DVD Review: Tom and Jerry Volume 1 - Fur Flying Adventures

When I was a kid, Tom and Jerry cartoons were already in syndication and played regularly on Saturday mornings. That was back when there were only a handful of channels, not hundreds of channels like we have now. And back then I wasn't much of a discriminating cartoon watcher. Whether it was Bugs Bunny, Tom and Jerry, Woody Woodpecker, Captain Caveman, Scooby-Doo, The Super Friends, or many others, I was typically glued to our old black and white TV with my bowl of Fruit Loops every Saturday morning.

Now as a parent, there are many more choices in the digital wasteland of television. A few new cartoons still get my attention now and then, such as 2011's Young Justice and the continued Clone Wars adventures, but I can't say that I really like shows like Spongebob Squarepants or Phineas and Ferb as an adult. As a result, I've found myself looking at older cartoons on DVD as a solution when we're looking to watch something as a family.

Tom and Jerry Volume 1 - Fur Flying Adventures collects fourteen different Tom and Jerry classics on one DVD for about an hour of cartoons. Most of these episodes were from the original Hanna-Barbera era from 1940-1958, but a few are from the Chuck Jones era (1963-1967) after he left Warner Bros. Cartoons in 1963. 

Episodes on the DVD include:

• Barbecue Brawl (1956)
• Happy Go Ducky (1958)
• Hic-cup Pup (1954)
• Little Quacker (1950)
• Rock 'n Rodent (1967) (Chuck Jones)
• Neapolitan Mouse (1954)
• Pet Peeve (1954)
• Pup on a Picnic (1955)
• O-Solar Meow (1967) (Chuck Jones)
• Robin Hoodwinked (1958)
• Guided Mouse-ille (1967)
• Timid Tabby (1957)
• The Vanishing Duck (1958)
• That's my Mommy (1955)

It was fun watching these with my daughters. We especially enjoyed the shorts with Ducky - the baby duck that somehow gets into all kinds of trouble with Tom, who of course wants to eat him. I still remembered "Little Quacker," "The Vanishing Duck," and "That's My Mommy" from my own childhood. And it's definitely fun to revisit those days every now and again.

Article Author: Fitz

Brian Fitzpatrick (aka "Fitz") is a software engineer and writer living in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with his wife, two daughters, two dogs, a cat, and two rats (new for Xmas 2010!) -- trying desperately to survive the chaos!

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