This phenomenon is even more true of DePatie-Freleng's output, as children of the 1970s probably know these cartoons best from The Pink Panther Show (1969-80) and its various spin-offs and retitlings, even while new shorts were still premiering in movie theaters back then. Cartoon (or CGI) short subjects have made a minor comeback in recent years, often preceding a big animated feature release, but from the early 1980s until very recently they had all but disappeared. I recall seeing scattered new DePatie-Freleng cartoons ahead of United Artists features, classic Disney shorts accompanying their new films and reissues, and, strangely enough, even (then) 20-year-old Three Stooges live-action shorts (always from the mid-1950s and featuring Moe-Larry-Shemp) ahead of some kiddie programs as late as the mid-1970s.

By the early 1960s, however, pretty much all the major studios had given up on theatrical short cartoons. DePatie-Freleng came about when in 1961 David DePatie became the last executive in charge of Warner Bros.'s cartoon division. Soon after, the studio informed DePatie that Warners would be ending its cartoon production as soon as the last batch of shorts was completed. Sensing an opportunity, he partnered with cartoon director (and, by this point, also producer) Friz Freleng to lease WB's animation department holdings and produce new material independently, probably with an eye on commercials, feature film title design, and miscellaneous projects for television.

But, as fate would have it, one of their first projects was to design the animated titles for Blake Edwards' The Pink Panther (1963), which turned out to be a huge box office success, in no small part because of its charming cartoon title design, featuring as it did a rascally pink panther, representing the Pink Panther diamond in the movie, around which the plot revolves. At a time when nearly every studio in town was closing shop, Edwards (via his Geoffrey Productions) and distributor United Artists probably shocked DePatie and Freleng by not only contracting a series of Pink Panther theatrical cartoons, but ordering several years' worth of shorts all at once, an unprecedented arrangement. (As cartoon expert Jerry Beck notes in the Blu-ray's excellent featurette, UA clearly had their sights set not only on theatrical distribution but, eventually, TV as well.) It was a shrewd move.

As A Shot in the Dark has nothing whatsoever to do with the Pink Panther diamond, DePatie-Freleng created a new cartoon character, The Inspector, essentially a cell-animated Clouseau. While their Pink Panther cartoons featured Henry Mancini's iconic music, The Inspector cartoons likewise utilize Mancini's less famous but equally catchy title music from A Shot in the Dark. These and other cartoons from DePatie-Freleng ("The Ant and the Aardvark," "The Tijuana Toads," etc.) eventually turned up on the various Pink Panther TV shows.

Typical Inspector cartoons have the never-named title character (voiced by the late Pat Harrington, Jr.) assigned a new case by the Commissioner (usually Paul Frees, but sometimes Marvin Miller or Larry Storch). Always tagging along is the strangely Spanish-accented gendarme Deux-Deux (also Harrington), for additional comic relief, and the villains they faced were often strikingly surreal and inhuman. One such example was "The Blotch," something like liquid red ink, with eyes.

I hadn't seen these shorts in probably 40 years, but correctly remembered them as something like a cross between the later, less ambitious Warner Bros. cartoons, the last batch of which DePatie-Freleng also produced, with some of the more adult wit of Rocky & Bullwinkle. Produced on presumably tiny budgets in a style for 15-odd years heavily influenced by the more abstract and schematic look of UPA's cartoon shorts, The Inspector has very limited animation but reasonably appealing design work, with especially colorful backgrounds.

Humor-wise, they're a strange mixture of recycled Warner Bros.-style violent slapstick (lots of bombs exploding in the Inspector's face), here presented almost in shorthand form, as if everyone already knew the gags, so let's get on with it; coupled with more adult-appealing puns mangling French and English words.

The shorts' titles make this plain. The set includes the following: The Great DeGaulle Stone Operation; Reux, Reux, Reux Your Boat; Napoleon Blown-Aparte; Cirrhosis of the Louvre; Plastered in Paris; Cock-a-Doodle Deux Deux; Ape Suzette; The Pique Poquette of Paris; Sicque! Sicque! Sicque! ; That's No Lady - That's Notre Dame! ; Unsafe and Seine; Toulouse La Trick; Sacre Bleu Cross; Le Quiet Squad; Bomb Voyage; Le Pig-Al Patrol; Le Bowser Bagger; Le Escape Goat; Le Cop on the Rocks; Crow De Guerre; Canadian Can-Can; Tour De Farce; The Shooting of Caribou Lou; London Derriere; Les Miserobots; Transylvania Mania; Bear De Guerre; Cherche Le Phantom; Le Great Dane Robbery; Le Ball and Chain Gang; La Feet's Defeat; French Freud; Pierre and Cottage Cheese; and Cartre Blanched.

Video & Audio

The shorts are on two Blu-ray discs, in 1.37:1 format. Presumably they were intended for 1.66:1 widescreen in theaters, but composed also with the 4:3 television format in mind. The framing is comparatively tight, so the decision to go with 1.37:1 seems reasonable. The image is fairly impressive throughout, with the subtle color palette especially benefiting. The DTS-HD 2.0 mono (English only, no subtitles) is adequate. The discs are region A encoded.

Extra Features

This set's main assets are its special features. Two 17-minute featurettes, "Goodbye, Warner Bros., Hello DePatie-Freleng" and "Of Aardvarks, Ants, Inspectors, and Cranes" prominently feature cartoon historian Jerry Beck, who really knows his stuff, and puts these shorts into context in a clear, intelligent, observant manner. He's joined by a few surviving members of the DePatie-Freleng team, though not David DePatie himself, now 87. There are also audio commentaries on six of the shorts, some by Beck, others by Greg Ford and which incorporate archival audio of Friz Freleng.

Final Thoughts

More for nostalgia buffs than today's kids (my eight-year, who'll normally have eyes glued to just about anything animated, found these rather dull), The Inspector is fascinating as a one of the last great gasps of big studio, theatrical short cartoons, and the extras really bolster this set, but as entertainment they're only fair. Still, overall, Recommended.

Stuart Galbraith IV is the Kyoto-based film historian and publisher-editor of World Cinema Paradise. His new documentary and latest audio commentary, for the British Film Institute's Blu-ray of Rashomon, is now available.