Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on December 5th, 2008
There seems to be some confusion over the title of this 2008 direct to video release. The release is simply called The Nutty Professor, like the original Jerry Lewis vehicle from 1963. It appears the working title of the film was The Nutty Professor 2: Facing The Fear. It is still listed under that title in the IMDB. Whatever the title, you should know that this isn’t your father’s Nutty Professor. This version is a CG animation feature, but don’t expect Shrek or Pixar quality work here. It’s a considerably lower budget affair, and that shows pretty clearly in the final product.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on December 2nd, 2008
Another cheery bit of nonsense in this release, consisting of a half-dozen SpongeBob cartoons. The disc gets its title from the first episode, “What Ever Happened to SpongeBob?” In this story, our hero, rejected by all his friends for his consistent screw-ups winds up, after an amnesia-inducing bonk on the head, becoming the hero of a crime-ridden metropolis. Weird and funny stuff, and the same is true for the other pieces. That said, there's even less of a connection than usual between the pieces, not even a hint of a thematic commonality that has usually been the case with these releases. What we have are six apparently randomly chosen episodes, adding up to 78 minutes of silliness.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on November 18th, 2008
Jack Black stars as a Panda named Po who works in his family’s noodle shop. His dreams, however, aren’t of noodles and broth, but of Kung Fu. He fantasizes of hanging out with the famous furious five, the living legends of Kung Fu. The five are made up of the actual animal poses in Kung Fu. You have Tigress (Jolie), Crane (Cross), Monkey (Chan), Mantis (Rogen), and Viper (Liu). Together they have been training with the Master Shifu (Hoffman). Under the guidance of Grand Master Oogway (Duk Kim) they are preparing for one of them to take on the mantle of Dragon Warrior.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on November 3rd, 2008
Before I watched X-Men, before I watched Scooby-Doo, there were shows on my television like Sesame Street, Electric Company, and so forth. The purpose of these shows was to entertain & educate. There was also a range of 3 minute shorts that ran during Saturday morning cartoons on ABC that served a similar purpose. They were collectively called Schoolhouse Rock. From talking about Adjectives to Multiplication to our good ole Government, they helped to inform as well as entertain. In preparation for the 2008 election, Disney decided to come out with a compilation of fourteen Schoolhouse Rock shorts about everything from the Preamble to the Electoral College.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on November 3rd, 2008
As I get older, I still find myself watching a lot of cartoons. New ones, blue ones, ones that I have no idea how they got made in the first place. So, with this practice I often run into cartoons that I have never seen but feel the need to give them a chance and see if they have any draw whether to kids, parents or me the cartoon nerd who enjoys such things. In my review pile, I stumbled upon one such cartoon and that was Pucca. From a critical eye, one might dismiss the odd characters and strange style rather quickly. However, to the careful eye one might find something a little more entertaining.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Michael Durr on October 17th, 2008
My personal bias may be leaning through but I fully enjoy the Transformers. More than meets the eye, robots in disguise, Starscream for President! Well, he can’t be any worse than the two turkeys we got running right now. Anyhow, after the Generation 1 cartoon series came and gone, we got a slew of off-shoots and attempts at re-creating the cartoon hit that was the Transformers. In the middle of 2005, a series produced by a partnership between Hasbro and Takara came to the fold. It was a sequel to Transformers: Armada & Transformers: Energon. It was called Transformers: Cybertron. Fifty two episodes later, the series ended. Was it any good or did it just get sucked into a black hole?
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 6th, 2008
Brothers and Sisters, we are gathered here today to extol the virtues of our moral champion, Eric Cartman. I’ve come here to praise Eric, not to bury him. It wasn’t much more than 12 years ago to this very day that we first met Eric. Certainly the presentation was a bit crude, and often the teachings were less focused and incoherent. Still, it didn’t take long before we could see an underlying message in the construction paper animation. Before too long the faithful grew, and the wisdom of Eric Cartman could no longer be stopped.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on October 3rd, 2008
The holiday season is coming fast. It should come as no surprise with all of the Chipmunk DVDs being released that a Holiday Collection was going to be included. Of all of the sets, this is the best. There 12 episodes in all, and each is among the best of the classic show. You get three discs, one for each of the upcoming special days: Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. There’s plenty of Chipmunk antics and some great song selections included in each disc.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on September 25th, 2008
The Alvin Collection is another group of episodes of The Chipmunks from their popular Saturday Morning series,
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on September 25th, 2008
Duckman began life as an underground comic created by Everett Peck. It gathered to itself quite a cult following, and like all such things caught the attention of
