have been watching at the end of the day.  The coolest part of the show was watching all of the Hanna-Barbera crew interact together.

“Duck! Rabbit, Duck!”/”For Scent-imental Reasons”/”Stop, Look, and Hasten”/”Hare-Way to the Stars” – The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour – I am not a huge Bugs fan, so the ones that have Daffy Duck are actually more enjoyable for me.  “Duck! Rabbit, Duck!” would be one of my top cartoons of the Bugs and Daffy shows.  What is interesting, though, is we get another cartoon that I liked next, because Pepe le Pew is some good stuff.  He is funny, and I love when he chases after the cat for a girlfriend.  “Stop, Look, and Hasten” is a Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner cartoon, and they were never a big hit with me on Saturday mornings.  They were repetitive for me even as a child.  “Hare-Way to the Stars” is a straight Bugs cartoon, and even though it has Marvin the Martian, they were never a draw for me.  Marvin’s voice, though, was always pretty funny!

“Forbidden Fruit” – Valley of the Dinosaurs – Dinosaurs are always cool, and I loved the fact that it is about a family from America that goes on a trip down the Amazon River and goes into a whilrpool that puts them in a prehistoric valley.  They meet up with a caveman family with whom they become friends, who try to help them home.  The interaction between the two familes as well as the dinosaurs made this one a hit in my childhood days, and it seems to hold up against another viewing as an adult. 

“No Way Stowaway”/”That was No Idol”/”The Ski Bunny”/”The All American Ape”/’Stay Awake or Else” – Tom and Jerry/Grape Ape – These are not the original Tom and Jerry style cartoons, but I remember watching both “No Way Stowaway” and “The Ski Bunny” as a child.  Loved them both then and love them now.   “Stay Awake or Else” was filler to me.  “That was No Idol” and “The All American Ape” made me remember how much fun Grape Ape and Beegley Beagley were.  I had forgotten the famous catch phrase of “YEOW! It’s a gorill-ill-ill-ill-la!” when people saw Grape Ape.  It was cool that Grape Ape had all this power but was just a big kid at heart.

“Joining the Knights”/”Danger Island”/”The Littlest Musketeer” – The Banana Splits Adventure Hour - Let me just be honest here, I was never a fan of The Banana Splits Adventure Hour.  I would almost never watch it and would rather be doing homework.  The Musketeers show was no better.  It is funny, though, that the Banana Splits make me think of Yo Gabba Gabba, but I never liked the music during the Banana Splits, which could have done it for me if I had.

“Diamonds Are a Crook’s Best Friend” – Inch High Private Eye – I liked this show, I still really do not know why even after watching it now.  But yet even on this viewing I still enjoy the show.  I guess all the little things that Mr. Inch does and how he interacts with the big world made it fun.  Plus th Inch High Private Eye was darn good at his job of solving crimes.

“A Sweet Joke on Gotham City” – The New Adventures of Batman – A sweet joke on all Batman fans; this one was tough to watch.

So let us get into the goodness.

On Disc One you also have some trailers, but the cool thing is the “The Power of Shazzan,” where we get a five-minute inside look at the creation of the show.  I always liked that show and found it interesting as an adult to hear what they did behind the scenes.  They also hit on a really good point, which was that it was not about the animation in those days, but rather in the storytelling.  They might have cut corners, but the story itself was what you were tuning in for.

The quality of the DVD is the best they could have gotten; just remember that these are from the 1970s, so there will be some grainy images.

This is a must-have set of DVDs for a few reasons, the top two being the nostalgia factor for yourself, and the second being that your children should be able to view some of the same classic cartoons that you grew up on.  I just wish I had already purchased Volume 1, as well!

Saturday Morning Cartoons 1970s Volume 2
Street Date: October 27, 2009
Check out the Official site: http://www.kidswb.com/
Own it on DVD!