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X-Men: The Animated Series (TV)
R1 - America - Buena Vista Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Noor Razzak (17th May 2009). |
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The Film
 The 1990's was an incredible growth period for comic book companies, the "comic boom" was in the height of it's arc, only to eventually reach it's peak and spiral down the industry in a glorious crash in the early 2000's. But the 90's was a haze in development of titles, the establishment of artists and writers as rock stars of the medium, it was also a time of gimmicks: Characters branching out into their own books, die-cut covers, variant covers, gold and silver etched covers, cross-overs with multiple-character story lines, the establishment of "creator owned" company Image among many other events that unfolded during this time. And throughout this, comic values continued to rise and classic books were classified as investments, the market built itself virtually overnight. During this time comic properties were hot, but too expensive to make into live action films (that would come much later as special effects became more cost effective). Animated series' were the way to go, and Fox was the leader in developing excellent programming for the Saturday morning flock. The success of the brilliant "Batman: The Animated Series" (1992-1995) would lead the way for more cartoons like "X-Men" (1992-1997), which burst onto the scene in a big way capitalizing on the success of the Jim Lee relaunch of the comic series and was also used as a keen marketing tool for peddling more comic books, action figures and collectibles... but it also was one of the better, well written shows on television and although is very dated by today's standards it's still a damn good series that finally, after many years makes its debut on DVD. The "X-Men" series carries over all the great elements that makes these characters and story lines so memorable. The themes of equality are predominant throughout the series (a theme that creator Stan Lee felt important to the overall book), there characters are brought to life in exactly the way fans had imagined it. Each character is so unique that it's easy to pick your favorites and there's a character for just about every person to relate to. That's what makes "X-Men" so endearing and long lasting. All the classic characters are here plus a few newer ones (like Gambit and Jubilee who both hit prominence in the 90's) and although there are lot to pick from (prominent favorites include Wolverine, Gambit and Beast) that wasn't enough as the producers added a new character in Morph (guess what his power is?), the adventures are lifted from the pages of the comic with a few adjustments here and there but overall it's fairly accurate to the original stories. So if you followed the classic stories over years but mostly the run during the 90's you'll be able to find plenty to marvel at (pun intended). While the animation is very dated, it still brings back great memories of when it originally ran and doesn't fail to entertain. Having viewed these episodes it became clear to me that the quality of animation writing has gone down hill in recent years as there doesn't seem to be anything near the quality of such shows as this or the brilliant "Batman: The Animated Series" (1992-1995) which was another favorite of mine. "X-Men: Volume 1" is worth picking up if you're a fan, whether you saw it originally back in the 90's or not... and don't forget there's a second volume of episodes also released. This 2-disc features 16 episodes that include: - "Night of the Sentinels Part 1" - "Night of the Sentinels Part 2" - "Enter Magneto" - "Deadly Reunions" - "Captive Hearts" - "Cold Vengeance" - "Slave Island" - "The Unstoppable Juggernaut" - "The Cure" - "Come the Apocalypse" - "Days of Future Past Part 1" - "Days of Future Past Part 2" - "The Final Decision" - "Till Death Do Us Part Part 1" - "Till Death Do Us Part Part 2" - "Whatever it Takes"
Video
Presented in the original broadcast ratio of 1.33:1 full screen. The show looks very much like it was produced in the 90's and the transfers tend to suffer from some dirt and specks, there are some blurry lines and animation flaws but overall the colors look good, blacks are mostly bold and the image is bright and vibrant. The image is slightly better than when originally broadcast but probably only just. It seems like a quickly effort to master these for DVD but at least we've finally got them, hopefully they well enough copies to allow more episodes to be released.
Audio
Three audio tracks are included in English Dolby Digital 2.0 surround, French Dolby Digital 2.0 surround and Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 surround. These are likely to be the show's original broadcast audio, the surround mix is pretty good considering we're talking about an early 90's animated series. The dialogue is solid, surrounds seem active at times, mainly during the action scenes and the music is quite loud and prominent. However, the track lacks depth and the appropriate range to go from ambiance (of which there is little to none) to the action scenes. It's a typical 2.0 surround and seems to do the trick. There are optional subtitles in English, French and Spanish.
Extras
None, nada, zilch, zero, nothing at all... this is very sad, it would have been nice to include some commentaries from the creators or voice actors especially since this release has been a long time coming, but alas we have nothing.
Overall
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