All About: The Ultimate Collection/Best Of California Dreams/Best Of The Littles/Best Of The Get Along Gang/Busy World Of Richard Scarry: Good Times Never End/Encounters From Another Dimension/Outside The Wire: The Complete Series/Punky Brewster: Best Of Season Three/Simon & Simon: Best Of Season Three (Cookie Jar/Mill Creek DVDs)/Spot Goes To School (BBC DVD)/Sniper: The Unseen Warrior (Mill Creek DVD)

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: D (Spot: C+, Sniper: C-)     Episodes: C+/D/C-/C-/C/C-/C/D/D/B-/C+

 

 

Here is a new cycle of budget releases from Mill Creek Entertainment with a nice child’s selection from the BBC…

 

 

All About: The Ultimate Collection is the best of the live action releases with ten shows for children that show them the worlds of cars, trucks, horses and more for ten shows in all.  These special interest series are not made as much and are underrated.

 

Best Of California Dreams takes episodes from the dreaded series we reviewed at this link and less is not more as a result:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/8362/California+Dreams+%E2%80%93+Sea

 

We also get two so-so animated show, Best Of The Littles (animated elves) and Best Of The Get Along Gang (animated animals) that are harmless and watchable, but nothing great.  Younger children will enjoy them besting these 10-show singles.

 

 

Busy World Of Richard Scarry: Good Times Never End is the second look at this animated franchise that I thought was a bit better after Every Day There’s Something New, which you can read more about at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10119/Busytown+Mysteries+%E2%80%93

 

It is more of the same, but not awful.

 

 

Encounters From Another Dimension is a 3-DVD set that boasts to be a “7 documentary set” but is really a silly collection of speculative programs that wear thin very quickly, so calling them documentaries is really, really pushing it.  Plus, we have seen this all before.

 

 

Outside The Wire: The Complete Series (taking place in Iraq) and Sniper: The Unseen Warrior are about modern technology and warfare that are not the best show sin their special interest category of modern warfare, but Sniper is a long timeline history lesson (its one bonus is a timeline) in six episodes.

 

 

Punky Brewster: Best Of Season Three is a cut down version of the same full season we reviewed here:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/4050/Punky+Brewster+%E2%80%93+Seaso

 

And the same can be said of Simon & Simon: Best Of Season Three, which we reviewed here.

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/8891/Simon+&+Simon+%E2%80%93+Seas

 

 

Last but not least is Spot Goes To School, only the second of this charming BBC DVD series we have covered following Where’s Spot, which we covered here:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/9879/Where%E2%80%99s+Spot+&+Other

 

This too is more of the same, but as charming, entertaining and the same kind of rewatchable content (six main episodes) that is as charming, has three bonus shows here as well and Spot’s Alphabet & Spelling Game.  I just wonder why this is not more popular or well known.

 

 

The 1.33 X 1 image on all the discs can have aliasing errors and a flat look, but Spot and Scarry (in anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 framing) are the best looking of the group.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 sound is barely stereo at best across these sets, but fares better on Spot and About, though there’s plenty of monophonic sound to go around.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo