...they're colorful enough and move along fast enough that children may well enjoy them.
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The William Hanna and Joseph Barbera animated characters Tom (the cat) and Jerry (the mouse) have been around in one form or another since as long as I can remember. They started out in MGM cartoons in 1940 and have continued in one medium or another ever since, notably the many film shorts, the various television programs, and the direct-to-video movies. The present set derives from the 2006- Warner Bros. TV series, with the cartoons carrying a 2005 copyright date.
Five theme-based shows of three, seven-minute episodes each make up the disc, for a total of fifteen separate episodes. None of them are as wacky or zany as some of the original movie shorts I remember from my youth, but that may be nostalgia speaking. Certainly, all of these segments have plenty of energy, crisp character animation, and surprisingly detailed background art. About half the time, Tom and Jerry are friends, and the other half they are chasing around from pillar to post. Nothing new here, I suppose.
The first installment has a horror theme, and the studio's decision to put it first makes sense. It's the most creative set of all the shorts in the bunch. Things start with "Bats What I Like About the South," wherein Tom chases Jerry into a haunted Southern mansion, haunted, that is, by Tom and Jerry themselves. Following that we find "Fraidy Cat Scat," another haunted-house tale. You'd think by now that Tom would finally catch Jerry, but what fun would that be? The final episode here is "Tomb It May Concern," where the fellows are in Egypt and involved with mummies. I wish there were more laughs in these films, but at least they're creative and pleasant to look at and extraordinarily fast-paced. Still, when the titles are the funniest thing about them, you have to wonder.
The second set of installments uses an outer-space theme. The first episode, "The Cat Nebula," finds the duo in a spaceship, with Jerry the captain and Tom a space creature. It's different, to say the least. "Martian Mice" shows the series is topical as space invaders attempt to abduct people (and animals) for their queen. And "Spaced Out Cat" has Tom trying to win the attention of a lady friend by building a spaceship. Jerry is not helpful to the cat's plans.
The third show centers around archeology. In "Dino-Sores" the pair encounter a baby dinosaur on a prehistoric island. This is probably the cutest of all the episodes. Continuing on their island hideaway, the heroes find themselves involved in volcanic tribal rites in "Freaky Tiki." This is one of the most distinctive of all the episodes and among the few that actually held my attention for the duration. Then, in "Prehisterics" the boys' ancestors are living in prehistoric days and still going at one another's throats.
The fourth show is all about construction work. In "Destruction Junction" their nemesis Spike has to finish a big building project, and when he's called away he asks Tom to finish up the job. Jerry becomes a mischievous nuisance. "Battle of the Power Tools" has the two fellows winning a big lotto and deciding to build their own mansions. The trouble is, they both want to outdo the other in the size of their houses, and the building soon escalates into a full-scale war. In "Jackhammered Cat" a construction site provides the setting for the film's antics.
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[release]22725[/release]