The Extras - Warner Archive January Announcement: 6 Classic Films, A Hanna Barbera Series, PLUS Two Film Collections

Episode Date: December 12, 2025

Send us a textThe Warner Archive kicks off 2026 with a diverse lineup of 6 classic films, including a Clark Gable and Jean Harlow erotic pre-Code, a hard-hitting Robinson/Raft/Dietrich drama, a suspenseful Greenstreet-Lorre team up,  a highly anticipated noir with Charles Mcgraw, a Technicolor musical, another Mario Lanza classic, and more Hanna Barbera. PLUS two more film collections! George Feltenstein of the Warner Archive provides all the details behind the restoration and the included extras.Pre-order links:RED DUST (1932) Blu-rayTHE NARROW MARGIN (1952) Blu-rayTHE VERDICT (1946) Blu-rayMANPOWER (1941) Blu-rayBY THE LIGHT OF THE SILVERY MOON (1953) Blu-rayFOR THE FIRST TIME (1959) Blu-rayTHE NEW FRED AND BARNEY SHOW (1979)-The Complete Series Blu-rayJames Stewart 4 Film Collection Blu-rayRobert Taylor 4 Film Collection Blu-ray The Extras Facebook page The Extras TV YouTube ChannelThe Extras Twitter Warner Archive & Warner Bros Catalog Group Join our new public Facebook Group for Warner Archive Animation Fans and get the latest update on all the releases. As an Amazon Affiliate, The Extras may receive a commission for purchases through our purchase links. There is no additional cost to you, and every little bit helps us in the production of the podcast. Thanks in advance. Otaku Media produces podcasts, behind-the-scenes extras, and media that connect creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals. [e-mail]

Hi, I'm Gregory Orr, grandson of Jack Al Warner, and producer of the documentary Jack Al Warner The Last Mogul, and you are listening to The Extras. Hello and welcome to The Extras. I'm Tim Larger host, and joining me is George Feltonstein, and we're going to be kicking off 2026, George, with the January Luray releases from the Warner Archive. Very exciting. I'm excited to Tim, and as always, it's a pleasure to be with you to talk about what we've got coming up. Every month, you know, I'm like a kid. What's coming?

What's coming? And I know a lot of other people feel exactly the same way because you just do a great, you know, job of trying to, you know, meet something for all the different various groups out there. And I think that is true of what you have coming in January because we're going to have an animation title. We're going to wait a little bit later to talk about that one. But I thought today we'll start oldest first, just because I'm also very excited about it.

And I wanted to get to it right away. And I know it's got a lot of fans out there who are very excited to see Red Dust from 1932. What can you tell us about this pre-code film? Well, this is something I'm really thrilled that we're doing. I've been wanting to do it for so long. It finally got approved. we had done a lot of work on this film, you know, everything in perspective for its DVD release in 2012.

And it's a very difficult film to deal with because it's shot, you know, kind of dark because there's so many night scenes and they're out in the middle of Africa at night and huts and this and that and so forth. And there's also rain. And when you've got rain, you have to make sure that the rain is preserved. It reminds me of before something I was not involved in, but the DVD debut of Citizen Kane was very controversial because not only did they remove the grain, they removed the rain.

It was a real disaster. That was something that you want to avoid when you're dealing with a film that has. rain. So our restoration team had to make sure that the film as photographed was reproduced. Again, another MGM film where the original negative is long gone. And I think this one was even long gone maybe before the fire, just because this film was reissued countless times, mostly due to the fact that Gene Harlow passed away at 26 years of age, such a young, young woman when she died and re-releases and retrospectives of her films really preceded the growth of revival cinemas in the 70s and 80s. So this is a film that

just never wasn't popular. But we did have our difficulties making it even digestible for DVD. Now, here we are years later, 13 years later, later. And we need to make it shine on Blu-ray. And I'm thrilled with what Warner Brothers motion picture imaging and the artists that labor there have done on our behalf, it looks really great. It sounds really great. It doesn't feel like a 93-year-old movie. Wow. 93. But this is also one of the most important films that cemented the chemistry of Gene Harlow and Clark Gable. And they made, you know, several films together, some of which we've talked about here on the extras in the past. But people were frustrated. Oh, it's great that you release Saratoga, but where is red dust? I don't think anything we release gets just, you know, a thumbs up. and that's great, but it usually is followed by,

but what about dot, dot, dot, that, that, that. And I'm not saying that in a pejorative or negative way towards anyone. Enthusiasm for classic film is something I am euphoric over, and our job is to try to please everyone, which is impossible, but we do our best to try and hit all the buttons. And based on what we've got planned in 2026, Red Dust is very indicative of the well-known, high-level, well-loved films that a lot of people have been waiting for,

and there will be a lot more following Red Dust. But this is one of the great MGM classics of the 30s, directed by Victor Fleming. The chemistry between Harlow and Gable is electric. Mary Aster is wonderful. Jean Raymond is terrific. which is not something I would often say. But he really gives a great performance in this film. And it's just to see the application of our technology

to make it as clean as possible and have it look as much as if you were looking at a brand new print in 1932. I think we've achieved that. It has a very healthy grain structure. It looks wonderful considering how weathered the surviving elements are, because this was one of the films that MGM converted from nitrate to safety early on in their preservation program. So we have a radio broadcast from 1940 with Gable, but obviously Gene Harlow had passed away, could not recreate her performance. But

interestingly, her role is taken on by Anne Southern. And what's interesting about that is Anne Southern had just started making a series of films where she played the character of Masey. And an early film in the Macy series was Congo Macy, which was written by Wilson Collison, who wrote the play on which Red Dust is based. And I've often heard it said that the Macy films that Anne Southern did, that that character was originally something the studio had in mind for Harlow. And I'm not a Gene Harlow expert, so I can confirm that with 100% accuracy, nor have I ever plowed through the files to see if it's true.

But I bet it is. But they're great in the radio version, and Screen Guild Theater had to condense the 90-minute movie, or 83-minute movie, to be exact, into a half hour. And it's a good condensation. And a lot of the visuals that you can't see when you're listening to a radio show, I think they did a very good job at conveying the atmosphere for audio only. But that's one of the bonuses on here. And we also have two 1932, two color, technicolor short subjects from the era, something you would have seen in the theater. And then the trailer for red dust we have, which we used on our DVD in 2012, is very interesting because it's the only surviving trailer element we have. Usually from 1932, the selection of MGM trailers is really limited. It gets better as the decade goes on. But this is an original release trailer. The kicker is the text is all in Spanish. The audio is English. Some of them were not used in the final film of Red Dust.

So you're actually getting to see alternate scenes. But when we came upon this film element back in 2012, we were like, oh, this is so awesome because it's very, very different. And so that trailer will be on here. It is a very weathered film element, but it is an HD. It's going to be a terrific disc, and I'm thrilled that we get to kick off the year with such an important film. Yeah. And I don't know if we mentioned the director.

Mr. Fleming. Victor Fleming also did a small picture Gone with the Wind. A few years ago. A little picture called The Wizard of Oz. Yeah. And a lot of other wonderful films at MGM before his relatively early death. He died, I believe, in 1949, but his work speaks for itself, and I think he did a great job with this film. This film is one of those really old feature films that you can put in front of a contemporary audience, and they'll be thrilled by it.

And just the pre-code nature of it is quite unexpected for those who are more familiar with older films. having all the constrictions of the production code. I think you wrote up that there's a erotic kind of a comedy. Without question. I mean, basically, Gene Harlow and Mary Aster's characters both want Mr. Gable. Not an unusual request from ladies of that era. Mr. Gable was quite popular. There's a reason why they called him the King of Hollywood.

He had, by 1932, really ratcheted in his stardom. You know, he had the previous, I'd say, 18 months made some other films at MGM that underscored his superstar quality, and it was very much cemented by the time of the release of Red Dust. So I think people are going to love the disc. and I'm excited that we get to kick off the year with talking about movies like Red Dust. Yeah, very exciting, very exciting. Well, next we have up a drama from 1941, Manpower.

Love the title. What can you tell us about this release? Well, Manpower has a very interesting production history because it was directed by Rowell-Walsh. And you had two Warner Brothers leading men who are known for being tough guys, and they're basically fighting over Marlena Dietrich, who is not a Warner Brothers contract player. She did work at many studios, primarily Paramount in the early part of her American career. But the chemistry between the three stars is quite electric. and I say that with a little bit of tongue and cheek because this is all about power lines and people

who work them and the danger of it. And then there's the explosive nature of the jealousy between Robinson and George Raft. And interestingly enough, I believe I read in some legitimate history book about the making of this film that Mr. Robinson and Mr. Raft didn't exactly get along very well. And I think it actually ended up in a physical altercation on the set. I'm not sure about that.

There are people who probably know this like the back of their hand, but I have to keep 8,000 movies in my head at once, so I can't give you every single detail. I do believe there was a very conflicted set on this movie. But the movie was a hit. And Raoul Walsh, I'm thrilled that we're bringing more of his works to Blu-ray into high-definition and make them look terrific. As I'm looking at these films, when the work is completed and we've gone back to the camera negative, it just blows my mind. I've never seen these films look so good. And it transcends the

viewing experience from entertaining to superbly entertaining. You're just drawn into it. And I think people are going to love this disc. And we added two cartoons from 1941, one in black and white, one in color. They're not very commonly seeing Warner Brothers cartoon, so I think people will enjoy having the addition of them. But manpower is what one of those films that we were constantly being, you know, when I look at the lists of people sending in, you know, there are posts on our Facebook page or what have you, this has asked for a lot.

So I'm very happy whenever we can check off another box of something that people really wanted. For those who don't know the movie, I think it is, no pun intended, dynamite entertainment. it. I think Dietrich is just pure Dietrich in this movie. And I love watching the interaction between the actors and the great Warner Brothers supporting players who are wonderful in the film. It's a terrific movie. What a lineup between the director and the cast. It's fantastic. And just to go back to those extras, if anybody wanted to know the titles on those,

It's no time for comedy, and Joe Glow the Firefly. That's probably not going to mean a lot to a lot of people, but there might be a few people listening that that hits a button for them. Joe Glow the Firefly is a very underrated, animated short subject. I was going to say cartoon, but I don't want that to be demeaning. It's a short film that happens to be animated. Right. And it's quite beautiful, and it's black and white.

And it is an HD. Both cartoons are in HD. And I think people will enjoy both of them. And as a whole, it's really a very, very entertaining film. You will note that there is not a trailer on this film. We do not have any film elements of a trailer for manpower, which is just weird. We did extensive searches to see, you know, was there one at one time? Did we lose it?

Do we not have it? We have no record. we didn't even have like a 16 millimeter. We had nothing. So we do the best that we can. But if someone has a trailer of manpower around and would like to help us add it to our archive, we would be very grateful for access to make a copy. For sure.

Well, I've been excited for the first two, but I'm also really excited for this next one, George. It's called The Verdict from 1946. What can you tell us about this thriller? Well, in 1941, when John Houston made the Maltese falcon, it introduced Sydney Green Street to the screen, and also a member of the cast of that amazing classic was Peter Lorry. And there was a chemistry between Green Street and Lorry that ended up making them basically a screen team, although you don't hear them referred to. in that way like, you know, Astaire and Rogers or, you know, they were not cast in a series of films. Rather, they were Warner Brothers contract players that happened to appear together in the Maltese Falcon. And then from there, their performances on the screen became more

frequent. And this film happens to represent the feature film directorial debut of a gentleman named Don Siegel, who had previously been an editor at Warner Brothers. And this was his graduation to direction. And of course, I think he's probably best known as the director of Dirty Harry. This is one of his greatest films. But this film was actually a remake of a 1934 movie that is almost never seen called The Crime Doctor. The rights to the story were bought by Warner Brothers and remade as the verdict in 1946. I always stress the year. I don't want people to confuse this with the 20th century Fox Paul Newman film, The Verdict, which is also an amazing movie. Unfortunately, not part of our library. This verdict is one that

really warrants seeing. It's an investigative story. We did not have a trailer available for this either to include on the disc, although we are on the trail of getting one, but we were not able to do so in time for this release. So what I did was include some very entertaining Peter Lurie and Sydney Green Street radio appearances. There's one from the series Suspense, which is a very famous radio series, Inner Sanctum, another famous radio series, and then the new adventures of Neuro Wolf, which Sidney Green Street did right before he passed away. So you've got those radio shows, and then we have two Warner Bros. Cartoons, Hair Raising Hair, which is the introduction of the Orange Monster, also seen in Waterwater Every Hair,

that is called Gossamer, but this was his first appearance, and Burr. of a notion. The thing that both those cartoons have in common is they both have caricatures of Peter Lurie. So I thought that was perfectly appropriate for this disc. This is very, very entertaining. It is a very fast-paced, well-made film. And it's kind of a little bit of a proto-noir. It isn't a, you know, it's set in 1890 London. It's not set in 1940s Hollywood or San Francisco or New York, you know. But there is a definite sense of shadow and light that gives it a noirish quality. And Green Street and Lory are terrific. Yeah. And I think people are going to really appreciate the verdict when it ends up on their

shelf. Yeah. Yeah. Looking forward to this one. It should be a lot of fun. Well, next we have a classic noir, the narrow margin from 1952. A lot of excitement for this one, George. What can you tell us about this? I would say there's more excitement for this than almost everything. This has been so heavily requested. And the DVD we had was not anything to write home for. It came from a fourth generation element.

By going back to the camera negative, Wow. It just looks amazing. It moves like a bad out of hell. And no one expected this movie to be of any substantial nature because Richard Fleischer was not a well-known director at that time. He had directed some other features. He is the son of Max Fleischer, by the way, the famed animator whose work is always something I cheer. but Richard Fleischer developed their reputation for being an excellent film director. And as he was on staff at RKO, he was assigned this picture. There were no big stars in it. Charles McGrath, Marie Windsor, Jacqueline White, they were all like B stars. And this was a very short, lower budget movie. But the reviews this movie got when it came out were all.

spectacular and as film noir has grown in re-evaluation and popularity in the last two or three decades the narrow margin is like an essential noir and it did get remade in the 90s and uh the original is always the best you know we have a commentary here that was done by A good friend of mine who passed away recently, but people know his work as a film director, William Friedkin. He was a passionate film fan, and he wanted to record commentaries for films that he was passionate about. And he approached us when we were doing the DVD to do this commentary. And since we lost him, it's all the more something to treasure to have his comments. And he's speaking to a both as a fan of film from the classic era and being a film director himself. So that's quite fascinating. And then we also have interview excerpts that Richard Fleischer did for our archival interview project that are cut in with Friedkin's commentary.

So you actually get to hear Richard Fleischer speaking about the film and his own perspective of making it. And then we've added onto the disc, a Joe McDokes short, so you never tell a lie, and a Looney Tunes classic cartoon in HD, the Super Snooper. And even though it's an Archaeo film, we actually do have the trailer for this movie. A lot of people say that this is almost Hitchcockian, and it would be a good cousin to strangers on a train.

It's just great. And I'm so thrilled we can find, finally bring it out with this beautiful new master with a 4K scan off the camera negative. It's something we're very proud of. And I'm excited to hear what people think when they see the disc. Right, right. And you mentioned it, but this is a 4K scan of the original camera negative. Right.

As the verdict is and as manpower is, all of them are 4K scans of the camera negative. To have that luxury, obviously we don't have that luxury with red dust. we do our best with what we have. But when the negative survives, we're able to bring so much more clarity to the presentation. And that's particularly exciting when it comes to Archao movies

because Arcao was not as meticulous in taking care of their original negatives as many other studios were. So it's a victory for noir films everywhere, and I hope people enjoy the disc. Yeah. Yeah, so many people you're making their month of January bringing this one out. Very, very exciting.

I mentioned the 4K scan for the previous films. You know, you just clarified. But I also wanted to kind of lead that into this next one because when you do these scans of these technicolor negatives, the final movie looks fantastic. And we're talking about by the light of the silvery moon from 19. 53. What can you tell us about this one? Well, this was a rarity of its era, but certainly not a rarity in the world we live in now or have been for decades. It was very unusual for a studio to have a hit film and then make a sequel. There were series films like the Andy Hardy movies or the

Nancy Drew movies. You know, there were all sorts of film series. But to have a film where you bring back the whole cast and pick up where the story left off of the first movie, that's exactly what happened here. Warner Brothers produced a Technicolor musical in 1951 called on Moonlight Bay that was set in just before World War I and had lots of music from the era. It was a gorgeous technicolor production, and we had the good fortune of having one of our signature Technicolor Restorations created for that movie. By the time this comes out, it will be the five-year anniversary of when we put out on Moonlight Bay. But literally, the story picks up basically where the first film left off.

And Doris Day and Gordon McCrae were a really great team together. I think they did four movies together, and then they also, like, were guest stars in another film. so that would be five. But their voices blended together wonderfully. And this is a funny, funny movie. I wouldn't call Meet Me and St. Louis a funny movie, but it's a delightful entertainment. This is similar to Meet Me and St. Louis

and being a nostalgic look back at years gone by from a 1953 perspective. But it's also got a very funny script. And the comedy, a lot of it, comes from the magnificent Mary Wicks, who was a great character actress and comedian for decades. Billy Gray, who plays Doris Day's Little Brother in these movies, later went on to do the Father Knows Best series, and happily he's still with us and has a great perspective on his Hollywood career. but these films, both on Moonlight Bay and by the light of the silvery moon, moon, are loosely adapted from Booth Tarkington's Penrod stories. And Warner Brothers had made Penrod and Sam in the early 30s,

and then they made a remake in the late 30s with a different cast, and there was a silent film developed from these properties. So this was a modern reboot, if you will, with music, with Ray Hinddorf leading the Warner Brothers Orchestra, great songs. It's just delightful. I carried over all of the special features that were on the original DVD because we have two Joe McDowkes shorts, and one of them, so you want a television set, has a little cameo appearance by Douglass. Doris Day and Gordon McCrae. So that doesn't, wasn't even in my team count for them. But so I had to put that on here.

And we also have another Joe McDoug short, so you want to learn to dance. And then the Roadrunner and the coyote in from A to ZZZZ. So, and that's in HD. And we've got the original trailer. People who bought on Moonlight Bay were saying, we want the sequel. We want the sequel. Well, now you have it. Right.

That's exciting. It's kind of interesting, you know, what you're saying. about they didn't do these sequels. And now that's, you know. Yeah, it was a real rarity at really any studio. It just wasn't part of thinking. It was a rare occasion that it would happen. But here, it was so comfortable for Warner Brothers to just take the story of those

characters and take it into a new scenario. And it's a lot of fun. And there's great songs, and it's, the Technicolor is just stunning. I mean, our folks did such a great job as they always do in aligning the Technicolor records for that sharpness and breathtaking Technicolor. And this is one of those rare films that was shot on safety film and in Technicolor. So there are only a small number of films that were made that way before the industry moved to a, single strand eastman color negative. This is gorgeous.

And I think people are going to be very, very happy to add it to their shelves. Well, we have more music in film to talk about for our next title, and that's for the first time from 1959. What can you tell us about this film? Well, this was the last film in which Mario Lonza appeared. and this film was released, I think about two or three months before he died at a very young age. He had health problems during the production of this. And I think I've talked on the podcast before with you about when we talked about that Midnight Kiss about some of the challenges he had with alcohol and overeating and just he had a lot of problems. This film was actually well received by the public and critics.

I went back to the New York Times review of this movie, and the reviewer was surprised to be able to say, hey, this is a really good film. And Lonza looks better, he looks healthier, and it's a sweet little love story. And if you're into opera, there are some operatic excerpts really in the center of the storytelling that would be like gold for Lonza fans. And even though he passed away over 65 years ago, there's still a legion of rapt fans for Mr. Lonza's unique vocal gifts.

And what makes this film interesting from a technical standpoint is it was shot in Techno We've talked about technorama before. It went through the camera sideways like this division, only it was with a 2.35 aspect ratio like traditional cinemascope of the period. So the film was shot on location throughout Europe. And I would say one of the most important members of the cast, and I'm speaking figure, are the various locations where this film was shot. With the added benefit of technorama, you get that incredible depth of field, the sharpness. The images are beautiful.

We released a DVD of this film many years ago. It was not so beautiful, but it was the best we could do on a limited budget for a DVD. This makes up the difference for that. The audio for this film is mono. do not have any stereophonic audio elements, and given that it was produced in Europe for MGM's distribution, I went through the files quite viciously trying to find out was this ever released with stereophonic sound, even though we don't have it. If you go to IMDB, it says you know, four tracks. IMDB is not 100% reliable with technical things.

facts. Because anybody can go in there and put in whatever they want. I could find no evidence that a stereo track was ever created for this film. But what we have is what we have and we did the best we could do. The sound is good. The picture is gorgeous. It's very entertaining and it's charming. One of the cast members in this movie is the famous Jaja Gabor, the Queen of Outer Space. She made this movie after Queen of Outer Space. She's actually quite charming and good. and not a caricature of herself in this movie. And I think people will be surprised by the film. It is a lovely piece of entertainment.

I'm very passionate about wide format film and being able to get it out there so that people can see. We've run the course with VistaVision. Now we're taking on Technorama, and there will be more Technorama. But right now, the film we're saluting in Technorama, is for the first time. And I think people need to give it a chance

if they haven't seen the film before, they'll find it as a refreshing entertainment and a salute to the incredible local talents of Mr. Lanzah. You know, the film you released just a month or two back. I don't know why the name's escaping me, but I really enjoyed that one. That Midnight Kiss. Yeah, that Midnight Kiss.

I really enjoyed it. And I'm a sucker for music in movies, whether it's a outright musical or just something where it just fits into the plot line. And so I highly recommend it because I'm not somebody who was that familiar with Mario Lanzah, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. And I'm really looking forward to seeing this one after what you just described. I mean, it says here from a 6K scan, wonderful. The last thing you did was fantastic.

So, well, we didn't talk about the extras here, George. There's only, aside from the trailer, there's only one extra. Okay. And that is, I put one of my favorite Bugs Bunny cartoons on here, long-haired hair, and it's where Bugs is basically doing battle with an opera tenor. You know, it was made way before for the first time. So it isn't, oh, it's a 1959 cartoon. I wanted it to be something that would thematically sit nicely with the feature.

It's a Chuck Jones cartoon. He was just brilliant. And it's bugs at his best. And it's a nice little extra. That's what extras are for. There we go. Is to entertain. And I think people will enjoy it.

Well, let's jump from that animation to our last title. What can you tell us about this TV series now from Hannah Barbera? Well, this is the new Fred and Barney show, which is not that well known. It was done in 1979, and it was shown on Saturday mornings on NBC. But in the early 70s, Hannah Barbera revisited the Flintstones by having Pebbles and Bam Bam grown up as teenagers. and this kind of took the Flintstones back to the original format where Pebbles and Bam Bam are little children again. When originally broadcast, these shows were formatted with other characters.

There was The Thing and the New Shmoo, both of which were not Anna Barbera created characters. We do not have the wrong. rights to release those programs as they were originally broadcast. So this brings together the actual Flintstones segments of the new Fred and Barney show. So the permutations, it's 17 episodes that were spread the end of the 1978, 79 season, then the 7980 season. But what's interesting about this is that we had played. plan to release this on DVD when we were going very deep into the Hanna-Barbera Library,

and the existing masters were unusable. They were so old and so terrible. We were doing a limited remastering on a lot of Hanna-Barbera things, you know, 10 years ago, 12 years ago. I think it was even a little later in the history that, We started to work on the new Fred and Barney show just for a DVD. And we ran into serious film element problems and missing footage. So that project had to be aborted.

And now we're able to go back to the original negatives and have the shows be. They run about 24 minutes apiece and leaving room for commercials, which we don't have any. There are 17 episodes on two discs. They come from 4K scans of the original negatives, and they look terrific. By the point that this show was done, Alan Reed, who was the original voice of Fred Flintstone, had passed away about two years before, and Henry Corden had taken over as the voice of Fred Flintstone, which he did for decades. And you have Mel Blank, the original Barney, returning as Barney Rubble,

and Jean Vanderpile, the original Wilma, returning to her role. Then there's another actress who does the voice of Betty. And the original Betty was, of course, B. Benadarrett. And then she left the Flintstones to star in Petty Coat Junction. So the woman who voices Betty in this particular series, her name was Gay Auterson. But you have the whole core Hannah Barbera crew working on these shows. shows. And for people who love Fred and Barney, this is a nice little piece of nostalgia. When we announced that this was coming out, a lot of people said, I've never heard of this.

And, you know, I've also seen many people say, we want Hannah-Barbera that's never been released before. And given how deeply we went into the Hannah-Barbera library with DVD releases, There are some people that don't care that it's Blu-ray and look so beautiful. They consider it released already when it's on DVD. We have a responsibility to make things look great. So finding that balance, here was an unreleased show that never came out on DVD, although we planned to. I had heard there was VHS like in Europe, and I don't know if that's legit or bootlegs,

frankly, but I could find no record of legitimate release here in the U.S. been on video cassette. So it's really a re-premise. These things were on television and, you know, they would appear on Boomerang or on Me TV tunes. But this is the first time they're getting a home entertainment physical release and on Blu-ray. I think fans of Hannah Barbera and fans of the Flintstones will be very happy with it. Yeah. Yeah, I love it when when you're able to release for the first time, you know, never on DVD, so to speak. You've done that a few times this year. Well, sure. I mean, all of Huckleberry Hound except for the first season was unavailable. Except for the first season. Yeah, there you go. And so we have a lot of other things in store.

So people who want the unreleased will be happy with what's coming out. And people who want an upgrade from something that didn't look so good in prior iterations will also get their wishes fulfilled. And will everybody be happy? No, you can't please everybody all the time. But we really try. And we know we have a dedicated fan base for our releases. And there are fan groups of different kinds of entertainment. Some people want, you know, this kind of film, or this kind of television series,

or they want a comedy, or they want a Western, or they want a drama. They don't want old TV. want new TV. Everybody wants something different. We've got a lot of people to try and please, so we're never going to be able to be 100% successful every month. But I think what's nice about the January release slate is there's a little bit of diversity, and yet an emphasis on quality entertainment. And I hope people really enjoy the January releases. I think it's a terrific terrific month, you've got classic films, including Technicolor musicals, noir, dramas,

and then you've got more animation. And I almost forgot, but we're not going to finish our episode without mentioning you come back with two film collections. Also, in early January. And it escaped my mind for a bit, but those we should mention because this podcast is to announce everything coming from the Warner Archive in January. So two, you know, kind of known guys, James Stewart for films, and Robert Taylor.

So maybe you could tell us a little bit about those. Well, I feel badly that people have forgotten Robert Taylor. You know, he first burst upon the scene in an MGM short in the mid-30s. And soon thereafter was the leading man for Garbo and Camille. and he could do everything. And one of the last things he ever did was a made for television, but of theatrical quality movie called Return of the Gunfighter in 1967.

He died of lung cancer, very young, heavy smoker. And he died at a time where people were just becoming aware of the dangers of cigarette smoking in cancer. And the tragedy of his early, death, relatively early death, kind of made an impact on a lot of people, but the screen career that he had as a leading man, the 30s, the 40s, the 50s, the 60s, quite remarkable. And this four-film collection, which I've talked about the multi-film collections before, they're not designed primarily for our core Warner Archive consumers, because our core Warner Archive

consumers and collectors will have likely bought some or all of the films in these collections. They're designed to provide a value proposition to build your library if you're missing one thing or the other, one performer, one director, one genre, and be able to affordably, a four film collection is 3998. That's a very attractive price. Sometimes they get discount. So I'm very, very excited about the Robert Taylor collection. Some of the films in there we've talked about here on this podcast. Yes. I think the most recent release included in this collection is Devil's Doorway, which we just

talked about last, but it's a great collection. And then for Jimmy Stewart, four film collection spans from 1940 to 1962. Because we have the shop around the corner, which is a beloved romantic comedy directed by Ernst Lubich. The Blubert we released, I think, four or five years ago. It's a perennial Christmas favorite. It was the basis for remake for In the Good Old Summertime with Judy Garland and Van Johnson. And you've got mail with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. So it's a wonderful love story.

And this is the original film. And the same year, James Stewart co-starred in Chop Around the Corner with Margaret Sullivan. He also co-starred with Margaret Sullivan in The Mortal Storm, which was really one of the first MGM films to address fascism and the coming threat of the Nazis in 1940. And it is a film that definitely deserves to be seen more. then you move into 1953 and you've got the Naked Spur directed by Anthony Mann, one of our Technicolor Restorations. That is one of the many westerns Stewart made with Anthony Mann. It's a terrific film. And then the set climaxes with an all-star film that was shot in the Cinerama process released here

in the United States in 1960. but it was released in Europe in 1962, so that's the actual release year. And that's how the West was won. And it's an all-star cast with three separate stories telling the settling of the West. But James Stewart really had a pivotal role in the film. I would say he and Debbie Reynolds probably have the most significant amount of screen time. So we thought it would be a nice addition to this four film selection, because it's a nice diversity of storytelling. I think people will really enjoy it, especially if they don't own the majority or any of the films in these collections.

That's what these collections are for, and there will be more of them released each month throughout the year. Yeah, that's a fantastic two collections for January. And like you said, I own most of them. But for those who don't, this is a terrific value. And just the amount of stars you have there at Warner Brothers that you can put these collections together around is fantastic. And genres and directors. And there's all, there are going to be some surprises.

We will have some four film collections and some six film collections. but they're all based on giving the consumer an opportunity to build or add to their collection with a very reasonable retail price. And I hope people are enjoying them. All indications are that they are. Yeah, yeah, yeah, fantastic. I know I am. Well, George, a great month of January to kick off 2026.

How do you do it? I don't know how you do it each month pulling together so much for, pleasing so many people, and it's just a fantastic way to start the year. So as always, thank you for coming on and sharing. Thank you, Tim, and thank you to everybody out there that supports the Warner Archive Collection. We really appreciate it. Well, it's another terrific month, and it's a great way to start 2026 with all of these fantastic releases from the Warner Archive. Now, it's a little unusual, but the pre-orders for all of these.

releases are available. So I do have those in the show notes so that you can order those right away. That includes the two film collections that we talked about as well. And I just want to clarify for those of you who were interested in the film collections that we mentioned what was on the James Stewart collection, but didn't go through the titles on the Robert Taylor. So let me do that real quick. And that's Devil's Doorway, Westward the Women, Ivanhoe, and The Last Hunt. So those are the four films on the four film collection for Robert Taylor. Those are fantastic films, by the way. So what a great collection for those of you who do not have these Robert Taylor films. Well, as always, if you haven't yet subscribed, we do ask you to do

that. It helps the show. And of course, we'd make sure that you get these episodes right away. Whether you're an animation fan or a classic film fan or just a fan of the Warner Archive in general. The rest of 2026 is also looking very robust. And I know. know you won't want to miss any of those episodes when they come up. There's just a lot of great stuff in the coming year. Until next time, you've been listening to Tim Millard. Stay slightly obsessed. Hey, are you a fan of the Warner Archive animation releases?

Do you want to get the latest updates and news right away? If you're on Facebook, we have just created a brand new Facebook group called the Warner Archive Animation Fans group. Now, we celebrate past releases, but really, we created this group because of all of the great releases that have come in this year and are anticipated in the coming years. So there have been a lot of great releases from the Looney Tunes Collectors Vault series. There's the Tom and Jerry releases. There's all of the Hanna-Barbera releases.

I mean, there's just a wealth of animation coming from the Warner Archive. So we celebrate all of it. It's a community with other people who enjoy these releases and want to talk about them and share the latest news, reviews, and updates from the Warner Archive. So if that sounds interesting to you, check out the link here in the podcast show notes. And we hope to see you soon.