Behind the Tunes: Porky Pig Roast - A Tribute to the World's Most Famous Ham

"Behind the Tunes: Porky Pig Roast - A Tribute to the World's Most Famous Ham" was created for Disc 2 of the "Looney Tunes: Golden Collection" DVD. The short documentary assumes that you know absolutely nothing about filmdom's well-known stuttering swine; I already knew most of what they discussed. I had never realized that Porky's stutter was supposed to sound like oinking, or that Porky and Bugs didn't co-star on account of their similar personalities.

So, it's mostly interesting - for me, at least - to see interviews with relatives of the cartoons' creators and Leonard Maltin. Worth seeing, if only once.

The history of Porky Pig is what this short featurette is all about. It's part of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume One, and can be viewed on disc two.

Porky was just one of the ensemble in early cartoon, just one of a group, but people liked him best. "He just stole that show," historian Jerry Beck points out. "They ended up making Porky the star of the (early) Looney Tunes."

From there, famous guys in the business like Tex Avery began doing Porky cartoons in the mid and late '30s, "many of them his best cartoons," according to film critic Leonard Maltin.

Anyway, there is a bunch of information packed in this short feature and all of it's pretty interesting.

This short three minute and 44 second featurette, which can be found as an extra on Disc two of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 1. It's nothing more than a basic primer for the character of Porky Pig made, I'm thinking, with an eye geared for newbies to the classical Looney Tunes. It details how Porky first came to be so beloved today. This is really REALLY basic stuff (the same can be said for pretty much all the other Behind the Toons feauterettes that are on Volume 1, fortunately the Behind the Tune features would get so much better starting with the ones found on volume 2).

My Grade: C-