Here's something of a long-planned project for me. After going through many cartoon series last year, I've finally decided to tackle an all-time favorite. The Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoon series (I'm treating them as one, as they were essentially the same for most of their existence) have been important to me since my early childhood when I was especially a huge Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner fan. But despite seeing many of these shorts, I've never seen the full series. So here it goes, starting from 1930 and going all the way to 1969. Along the way, I will also watch other related shorts made by WB and their cartoon studios. I'll try to review each cartoon with some occasional background details, though they'll be fairly short given the huge amount of content. I'll also try my best to take the era into account, so a cartoon that receives a certain rating in the early 30s might have got a slightly harsher review if it had come out in the later years. Especially innovative cartoons are bound to get some bonus points!

It all started with a man named Leon Schlesinger. He had been producing intertitles for silent films, but with the advent of sound films, that business was no longer quite what it used to be. Inspired by the success of cartoon shorts, especially those by Disney, he decided to start producing his own ones. Supposedly John R. McCrory pitched his creation "Buster Bear" to him, but Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising's short film "Bosko the Talk-Ink Kid" made a much bigger impression and they were hired to produce and direct the new cartoons.

Bosko the Talk-Ink Kid
A live-action animator (played by Rudolf Ising himself) draws Bosko who then does his best to entertain the audience. The interaction between the animator and his creation and the cartoonish behavior of Bosko make this quite impressive for the time, I'm not surprised this convinced Schlesinger to hire the two.
8

The first short wasn't seen by the public until decades later. But on April 19, 1930, the first Looney Tunes cartoon was released – an event whose real significance would only be realized decades later.

Sinkin' in the Bathtub
And this is where it all officially began! Essentially a musical cartoon with Bosko making an instrument out of pretty much everything. He also takes his girlfriend Honey for a ride in his car but not everything goes well. Old-fashioned but in a charming way – no one would probably count this as one of the best in the series, but I think the series could have had a much worse start.
8

Congo Jazz
Bosko is in the jungle and has some run-ins with various animals. Thankfully music is the solution to the problem! Not quite as good as the first one (I felt some scenes went on a bit too long), but I liked the jazzy soundtrack!
7.5

Hold Anything
Bosko works at a construction site, and surprisingly, makes music with various objects and animals. Not much in the sense of a plot, but the funniest gags in the series so far (especially a surprising one involving a slightly Mickey-like mouse).
8

The Booze Hangs High
Bosko on a farm, otherwise not much has changed, apart from the addition of alcohol and some toilet humor. The drunken piglets are quite memorable. The cartoons already seem to be getting a little edgier!
7.5

Box Car Blues
Bosko is on a train with a hobo pig. Suddenly his car comes off, leading to a chase involving a cow. This felt quite repetitive (especially the admittedly impressive animation of the cow running from the train being shown many times) and maybe also too derivative of the car scenes in "Sinkin' in the Bathtub".
6.5

In addition to the Looney Tunes, Leon Schlesinger started another series of shorts this year, the Spooney Melodies (later renamed Song'Nata). This series, credited to Neil McGuire, featured popular songs, combining simple animation with live-action performances by a singer and an organist. It didn't prove as successful as its sister series and would soon be replaced by another one...

Crying for the Carolines
The first Spooney Melody features Milton Charles, "the Singing Organist" performing the titular song (which had also been performed by Bosko and the pig in "Box Car Blues"). The animation is very limited, but the drawings are very abstract and surreal for the time with interesting visual effects, and the song itself is quite haunting. Somehow this makes for a fascinating and a little creepy combination that works well, though I'm not surprised this series didn't last longer.
8

Over the decades, Warner Bros. would sometimes also distribute animated shorts made by studios other than Leon Schlesinger Productions. This year, two stop-motion Dolly Daisy shorts with puppet animation by Charles Bennes (and occasional cel animation) were released in the Vitaphone Varieties series: "Dizzy Doings" and "Hearts and Flowers". These two shorts have fared pretty badly – the former appears to be completely lost, while the latter only survives as a silent print.

Hearts and Flowers
Directed by Howard Moss
Two boys (one of them apparently called Mugzee – he also appeared in other shorts by the creators) go to Dolly Daisy's house. They're both interested in her, taking her for rides in their cars until Dolly flies away with a balloon. Eventually she lands when the balloon is shot down by her father. All I can say is it's an extremely weird and confusing short! We see peeping, people getting crushed by window panes and run over by cars, the moon getting shot... The stop-motion animation is quite fluid for the time, but the puppets' faces give them a rather creepy vibe. A strong candidate for the strangest animated short ever released by WB.

I think the first year, while not having many cartoons, is a promising one. The cartoons are still far away from the style and quality of the later ones, but they're definitely enjoyable for what they are. It must also be noted that in the Depression era, the cheerful characters singing and dancing must have made a much bigger impression than they would today, and most studios' cartoons followed this style back then. On to another year!