The Lion King Trilogy Today’s Amazon Deal of the Day features 55% off two recent Disney collections. The Lion King Trilogy (eight discs, including The Lion King, The Lion King 1½, and The Lion King 2 on DVD and Blu-ray), list price $100, is now $45. Cars Director’s Edition (11 discs, including Cars, Cars 2, [...]

Next Tuesday, November 22, is a huge release day for home media — movies, TV shows, and cartoons — since it’s the Tuesday before the holiday shopping season officially starts on Thanksgiving weekend. Everyone wants to be on the shelves when customers show up to spend money and buy gifts. Among the many items coming [...]

Disney/Pixar has released the trailer for Brave, as shown here: This film, which will be released June 22, 2012, is the first of Pixar’s movies to star a female lead, so I’m very curious to see how they tackle the idea of a Scottish “princess” in what they’re terming a fairy tale. Update: Courtesy of [...]

One of the major new characters in Cars 2 is the female spy car Holley Shiftwell, voiced by Emily Mortimer. Shiftwell is new to field work, but she takes to it quickly, even rescuing herself and boss Finn McMissile (Michael Kaine) from a deathtrap, as shown in this clip. I was surprised to find that [...]

Here’s a clip from the Toy Story Toon “Hawaiian Vacation” (from the just-released Cars 2 DVD) that sets up the premise and shows all your favorite toys, including a new cameo by Lego minifigs that tickled me. Story Supervisor Jason Katz describes the generation of the story like this: “One of the initial ideas involved [...]

I was curious to see this latest Pixar movie. It’s the worst-reviewed of any of their films, and the first one in a long time that KC and I didn’t see in the theater, knowing it would be available on home video soon enough. And here it is! Cars 2 Cars 2 wasn’t what I [...]

I found a couple of Young Justice video clips that elaborate on two moments I mentioned in my review of Season 1 Volume 2. The first shows Superboy learning to channel his anger usefully, as the team fights Amazo: The second features the new Topo telling Aqualad’s origin through animated flashback cartoon:

As with the first volume, Young Justice Season 1 Volume 2 is a bare-bones, just-the-episodes disc. I didn’t care much for the first few episodes, but I keep hearing that the show continued to improve over its run, so I figured I’d try these next four and see what I thought. “Schooled” begins with Superboy [...]

Out yesterday were DVD volumes three and four of the cartoon The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes! The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes! Volume Three Volume 3, Iron Man Unleashed, has these six episodes, pitting the team against Kang the Conqueror and Black Widow, among others: Masters of Evil 459 The Man Who Stole Tomorrow Come the [...]

Casting information on the next original DC animated movie, Justice League: Doom has already been released. Now, here’s the official trailer, showing Vandal Savage assembling the Legion of Doom to take down the Justice League. Justice League: Doom is due out early next year. I admit, there’s something about seeing all the big-name heroes teamed [...]

In preparation for the debut of Green Lantern: The Animated Series, Warner has released this first scene of the new cartoon: The one-hour debut special will air on Cartoon Network Friday, November 11 at 7 PM. Further episodes of the CG-animated series will launch next year as part of the “DC Nation” programming block. The [...]

I haven’t heard much about this film previously, but I’m always excited to see another Ardman movie. They’re the folks behind Wallace & Gromit and Chicken Run, and their style, a kind of lumpy Claymation, is adorable. This movie opens at the end of March 2012, under two different titles. In the UK, it’s The [...]

We’d been anticipating this one, since buzz from friends was good. We were hearing that it was faithful to the classic Frank Miller/David Mazzucchelli story while still being entertaining in its own way. Our friends were right. Batman: Year One is a little over an hour, but it’s solid and unflagging. It moves from key [...]

Review by KC Carlson Probably best known for its earwig of a theme song (“It’s truly, truly, truly outrageous!”), Jem and the Holograms holds a unique place in animation history, is of interest to comic book historians, and has a truly dedicated fanbase — how many other long-defunct cartoon shows have their own annual convention? [...]

The first three DVD releases of Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated have been simple, four-episode discs labeled “Season 1 Volume X”. Now, via TV Shows on DVD, comes word that Warner is changing its release strategy. Unfortunately, it isn’t to a complete season set, as older fans have been hoping. “Season 1 Part 2″ will contain the [...]

At a kids’ entertainment conference in France earlier this month, Sam Register, Executive Vice President for Creative Affairs at Warner Bros. Animation, revealed some of the company’s upcoming plans. Other sites focused on the CGI Beware the Batman cartoon (featuring “the sword-wielding samurai” Katana and “new villains” from the “villain library”), but I was more [...]

Review by KC Carlson Dragon’s Lair began life in 1983 as a revolutionary arcade video game. Developed and published by Cinematronics, its key feature were the lavish cartoon graphics produced by ex-Disney animator Don Bluth (An American Tail, The Land Before Time). The mechanics were clunky, since the animation was provided on a laserdisc inside [...]

The original DC Animated film for 2012 will be Justice League: Doom, based on JLA: Tower of Babel, written by Mark Waid. That’s the storyline where the Justice League is taken down using Batman’s secret contingency plans to exploit each member’s weaknesses. The voice casting news for this film is great, bringing back plenty of [...]

Archie Comics has announced plans for a new half-hour animated TV series starring Sabrina the Teenage Witch. In partnership with the production studio Moonscoop, this Sabrina will have “a new look … in line with a more modern and teen-centric sensibility.” She’ll fight monsters, the supernatural, and teen “trials and tribulations”. The goal is to [...]

This third volume, like the first disc in the series, contains only four 23-minute episodes. In this case, it’s 9 through 12. Since I’ve already talked about what’s cool about the show in general in that link, here, I’ll just focus on these particular episodes. “Battle of the Humungonauts” opens with one of the dynamite [...]