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Released by: CBS
Released on: 1/5/10
Director: Various
Cast: Patrick Pinney, Maggie Roswell, Dana Hill, Charlie Adler
Year: 1987 - 1988
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The Movie:
Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures lasted three seasons on CBS, airing Saturday mornings from its debut in 1987 until it was taken off the air in 1988. Produced by none other than Ralph Bakshi, the series took the classic Mighty Mouse and many of his supporting characters and delivered them in a new, and at times seriously twisted, version. The series was, in many ways, really ahead of its time. It doesn't take much to see the seeds of shows like Ren & Stimpy sewn throughout the show, and in fact John Kricfalusi did a lot of work on the series as did other animation big-wig's who would later prove themselves, such as Bruce Timm, Jim Reardon and Rich Moore. The influence of the series can still be seen today in shows like Spongebob Squarepants and even South Park.
The series revolves around Mike Mouse (Patrick Pinney), a factory worker in his 'real life' but who also happens to be Mouseville's premiere superhero, Mighty Mouse. Along with his sidekick, Scrappy (Dana Hill) and comrade in arms, Bat-Bat (Charlie Adler) he spends most of his free time keeping the city safe from the likes of Oilcan Harry, The Cow (Michael Pataki) and the angry, bald Petey Pate (Pinney again). Occasionally he also woos the lovely Pearl Pureheart (Maggie Roswell). On the surface it's pretty basic superhero stuff and it doesn't sound too far removed from the original 1940's Terry Toon Mighty Mouse episodes or even the later 1960's incarnation… but it's really not so close at all. The series has an irreverent wit to it that makes it a blast to watch and is loaded with so many pop culture references and gags that there's just no way it could be mistaken for the earlier incarnations.
Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures holds up well by modern standards and it might actually fare better when viewed as an adult than as a child. Older viewers will pick up on the more subtle jabs while younger ones will enjoy the slapstick, the garish color, the ridiculous scenarios and the goofy characters. Some affectionate nods to the older series are welcome, and it's cool to see some of the Terrytoons characters alongside the likes of Bat-Bat (an obvious Batman parody) and The Cow (who'd have ever guessed Pataki would show up in this series?). Bakshi even manages to work in an appearance from his sixties Terrytoons series, The Mighty Heroes - how's that for obscure?
What really stands out in regards to how this series holds up against others made around the same time is how it absolutely does not play to formulaic standards. While up until this point in time the vast majority of cartoons followed simple, linear plots, Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures is more scattered and random, predating shows like Family Guy by quite a margin. For every standard superhero story we get, we're given an off the wall episode that may take on something as random as Fantastic Voyage or any number of comic book characters. As such, you never really knew what you were going to get when you tuned in Saturday mornings, and the show was always interesting and a whole lot of fun for that reason.
RANT TIME:
While on the surface this might seem like your average kids show, if you pay attention you'll realize Bakshi's odd sense of humor is rampant throughout the series. Odd innuendos are frequent and pop culture references are everywhere. Of course, the series became the subject of some notoriety when the episode The Littlest Tramp featured Mighty Mouse sniffing some flowers which somehow lead American Family Association head Donald Wildmon to interpret as portraying Mighty Mouse snorting cocaine. The episode aired in 1987 without issue but a year later Wildmon ran it up the flagpole leading the AFA to refer to Bakshi in a press statement as a 'known pornographer' in regards to his previous films, specifically Fritz The Cat. CBS in turn removed the scene in question from later broadcast versions (the series was brought back on the Fox Kids network in 1992 without the scene) so as to avoid further controversy and misguided insanity from the AFA and other 'concerned parents ' groups liable to misinterpret its intent. The episode is presented here uncut (previous trims amounted only to a few scant seconds so if you blink you'll miss it). Wildmon, who made a career out of freaking out over things like this, is still around and the AFA are still crusading against what they deem immoral, and in turn, against freedom of choice, freedom of expression, and other founding elements of the American constitution and way of life, though these days they seem to be more concerned with homosexuality than cartoons. Regardless, they're still a viable force and still quite insane.
END RANT
The episodes spread out across the three discs (and which make up the entire series) in the set are:
Night on Bald Pate/Mouse from Another House - Me-Yowww!/Witch Tricks - Night of the Bat-Bat/Scrap-Happy - Catastrophe Cat/Scrappy's Field-Day - The Bag Mouse/The First Deadly Cheese - This Island Mouseville/Mighty's Musical Classics - The Littlest Tramp/Puffy Goes Berserk - The League of Super-Rodents/Scrappy's Playhouse - All You Need Is Glove/It's Scrappy's Birthday -Aqua-Guppy/Animation Concerto - The Ice Goose Cometh/Pirates with Dirty Faces -Mighty's Benefit Plan/See You in the Funny Papers -Heroes and Zeroes/Stress for Success -Day of the Mice/Still Oily After All These Years -Mighty's Wedlock Whimsy/Anatomy of a Milquetoast - Bat with a Golden Tongue/Mundane Voyage - Snow White and the Motor City Dwarfs/Don't Touch That Dial - Mouse and Supermouse/The Bride of Mighty Mouse - A Star Is Milked/Mighty's Tone Poem
Video/Audio/Extras:
The episodes are all presented in their original 1.33.1 aspect ratio, as they were originally broadcast over twenty years ago. Unfortunately they're interlaced. Colors are nice and bright and bold with the reds periodically a little oversaturated. Some mild print damage shows up here and there but generally the picture is strong. The image is consistently clean and shows no edge enhancement or mpeg compression.
The only audio option on this release is an English language Dolby Digital Mono track that sounds about as good as an eighties series probably should. You won't have any problems understanding the dialogue and the levels are properly balanced. There's no hiss or distortion to complain about and everything shapes up nicely in this department.
CBS has assembled some good extras here. John Kricfalusi, Tom Minton, Mike Kazaleh, and Kent Butterworth provide commentary for the Night of the Bat-Bat/Scrap-Happy episode and on the Mighty's Benefit Plan/See You in the Funny Papers episode as well. These tracks are interesting though it'd have been preferable to get Kricfalusi's thoughts over the flower sniffing episode in particular as he was the one who created the scene in question. Regardless, these are interesting talks that cover influences, themes, ideas, styles and which give a good overview of their involvement in the series, including their thoughts on working with Bakshi.
Also included here are three original Terrytoons Mighty Mouse episodes - He Dood It Again, from 1943, introduces us to Super Mouse (a red and blue hero before he turned to the yellow and red costume and changed his name; Gypsy Life from 1945 features an opera singing Mighty Mouse; and Mysterious Package from 1960 which is a fairly standard episode. These are interesting cartoons in their own right but they're made all the more interesting when compared to the episodes from Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures.
The best extra is the forty-five minute documentary, Breaking The Mold: The Re-Making Of Mighty Mouse, which includes input from Ralph Bakshi, Andrew Stanton, John Kricfalusi, Tom Minton, Mike Kazaleh, Kent Butterworth, Libby Simon, and Bruce Timm and which provides a really thorough overview of the series. Presented in anamorphic widescreen and well edited to include some poignant clips, the series touches on its influence, what made it different from other shows at the time it originally aired and more. Not too surprisingly, the flower sniffing incident is also covered here, which makes for interesting viewing.
A few unrelated promos for other CBS DVDs are included and each episode has its original teaser spot available to watch as an option before the episode proper begins. Menus and episode selection are included and on the reverse side of the cover art there's a complete episode listing and disc content breakdown.
The Final Word:
One of the best animated series of the eighties, Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures - The Complete Series deserves a spot on any animation fan's DVD shelf. The episodes all look and sound great and hold up better than a lot of people probably ever expected they would, while the extras are interesting, informative, and plentiful. This release is awesome in pretty much every possible way.