Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)Looking for a fun DVD set for your kids? You can't do much better than this one. You get a lot of video (17 22-minute programs), all of it filled with the same decidedly offbeat, narrated storytelling style creator Jay Ward made famous in his earlier "Rocky & Bullwinkle" programs. Though "George of the Jungle" doesn't have the sly adult themes of Bullwinkle, it still has plenty of appeal, to kids as well as parents.
My 13-year-old daughter offers this review: "Silly. And 4 and a half out of five stars."
Of the show's three cartoon series ("George of the Jungle," "Tom Slick" and "Super Chicken"), my personal favorite is "Super Chicken." Its far-fetched premise suits Ward's dry sense of humor to a tee. I've read where some parents fear Super Chicken because they think the lead character's continual need for "super sauce" may be a hidden drug reference. Maybe it is, but I can't imagine today's kids being influenced by it. In fact, the whole '60s sense of humor is what makes these shows so funny in the first place. Many of the throwaway lines are simply gems. "The pearl went back to the museum," explains the narrator after a villainous mollusk is captured, "and the oyster went to jail to serve every month with an 'R' in it for the next 30 years."
The show originally aired in 1967 and 1968 on ABC.
As far as these two DVDs go, they're pretty much just what you'd expect. The video is a little fuzzy but it's not bad unless you've got a really large-screen television. For each episode you can either Play All three cartoons, or cherry-pick them out individually. A great plus: There's only one commercial to sit through, a short promo for the new "George of the Jungle" series on the Cartoon Network.
Disc 2 has two neat bonus features -- the pilot cartoons of both "George of the Jungle" and "Super Chicken." The "George" pilot lacks the familiar theme song, but includes a caricature of, of all people, Humphrey Bogart as an elephant hunter. The "Super Chicken" pilot has even more Superman-style premise and, though plenty watchable, is not quite up to par to its later shows. Both pilots, by the way, look tremendous, with brilliant color and crisp definition.
The only two things not to like on the DVD set: There are no subtitles (I am not hard of hearing but I love watching television with subtitles on), and as you start each episode, the "George of Jungle" theme plays twice in a row. You see, and hear, it once as a 60-second show open, and then immediately again as a 30-second introduction to the first cartoon. The theme song is one of the catchiest ever, but hearing it twice in a row every time you play an episode gets old.
After watching these old shows I noticed one of my favorite things about them was their character voices. They're so familiar! George, Tom Slick and Super Chicken are voiced by Bill Scott, best known as the voice of Bullwinkle, Dudley Do-Right and Mr. Peabody. Tom Slick's girlfriend Marigold (and nearly every other female) is June Foray, the voice of Rocky and Nell Fenwick. Best of all are the contributions of Paul Frees. In the world I run in (note my byline) Frees is best known as the Ghost Host at Walt Disney World's Haunted Mansion, but he also supplied the voice to hundreds of television characters, including the Pillsbury Doughboy. Here he provides, among other things, a dead-on impression of Ed Wynn (the Mad Hatter in Disney's "Alice in Wonderland" and Uncle Albert in "Mary Poppins") for the character of Super Chicken's lion sidekick Fred. Frees did the same voice for Captain Peachfuzz of "Rocky & Bullwinkle" fame.
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