Krazy Kat Kartoon Kollection

 

Picture: C+     Sound: C     Extras: D     Cartoons: B-

 

 

Krazy Kat began as a cartoon strip back in 1913 and over 90 years later (!) resurfaces yet again, this time on DVD.  Instead of the older theatrical shorts where the title character was essentially male, Krazy Kat is now a woman while antagonist Ignatz remains male and very recognizable in this 1960s TV incarnation.  The new double DVD set from Koch Vision features most of the series.  The entire run of episodes, first shown on the compilation series Beetle Bailey and His Friends, are as follows:

 

1)     Keeping Up With Krazy (1962 begins)

2)     Mouse Blanche

3)     Housewarming (1963 begins)

4)     The Quickest Brick In The West

5)     Sea Sore

6)     Sporting Chance

7)     Fizzical Fitness

8)     Monument To A Mouse

9)     Looney Park

10)  Network Nitwit

11)  Road to Ruin

12) There Auto Be A Law

13)  Earthworm Turns

14)  Pilgrim’s Progress

15)  Duel Personality

16)  The Purloined Persian

17)  Happy Daze

18)  Malicious Mousechief

19)  An Arrow Escape (1964 begins)

20)  The Desert Island

21)  Frozen Feud

22)  How To Win A Mouse

23)  Bungle In The Jungle

24)  Arty Smarty

25)  Stoned Through The Ages

26)  Castle Hassle

27)  Krazy’s Krismas

28)  Carnival Capers

29)  Alp Wanted

30)  Big and Little

31)  Krazy and the Krooked Kaper

32)  A Kat’s Tale

33)  Adman On The Loose

34)  Folly The Leader

35)  Serie-ous Business

36)  No Such Luck

37)  Collector’s Item

38)  Dreams Of Attracktions

39)  Mountain Never-Rest

40)  A Star Is Born

41)  Odd For Art’s Sake

42)  Don’t Call Us, We’ll Call You

43)  Potions Of Love

44)  Southern Hospitality

45)  My Fair Ignatz

46)  Safari

 

For the most part, just about all those episodes are here, produced in color by King Features Syndicate with Gene Deitch directing many of the shows himself.  His most seen work lately has been some of the most abstract Tom & Jerry shorts MGM ever greenlighted, always included as part of the MGM package on TV.  From 1916 to 1941, various theatrical shorts with even more varying artwork were made.  Though hardly ever seen on TV, video or in movie theaters, there are endless 100’ 16mm spools of usually black and white, silent films of them still showing up in antique & collectibles stores, toy shows, on line sites, and older mom and pop film stores.  This is really the last series made and one of the things Ignatz does is throw bricks at Krazy Kat, but now female, it is more disturbing; the woman who loves too much impervious to physical pain is a problem, no matter how much the original intent was to be comic with “cartoon” violence.

 

Besides that, it is light entertainment form a time that King Features was a serious film and TV production force.  I miss that.  The shorts overall are not bad, but not as interesting as their predecessors, in part because of the vintage of them.  However, they were not necessarily TV’s best cartoons at the time.  Outside of animated theatrical shorts making it to the small screen, this and the other King Features on Beetle Bailey had to compete against the comparatively more daring and funny Courageous Cat & Minute Mouse (already in a DVD boxed set from A&E).  With that said, it is really for nostalgic adults or older children who will not take the “brick against a woman” part to seriously.  Animation fans and TV buffs can watch one of the early animated shows simply as curios.

 

The full frame, 1.33 X 1, color image is remastered and the result is an impressive absence of artifacts and scratches, yet the color (supposedly processed by Technicolor) is not quite right.  It is not faded, yellowing, or very wrong, but the fidelity is not as pure as it should be.  Something seems a shade off and some softness and even frame mixing that likely is from the use of DVNR (digital video noise reduction to remove flaws the short-cut way) is also present.  The original material has seemed to have survived well, and the animation is over-simple enough to not complain too much about flaws, but it is not film-like.  This is still better than it likely ever looked on TV.

 

The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono is average and shows its age, but is not too compressed.  Voicework is clear enough, though as compared to the older theatrical shorts, this series borders on animated radio more than anything else.  No extras are included, though some sample original Krazy Kat comic strips, promo material for its inclusion in the Beetle Bailey show or a documentary on the character or King Features’ pop culture library might have been fun.  For fans, these will suffice.  Now if only someone could find out what happened to all those old theatrical shorts and out them out on DVD.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo