Why have Disney & Warner Bros given up on releasing their vintage shorts to Blu-ray?

[Jar Jar Stinks]

As far as I know, Disney has not released any titles with just their vintage shorts. Warner Bros. has only released 5 titles: 3 volumes of Looney Tunes, Chuck Jones' The Mouse Chronicles, and a volume of Tom & Jerry.

Earlier this year WB released "Tom & Jerry – The Gene Deitch Collection" to DVD only. With regard to this release, Jerry Beck said "Considering the sorry state of the DVD business – at least among the major studios – this may be the last classic theatrical cartoon collection from Warner Bros. to feature restored cartoons and include a bonus documentary."

Apart from Disney feature films, there's precious little vintage animation on Blu-ray and it doesn't seem like we'll be getting much more.

[steve_dave]

For Warner, the expense of remastering them in HD outweighed the sales. It simply cost far too much to produce the Blu-rays which were just not selling as expected.

Paramount had this happen with Star Trek: The Next Generation, far too many fans demanded they be remastered for Blu-ray. Paramount put forth the effort but far too few fans actually bought the release to justify any further remastering projects for Deep Space Nine and Voyager.

And Fox realized that with over 25 seasons, The Simpsons would be a financial black hole. Yeah, we have folks here who say they would buy them but the world is huge. When people aren't buying something, the company has to say we need to stop.

[CharlieBarkin]

Disney simply needs to get some of their shows out on disc period. Blu-ray or DVD...they've left a few good ones half finished. I'm looking at you, Darkwing Duck, or Rescue Rangers....

[willbfree]

Disney doesn't even release their current hit cartoons on BluRay. Phineas & Ferb was probably their hugest cartoon series of the past ten years with fans both young and old, but they didn't release it on BluRay (or DVD for that matter, not in season sets).

[Scarface32]

Originally Posted by CharlieBarkin

Disney simply needs to get some of their shows out on disc period. Blu-ray or DVD...they've left a few good ones half finished. I'm looking at you, Darkwing Duck, or Rescue Rangers....

I'd love to have those on Blu-ray, as well as Tail Spin and the old Chip 'n Dale cartoons.

[blurayfriend]

Originally Posted by CharlieBarkin

Disney simply needs to get some of their shows out on disc period. Blu-ray or DVD...they've left a few good ones half finished. I'm looking at you, Darkwing Duck, or Rescue Rangers....

Ducktales NEEDS to be finished, and there were only 12 episodes left of Chip n Dale or something. Come on! The worst by far though, is the non-release of the 1994 Spider-man series, which Disney owns the rights too, would sell like gangbusters, and just sits on it because it would "conflict" with sales of their Ultimate Spider-man show. What a crock!

[AeroK]

Originally Posted by blurayfriend

Ducktales NEEDS to be finished, and there were only 12 episodes left of Chip n Dale or something. Come on! The worst by far though, is the non-release of the 1994 Spider-man series, which Disney owns the rights too, would sell like gangbusters, and just sits on it because it would "conflict" with sales of their Ultimate Spider-man show. What a crock!

I got tired of waiting and just got the OOP Region 2 volumes...third party sellers were beginning the price gouging by the time I found the final volume. I also got swindled into getting a bootleg set on eBay before that which was advertised as the Region 2 set but it was still decent quality.

[blurayfriend]

Originally Posted by AeroK

I got tired of waiting and just got the OOP Region 2 volumes...third party sellers were beginning the price gouging by the time I found the final volume. I also got swindled into getting a bootleg set on eBay before that which was advertised as the Region 2 set but it was still decent quality.

Can you play the Region 2 dvd's on any blu-ray player? I always forget about that since i'm so used to good ol' DVD players only working for Region 1.

And to whoever mentioned it above, of course it would sell! You're nuts if you think otherwise. This series is beloved. Disney is not refusing to release it due to lack of sales; they think it would sell TOO well that it would cannibalize sales of their Ultimate Spider-Man cartoon.

[The Edge]

Because people keep talking about how much they want them instead of showing the studios how much they want them.

And if by chance the studio actually releases something like that, no one is willing to fork over the money, therefore convincing the studios that their customers are all talk and no action.

[AgentOrange]

Originally Posted by steve_dave

For Warner, the expense of remastering them in HD outweighed the sales. It simply cost far too much to produce the Blu-rays which were just not selling as expected.

Paramount had this happen with Star Trek: The Next Generation, far too many fans demanded they be remastered for Blu-ray. Paramount put forth the effort but far too few fans actually bought the release to justify any further remastering projects for Deep Space Nine and Voyager.

And Fox realized that with over 25 seasons, The Simpsons would be a financial black hole. Yeah, we have folks here who say they would buy them but the world is huge. When people aren't buying something, the company has to say we need to stop.

Completely different sales expectations though. TNG probably sold 100x the Looney Tunes collections. Of course it was a far more expensive endeavor, so it needed those sales. DS9 and Voyager had far worse ratings, far lower sales projections, and also wouldn't be cheap to bring to blu-ray. I doubt they lost their shirt on TNG, but those other Trek series might be a different story.

It didn't seem the Looney Tunes collections had that much effort put into them - relatively speaking. It's a shame they don't seem to have much interest in making some volumes as Archive releases or something along those lines.

[EVERYONE LIES]

Don't forget Sony and The 3 Stooges.

[Jar Jar Stinks]

Originally Posted by EVERYONE LIES

Don't forget Sony and The 3 Stooges.

I'm still hoping they come through with at least the Curly years.

[Jar Jar Stinks]

Disney has stopped caring about it's legacy. It's all about Pixar, Marvel, and Star Wars now.

What I don't understand is why they don't just make sets available direct-to-consumer. They'd make 100% more profit.

Seriously, the demand would be crazy for these titles as a deluxe set:

• Silly Symphonies
• Mickey Mouse in Black and White
• Mickey Mouse in Living Color
• The Chronological Donald
• The Complete Goofy
• The Complete Pluto

[MifuneFan]

Because they don't sell well enough

/thread

[Starchild]

It doesn't make sense not to remaster these shorts in HD. Especially in the case of Warners who still shows their shorts on the air. Whether it be Cartoon Network or elsewhere these shorts could be shown in HD. Of course, then mastering and selling these on Blu ray would be a cake walk.

Disney shorts in my opinion are national treasures which beg being remastered and exhibited both on television as well as on Blu ray. It's a pity they haven't been treated this way. Walt would have recognized this.

And I cannot wait to see what MGM does with the Pink Panther shorts. Maybe we will get a glimpse of how good they can look when Kino Lorber releases the other Depatie-Freling shorts next spring.

[javi92]

Originally Posted by Jar Jar Stinks

Seriously, the demand would be crazy for these titles as a deluxe set:

• Silly Symphonies
• Mickey Mouse in Black and White
• Mickey Mouse in Living Color
• The Chronological Donald
• The Complete Goofy
• The Complete Pluto

Well, I can't speak for others, but I would sell organs if I had to to pick up (non-degrained) blu-ray upgrades of these sets.

[KG204]

Originally Posted by Jar Jar Stinks

Disney has stopped caring about it's legacy. It's all about Pixar, Marvel, and Star Wars now.

What I don't understand is why they don't just make sets available direct-to-consumer. They'd make 100% more profit.

Seriously, the demand would be crazy for these titles as a deluxe set:

• Silly Symphonies
• Mickey Mouse in Black and White
• Mickey Mouse in Living Color
• The Chronological Donald
• The Complete Goofy
• The Complete Pluto

The issue becomes having to set up the infrastructure to handle that, which could be costly, or pay someone like Amazon, which means splitting profits plus other fees Amazon may have. There is also the issue where they might decide they have plans later for them that if they do that, they might be able to persue other avenues. I'll give an example:

For a long time, Ducktales the movie on DVD was only available on Disney Movie Club. The point on having such a notable title in the Club was to entice people to join the club who otherwise may not have had anything else that interested them. If Duck tales was general release, you can bet there would have been a lot less DMC memberships over the years.

So just because they don't have an idea what to do with the classic shorts right now, doesnt mean they won't later.

[rexcrk]

Originally Posted by steve_dave

And Fox realized that with over 25 seasons, The Simpsons would be a financial black hole. Yeah, we have folks here who say they would buy them but the world is huge. When people aren't buying something, the company has to say we need to stop.

I'm still not over this. I find it very hard to believe that the Simpsons sets weren't profitable enough. I'm still convinced that it's a ploy to push digital streaming BS.
The only consolation is that at least the best years are on DVD. Still would've liked to have the whole series though. If only they didn't take so freaking long releasing them.

[StLouisRibs]

Originally Posted by rexcrk

I'm still not over this. I find it very hard to believe that the Simpsons sets weren't profitable enough. I'm still convinced that it's a ploy to push digital streaming BS.
The only consolation is that at least the best years are on DVD. Still would've liked to have the whole series though. If only they didn't take so freaking long releasing them.

It's not that sales weren't high enough, it's that year-over-year they were decreasing to the point they predicted the sales wouldn't be high enough soon enough.

[Bandit Tajomaru]

Its because those classic shorts contain Politically Incorrect stuff that these Hollywood execs. don't want people to see. Look at the WB Tom and Jerry fiasco. Disney only released the treasures on DVD because Roy Disney fought for them. Disney also only released a limited number of each set so that the collectors would buy up all the copies quickly.