Usagi Yojimbo DojoBoard

Anyone else here have this DVD set? I picked it up recently, and I've been rewatching the cartoons in this set nearly non-stop ever since. The two two-reel color cartoons, "Popeye Meets Sinbad The Sailor" and "Popeye Meets Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves" are especially great. I highly recommend this set to anyone who likes old cartoons.

I also enjoy the Looney Tunes DVD sets that we get about once a year. There's a new one coming out toward the end of the month that I'm looking forward to getting.

There's one old Fleischer cartoon that I really wish someone would include in a DVD set, the wonderfully bizarre "Swing, You Sinners!" :

http://youtube.com/watch?v=_xZocdDR9WM

Nobody on the Popeye DVD set goes into this subject, but I remember reading that Osamu Tezuka was influenced a lot by Fleischer cartoons (Some people trace the big-eyed "kawaii" look of many anime characters to Tezuka being influenced by Betty Boop). I think it's interesting that these cartoons have a slight connection to anime, even if it's a fairly tenuous one.

While we're on the subject, here's a somewhat amusing item on Jerry Beck's Cartoon Brew blog from yesterday:

Popeye the Sewer-man:

http://www.cartoonbrew.com/cartoon-cult ... -sewer-man

I was thinking of getting the Popeye set since Popeye meets Sinbad is my all time favorite Popeye cartoon, with Ali Baba a close second. Though a lot more fanciful, these were more in line with Segar's vision of Popeye.

Fantagraphics did a great job in publishing the Complete Segar Popeye comic strips. It was very different with the Popeye we know today.

I saw Ali Baba years ago - when I was college they showed it on the big screen -- and what I remember is the most hilarious lines Popeye mutters under his breath. You almost can't hear them!