Paddington
Bear: The Complete Series
(1989/Hanna Barbera/Warner Archive DVD Set)/Scoob!
4K (2020/Warner 4K Ultra
HD Blu-ray w/Blu-ray)
Picture:
C+/A- & B+ Sound: C/B+ Extras: D/B Main Programs: C+
Here's
a pair of child-aimed animated releases to know about...
I
do not remember ever seeing Paddington Bear: The Complete Series
(1989) but it is not exactly like the live action feature film with a
CGI animated Paddington, with only 13 episodes where he is a bit
sillier and a bit more sloppy, but it is a child-friendly series,
albeit for very young children. Issued across two DVDs, the first
episode (''Please Look After This Bear'') has the Brown family
find him partly dressed and at Paddington Station in the U.K., with
them quickly bringing him home and everywhere else with them.
Made
by Hanna-Barbera, I was surprised so few shows were made, but the
company was in transition and despite being around for just over 30
years, the characters were not as well known in the U.S. as they
should have or could have been. That has changed for the better
enough, but maybe some of this could have been written with a little
more ambition. Still, this is colorful, if sometimes limited and
looks good for its age. It flows a little better than the feature
film, but has its own limits, though young fans should enjoy it.
The
1.33 X 1 transfer can show the age of the materials used, but not
much since we get few aliasing errors and a pretty clean, clear
presentation, while the lossy Dolby
Digital 2.0 Mono is a little lower in volume than I would have liked,
despite being clean and consistent. Just be careful of volume
switching and high volume playback. This is among the last major
animated TV series with monophonic sound before they all went at
least into stereo.
There
are sadly no extras.
Next
and finally, Scooby Doo and his crew are timeless cartoon characters
that have survived the test of time like few others. Seen here in
their newest digitally animated re-imagining, Scoob! 4K
(2020), the characters are brought back again in sleek animation that
is comparable to the style of the Despicable Me films. Adding
a superhero element to the story and spicing it up a bit from the
normal spooky mystery, the gang is all here in a new adventure that
mixes old elements with new elements to make for an overall fun
update for fans.
The
all star voice cast includes Frank Welker, Zac Efron, Mark Wahlberg,
Jason Isaacs, Kiersey Clemons, Tracy Morgan, Simon Cowell, Gina
Rodriguez, Henry Winkler, Christina Hendricks, Justina Machado, Will
Forte, Ken Jeong, and Amanda Seyfried.
The
Scooby Doo Gang have been solving mysteries for many years and soon
find themselves separated when Shaggy and Scooby get abducted by a
superhero named Blue Falcon (the classic Hanna-Barbera character, now
voiced by Wahlberg) and his counterparts who are at war with Dick
Dastardly who has an army of shapeshifting robots at his disposal.
(However, Dastardly lost his pet Mutley in a bizarre multi-dimension
star gate device and is still healing from that.) Eventually, the
gang reassembles with these new heroes and discover that Scooby Doo
is in fact the key to a world threatening ritual, all of which has
been orchestrated by Dastardly.
Due
to the COVID-19 pandemic and theaters across the globe shut down
indefinitely, Scoob! didn't get a proper chance to play in
front of audiences as I'm sure Warner Bros. would have liked. Which
is likely why it was fast tracked to streaming services and home
video (like HBO Max and now 4K UHD disc.) Still, it's not a bad
children's film and makes one wonder what The Jetsons or The
Flintstones would look like with a similar animated style and
sleek update. Only time will tell if Warner will go back into the
vault and pull out other animated properties to reboot in similar
fashion.
Scoob!
is presented in a 2160p HEVC/H.265, HDR (10+; Ultra HD
Premium)-enhanced Ultra High Definition
image on 4K UHD disc with a widescreen aspect ratio of 2.39:1
and audio mixes in English: DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 (48kHz,
24-bit) lossless mix, which sounds fine for the nature of the film,
but still a little shocking seeing that it's a 4K UHD disc. Also
included is a 1080p Blu-ray disc of the film with identical
widescreen and audio tracks. The 4K image is considerably sharper
with more attention to detail in the animation than the Blu-ray, as
big money went into the animation here. The soundtrack is a mix of
updated tunes and a few oldies for good measure.
Special
Features include:
Bloopers
Deleted
Scenes
How
To Draw Scooby Doo
New
Friends, Newer Villains
and
Puppies!!
-
Nicholas Sheffo and James
Lockhart (4K)
https://www.facebook.com/jamesharlandlockhartv/
