Some fans are crying foul over Warner Bros.’ content selection for Looney Tunes — Golden Collection. All Looney Tunes — Golden Collection images © Warner Home Video.

Those of you reading the title of this month’s column and expecting a culinary twist will find little to nibble upon; the title actually refers to a Chuck Jones opus from 1951 entitled, Chow Hound. In this sardonic short an antisocial dog cheats the aggrieved owners of lost pet cats by passing off a stooge (or rather, slave) cat as their missing meowbag. The relieved owners give the confederate cat generous meals, which he then must turn over to his greedy Fagan. The dastardly dog is a tough employer; rather than proffering a “well done” he snarls “What, no gravy? You forgot the gravy!” He then gorges away and plots his next sinister scam. Several times over the past week or two, I have had this cartoon flash through my mind whenever I read about the contention over the recent release of the four-DVD box set Looney Tunes — Golden Collection.

If you do not yet own this compilation (and I assuming that virtually everybody reading this does), you have no doubt noticed that the DVDs contain 56 shorts culled from the “Golden Age” of the studio, several recent cartoons produced well after Warner closed in the late 1960s, the excellent documentary, The Boys From Termite Terrace, excerpts from the TV program The Bugs Bunny Show and several other fascinating features (including a recording session by the late Mel Blanc) guaranteed to keep you prisoner to whatever technology you are viewing the discs on. The shorts themselves have been restored to the point where many of them probably look better than they did upon release, and gone is the hack-and-slash editing and censoring that made so many purists gnash their teeth for lo, these many years. Roughly half of them can be viewed, if you wish, with commentary by Michael Barrier and Greg Ford, who should know a thing or two about the cartoons contained herein.

Yet, some fanatics have responded like the Chow Hound; with this marvelous cornucopia dropped into their laps, their reaction has been, “What, no gravy!” Controversy abounds on the Web, in the print media, and among the fans. The contention mostly arises from the following gripes: Some of the “best” Looney Tunes are absent (What’s Opera, Doc and One Froggy Evening seem to be the most conspicuous absentees by fan consensus); some shorts were deliberately withheld so that Warner could soak the buying public at some future date; the shorts are not arrayed according to chronology or director; dust and flaws can still be seen even on the restored shorts; half the cartoons are directed by Chuck Jones and minimize the contributions of Tex Avery and Bob Clampett; the cover art does not look like the classic animation; the sound is mono; and sundry other complaints ranging from the informed to the downright nibby. You forgot the gravy!

Above, Bugs and Yosemite Sam take a rebel stand in Bunker Hill Bunny. These two characters have helped to cement Warner Bros.’ place in pop culture.

In an Associated Press interview with Anthony Breznican, Warner marketing director George Feltenstein (who assisted in the selection of shorts) attempted to mollify those who believed they are being milked: “We couldn’t release all the best ones at once... what would we do for an encore?” Warner Home Video has assured the hungry that they will be fed a set of 60 cartoons annually. Presumably with gravy.

It would be tempting to chide these dissenters. After all, a full collection of the roughly 1,100 Looney Tunes produced would result in something like 20 comparable boxed sets costing, oh, about $1,700. That’s some saucer of gravy to most of us. Before arguing with the selection of shorts, it could be considered that we are fortunate that Warner finally wised up and followed the successful Disney formula in releasing most of their classic shorts on DVD, with more to come.

In fact, most of the history of American animation has yet to find its way to DVD or even video for that matter. Now that Warner has finally opened the spigot, why decry what they have sent us? It isn’t as though the selection is a miserable one, and I am sure that most fans will recognize that before they open the package. The extras are sumptuous, and if the restoration isn’t crystalline, it surely looks better than your compilation VHS tape, the standard way to collect classic Warner shorts before now. The closest we have ever come to anything like this was the awesome five-volume, $500 laserdisc collection The Golden Age of Looney Tunes that was offered back in the 1990s. Still, how good did the toons look? What extras did you get? By the way, watch any laserdiscs lately?

Yet chide them I will not: As usual, there is more to the story. The fan furor over the Golden Collection has a deeper meaning, one that can be found at the nexus where technology, popular culture and marketing meet. As we shall see, fan contention was unavoidable... and, perhaps, not unwarranted. To begin with, consider the DVD. As we all know, a prodigious amount of cinematic material can be crammed on to one disc, and it is possible that a four-disc set could have held many more than 56 seven-minute shorts with space to spare for the extras. Would there have been room for a selectively singing frog and a Wagnerian bunny? Ehh, you bet, Doc!