TV Show Review: Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends - Season 2

Stars: 5 out of 5

Pros: 26 hours guaranteed to tickle your punny bone

Cons: Clear "R&B" logo in lower right hand corner, middle segment not in booklet

The Bottom Line:

Some more funny puns

Provide plenty more great fun

For young for and old

The Pun Continues

Back with their second season of groan inducing puns, it's the cartoon adventures of Rocky the Flying Squirrel and Bullwinkle the Moose!!!

This time around, we get 52 half hour episodes on 4 double-sided DVD's. That'll keep you watching and laughing for quite some time. Each episode features two segments starring our heroes. There are seven plots for our heroes this go around.

Upsidaisium, by far the longest with 36 segments, tells the story of Bullwinkle's inheritance of a anti-gravity metal. Trying to get it to Washington proves dangerous when the pair must deal with their old nemesis, Boris and Natasha.

Metal Munching Mice finds our heroes facing a horrid terror in the form of six feet tall metal mice who eat television antennas. The horror!

Greenpernt Oogle finds Bullwinkle kidnapped to take the place of an island's oogle bird. Now he must accurately predict the weather or else.

Rue Britannia once again deals with Bullwinkle inheriting something. This time, it's an English estate. The catch? He has to live in Abominable Manor for a week. Even though he's been living in an abominable manner all his life, he still faces danger since the other heirs have hired Boris and Natasha to do him in.

Buried Treasure Frostbite Falls is running a contest to increase it's circulation. Soon, the entire town is searching for the treasure. But Boris wants to use it as an excuse to rob the local bank.

The Last Angry Moose, the shortest with only 4 segments, finds Bullwinkle in Hollywood trying to make a movie for a director bearing a remarkable resemblance to Boris.

Wailing Whale Ships are disappearing and it's up to Rocky and Bullwinkle to find the fearsome whale Maybe Dick and put a stop to the whole thing.

Of course, each 30 minute episode includes other fun segments as well. It has either a Fractured Fairytale (a take off of some well known tale or fairytales in general) or an Aesop Fable (fable like stories with a humorous twist); Bullwinkle's Corner (poetry acted out and mocked), Mr. Know-It-All (Bullwinkle trying to show us how to do something and failing), or a Rocky and Bullwinkle Fan Club segment (actually, these are rather stupid, so fortunately there are only a handful); and Dudley Do-right (a riff melodramas set in a Royal Canadian Mounted Police Camp) or Peabody's Incredible History (Mr. Peabody, a dog, and his boy Sherman travel back in time and make sure history actually happens). In fact, this set contains my favorite Dudley segment, "Saw Mill."

The show was low budget TV from the 60's, so its animation isn't going to impress anyone. It's simple and often slightly off from one shot to the next. However, it serves its purpose to tell the story, and the dialogue is so funny you really won't care.

The set this time around has a Sherman and Mr. Peabody theme with the cover art and they get a couple page write up in the included booklet.

The set includes 16 minutes of extras on the final disc. The highlight of these is an interview with June Foray, voice of Rocky, Natasha, and countless other characters in the show. There are also three Bullwinkle commercials for Cheerios, a segment from "Kirwood Derby," part of the next season set, and a downright hysterical spoof ad for "Moose Calls: The Best of Bullwinkle Sings."

Purists will note that the opening and closing from the last season set is once again present for almost all of episodes. It changes for the final 9 - no idea why. Personally, I didn't grow up watching the show, so these don't mean much to me. A little more annoying is the presence of the mostly clear "R&B" in the lower right hand corner for a couple minutes each segment. My biggest complain is that the middle segment (Bullwinkle's Corner or Mr. Know-It-All) isn't included in the episode guide in the booklet. On the plus side, the full frame picture is super clear and practically free from dust. The mono sound, while not impressive by today's standards, gets the job done perfectly.

This show's wit and puns tickle my funny bone every time I watch it. With a great low price for what you get, you won't find a better deal then this second season set.