Loud
House: Welcome To The Loud House - Season One, Volume One
(Nickelodeon DVD Set)/Max 2: White House Hero (Orion/Warner
Blu-ray w/DVD)/A Mermaid's Tale (Lionsgate DVD/all 2016)
Picture:
C+/B & C/B Sound: C+/B & C+/C Extras: D/C-/C Main
Programs: B-/D/C+
Now
for a new set of child-aimed releases...
Loud
House: Welcome To The Loud House is the introductory set to a new
Nickelodeon Network series they hope to have as the next big hit with
Lincoln Loud having to deal with his house full of sisters, parents,
other family, plus his friends, wacky life and adventures. With this
being the first half of the debut Season One, we get 2 DVDs
with 27 tales that add up to no less than 305 minutes!
If
that's not a strong, thorough introduction, nothing will be, but the
show is not bad. It is much of what I expected and has some amusing
moments, though I don't know if it can do well in the long term just
having him stuck in these semi-familiar situations. Still, it has
the energy of the network's better shows and at least they are
trying.
There
are no extras.
Brian
Levant's Max 2: White House Hero is a highly unnecessary
sequel to a barely existent franchise about the title German Shepherd
who is better at protecting people and the country than actual human
agents apparently. This is one of the oddest things of any kind I
have encountered in a long while, never bought it and have no idea
what the makers thought they were doing. It is a bizarre mess,
seeing any of the previous material would not make any difference and
the acting's dullness is only outdone by the awful script.
A
sadly-revived Orion via MGM is doing this one with Warner Bros. to no
avail and the child actors even overact or just come across as
mechanical and odd. This runs 85 LONG minutes and is not worth your
time.
Digital
Copy and two featurettes are the extras.
A
Mermaid's Tale
Ryan
and her father just moved to live and help with her grandfather in a
coastal town and the very first friend she makes turns out to be a
mermaid, Coral. As the two girls becomes BFFs they learn about each
other's worlds, hanging out, shopping and just having fun. But how
long can they keep their friendship a secret? Can they bridge the gap
between the humans and the mermaids?
In
A Mermaid's Tale (2016), Ryan is a young girl who accidentally
meets Coral a mermaid teenager like her. After freeing her from a
fisherman's net, they become fast friends and share a forbidden
friendship against the all the rules they were taught to grow up
with. Coral is able to change into a human form and she learns about
life on the land and Coral takes Ryan to see her undersea world and
powers of the mermaids. Once again, they open the possibility of
humans and mermaids co-existing, but there are reasons why they
remained myth and legend, to protect their secret. Can Ryan and
Coral convince their parents, their family the power of friendship
can overcome any obstacles?
This
was a heart warming and feel good chick flick with girls and
mermaids. It plays with the idea of what if mermaids were REAL?
(Honestly, telling girls to keep secrets is like saying water doesn't
get you wet.) And if it was real, I can't imagine the government and
scientists not getting involved (fortunately they weren't part of the
story). It is about friendship and what it means to be a friend and
the importance of family. Extras include making of the film, behind
the scenes, 'Beneath the Waves' featurette and trailers.
Everything
here is presented in a 1.78 X 1 frame with the 1080p digital High
Definition image in the Max Blu-ray just surpassing the
anamorphically enhanced Mermaid DVD, which is better than the
too-soft, anamorphically enhanced Max DVD and slightly better
than the anamorphically enhanced House DVD. The Max
Blu-ray has lossless DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 mix that is the
best sound performer here, but barely so with nothing much special
sonically to offer. All three DVDs have lossy Dolby Digital 5.1
sound, but the Mermaid DVD is a little more inconsistent than
expected.
-
Nicholas Sheffo & Ricky Chiang
