Tex Avery worked at
Leon Schlesinger Productions directing
Looney Tunes and
Merrie Melodies shorts for
Warner Bros. between 1936 and 1941. Here, Avery had developed the
Looney Tunes signature style of
cartoon humor and was essential in the creation and/or development of many of the studio's star characters, including
Porky Pig,
Daffy Duck,
Elmer Fudd and most notably
Bugs Bunny. In 1941, after a dispute with Schlesinger over the ending of the Bugs Bunny cartoon
The Heckling Hare, Avery was "suspended" from the studio. After spending a few months at
Paramount Pictures developing a short-lived series of live-action comedy shorts named
Speaking of Animals, Avery was hired by the MGM cartoon studio. Between the years of 1942 and 1955, Avery directed over 60 one-shot cartoons with only a handful of reoccurring characters such as
Screwy Squirrel,
George and Junior and
Droopy. Many animation fans and historians consider this period of Avery's career to be his finest output and amongst the best cartoons of the
Golden Age of American Animation. Five of Avery's MGM cartoons,
Red Hot Riding Hood (1943),
King-Size Canary (1947),
Bad Luck Blackie (1949),
Little Rural Riding Hood (1949) and
Northwest Hounded Police (1946), were included in
The 50 Greatest Cartoons book in 1994 as selected by 1,000 animation professionals. In addition,
Blitz Wolf (1942) and
Little Johnny Jet (1953) were nominated for an
Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in 1942 and 1952 respectively, and
Magical Maestro was deemed "culturally, historically and aesthetically important" by the
Library of Congress and was selected for preservation in the
National Film Registry in 1993. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, MGM and
Turner Entertainment released VHS and Laserdisc collections of Avery's work, such as the
Tex Avery Screwball Classics sub-series of Cartoon Moviestars VHS tapes, and
The Compleat Tex Avery laserdisc collection in 1993. Throughout the 2000s and 2010s, Tex Avery's MGM cartoons were notably absent on DVD and Blu-ray. According to animation historian
Jerry Beck and Warner Archive Senior Vice President George Feltenstein, this lack of availability was because most of the original
film negatives to pre-1951 MGM cartoons were destroyed in the 1978 film vault fire at the
George Eastman House leaving only inferior duplicate copies, mainly mid-1990s Turner broadcast television masters as seen on the Ted Turner-owned cable networks
Cartoon Network and
Boomerang that were unsuitable for HD releases. which was released in December 2020 containing 21 restored and uncut shorts as well as
Tex Avery: The King of Cartoons, an archival documentary as a special feature. According to Jerry Beck production on Volume 2 started in March 2020 with an entirely different selection of cartoons and was intended for a release date of June 2020. However, due to the outbreak of the
COVID-19 pandemic, lockdown restrictions prevented the restoration team from working at their facilities, and were forced to use shorts that were already being restored by
HBO Max independently - which was incidentally a completely different line up of cartoons than what the Warner Archive team initially had planned. The set had to be delayed from June to December because the initial restoration quality of the shorts done by HBO Max was so poor that it was deemed "unreleasable" and the transfers had to be sent back multiple times to be redone and fix the problems. Initially, 25 cartoons were planned, but only 21 of them lived up to Warner Archives' high standards and made the final cut. Since cartoons were not restored by the regular Warner Archive team when
Volume 2 was released on December 15, 2020, the set received a somewhat mixed reception from fans noting some minor issues with DVNR, color correction, as well as titles being redone with
Photoshop. The next volume was delayed and at one point was put on hiatus due to numerous layoffs at Warner Bros. in January 2021, including George Feltenstein. As a result, most of the volume's production was done without his oversight and plans for using original 35mm film print for
The Shooting of Dan McGoo (1945) courtesy of animator Mark Kausler, and a documentary about the original titles to MGM cartoons featuring the original titles for
Wild and Woolfy (1945) had to be cut. However, George was able to return in August of that year and has since taken back his role at Warner Archive. Volume 3 was released on October 5, 2021. As of 2023, 62 of Avery's 67 MGM cartoons have been released, with the 5 remaining unreleased cartoons being
Henpecked Hoboes (1946), ''
Uncle Tom's Cabaña (1947), Half-Pint Pygmy
(1948), Lucky Ducky (1948) and Cat's Meow (1957) — the latter being a CinemaScope remake of Ventriloquist Cat'' — made after Avery's departure. ''
Droopy's Good Deed (1951) and Millionaire Droopy (1956) have been released, but those cartoons can be seen only on Tex Avery's Droopy - The Complete Theatrical Collection''. == Tex Avery Screwball Classics: Volume 1 ==