At last, some good news from Jerry Beck and the gang at Warner Brothers.

There will be 2 single-disc Looney Tunes DVDs out in April, with 15 restored cartoons each. These will be character-based, one featuring Bugs Bunny, the other Daffy Duck. Cartoons will include Hare We Go (Bugs and Christopher Columbus discover America); The Fair-Haired Hare (Bugs and Yosemite Sam have to share a plot of land equally); and Tick Tock Tuckered (Porky and Daffy try to get some sleep, but tiny things keep them awake all night). There will be no repeats from the Golden Collections. After this, we'll get more single-disc releases in the future, all character-based; no one-shots for now.

The fight continues for a proper remastered and uncut Ton and Jerry with no issues or missing cartoons; no actual news as of yet.

There will be future Disney Treasures sets with cartoons (this year only featured the Zorro TV show).

Popeye's 1940s color cartoons are currently having restoration problems - WB wants to release them, but the prints are utterly crappy and in these current economic times, they can't afford to pay for the huge restoration.

Getting classic Mighty Mouse cartoons - and possibly Betty Boop - depends on our buying the 1980s Ralph Bakshi MM collection.

Universal's cartoons (Woody Woodpecker, etc.) are on hold because of low sales.

No news regarding Famous Studios, Columbia, UPA, or the Gene Deitch Tom and Jerries.

There will be a Saturday Morning Cartoons - the 1980s set. The 1970s set will also have a Volume 3, it did much better than the 1960s sets.

That's it! Better news than we've had for a while!

Jerry Beck was on Internet Radio last night, and we have some news.

Bad news first: No Looney Tunes set or Popeye set this year, owing to bad sales and the economy. There should be sets in 2010, though.

There is a Woody Woodpecker Favorites set coming out. Will have some previously released stuff and some new stuff, so double dipping there.

A Saturday Morning Cartoons set, one for the 60s and one for the 70s. Despite what TVShowsonDVD said, no Bugs Bunny Shows on it, but there's a ton of old HB, like Quick Draw, Magilla Gorilla, Josie & The Pussycats, etc. That's out this Spring. Sadly, also no Laff-a-Lympics. :(

Fleischer Superman set this April, with improved picture quality and a documentary.

There may be a Mighty Mouse collection this year.

That's about it... slim pickings... these are the times we live in.

Jerry Beck was on internet radio last night, and gave us some news and tidbits:

Firswt off, the 6th Looney Tunes Golden Collection comes out in 2 1/2 weeks. You can see some screenshots of it here: http://www.cartoonbrew.com/classic/looney-tunes-golden-collection-vol-6 They expect sales to be 'mild', so prove them wrong and go get it! It's a collection pleasantly balanced between cartoon buff discs (the wartime and B&W ones) and casual fan discs (esp. Disc 4, with Chow Hound and Much Ado About Nutting). There are also 15 bonus cartoons, some of which are restored (one or two of the older, B&W cartoons look 'rough').

This is likely the last Golden Collection, however, WB is still planning to restore 60 cartoons a year, and there will be future DVD sets. And WB is pondering a Blu-Ray set.

A week after the WB collection, the 3rd Popeye set comes out. This was delayed a few weeks as they found some errors with the opening/closing titles, but these should be fixed. The prints are restored (though some are still rough, apparently some of the early Famous negatives were in wretched shape). And all the B&W wartime cartoons are here, uncut.

Most exciting news of the show: WB is planning a 'Saturday Morning TV' release for next year. This would feature several WB, MGM, and Hanna-Barbera shows, edited together to emulate a Saturday Morning. I.e., we might finally see Quick Draw McGraw! This sounds like a great marketing idea, and I'll be very interested in the results.

Speaking of Saturday Morning TV, they're still thinking about how to restore The Bugs Bunny Show, and still trying to find color materials.

They're thinking about a set of the Chuck Jones Tom & Jerry cartoons. No plans for a Tex Avery set atm.

Sadly, future Woody Woodpecker sets are on hold due to the fire at Universal Studios.

It would be remiss of me not to mention that today is the 100th birthday of legendary cartoon director Tex Avery.

Tex passed away in 1980, but we won't let that stop us from wishing him all the best.

Verity Lambert has passed away. Not sure what I can add to what everyone else has said. She was the first producer of Doctor Who. She had no preconceptions to work with, no built-in audience. It was a brand-new show, and she was a newbie producer - and female, in 1963 at the BBC too. Without her, we wouldn't be complaining about the shows being too fast or the shipping now, would we? Rest in peace, Miss Lambert.

I would like to note that trying to get back into work mode after a 5-day holiday break can be extremely difficult.

There's now an Amazon link for the Academy Award cartoon set I told you about. Here you go: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=B000ZOXDKA/theunofficlooneyA/

Most boggling thing I saw today: a fanfic that took two normal, female, often-paired characters and made them twins, so that it could be twincest and therefore hotter. What the hell? Internet, why? Why?

I finished Moore and O'Neill's Black Dossier today. It's sort of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen 2.5, not having enough plot to be an actual volume but setting everything up for the next one in 2008. It was highly variable, as you might imagine from a project like this. The Fanny Hill and Bertie Wooster pastiches were fantastic. The Kerouac/Burroughs one was nigh-on unreadable. I appreciate Moore's attention to detail in getting the Beat voice right, but it was so dead on I skipped it. Also, surprise Golliwog out of nowhere for Upton/Blyton fans. Although I doubt any Upton/Blyton fans will appreciate the Dutch dolls staying with the Golliwog because of his huge member. ^^;;

It's supposed to rain all day today. Yeurgh.