DVDizzy Forum

This is something I want to see on home media (DVD or Blu), the full collection of all Rankin/Bass specials.

I was just pondering this while I was just looking at my "The Original Christmas Classics" set. A definitive set of them all, the popular ones as well as the more obscure ones that have not yet been released on any home media yet. Would be cool to see. Why do you think they haven't done it yet?

Sony / ClassicMedia have also released a bunch of episodes from the "Festival of Family Classics" series, and the stand-alone special "Return to Oz" on DVD.

Barbossa wrote:Why do you think they haven't done it yet?

For one thing, there are different studios involved. Some of the most popular ones are Classic Media, but Warner has a bunch of other ones. Neither studio seems to want to release more than one or two per disc anyway.

Barbossa wrote:This is something I want to see on home media (DVD or Blu), the full collection of all Rankin/Bass specials.

I was just pondering this while I was just looking at my "The Original Christmas Classics" set. A definitive set of them all, the popular ones as well as the more obscure ones that have not yet been released on any home media yet. Would be cool to see. Why do you think they haven't done it yet?

Nice thread!

It would seem unlikely to have them all in one set as Classic Media holds the rights to the first 5 Christmas specials (which are thankfully all on their Christmas Classics set), and Warner is the rightsholders of the remaining 13. (14 if you count the much more recent Santa Baby, from 2001, though I'm not sure who has those rights).

Of those 13 WB holds the rights to from the original R/B era, 9 have been released on their "Classic Christmas Favorites" set with Stingiest Man In Town, Pinocchio's Christmas, and Leprechaun's Christmas Gold exclusive to that set.

As for why Warner hasn't come out with an all-inclusive R/B set of all the Christmas specials they have the rights to, including the 4 not included on their existing set, that is a very good question. Jack Frost is available as a stand-alone DVD, and Life And Adventures of Santa Claus only available as a "burn on demand" release from the Warner Archives, but it's never had a proper retail DVD release.

This still leaves The Story Of the First Christmas Snow and Little Drummer Boy Book 2 without ever having had a DVD release of ANY kind. Every year I hope they will get one, and they would have been a great fit as bonus episodes on the recent Twas the Night Before Christmas standalone DVD release.

At least all 3 of the R/B Easter Specials are now out on DVD, since Warner released the long-awaited The First Easter Rabbit this past spring.

The only Rankin/Bass holiday special I have no memory of seeing is Mouse on the Mayflower, their only Thanksgiving special. Being from 1968, this would make it up to Classic Media to release this.

I think I vaguely remember "Story of the First Christmas Snow". Isn't it about a blind boy in an orphanage?

Hehehe when I first saw "Rankin/Bass" my mind automatically thought of their Hobbit and Return of the King movies

Cordy_Biddle wrote:I think I vaguely remember "Story of the First Christmas Snow". Isn't it about a blind boy in an orphanage?

Yes, that's the one! A half hour special from 1975 in stop-motion, told and sung by Angela Lansbury as Sister Theresa. It's one of my favorites.

Here is the Wikipedia link, which contains spoilers:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_First_ ... stmas_Snow

They just about have all of them out. It seems to me the road that Warner takes for the ones they own is every few years, release one more obscure one into a complete set. But then again, maybe they won't release the last ones? I don't know, they could end up being release via the Warner Archives DVD's.

Barbossa wrote:Of those 13 WB holds the rights to from the original R/B era, 9 have been released on their "Classic Christmas Favorites" set with Stingiest Man In Town, Pinocchio's Christmas, and Leprechaun's Christmas Gold exclusive to that set.

I have an earlier version of that box set and unfortunately those three specials are not on there (but Horton Hears a Who is, since it is on the Grinch DVD). I'd really like to have them, but I'm not buying the set over again for just those three.

I'm also puzzled as to why Warner Archive put Nestor on the Life and Adventures of Santa Claus DVD and not a special that hasn't been released before.