Cody The Robosapien (2013/Anchor Bay DVD)/Kung-Fu Panda: Legends Of Awesomeness – Good Croc, Bad Croc
(2013/DreamWroks Animation TV/Fox DVD)/Martha
& Friends: Summer Fun (2013/Gaiam Vivendi DVD)/Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!: Best Of Daizy (2013/Nickelodeon DVD)
Picture: C+ Sound: C+ Extras: D/D/D/C Main Programs: C-/B-/C/C+
Here are
four child-geared titles that do not always succeed…
Poorest
and oddest is our one live action entry, Sean McNamara’s Cody The Robosapien (2013) which wants to mix Short Circuit with any new technology and cliché it can get its
hands on as a “cute-talking” robot that does “good missions” and is “lovable”;
too bad an evil industrialist wants to turn him into a killing machine. Is this child-friendly entertainment? Barely. Younger new actors are mixed in with some
older ones you may or may not recognize and Penelope Ann Miller gives easily
the best performance here. This is weak,
lame and should have been much better, but the makers don’t really know what
they are doing.
There are
no extras.
Kung-Fu Panda: Legends Of
Awesomeness – Good Croc, Bad Croc (2013) offers seven episodes of the DreamWorks Animation
TV series version of the two hit movies and counting. If you are unfamiliar with the first hit, try
this link:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/7825/Kung-Fu+Panda+(2008/Blu-ray+++DV
The show
is child-friendly, entertaining and well done enough. Running over 2 hours, this is the best
release on the list and I was surprised how consistent the show really
was. Unfortunately, there are no extras.
Martha & Friends: Summer Fun (2013) is the third animated
Martha Stewart DVD we have covered following…
The Holiday
Collection
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/11850/The+Adventures+Of+Scooter+The+Pe
and Martha’s Magnificent Egg
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/12075/Martha+&+Friends+%E2%80%93+Ma
That
makes this release the first non-Holiday issue, but it only has two episodes
and despite its Perchant for encouraging young viewers to make things at home,
I thought that was not enough for a DVD release and more episodes or some kind
of extras should have been included.
There are no extras and I thought this was the weakest of the three so
far.
Finally
we have Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!: Best Of Daizy
(2013) which continues our coverage of DVD singles from this popular
Nickelodeon hit. It is a quality
child-friendly show too and the second best release on this list, but the seven
segments only add up to 70 minutes and that too is a little shorter than a DVD
release like this should be. Fans will
like it and it is a decent introduction to the series, but
Extras
include Music Videos and PC printable Coloring & Activity Sheets.
The
anamorphically enhanced 2.35 X 1 image on Cody,
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on Kung
Fu and Martha and 1.33 X 1 on Daizy are on par with each other,
slightly soft, but passable. Cody has the most flaws. The lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 mixes on Cody and Kung Fu and lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo on Martha and Daizy are
also on par with each other and are as rich as they need to be for child
titles, though Cody and Kung Fu let me down a bit in the
soundfield department.
- Nicholas Sheffo
