Looney Tunes: Golden Collection, Volume Two

The first volume of Warner's Looney Tunes: Golden Collection included many of the studio's classic cartoons, but a surprising number of the best ones were omitted (much to the chagrin of diehard animaniacs). This four-disc box set redresses that fault by including virtually all of the great Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies shorts that didn't make the cut in Volume One. Some 60 cartoons have been meticulously restored and remastered (many are presented uncut for the first time in years owing to the lamentable recent trend in purging vintage 'toons of politically incorrect content), with Bugs Bunny, the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote, and Tweety Bird and Sylvester each meriting their own disc, and the fourth DVD compiling other memorable pieces of animation from Warner's legendary "Termite Terrace" studio. The Chuck Jones-directed classics "One Froggy Evening" and "What's Opera, Doc?" are here, along with the surrealistic "Porky in Wackyland" and the well-remembered "I Love to Singa" (featuring "Owl Jolson"). Also on hand are quite a few of Warner's cartoons parodying top Hollywood stars of the '30s and '40s (the best of these is "Hollywood Steps Out"). Other standouts include "Bugs Bunny Rides Again" (a hilarious western spoof), "The Great Piggy Bank Robbery" (a bizarre takeoff on the various grotesqueries seen in the 1940s Dick Tracy comic strip), and "Gorilla My Dreams." Fully half of the assembled shorts are accompanied by commentaries, and the boxed set also includes two documentaries, nine behind-the-scenes featurettes, and a timely, all-new cartoon, "Daffy Duck for President." Volume Two skims the remaining cream from the studio's extensive cartoon library; it's hard to imagine a Volume Three matching the first two. Recommended. (E. Hulse)