Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

A forum poster over at UltimateDisney.com seems to have uncovered that Zorro will be included in Wave 9 of Walt Disney Treasures. View a scan of the flyer

Another post that features an e-mail response from Leonard Maltin seems to indicate a Ludwig Von Drake set also in development:

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Well hopefully they don't colorize Zorro like they have been for the season sets. Presumably Maltin can set them straight on that.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

I'm still hoping they'll put out Kurt Russell and the Osmonds at the Haunted Mansion in some odd set.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

If they can just gather all of the remaining theatrical animated shorts together, then that'll probably be the last Treasure that I'd purchase.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Given the demand for Dr Syn this set could be just as difficult to locate without an increase in production.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

I'd certaily buy both ZORRO and a VON DRAKE set.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

I don't see how they'd fubar the set that badly. Really, I don't even want to see the colorized versions anywhere on the set: not as extras, not on the cover...nowhere.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

I'll buy any treasure they release. Nice to hear these are continuing. I'd like to see more of those legacy ones too, whatever that series that TRUE LIFE ADVENTURES came out in. They could do a run of educational films under that banner.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

It's kind of mind boggling and downright silly that they won't release one of their classics, i.e., "Song of the South," which has nothing in it any worse than "Gone With the Wind" has.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Zorro lasted two seasons, 82 episodes altogether, including 4 hour-long episodes that some fans consider a third season, so it can't all be in one volume of Walt Disney Treasures. The Disney Movie Club issued the first season, 39 episodes, over five volumes, or about 8 episodes per disc. The second season has started to come out now (amazon and ebay resellers are trying to control those and are selling them at outrageous prices). I wonder if this new release will be in multiple volumes or as a box-set for each season. My hope is for a box-set of each season. Supplements would be nice. It will sell like crazy in any case. People have been demanding Zorro since DVD began 11 years ago.

Speculation: perhaps the Treasures set will not repeat the Movie Club edition. Some stories and themes lasted over a number of episodes between 1957-1960. These were later assembled into feature-length -- I forget if it was 4 or 5 Zorro films including the origin story -- which appeared on vhs two decades ago. Picture quality, not so good. Or perhaps the Treasures set will consist of the 4 hour-long episodes from 1961. The latter seems to me the most likely.

If anyone has inside information, let us know.

Plus it's a gentler movie than Gone With the Wind. It appears that Song of the South is sold in France exclusively by the Disney theme park there. At least that's what a website claims that offers the DVD as an import. Someone said it's a bootleg but it sure looks authentic to me. I plan to buy it after the holidays. I will post the link if anyone wants to look over the website.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Assuming Zorro is included in the next Treasures wave, I'm expecting it to be the hour long episodes. It's about the right size for a Treasures and would come out probably about the time they were finishing up season two for the club.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Have you seen Viewmaster's 3-D slides of Disney's Zorro? Viewmaster released two different 3-D sets, or six reels of 3-D slides.

Viewmaster's Zorro is interesting for two reasons. First, the spectacular stereoscopic photography makes you realize how great this series would have looked as a 3-D feature film. Second, the slides are in color, whereas the program was monochrome. So we get to see the natural color behind the scenes. The color pallette is designed for monochrome filming, with set walls, props and costumes co-ordinated in different shades of black, white, gray, and brown. This is how it really looked on the set, a simpler and entirely different palette than the colorized version.

I think Disney has been playing Zorro too close to the vest. Time to just release the program with its beautiful monochrome photography in box-sets that everybody can buy. Perhaps a colorized version, too, for those who prefer it.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

It is a bootleg. The transfer comes from the Hong Kong LD release which doesn't include the burned in subtitles at the start of each song like the Japense LD release.

WALT DISNEY PRESENTS: ZORRO!!!!!

When push comes to shove it seems that these (major) DVD distribution companies always release the dullest, most lackluster and least interesting tv properties in their possession.

ZORRO (ABC 1957-59) is another rarity in my top 10 tv series want list but in the interim there were also 4 hour long ZORRO segments produced for the WALT DISNEY PRESENTS (ABC 1954-61) tv series that could all be handily packaged together in a WALT DISNEY TREASURES collection.

These segments consist of:

01) "El Bandido" (30/10/1960)
02) "Adios El Cuchillo" (06/11/1960)
03) "The Postponed Wedding" (01/01/1961)
04) "Auld Acquaintance" (04/02/1961)

Perhaps the two ZORRO tv episode compilation films THE SIGN OF ZORRO (1961) and ZORRO THE AVENGER (1962) could also be included (or failing that the still outstanding ELFEGO BACA segments).

At the very least let's get something positive started here! How about it Disney?! I'm sure that the late Walt Disney would certainly approve.

Jeff T.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

I wonder how well a 9th wave will do without any character cartoons left to anchor it.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Zorro is sufficiently popular and in demand to anchor the next wave. Disney generally crams at least 2.5 hours onto a Treasures disc. Some discs run 3 or 4 hours. All four hour-long episodes could conceivably fill 1 disc. Two or three feature-length edits lasting roughly 90 minutes could fill the second disc. Or maybe the feature length edits -- I think there's five of them altogher including the origin story The Sign of Zorro, Zorro and the Mountain Men with co-star Annette Funicello, Zorro and the Eagle, and The Secret of El Zorro -- will fill both discs, instead of the hour-long episodes. Disney is probably mulling over the possibilities now.

It's a long wait until December 2009.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Zorro will be a definite buy for me. I don't own many of the treasure sets because I came across the line late and missed a lot of them but I loved the ones I did get. I don't want to pay through the nose for the ones I missed through third party sellers. I hope we get more Spin and Marty and/or The Hardy Boys this year, if not, then in the next wave.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

-- deleted --

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Bumping up this topic with the latest update from UltimateDisney.com on Wave 9: Cover art here

It's an interesting move. Just one series really, but heavy emphasis on that title. Sort of a cop-out for a Treasures release.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Wow. $60 MSRP?!? Yikers.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

$41.99 pre-order at amazon.com :

Amazon.com: Walt Disney Treasures: Zorro - The Complete First Season: Movies & TV

Amazon.com: Walt Disney Treasures: Zorro - The Complete Second Season: Movies & TV

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

A very interesting move, but it does make sense from a marketing perspective.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Thanks for the links.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

just these two, or are there going to be more treasures this year?

considering I went as Zorro for halloween when I was seven and that was entirely due to the show's reruns on disney channel at the time, I'll be getting these, just as did every other Treasures set.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

That was my initial thought but each set does have 39 episodes and is (I believe) 6 discs each. So all that for $42 isn't that bad in my mind.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

My other way of looking at the pricing this time around is that I normally pay between $75 and $100 in discounted pricing per wave, depending on the number of titles. So, 80 bucks for wave 9 is right in line for me. Of course, I'm one of those nuts who buys every Treasure.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

These are 6 discs sets instead of the normal 2 disc. Plus this will surely be $99.00 plus dollars on e-bay the week after release when its sold out, so I wouldn't hesitate if you want it.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

Oh I'm well versed on how MSRPs translate to real shelf prices AND to the supply/demand issues with WDT titles.

The higher-than-before price on these sets just means a big initial commitment on the part of the buyer (although, as Scott points out, the hit ain't so bad for completists since there are fewer titles in this wave).

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

I'm pre-ordering these. I don't want to get suckered into paying a speculator twice what the disc is worth like that Dr. Syn incident.

Re: Walt Disney Treasures: Wave 9

yup I got my preorder in as well. Just wish that there was an animated treasure to accompany these. :-p