Adventure Time Season One
Blu-Ray | DVD
Created By: Pendleton Ward
Creative Directors: Patrick McHale, Cole Sanchez, Adam Muto, Nate Cash
Voice Cast: Jeremy Shada, John DiMaggio, Hynden Walch, Niki Yang, Tom Kenny, Olivia Olson, Martin Olson, Polly Lou Livingston, Jessica DiCicco
Frederator Studios | Cartoon Network Studios
Rated TV-PG | 286 Minutes (26 Episodes)
Release Date: June 4, 2013

Want to know what time it is!? It’s Blu-Ray watching time with Finn and Jake – two of the coolest heroes to ever hero-ize! They’re traveling across the Land of Ooo searching for adventure, but adventure isn’t always easy. Sometimes you’ve got to battle mean little Fire Gnomes, Frozen Businessmen Zombies, and the very, very, very evil Ice King. What the Cabbage?! It sure is a lot of battling for just the first season.

Created by Pendleton Ward, Adventure Time follows the adventures of Finn (voiced by Jeremy Shada), a human boy, and his best friend and adoptive brother Jake (voiced by John DiMaggio), a 28-year-old dog with magical powers [...]

mc chris is known for a lot of things. From his early days as the simple, mild mannered Chris Ward working on Adult Swim, to his super hero like transformation into nerd rapper, mc chris – who’s known for songs such as ‘Fett’s Vett,’ ‘Hoodie Ninja,’ and ‘Part One’ (or as my fiance calls it, the Batman song). Ward has had his share of ups and downs, but has not balked from the downs, openly discussing them. I respect that, and have been a fan of his ever since the line “Hesh wants sex!” from Sea Lab 2021.

I had the opportunity to talk with Ward this week about his Kickstarter and current work-in-progress, the tentatively titled mc chis cartoon.[...]

If you’ve not yet seen Bob’s Burgers, the animated comedy that runs as part of Fox’s Animation Domination lineup, then you are missing out on greatness. And considering the show only does “OK” in the ratings, it’s clear that many of you are among those missing out.

Many fans of fellow Animation Domination shows like Family Guy and American Dad! watch replays of those shows every night when replays of them are show on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim lineup. And soon you’ll be able to do the same with Bob’s Burgers as well. [...]

In honor of 4/20, a day in which all things green and sticky make the rounds in a celebratory fashion, a day in which people across the nation turn on, tune in, and drop everything with a chill pill in the form of the mind-numbing and relaxing herb — that’s right, the hemp, sensemilla, rope, reefer, pot, and countless other synonyms for weed, but mainly known as marijuana. With today comes most appropriately a new animated cartoon by the comedy kings of the whole lifestyle, Cheech and Chong, entitled [what else?] Cheech and Chong’s Animated Movie.

Hilariously rendered and perpetually red-eyed, the cartoon looks to be a stoner-fest extraordinaire and shows the duo in their most well-known guises, those characterizations of the innocuous, yet dumbstruck and low key hilarious characters they parlayed to much success in the 1970s. Directed by Branden Chambers and Eric D. Chambers, the film is already playing in select cities and will have a full scale DVD and Blu-ray release come April 23rd, at all “dealers” (no pun intended and not just head shops mind you).

There’s a lot of interaction with the team planned for today on various social media sites, like Reddit, Facebook, Twitter, and more, beginning at 11am ET. Wake and bake with the team and ask them some of your favorite questions, hang out on Google with them, and even check out some clips at a Livestream Event, all happening during the day today. The full schedule is below [...]

Neon Alley
24/7 Streaming Anime Network
Available on Playstation 3, Xbox 360
Launch Date: October 2, 2012
Viz Media
Price: $6.99 Monthly Membership

They say it takes a month to really get to know someone (okay, no one really says that, I just needed to set up this review, okay?). After a month, with any luck, all the quirks and vices that drive us to love or hate someone have began to bubble to the surface. It’s from there that we decide whether to keep the relationship going or not.

Streaming anime network Neon Alley and I have been courting for the past month, and I have got to tell you: things are looking good.

Neon Alley works like no other streaming anime service out right now. Unlike Crunchyroll or Hulu, Neon Alley runs exactly like any cable network with a full slot of programmed shows airing with episode one. It’s a novel idea that harkens back to the days of Cartoon Network’s Toonami.

Okay, a television network that plays all anime, not that special, right? Wrong, dead wrong [says while pointing an accusatory finger]. [...]

The Gold Box spotlight deal of the day over at Amazon today is the Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!: Complete Series DVD box set for only $31.99 (that’s 64% the list price of $89.97).

This 8-disc DVD box set contains 41 episodes spanning the 3 seasons of the Hanna-Barbera animated television series. There’s several bonus features in this set, including one on how the series began, as well as several with trivia featurettes about the show. The discs are housed in a limited edition Mystery Machine packaging.

The cartoon series, which ran from 1969-1973, centered on Scooby Doo, a dog who helped to solve mysteries along with his teenaged human companions, Shaggy, Velma, Daphne, and Fred. The gang, traveling around in their groovy van, known The Mystery Machine, acted as amateur detectives, usually finding themselves in humorous predicaments as they try to uncover various criminal plots, typically of the “supernatural” nature. The reason the series title is asking Scooby-Doo “Where Are You!” is because the hound scares very easily – he and his pal Shaggy flee at the first sign of trouble and the Great Dane can only be coerced into returning with the promise of a “Scooby Snack.” In the end, the gang always solves the mystery and the villains are angered to have their nefarious plots foiled by “those meddling kids.” [...]

Archer
Season 4, Episode 13 – “Sea Tunt: Part 2”
Directed by Bryan Fordney
Written by Adam Reed & Rick Cleveland
Starring: H. Jon Benjamin, Judy Greer, Amber Nash, Chris Parnell, Aisha Tyler, Jessica Walter, Eugene Mirman, Kristen Schaal, and Jon Hamm
FX
Air date: April 11, 2013

What always works so well for me in a comedy like Archer is how well developed each and all of the characters are. Guest stars or series regulars, Adam Reed and company nail the interactions between all involved. “Sea Tunt: Part 2” fully capitalizes on some of the exact situations you’d expect to happen when Archer (H. Jon Benjamin) and the rest of the ISIS field agents go to an underwater base. But there are still just enough swerves and twists and turns to make the episode enjoyable and downright hilarious. [...]

The Looney Tunes Golden Collection Vol 1-6, a 6-volume 24-disc DVD compendium of some of the greatest animated cartoons to come from the Warner Brothers studio, is on sale today from Amazon for only $64.99, an incredible deal that’s more than half the list price of $145.00!

Without question, the animated shorts that came from Warner Brothers still stand today as one of the upper echelon bodies of work of the entire animation genre itself. Making the focus on comedy , they were in sharp contrast to the output coming from the Walt Disney studios at the time (the mid 20th century). Sporting a rather rebellious, anarchic feel to them, they delighted and continue to delight scores of generations of fans globally. They also manifested superstars and legendary characters such as Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Sylvester the Cat, Tweety Bird, Yosemite Sam, Foghorn Leghorn, Elmer Fudd, and of course, one of the great characters in the history of cartoons itself, the irrepressible, take-no-prisoners, do whatever it takes to snare your opponent and outwit him, the one-of-a-kind, once in a lifetime, Bugs Bunny [...]

Today marks the birthday of the late Tex Avery, the master class animator who stretched the boundaries of the cartoon and produced work during the 1940s and the 1950s that completely changed the game in terms of what the genre could achieve.

Starting at Walter Lantz’s studio right before their heyday in the animation ring and then jumping ship to direct some Warner Brothers and especially MGM’s finest and funniest cartoons of all-time, the work of Tex Avery stands and remains akin to a cachet of symphonies written by Beethoven or the works of Duke Ellington. [...]

Today marks the 13th Anniversary of the passing of Charles M. Schulz, whose simple pen and ink comic strip Peanuts parlayed into a worldwide empire of riches, success and set the bar and standard as one of the greatest comic strips of all time.

Schulz, who was a passive and insecure man in real life, utilized those “traits” as the building blocks to the main character of Peanuts, the young tyke Charlie Brown. The sparse-haired, zig-zagged-shirted Brown, became the true embodiment of the seminal “loser” type everyman who seemed to never get a break, let alone an even one, in his life…always coming up empty, always rolling snake eyes with the metaphorical dice he was given. [...]

Peter Pan
3-Disc Blu-ray/DVD/Digital l 2-Disc Blu-ray/DVD
Directed by Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske
Starring Bobby Driscoll, Kathryn Beaumont, Hans Conried
Paul Collins, Tommy Luske
Walt Disney Home Entertainment
Release Date: February 5, 2013

The boy who never grew up flies onto Blu-ray. Here’s my review of the Peter Pan Diamond Edition on Blu-ray.

Six decades ago Walt Disney released this classic feature, which has stood the test of time – Tick Tock the crocodile would agree with that statement – and represents one of the most enduring Disney animated films. Consider that presently Tinker Bell leads a whole series of direct-to-video films and that Jake and The Neverland Pirates is one of Disney Junior channel’s greatest hits. [...]

Thirteen years ago today saw the passing of one of the strangest, highly creative, and most gleefully insane cartoonists in the mediums broad and rich history, one Don Martin, whose wacky, off-center, and superbly memorable cartoons graced the pages of Mad Magazine for much for that publications heyday.

The style of Martin’s work was instantly recognizable, his characters had bombastic traits about their physicality, huge noses and feet, and borrowed heavily from and also acted as a drawn homage to the broadest, wildest forms of inane, surreal, and crazy slapstick and all its slapdash manifestations. Martin coupled this with a technique he pretty much pioneered, the usage of sound effects created in Martin’s own language, utilizing an onomatopoetic approach to them, which were at once ridiculous and hilarious, examples being “Blib, Blib, Blib, Blib,” which emulated the sounds of the whirling blades on a helicopter, to a car shifting gears to the wild strains of “Brak Brak” to the altogether startlingly original and wackiness of “Fluk, Groon, Groon, Splazitch, Spalzatch,” which illustrated the noise of a vending machine that put check marks onto luggage. These examples here just scratch the surface of Martin’s warped, genius mind, and he arguably became the lightest light in Mad, a strong statement considering the creative gene pool at the magazine during its peak years was full of artists and writers who were all in a higher class of surreal insanity at their respective crafts [...]

Batman Year One
Netflix Streaming
DVD | Blu-ray
Directed by Sam Liu and Lauren Montgomery
Starring Bryan Cranston, Benjamin McKenzie, Eliza Dushku, Katee Sackhoff, Alex Rocco
Warner Home Video
Originally Released: October 18, 2011

Speaking nostalgically, the Batman Year One comic series by Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli instigates many happy memories for me. I, along with many other geeks, hold the earlier Miller Batman work in high esteem, and the Year One arc released back in 1987 is often regarded with much reverence. It, accompanied by titles like The Killing Joke and others, is often pointed to as being must-read material for new Batman readers.

Thus, when it was announced that Warner Brothers Animation and DC were going forward with an animated adaptation of the classic and timeless Batman Year One, it was a bittersweet moment. Would they stand true to the original material? Or make sweeping adaptations for the release? [...]

A new movie based on the popular Mattel toy He-Man has been in the works for more years than anyone who’s been excited to see the movie cares to admit. For a number of reasons things just haven’t worked out, whether it was budgetary issues, script/story problems, and so on.

Last we heard, G.I. Joe: Retaliation director Jon Chu was in talks to be the next to take a swing at making a new He-Man movie, titled Masters of the Universe, a reality. Now Chu is talking about his excitement and plans for the movie, and you can read what he’s saying below. [...]

If there is something strange on the frontier range? Who are you going to telegraph? The Ghost-Busters! Check out the images here below of this ingenious reimagining of parapsychologists Egon Spengler, Peter Venkman, Raymond Stantz, and Winston Zeddemore as the turn-of-the-century Ghost-Busters: 1900.