Customer Ratings & Reviews

This review is for the Blu-ray release of: Popeye the Sailor: The 1940s Volume 2 Distributed by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Catalog #2000150677 UPC: 8 83929 68592 9 The quality is impressive! All of the cartoons appear to be complete without any edits whatsoever except two. I grew up watching most of the cartoons from this collection with the a.a.p. intros. I always hated the fact the poor editing of those intros made it obvious the cartoons hadn't been produced that way originally. The music would skip or change drastically also. That is NOT the case here!!! The intros all smoothly transition to the beginning of each cartoon without any unexpected change in picture nor sound quality. In fact, the quality is so good, I thought some of the initial frames in the intros might have been one frame frozen for clarity. I was wrong. The animation with Popeye's head popping out of a twirling star begins, yet the background is rock-solid stable. I didn't detect any jitter at all!!! That's practically unheard of with animation and live-action sources dating from over 70 years ago. I didn't detect any scratches at all either. I've only watched the disc two times all the way through, so it's possible I may have missed some. I did find it incredible how consistent the colors and the brightness were from the top of the frame to the bottom, and from cartoon to cartoon. This makes the cartoons appear to have been produced in modern times. Warner did an amazing job with this release. There is some film grain visible throughout, but that's such a minor detail. I was unable to distinguish the differences between the cartoons produced using "Cinecolor" and those using "Technicolor". Perhaps the restorations helped minimize them. Yes, the disc is barebones. However it is an actual silver disc---NOT a BD-ROM. The disc itself has the same description of "MOD DISC" printed on the disc label itself as had the Volume 1 disc. The cover artwork is used for the menu, albeit in a re-arranged format. The menu has 3 options: PLAY ALL SUBTITLES: OFF EPISODE SELECTION Selecting "SUBTITLES: OFF" toggles it to "SUBTITLES: ON" and back. Choosing "EPISODE SELECTION" displays a cartoon titles list with an arrow on the right: House Tricks? Service With A Guile Kondike Casanova Peep In The Deep Rocket To Mars Rodeo Romeo The Fistic Mystic The Island Fling Pressing the right arrow on your player/remote replaces the cartoon titles list with the remaining cartoon titles list along with an arrow on the left: Abusement Park I'll Be Skiing Ya The Royal Four-Flusher Popeye And The Pirates Wotta Knight Safari So Good All's Fair At The Fair Pressing the left arrow on your player/remote replaces the remaining cartoon titles list with the initial cartoon titles list. These cartoons have reportedly been mastered in 4K from the original nitrate negatives. I don't know why they weren't also released in the 4K Blu-ray format. Perhaps that will be done in the future. Warner Brothers added this statement on the back of the case artwork: "Popeye the Sailor: The 1940s, Volume 2 is intended for the Adult Collector and May Not Be Suitable for Children." I think the only cartoons that may offend some people are: Rocket To Mars - A quick scene depicting an exaggerated Japanese stereotype found may be offensive to some. Fistic Mystic - A black stereotype appears. The Island Fling - Robinson Crusoe's black native servant Friday, along with Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, all appear in stereotypical fashion. Wotta Knight - A black stereotype appears. Also, Bluto is shown in blackface for a moment. One thing Warners didn't add to the Blu-ray case artwork was a list of the cartoons included. If you decide to select the "PLAY ALL" option from the menu, there is no way to know what is going to play next. Warners chose to put the list of cartoon titles on the disc itself! That's great for those with photographic memories. For other people, it's a bit of a drag! There are a couple of items I noted while viewing these cartoons: Popeye and the Pirates - Before the cartoon begins, Warner displays a note about a missing scene they believe was censored. They believe it was lost over the years. It concerns a scene where Popeye, who has dressed up like a woman to distract the pirates away from Olive Oyl, throws Pierre into a chest, ties chains around it, and then throws it overboard. Popeye then proceeds to take his disguise off. First he kicks off his left high-heeled shoe, then the other, and finally his floppy woman's hat. As he appears to reach for the top of his dress to remove it, all of a sudden the scene changes to one where Pierre is on the deck, Popeye is staring at him eye-to-eye hovering at a 90 degree angle in shock, and Popeye's dress is falling under him. For some reason, Pierre's mouth looks like he's got a pair of dumbells in his mouth. What happens during that cut scene isn't explained in the note at the beginning. I think Popeye had dumbbells for boobs, and he discarded them just as Pierre climbed back on deck. I think the dumbbells landed in Pierre's open mouth as Popeye removed his dress. It's at that moment Popeye is shocked by Pierre's reappearance, and that's where the cartoon continues. Does anyone agree with my guess? Does anyone have an alternative theory about what was censored? Safari So Good - At 2 mins 10 secs into the cartoon, an ape appears on top of Olive Oyl's chair that Popeye had been carrying. (She'd been accidentally clothes-lined by a branch earlier.) For some reason, there appear to be a few frames missing. There is a slight jump cut, but the music doesn't appear to be affected. Who knows what happened there! Here are a few things to look out for: - Popeye's voice changes. -- Harry Foster Welch voices Popeye from "House Tricks?" through "Abusement Park" and the end of "Rocket to Mars". -- Jack Mercer was unable to voice Popeye due to his time in service. He voiced about 3/4 of Rocket to Mars" and then returned for good with "I'll be Skiing Ya". - Olive Oyl's appearance changes. -- Peep in the Deep - Last appearance with pulled back hair and boots covering her feet up to her ankles. -- Rocket to Mars - First appearance with center puffed hair style and high heeled pumps. - Popeye's uniform is blue in "Klondike Casanova" - Some cartoons are in "Cinecolor" -- "Peep in the Deep", "Rocket to Mars", "Abusement Park", and "All's Fair at the Fair" -- I couldn't detect any noticeable differences between "Cinecolor" cartoons and "Technicolor" cartoons. Perhaps the restorations for this set eliminated any deficiencies in the smoothness or shifting of the colors over time. I've seen some Cinecolor cartoons that appeared to attain a reddish hue throughout over time. - Cameo appearances: -- "The Island Fling" - Herman the Mouse is annoyed when Friday sweeps dirt under the rug where Herman lives. -- "Wotta Knight" - King Little of Lilliput from "Gulliver's Travels" appears as the jousting announcer. This set of cartoons is subtitled "THE 1940s VOLUME 2". It includes 15 cartoons. Hopefully the series continues. If it does, it's probable the last volume will contain the rest of the 1940s cartoons: THE 1940s VOLUME 3 - 17 cartoons 1948-1949 If we're lucky, they'll continue on with: THE 1950s VOLUME 1 - 16 cartoons 1950-1951 THE 1950s VOLUME 2 - 16 cartoons 1952-1953 THE 1950s VOLUME 3 - 17 cartoons 1954-1955 THE 1950s VOLUME 4 - 13 cartoons 1956-1957 ...and finish with completing the 1960s releases too: THE 1960s CLASSICS VOLUME 2 - 72 cartoons THE 1960s CLASSICS VOLUME 3 - 72 cartoons