I was telling my wife about the Gummi Bears* the other day because she never watched it as a kid, and it gave me the urge to track it down again. For some reason, I never picked these up on DVD, but I think I might have to now.

For your viewing pleasure, here is the first episode of the Gummi Bears: A New Beginning.

I’ve got some epic plans in the works regarding the entire Disney Afternoon lineup, so expect to hear more about the Gummi Bears around here pretty soon.

*by “telling her about” I mean “singing the theme song”

Related posts:

1. Watch This: Disney’s The Mad Doctor – 1933
2. Watch This: Adventures in Dinosaur City
3. Watch This: Hooked Bear – 1956 Disney Short

Out now from Warner Bros. is the great film Where The Wild Things Are on DVD and Blu-ray. I absolutely love this movie. I think it’s a great representation of being a kid, and I’m so glad to be able to own it so I can watch it whenever I want now.

The Movie

I’ve covered Where The Wild Things Are a bit on the site, so you know I love the source material. I’m so glad to be able to claim that I love a film based on a piece of nostalgia with drivel such as the Chipmunks movies being released almost monthly now.

The Features

The DVD has the following short featurettes by Lance Bangs:

• The Absurd Difficulty of Filming a Dog Running and Barking at the Same Time
• The Big Prank
• Vampire Attack
• The Kids Take Over the Picture

…but if you’re really wanting the ultimate WTWTA package, go for the Blu-ray/DVD combo. It contains the following features:

• Higgelty Piggelty Pop! An all-new short featuring the voices of Meryl Streep and Forest Whitaker
• HBO First Look
• The four webisodes from the DVD release, plus:
• Maurice and Spike
• Max and Spike
• The Records Family
• Carter Burwell

Where the WIld Things Are was one of my top movies of 2009 (and that’s saying a lot), so I can’t recommend it enough. It’s available now, so pick it up at your favorite retailer!

Related posts:

1. WTWTA Roundup – Let the Wild Rumpus Start! [Update]
2. Where The Wild Things Are Poster
3. Where the Wild Things Are Art Gallery Show

Before the days of DVDs, I had a couple VHS compilation tapes of skits from the Muppet Show, and this was always one of my favorite songs. I thought of it the other day when I was chopping onions, and I had to look it up.

Related posts:

1. The Best Muppet Show Beatles Covers
2. Watch This: The Lone Chipmunks (1954)
3. Mickey’s Trailer – 1938 Disney Short

There hasn’t been a whole lot of news from the Disney/Marvel acquisition front yet, until now. Some enterprising fanboys discovered that one of Disney’s recent domain name purchases was ANT-MAN-THE-MOVIE.COM. We already knew that Disney has to keep their hands off the Marvel film franchises already in development with other studios, so they’re obviously frantically flipping through the pages looking for undeveloped characters.

Lets just hope that they stick with the Edgar Wright version of Ant-Man.

The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes

The other big announcement this week was that Disney is prepping The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes for release. I don’t know how much Disney has to do with this besides distribution, since the show was announced back in 2008, but it looks awesome.

Via SlashFilm

Related posts:

1. Hitler is Pissed About Disney Buying Marvel
2. Marvel Super Hero Squad Mania with Twitter Contest!
3. Watch This: Hooked Bear – 1956 Disney Short

If you were a child of the late 80s/early 90s like me, it was hard to avoid the Micro Machines commercials. I had quite a few, including the awesome fold-out city in a bus (which I can’t seem to find online). Tiny cars and trucks are cool and all, but they don’t compare to tiny robots and their ginormous compandres. Even though I didn’t own very many Z-Bots, I was a big fan.

Especially of this guy:

In fact, the Megabot set may have made up the only Z-Bots I ever owned, but it was enough to etch them in my nostalgic memory for years and years. Someday I’ll get him back.

Ps – Google Z-Bots and you’ll find there are quite a few hardcore/crazy collectors out there. Not that that’s surprising, just sayin’.

Further Reading

• Micro Machines Museum
• Z-Bots on Wikipedia
• Virtual Toy Chest’s Z-Bots Page

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The Simpsons Sing the Blues came out in 1990, riding on the huge wave of popularity the Simpsons were enjoying at the time. I was an insanely huge Simpsons fan when I was younger, and I’m starting to regain that obsession now thanks to finally buying all the DVD sets.

I had two or three of the Simpsons albums back in the day, and The Simpsons Sing the Blues was my first. While I liked the albums of music from the show better, I can’t help but feel nostalgic when I listen to Do the Bartman or Deep Deep Trouble. Since it’s a couple decades old, you can pick up the album on Amazon for less than ten bucks, or you can listen to all the songs with me thanks to the magical world of YouTube.

Who can forget how huge Do The Bartman was when it came out? I never knew until now that the song was actually co-written by the great Michael Jackson, who was apparently a big fan of the show. Later in Stark Raving Dad Jackson would provide the speaking voice of Leon Kompowsky (but not the singing voice). You can read more about Jackson’s ties to The Simpsons over here.

Well, I think you’ll agree it’s more of a The Simpsons Rap than it is Blues, but that title is lame so I don’t blame them. Now, if you’re a Simpsons fan looking for a more satisfying musical experience, go pick up one of the great soundtrack albums containing tracks from the show like Songs in the Key of Springfield.

Related posts:

1. Mickey Unrapped

It seems like every week I add more cartoons to my DVD collection. This time, it’s another great set of Tom and Jerry shorts! Warner Bros. has released another volume of the Tom and Jerry Greatest Chases, and this time around it has 14 classic cartoons featuring everyone’s favorite cat and mouse team this side of Itchy and Scratchy.

For around ten bucks you get 98 minutes of classic animated shorts, and the shorts speak for themselves. The presentation is what we’ve come to expect from these releases, but Tom and Jerry completists who don’t own the Spotlight sets (like me) will find Vol. 4 to be another great way to add a handful of classic shorts to your collection.

The Cartoons:

• The Mouse Comes to Dinner
• Springtime for Thomas
• Trap Happy
• Polka-Dot Puss
• Saturday Evening Puss
• Little Quacker
• Cruise Cat
• The Missing Mouse
• Jerry and Jumbo
• Just Ducky
• Little School Mouse
• Tom and Cherie
• Muscle Beach Tom
• Down Beat Bear

I was really surprised how many of these I remembered from TV as a child. With a library as huge as Tom and Jerry, I’m sure we’ll be getting these DVD sets for a long time now, but that’s fine with me.

Tom and Jerry Greatest Chases Vol. 4 is out now, so make sure to pick it up on DVD today!

Related posts:

1. Tom and Jerry Greatest Chases Vol. 2 Review
2. Tom and Jerry’s Greatest Chases Vol. 3 Review
3. Tom and Jerry: The Chuck Jones Collection Review

My goal is to provide news, reviews, and a complete release database (and coming soon calendar) for all animated Blu-ray titles here in the US. I’ll still write about animated Blu-rays here a little bit, but for the most part I’m going to separate that content to the new site.

There are plenty of sites that aim to do the same thing for all Blu-ray releases, but I thought there was room for one that would be more specialized, for my fellow hardcore animation fans.

It’s still a work in progress, and I’m going to be adding more features soon, but I’d appreciate any feedback you might have!

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Retro Thing is a great blog about all things retro, with a slant towards gadgetry and gaming. Now they are getting into the hardware business with the Retro Thing USB Controller.

They had this designed and manufactured here in the United States, it lights up blue when plugged in via USB, and they even took some extra steps to make it extra hackable for the DIY crowd. It’ll work on Atari, Amiga, and Commodore emulators, or as a controller for your very own MAME cabinet (which is something I’ve been meaning to do). For $30, it’s a steal.

Check out the full story at Retro Thing or jump straight to the order page and support the geek cause.

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Out on DVD today is You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown from Warner Bros. This Peanuts release is a little different from the recent ones from WB in that it is an animated adaptation of the Broadway musical of the same name.

You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown is made up of sketches and musical numbers and is quite different than most Peanuts animated fare, but a little variety is nice. I played Charlie Brown in a production of the sequel to this musical once, called Snoopy so I was surprised to see that this even existed.

As far as bonus features, there is one featurette called Animating a Charlie Brown Musical that is pretty interesting. It features plenty of interviews and behind the scenes footage that offer a glimpse into the making of this feature.

If you’re a Peanuts completist or just a huge fan like me, I’d suggest picking this up on DVD today!

Disclaimer: This review was based on a free review copy. Read my blog disclosure statement for more.

Related posts:

1. I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown DVD Review
2. Peanuts 1970s Collection Vol. 1 Review
3. A Charlie Brown Christmas Blu-ray Review