(c) Disney

The series is divided into four individually sold volumes in unique collectable packaging. The discs themselves are stored in mini film canisters, and each set comes with a nifty “passport�? that maps out the locations for each film. Roy himself introduces each volume, live from Disney’s Animal Kingdom, which itself was partly inspired (along with Disneyland’s Adventureland) by the TLAs.

Disc 1 opens with the Oscar-winning feature White Wilderness (1958). Filmed in Canada over six years, viewers travel way up north to witness massive avalanches, majestic polar bears, happy-go-lucky seals and the infamous saga of the lemming.  Moments of true suspense highlight this outing, one of the series' best.  Features Oliver Wallace's sweeping, Oscar-nominated score.

Three TLA featurettes follow, starting with the Oscar-winning Water Birds (1952) in a version vastly superior to its previous DVD appearance on The Rescuers. Migratory birds are the subjects here, including pompous pelicans, dapper ducks and flamboyant flamingoes. “Nature’s engineer�? is the star of Beaver Valley (1950), another Oscar-winner, which depicts how the workmanlike beaver and his dam helps his woodland neighbors. One of the less successful TLAs, Prowlers of the Everglades (1953), which closes out the disc, is no Crocodile Hunter. This trip to southern Florida is marred by an odd day-glow hue to the footage.

The first of disc 2’s bonus features is the non-TLA short Mysteries of the Deep (1959), with narration written by Roy. This Oscar nominee takes you under the sea to a coral reef and all its myriad denizens. Two anthology episodes follow: “Wonders of the Water World�? (from Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color, 1961) is filled with outtake footage - if you’re looking for deleted scenes, here they are; and “The Crisler Story�? (from Disneyland, 1957), goes behind the camera with photographers Herb and Lois Crisler as they film the caribou for White Wilderness.

Each volume includes a cross-promotional featurette taking you “Backstage with Roy Disney at Disney’s Animal Kingdom�?. This episode: birds. After a brief “Tribute to James Algar�?, who directed most of the TLAs, we come to the first “Filmmaker’s Journals�?. Basically the “making of�? feature for each volume, they include new and archival interviews with such surviving participants as photographers Elma Milotte, Lloyd Beebe and Paul Kenworthy and editor Norman “Stormy�? Palmer. They offer invaluable insights into the making of each film, with special attention made to the musical contributions of Paul Smith and Oliver Wallace. Not quite as successful is the inclusion of interviews of sound effects expert Jimmy Macdonald, which seem tacked on.

The perky Stacia Martin, a Disney historian, pops in for “Collectors’ Corner�? featurettes on each set, showcasing the merchandise created for each of the TLAs. Each volume also has corresponding theatrical trailers for each feature.

Volume II - “Lands of Exploration�?

If you get only one volume of this series, this would be the one. It includes the three most famous TLAs, Oscar-winners all, on disc 1 alone.

The Living Desert (1953), the first TLA feature and the first film ever released by the then newly formed Buena Vista Distribution Company, offers a lot of the iconic imagery the TLAs are known for (see “Top 10�? side bars). Set in Death Valley, California (the lowest point in North America), Desert offers majestic views of Monument Valley, bubbling mud puddles, unrelenting sand storms, frisky roadrunners, amorous tortoises, heroic kangaroo rats, sidewinders twisting in the moonlight and the dreaded Gila monster, all set to Paul Smith’s classic score.

Following Desert chronologically, The Vanishing Prairie (1954) surpasses it as arguably the best of the whole bunch. The immense grasslands of the central United States are the setting, its inhabitants its cast of characters: dancing whooping cranes, regal buffalos, fleet-footed antelope, cunning coyotes, range fires and flash floods - but it is the industrious - and personable - prairie dogs who end up stealing the whole show.

Seal Island (1948) was the very first TLA and set the tone for all that followed in its illustrious flipper-prints. Summer means mating season for these seals, and the monstrous bulls (with startlingly human-like faces), known as “beach masters�?, collect any available female into “harems�?, resulting in the cutest - if most awkward - batch of babies in the whole series.

Two non-TLA nature shorts, Islands of the Sea (1960) and Nature’s Strangest Creatures (1959) can be found on the second disc, and both equal or even surpass some of the “official�? TLA shorts. The Oscar-nominated Islands takes a tour of several uniquely populated isles (including the island of Midway, deep in the pacific, where Orville the Albatross surely hailed from), while Nature’s takes us down under for a peek at Australia’s own menagerie of oddities, including rare footage of the noble platypus.

“Prairie�? (from World of Color, 1954) is, as its title suggests, a look at the making of The Vanishing Prairie, while the Disneyland segment here takes you “Behind the True-Life Cameras�? (1955) during the filming of Secrets of Life and The African Lion. After a DAK visit by Roy with some insects and snakes, this volume’s “Filmmaker’s Journals�? details how Seal Island won the Oscar, thus insuring the success of the rest of the series. Also included is rare “backstage�? footage of the “controlled environment�? sets for Living Desert and Vanishing Prairie and Roy’s chuckle-worthy story about the latter film’s famous duck sequence. This edition’s “Collectors’ Corner�? focuses mostly on The Living Desert and concludes with an amusing anecdote that would leave a certain boy wonder exclaiming “holy bat poop!�?