I’m a sucker for awesome fan art, and this wallpaper of Donatello by CapMoreno is no exception. I’d love to see his versions of a few more characters.

Grab it here.

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Nerf guns are fun, and if you work in an office, are the perfect distraction. I’m readying a video post on this topic, but in the meantime, here’s a classic Nerf commercial from the 90s. Enjoy.

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I love the Peanuts. The TV specials are classic, and one of the most rewarding nostalgic cartoons to re-watch in adulthood. I own the Peanuts Holiday Collection, but have always wanted the complete collection of Peanuts specials. I was delighted when I received my copy of the Peanuts 1960s Collection.

Warner Brothers has taken all of the specials from the 60s and packaged them in a two disc set that contains:

• A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)
• Charlie Brown’s All-Stars (1966)
• It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966)
• You’re in Love, Charlie Brown (1967)
• He’s Your Dog, Charlie Brown (1968)
• It was a Short Summer, Charlie Brown (1969)

The Specials

All six of the specials on this set are classic, and all give me that hard-to-explain, instant nostalgic feeling when I watch them. I’ve never known exactly why the Peanuts specials seem so nostalgic, even if I see one for the first time. My wife thinks it’s because they’re so simple, they use real children’s voices, and have the awesome music of Vince Guaraldi. I think she’s right.

Of course the Christmas and Halloween specials are classics, but what about the other specials? Charlie Brown’s All-Stars is the second Peanuts special to air on television, and it follows Chuck as he is the pitcher and manager of his baseball team. They’re not having much luck, but they get motivated when a local hardware store wants to sponsor them with new uniforms. Just before the last game before they officially get the sponsorship, Charlie Brown finds out that in order to get the uniforms, he would have to kick Snoopy, Lucy, Patty, Violet, and Frieda off the team (apparently only male humans can play baseball on Mr. Hennessy’s terms). He doesn’t tell the team, they lose, and they get really mad. Lucy suggests they kick him. Linus saves the day when he tells them what really happened.

If you’re familiar with the Peanuts musicals, a scene in You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown was inspired by this special. Fun Fact: I played Charlie Brown in a local theater company’s production of Snoopy! when I was in High School. Pictures coming soon.

You’re in Love, Charlie Brown – This is the classic “The Little Red-haired Girl” special. Charlie Brown tries to work up the courage to talk to her for the entire special, but of course never does. All seems lost for the round-headed-one, but he perseveres and enjoys a happy ending.

He’s Your Dog, Charlie Brown – This special focuses on Snoopy more than Charlie Brown. He gets into some trouble and Chuck calls the Daisy Hill Puppy Farm to enroll him in some “refresher” courses. Instead of going there like he was supposed to, he instead sets up camp at Peppermint Patty’s house, and proceeds to eat her out of house and home. I enjoyed seeing a Peanuts story not completely revolve around Charlie Brown.

It was a Short Summer, Charlie Brown – This was the last special featuring Peter Robbins as Charlie Brown. To me, this is the special where it started feeling more like a series about a group of kids, rather than just all about Charlie Brown. The kids are finally on summer vacation, but they have to put up with homework assignments, bad summer camp food, and The Masked Marvel.

The Bonus Features

There is one excellent bonus feature on this set, the documentary The Maestro of Menlo Park – Profiling Composer Vince Guaraldi. If you’re a fan of the music behind the Peanuts specials, you’ll find this very educational. I didn’t know much about Vince other than his Peanuts music, and this documentary delves surprisingly deep into his life. This is clearly a special feature aimed at adults, and features interviews with Vince’s son David, as well as producer Lee Mendleson and many musicians who played with Vince. I think it ran over thirty minutes, and my wife and I love it. I could listen to Vince’s Christmas score year-round, but his other Peanuts music is just as classic.

The Verdict

I like how Warner Bros. grouped these specials by the decade. I wouldn’t want to pay for an individual DVD of some of these, just because they’re so short, so this is a great way to start collecting all the Peanuts specials. I hope they continue releasing them by decade like this. It would only take two or three more sets to complete the entire run of Peanuts specials.

If you’re a Peanuts fan, or you’d like to introduce your kids to some classic cartoons and give them a break from aliens and robots and sponges, I highly recommend you head on over to Amazon or your favorite local mega-store on July 7th to Own it on DVD. Viva la Peanuts!

This set will be released on Tuesday, July 7th.

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Thanks in part to all the people who put Transformers 2 over $200 million in five days, Hollywood now officially thinks that the public will only accept films based on pre-sold franchises. We’ve all heard how there will be movies based on Monopoly, Candyland, Stretch Armstrong, and Battleship, but now they’re digging into the classic video game archives, starting with Asteroids.

I see what they’re trying to do. Kids from the 70s are now all grown up and have kids of their own, so why not try and tap that market? Soon enough we’ll be seeing trailers for Centipede, Pole Position, and Pitfall.

Asteroids was way before my time, but my family had the arcade cabinet when I was growing up, so its nostalgic for me too. I’ll never forget the look and sound of this:

Someday I would love to get that arcade back, the art is permanently ingrained in my mind. All nostalgia aside, however, I don’t see a movie based on the game being any better than Armageddon or Deep Impact.

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I’ve never paid much attention to the more recent TV incarnations of my beloved Turtles (mainly because I don’t watch TV, give me season sets and I would check it out), but this is just too good to pass up. Following a TMNT Top Ten Countdown in September, 4Kids Entertainment is releasing a straight-to-DVD. It looks like it’s actually a crossover between the classic ‘87 Turtles and the 2003 (an onward) Turtles.

The video shows Bebop and Rocksteady, robotic Foot Soldiers, and even the classic Turtles themselves rubbing shoulders with the new class. I’m sure this will be some wacky time travel plot, but the fact that it’s going to be feature length is pretty awesome. On the 4Kids site, if you click the image below you’re taken to a “top secret” MP3 file of a very bad 80s Shredder impression. I can’t tell if Rocksteady’s voice is the same or another bad impression, but I guess we’ll find out in the months to come. The suspense is killing me!

Found via Topless Robot

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Artist Dean Fraser’s Simpsonized Ghostbusters have been flying around the intertubes like crazy today, and rightly so. His blog Springfield Punx is awesome, and I wish I had found it earlier. He draws all kinds of characters in the Simpsons style, and browsing through his archives I found his (or Matt Groening’s) version of the Teengage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Be sure to check out the rest of his archives, he’s got everything from Arrested Development to Pee Wee Herman and GI Joe.

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Well, this just sucks. The King of Pop, and the person I’ve always considered to be the most talented person on the planet died yesterday. This is the first celebrity death I’ve cared about in my life, and it’s hitting me pretty hard. Even though Thriller came out two years before I was born, it’s always been one of my favorite albums, and I’ve always loved Michael Jackson and his music. I think he had a tragic life, and was constantly crucified by the media.

For those of us who grew up with him primarily in the 90s instead of the 80s, this is how I’ll always remember him, how I discovered him.

Who can forget Black and White with Macaulay Culkin, or playing Moonwalker (my Dad had the arcade in his pizza shop). These are all memories from the 90s I have of Michael Jackson, and they mean as much to me as the 80s memories mean to my sisters.

His music was amazing. Someday I’m going to introduce my kids to his music and his videos, and I’ll look back and think of where I was when I heard he died. Like many people yesterday, I was on Twitter, hoping the reports weren’t true and trying in vain to access CNN on my phone.

I’m not going to go on and on or post a ton of YouTube videos because, chances are, you’re already doing that if you care. We’ll miss you Michael.

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Last week I reviewed the WB DVD set of Tom and Jerry Greatest Chases Vol. 2, and this week Warner Bros. is continuing their quest for awesomeness with the release of the Tom and Jerry Chuck Jones Collection.

Chuck Jones is remembered most for his amazing work on Looney Tunes, Merrie Melodies, Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and his Oscar winning short The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics, but from 1963-967 he gave the world his version of one of the longest running animated theatrical series; Tom and Jerry.

One of Chuck Jones’ greatest strengths was his subtle, dry sense of humor. I remembered seeing a lot of his Tom and Jerry shorts when I was younger, but I had no idea they would be so funny. Riley and I popped this set in one night and found ourselves laughing out loud at Jones’ quirky, sometimes bizarre gags. Whether it’s Jerry getting intoxicated and dancing on a piano or Tom’s fur being torn off constantly, you’ll find more than a few things to laugh at in this set.

It includes all 34 of Jones’ Tom and Jerry shorts, together for the first time and presented in widescreen. Even though it’s a standard definition DVD set, the picture looked great on my HDTV. The set has two discs and comes in a sturdy slip case, and actually looks pretty sweet on the shelf.

The set also includes two documentaries. Tom and Jerry…and Chuck tells the story of how CJ came to work at MGM after Warner Bros. terminated him and the shorts department. Chuck Jones: Memories of a Childhood is an 30 minute documentary produced by John Canemaker, a well known animator and historian. It includes interviews and animated sequences made just for the documentary. You can read more about this documentary over at Cartoon Brew.

This is turning out to be a great year for classic animation on DVD, mostly thanks to Warner Bros, and with How the Grinch Stole Christmas coming out on Blu-ray in the fall, it’ll also be a great year for Chuck Jones fans. Head over to Amazon if you’d like to own it on DVD, and show the studios that we appreciate them putting out these sets!

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Photo by Great Beyond

Growing up, I was never able to play board games as much as I wanted, party because my siblings were all 10+ years older than me and out of the house by the time I was six. Most of my games were strictly for kids, and that meant I only got to play them when someone came over. As soon as a friend or cousin would step foot in my room, I’d be busting out The Grape Escape or Bonkers like they were going out of style.

On the other hand, one game I did get to play a lot growing up was Parcheesi. This was a game my Mom would play with me. This was the Royal Game of India, and has always had an important place in my nostalgia.

Parcheesi Royal Edition

History

This is the part where I paraphrase from Wikipedia and make myself sound smart. Parcheesi, also known as Pachisi, was created in India around 500 BC. It was ported into an American board game somewhere around 1867 and named Patcheesi, changed hands a lot, and now Hasbro owns the rights to the game in North America.

Gameplay

You play Parcheesi with two dice, and if you have the “Royal” edition pictured above, you get to shake ‘em around in a fancy cup. Thats the version I had when I was younger. Recently, I wondered why Parcheesi wasn’t in my life anymore, and my wife and I bought a copy at our local Toys R Us. We didn’t get the royal edition, but opted for the “Classic” edition, which means our board looks a little more Indian, and instead of Sorry pieces we have fancy Elephants, Tigers, Camels, and Oxes.

Photo by Jek in the Box

Basically, you have to get your four pieces from your start to home, by traversing around the board and up your home path. It’s not as quick or easy as it sounds, especially if you play with four people. It starts getting crazy when you get captured (sent back to start) and when bonus moves up to 40 spaces are being had. All in all, it’s a fun game, and a good way to spice up your routine of watching TV/movies, knitting sweaters, or whatever else you people do in the evenings.

You can imagine how excited I was to play this game after so many years, especially because Riley had never played it before. We sat down one evening, read the rules, and an hour or so later we had three games under our belt. Did I win any of those games? Nope, but it was still fun.

I have this vision of having a crazy huge collection of board games someday, so I’m going to be digging around on ebay and at garage sales to find all of the games from my childhood. I’ll be sure to keep you posted.

What games did you play the most as a child?

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If you’re like me, you’re always looking to add some classic cartoons to your DVD collection. Well, this week Warner Bros. is releasing a great title – Tom and Jerry’s Greatest Chases, Vol. 2.

This is of course a follow-up to Tom and Jerry’s Greatest Chases (which is a steal right now), and this collection adds another 14 shorts to the series.

These shorts were originally released between 1943 and 1951, and includes the Oscar winning shorts Mouse Trouble and Quiet Please! If you’ve ever watched Tom and Jerry, you know to expect the craziest 7 minute long cat-and-mouse chases money can buy, and this set doesn’t disappoint.

After so many years, these cartoons are still hilarious. They’re filled with a delightfully over the top level of cartoon violence that you just don’t see anymore. These shorts represent the classic Tom and Jerry era, pre-Chuck Jones (look for a wonderful CJ Tom and Jerry set next week), and the full line-up is:

• Surfin’ Cats!
• Baby Puss
• Million Dollar Cat
• The Bodyguard
• Mouse Trouble (Oscar Winner)
• Flirty Birdy
• Quiet Please (Oscar Winner)
• Cat Fishin’
• The Invisible Mouse
• Heavenly Puss
• Jerry and the Goldfish
• Cue Ball Cat
• Slicked-Up Pup
• Jerry’s Cousin

This set is available today, so Own it on DVD and keep the classics alive!

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