I grew up on the UPA TV cartoons of Mr. Magoo, and Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol (the first and best of the animated TV Christmas specials, predating Charlie Brown) and even the series of Classic Tales starring Mr. Magoo that ran in prime time on Saturday nights.
But I don’t think I’ve ever seen any of the “classic” Mr. Magoo cartoons – the ones that were highly praised, and even won Academy Awards (Yes! Unbelievable as that may seem). They simply never ran them on TV, at least that I can recall. All I got to see were the cheapie made-for-TV cartoons.
I found out via the Internet that some of them were on obscure VHS collections, and that some were on the extended edition of the Leslie Nielsen live-action Mr. Magoo movie of a few years back. Alas, our video stores only have the regular edition. And I ain’t shyellin’ out big bucks to buy a copy of a movie I don’;t think I’m going to like.
I was very surprised when I learned that I could see the UPA cartoon of Edgar Allen Poe’s The Tell-Tale Heart (narrated by James Mason) as an extra on the two-disc edition of Hellboy, of all places. I’d wanted to see it for years. Also on that disc were three Gerald McBoing-Boing cartoons, which I’d also never seen, and wanted to. Gerald McBoing-Boing? On Hellboy?
Anybody else know about weird cartoon couplings? (Tim Burton’s “Frankenweenie” and “Vincent” on “Nightmare Before Christmas” isn’t exactly surprising, ut G McB-B on Hellboy sure as heck is)
Or know where I can see old theatrical Magoo cartoons?
Yeah, and it was years before I realized that “Tiny Tim” in the Magoo Christmas Carol was really Gerald McBoing-Boing from the cartoon of the same name, and then only becauase I saw pictures of the character. I didn’t actually see the original Gerald McBoing-Boing cartoon until last week.
There are two of them available on Time Warner On Demand. Go to Kids, then Classic Kids. There are two Mr. Magoo cartoons as well as a couple of Dick Tracey episodes.
Yeah, butcha see, that line, from the opening of the TV show and the made-for-TV cartoons, is part of that l;ater, 1960s package. It’s not the classic Magoo of the 1950s – the ones that were considered so good they won awards.
I never saw any of those cartoons. I’ll bet you never did, either.
Has anyone on this Board seen “Ragtime Bear” or any of the 1950s theatrical Magoo cartoons? If so, any opinions about them relative to the later TV 'toons?
I believe the director of the film intentionally decided to put those onto the disc because he knew that they were rare cartoons and this would be the only way anyone would be able to see them. (The old UPA cartoons were released through Columbia Pictures, the same studio which released Hellboy.) Columbia recently did release a DVD of the four Gerald McBoing-Boing cartoons, since he is now at least a knowable character due to a Canadian kids’ show starring the character which airs in the U.S. on Cartoon Network (licensed through Classic Media, the current owner of the UPA characters).
As for cartoons on DVDs, both Warner Bros. and Disney place a cartoon on many of their DVDs of live-action movies. I’m not sure about Disney, but Warner Bros.'s choice of cartoons usually match the theme of the movie (Rabbit Hood on The Adventures of Robin Hood, 8-Ball Bunny, in which Bugs befriends a penguin, on March of the Penguins), but some of the choices are rather bizarre, such as Chuck Jones’s Oscar-winning The Dot and the Line on The Glass-Bottom Boat, a live-action film directed by former cartoon director…Frank Tashlin.
And, of course, there are those cartoon choices which seem rather unusual at first, but really make sense when you think about it. You may, for instance, wonder what the Oscar-nominated sci-fi spoof cartoon The ChubbChubbs! is doing on the Men in Black II DVD, other than the fact that it’s a sci-fi spoof, so it kind of fits. It’s not that unusual of a choice, seeing as The ChubbChubbs! actually ran in front of MIB II during its theatrical run.
Of course, when it comes before shorts before the film and on DVD, you can’t help but think of Pixar- not only do they place a short film before the feature (either a classic Pixar short or a new one), they’ve created a new short featuring the characters from the film for every DVD since Monsters, Inc.
the choice of cartoons put on videos is often pretty weird. Back in the late 80s/early90s, when they released the Bond films as sets on VHS, they packaged them with Pink Panther cartoons. The only connections were that the studio owned them, and one of the PP cartoons was about spying.
the extended edition of the live-action Mr. Magoo film was an obvious place to put theatrical Mr. Magoo cartoons, but I can’t think of any others.
Although I don’t know for sure, I’m willing to wager that seemingly odd cartoon-feature DVD combination came about because Jones’ The Dot and the Line was also shown before The Glass-Bottom Boat during their original theatrical run in 1965.
In case you’re wondering, info on those Magoo cartoons:
Jim Backus’ entry on IMDB lists the theatrical Magoo cartoons, starting with 1949’s Ragtime Bear and going through Terror Faces Magoo, a total of 55 cartoons, by my count, that I’ve never seen. The same year he appeareed in a theatrical feature cartoon, 1001 Arabian Nights, which I’ve not only seen, but have on VHS.
The TV cartoons and the Christmas special followed all of these.
