Blu-ray Review: Tom & Jerry: The Golden Era Anthology

Synopsis: For the first time ever, all 114 theatrical shorts from originally created by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera are brought together in one definitive collection, offering the ultimate way to revisit every chase, gag, and laugh that defined generations.

Main Feature: Tom & Jerry: The Golden Era Anthology set is a stellar, beautiful trip down memory lane. I may have not existed during it's original showings, but boy did I grow up on the classics every Saturday morning. I was a Looney Tunes guy but Tom & Jerry were certainly in rotation. This stellar HD set is144 of the classic shorts looking beautiful as before. Five discs of treasurable fun are had watching these. Warner Archive certainly painstakingly made sure to get this done right. It's a high-mark for remastering of classic toons. Supposedly, these aren't taken from the original master negatives--those were lost in the 1978 George Eastman House fire in which 12.6 Million Feet of highly flammable nitrate film were forever destroyed. Whatever was used in spite of that tragic historical event works for me. The presentation is crisp, vibrant and clean beauty.

Bonus Features: This set is filled with plenty. The first five discs have many commentaries on the the shorts. The sixth disc is filled with featurettes focusing on idolized characters, memorable shorts, behind the scenes featurettes, among many others. Some are brief, others go 30 minutes. Either way, it's a perfect compliment to a beautiful set. 

Final Call: Tom & Jerry: The Golden Era Anthology is one of those physical media releases to come along that requires immediate chasing down for all it is worth--and it is a worthwhile, priceless set.

Grade: A-