DVD and Blu-Ray reviews

An archive of the blog’s reviews of DVD and Blu-Rays

Film reviews

Review: Justice League: Doom

28 February 2012 Natalia Romanova 1 Comment

Starring: Kevin Conroy (Batman), Tim Daly (Superman), Susan Eisenberg (Wonder Woman), Nathan Fillion (Green Lantern), Carl Lumbly (Martian Manhunter/Ma’alefa’ak), Michael Rosenbaum (The Flash), Bumper Robinson (Cyborg), Carlos Alazraqui (Bane), Claudia Black (Cheetah), Paul Blackthorne (Metallo), Olivia d’Abo (Star Sapphire), Alexis Denisof (Mirror Master), Phil Morris (Vandal Savage)
Writers: Dwayne McDuffie, Mark Waid.
Director: Lauren Montgomery
Price: $24.98 (Amazon price: $14.99)
Released: February 28, 2012

When it comes to movies, Marvel and DC both have their specialities these days. Marvel has it sewn up at the movies, with things like Captain America, Iron Man, The Avengers, The X-Men, Daredevil, Thor et al. Sure, DC has Batman, but Superman isn’t working that well, Green Lantern wasn’t exactly brilliant and if you can’t work out how to make a movie of Wonder Woman after a decade of trying, clearly you’ve got problems.

By contrast, in the realm of animated movies and TV shows, it’s the other way round. You’d only have to have a teeny weeny, atom-sized piece of paper to write down all the decent animated shows that Marvel has put out (X-Men Evolution and that’s about it) in the last couple of decades, while DC has had Batman, Superman, Green Lantern and, of course, Justice League shows filling up the airways for years. They even did a halfway decent animated Wonder Woman movie.

Possibly their best effort was Justice League, which expanded to become Justice League Unlimited later on. That, of course, ended nearly six years ago, but now the brainiacs at DC have decided to take an old Justice League comic and create a brand new Justice League animated movie, Justice League: Doom, in which the Justice League’s arch-enemies club together to kill the League. Cleverly, DC has got together virtually all the cast from the original series, as well as Nathan Fillion (Firefly, Castle) from its Green Lantern animated TV series, Tim Daly from its Superman animated series and a great guest cast to do it.

And while it’s not outstanding, it does at least make you wonder why the hell they can’t make a proper live-action movie. Here’s a trailer.

Continue reading “Review: Justice League: Doom”

Competitions

Competition: Win Doctor Who – The Doctor, The Widow and The Wardrobe on DVD

13 February 2012 Rob Buckley 6 Comments

The Doctor, The Widow and The Wardrobe

BBC Shop Badge
Starring: Matt Smith, Karen Gillan
Writer: Steven Moffat
Director: Farin Blackburn
Price: £10.20 (Amazon price: £6.49; BBC Shop price: £6.99)
Released: January 16th 2012

Well, those nice people at the BBC Shop have sent me some more DVDs to review, and as always, I’m giving away the ones I don’t want. First up, it’s The Doctor, The Widow and The Wardrobe, which I reviewed briefly a while back:

Quite nice, but nothing too remarkable. Some nods to continuity (Androzani Major) and a few tears were elicited towards the end, but this was just a bit of Christmas fun and loveliness really.

If you’d like a proper review, Stuart has a good one.

Anyway, the DVD contains not only the whole episode but also two hours of bonus features, including a prequel and three ‘The Best of Doctor Who‘ features. I haven’t watched them. They might be good. Okay, I have watched the prequel because it’s on YouTube and here:

But I don’t want the DVD. However, if you want it, now’s your chance to enter the first TMINE competition of the year!

To enter, all you have to do is leave a comment below or email me! Usual competition rules apply and you have to live in the UK. Closing date is Sunday 19th February 2012 at 11.59pm.

Competitions

Review and competition: Top Gear at the Movies

20 December 2011 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Top Gear at the Movies

Time for another shiny Christmas competition, courtesy of those lovely people at the BBC Shop. Go buy something from them sometime. They’re quite cheap.

BBC Shop Badge

At first, Top Gear At The Movies sounds like it could be quite a fun but cheap idea: clips of all the great car chase movies.

But you’d be wrong. That’s not what this is.

This is Top Gear‘s homage to the car chase and cars in movies, in all its various forms, all done in a very Top Gear style. Let Richard Hammond and James May explain it all to you.

Continue reading “Review and competition: Top Gear at the Movies”

UK TV

Review: The Dark Angel

27 May 2011 Rob Buckley Post a comment

A painting of Peter O'Toole in The Dark Angel

Starring: Peter O’Toole, Beatie Edney, Jane Lapotaire, Charlotte Coleman and Barbara Shelley
Writers: Don MacPherson (based on Uncle Silas by Sheridan Le Fanu)
Director: Peter Hammond
Price: £14.99 (Amazon price: £11.20)
Released: May 30th 2011

Sheridan Le Fanu is something of a neglected author. Although influential in his day with classics of the horror and gothic genres, such as Through a Glass Darkly, Carmilla and Uncle Silas, he’s now overshadowed by the likes of Poe, Collins and Stoker. Movie and TV adaptations of his work are few and far between.

Back in 1987, the BBC adapted Uncle Silas as the three-part mini-series, The Dark Angel. Directed by Peter Hammond (who directed many of Granada’s Sherlock Holmes episodes as well as 18 episodes of The Avengers and a whole lot more), it faithfully sticks to the book in seeing young Maud Ruthyn (Beatie Edney) having to live with her uncle Silas (Peter O’Toole), a noted wastrel and alleged murderer, even though if she should die, he would inherit from her one of the largest fortunes in England.

Cue the trailer:

Continue reading “Review: The Dark Angel”

DVD and Blu-Ray reviews

Review: Philips BDP3000 Blu-Ray player

3 January 2011 Rob Buckley 8 Comments

Philips BDP3000

This isn’t so much a review as an “artist’s impression” first look at the Philips BDP3000 Blu-Ray player. Because let’s face it, if it

  1. Plays Blu-Ray discs
  2. Plays all your old DVDs as well

That’s pretty much all you need from it, so I don’t really need to go into the fine details too much. And there’s a decent review on TechRadar anyway, if you need some tech specs, et al.

But I will point out a few caveats with this new high tech world we live in.

Continue reading “Review: Philips BDP3000 Blu-Ray player”