Charlie Brown & Snoopy Show: The Complete Series

Good Grief; those "blockheads" at Warner Archive had recently put out The Complete Series for The Charlie Brown and Snoopy. For those of you that don't know, The Charle Brown and Snoopy Show was a series made for Saturday morning. The first season was shown in 1983 while the second season was done in 1985 (with lyrics added to the opening theme). I think the reason why it only lasted two seasons was because Charles Schulz was probably too busy to work with a Saturday morning show (after all, writing for a Saturday morning cartoon and a comic strip would be too much). If he had sent somebody else to write them and let the characters stay true to his comic stip, it probably would have lasted a lot longer, but that's just it; Schulz did not believe that anyone would be up to the task. Besides, at that point, they didn't NEED a Saturday morning show; the specials have since become classics and continue to air on TV to this day. The Charlie Brown and Snoopy Show, however, did end up in syndicaion and have aired on Disney Channel and was last seen on TV on Nickelodeon.The shows are very entertaining (I still remember some of them from my childhood such as Lucy kicking Linus out of the house, Peppermint Patty staying at Snoopy's doghouse while her dad's away, and of course, the gambling problem caused by Rerun, causing the baseball team to lose their first game they ever won). The segments in each episode ranges from about a minute to about 6 minutes, so watchin a bunch of storylines in one disc with your favorite Peanuts characters will bring the biggest die hard fan in heaven for the next 2hrs or so. However, because of the new deadlines for Saturday morning programs in contrast to primetime airings, there are some mistakes made in some of the episodes. Some are minor such as off modeled characters, but in one episode, they made the mistake of making Linus's blanket GREEN; not light blue, and the bad part about it is that it was one of the many storylines that you'll find on this set that revolves around Linus and his blanket. So in order to correct it; they had whoever was the voice of Lucy dub over for the first 5 seconds of the segment stating to kids that "Linus has a stupid new green blanket" to avoid confusion. Fergie fans will be happy to know that Fergie (as a kid) did the voice of Sally on some of these episodes. She is credited as Stacy Fergison and does a very good job as Sally.As for the collection itself, it is comprised of two DVD-Rs (remember, Warner Archive will only make a copy for YOU via MOD). As a first time buyer of Warner Archive, I can say that the menus are really EASY to navigate. No trailers, and no build up like what Disney does just to plug themselves. The episodes vary in quality from episode to episode, but they either look great or excellent, and will look absolutly fine if you have an HD TV. There are no bonus features, but who cares; the fun of watching these on DVD is better than those recent Happiness is Peanuts releases (with one episode of the Charlie Brown and Snoopy Show and one special).Final thoughts is that I highly recommend it to any fan of Charlie Brown and the Peanuts. Here's hoping that the Warner Archive team will look deeper into not just the Peanuts cartoons (It's and Adventure Charlie Brown, Why Charlie Brown Why), but also the Warner Brothers animation library (a proper release of Quick Draw McGraw perhaps).

Good Deal All Around

I used to watch this show on Saturday mornings so I had to get the DVDs. They have a lower production value compared to the larger Peanuts production but you have to remember these were produced on basically no budget the same as any of the Saturday morning cartoons. Still a great show and recommend if you're a Peanuts fan.

Good family entertainment

I remember watching this series on Saturday mornings. I missed a lot of it though as well it was Saturday and sleeping in rules! but this was worth the effort, time and time again you'd find something to smile and laugh about. These were people you know, and in some ways they were us. Genuine humor without the snarky or profane or disrespectful tones you find nowadays, and while those cartoons have their place you really can't beat the originals, even Family Guy and the Simpsons have their roots in the inspiration of Peanuts. Anyone in animation will tell you that Peanuts is the cornerstone of all great animation. When it comes to comic strips, Peanuts is not only a classic but it's the benchmark to rate all other cartoons. You'll definitely find something to enjoy that you can share with your family.

This saturday morning cartoon was one of my fondest memories of growing up. I loved it then and love it now. One thing that I've always hated about Peanuts releases is that they only give you 1 to 2 specials on a dvd. This is something that I thought would be allieviated with the advent of DVD, but alas it appears that was wishful thinking. With this set you get the entire series on two discs. I love the 60's and 70's releases of the Peanuts specials (even though they feel a bit skimpy on the number of specials you get per set, splitting the 70's into two volumes especially felt like a cash grab). There's nothing really wrong with the presentation of the shows or the menus or even the sound. My biggest complaint with this set is the flimsy DVD case it comes in. Because this is a MOD (something that I don't like given the high price and inability to find a competiitive price). The case is a standard DVD case, but it is very flimsy. One of my favorite asthetic features of the 60's and 70's releases were the cardboard outer casing of the set. It adds protection and is pleasing to the eye. Upon receiving the package I found that the case was easily bendable (you could easily break this case with very little force). Thankfully the seller packaged it well but I fear for the safety of it if the set is ever left on a table or shelf during viewing. I know this is nit-picky, but when you throw down 30 dollars for a two disc set in this day and age, it better have some production value outside of the lowest grade materials available. There really aren't any extras or specials that come with this set. I don't mind this, given that I never really spend a lot of time viewing these on any other DVD, but it always smacks of lack of effort when they are not available. Again, I love this show and think the world of it; however I can't say many nice things about the MOD program.

Yes, these are mostly great episodes, some of the best laffs that animated Peanuts have to offer - not sure why but a couple of them have sub-standard animation, so bad it looks amateurish -- you cant miss it. Seeing I already have over half of the series on rare laserdiscs and the remainder on decent VHS tapes its difficult to justify making the purchase here - unfortunately, the deal breaker was the fact these aren't factory-pressed but burned discs, otherwise I might have gotten this product.Also, not sure why studios would be reluctant to properly release some material and risk the compatibility issues that come into play with burned media -- if its because they fear low sales, let me tell you they are contributing to lower sales of the product this way.