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Futurama: Into The Wild Green Yonder
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray ALL - America - Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Adam Palcher (15th April 2009). |
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The Film
 "Futurama: Into The Wild Green Yonder" is the latest in the straight-to-video movies that Matt Groening decided to put out after the unfortunate cancellation of his underrated animated show "Futurama" (1999-2003). "The Simpsons" (1989-Present) creator and writer received much response from the "Futurama" fan base for more episodes; I’m guessing this is the answer. The movie plays out like a long episode running 89 minutes of the Planet Express crew going to watch the old Mars Vegas city destroyed as Amy’s Father, Leo Wong (Billy West), plans to build a new one. Fiendishly screwing people over and killing endangered species Mr. Wong gets caught up in the idea of building an oversized miniature golf course that spans the whole galaxy. As a plentiful planet with extinct animals DNA embedded is in jeopardy of being destroyed the crew is off on their own missions to save the world. Leela (Katey Sagal) joins a feminist group, Bender (John Di Maggio) gambles and has an affair with Don Bot’s wife and Fry’s (Billy West) the only hope for survival with his new memory reading capabilities. Fry has always been my favorite character due to the fact that Groening writes such hilarious dialogue for his idiotic characters; his cluelessness is comic gold in my opinion. His bits with the Mad Fellow group are great and the fact that the aluminum hat he wears to protect people from reading his mind changes with every scene is a funny little nuance. This is your typical wacky "Futurama" scenario with tons of laughs and gags for any "Futurama" fan. The story is a bit predictable if you’ve seen any past episodes, but it’s nice to see a relevance of environment and how we are so careless, even in today’s world. The humor and vibrant animation are shown off in respectable form, and the scenes in space and the galaxy have to be fun to animate and look terrific. If you are looking for more of the series, or just more "Futurama" these straight-to-video movies are a fine substitute. Groening’s brand of humor and comedic timing is delivered along with his terrific view on current and future culture. The voice acting is always terrific with Katey Sagal, a href=http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0921942/>Billy West, and John Di Maggio at the helm. Though I would probably rather watch the series over and over, due to it’s shorter length these films are all in good fun and will surely fill the void for those Bender one-liners you’ve been missing.
Video
As most animated High-Definition releases the picture looks terrific being represented in 1:78:1 aspect ratio and 1080p 24/fps mastered with AVC MPEG-4 compression. The beautiful transfer looks sharp and defined. This was my first experience watching the show in HD and was not disappointed.
Audio
Matching the video there is a terrific audio track that really shows off the zooms and vrooms of space and the fights in space. Generally front-loaded packed with dialogue this audio is presented in English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track (3482 kbps/48kHz/24-bit). Subtitles are presented in English for the hearing impaired, French, Spanish, Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish. Groening is worldwide!
Extras
Fox has released this film with a collection of extras that includes an audio commentary, a storyboard animatic, a series of 7 featurettes and some deleted scenes. Below is a closer look at these supplements. First up is the feature-length audio commentary, this is an option to watch the film audio commentary with creator Matt Groening, co-creator David X. Cohen, voice actorsJohn Di Maggio and Maurice LaMarche, co-executive producers Patric M. Verrone and Micheal Rowe, producer Lee Supercinski and director Peter Avanzino. The tone and the humor of the commentary is fun and it’s interesting to actually hear Groening and his cohorts actually talking and joking around. You may pick up on it a little through the audio commentary but you can really see the passion and love these guys have for what they are doing and they all have a terrific sense of humor that translate into the movie. They tell interesting stories of the process and explore their love for Bender. If you’re a "Futurama" fanatic this is definitely worth your time. There is also an option that includes a "BonusView" picture-in-picture video commentary with those participants listed above. As we see video pop-up while watching the film and commentary. This feature is accessible on profile 1.1 players or greater. "Into the Wild Green Yonder: Part 1" is a storyboard animatic of the first act of the movie in the very early, rough stages of animation. Run time is 22 minutes and 25 seconds. "Docudramarama: How We Make Futurama So Good" featurette is a mockumentary about "Futurama" with voice actress Lauren Tom. Presented in HD and a run time of 5 minutes and 9 seconds. “Louder, Louder: The Acting Technique of Penn Jillette" featurette, is a 2 minute 8 second clip about Penn Jillette’s contribution to the film. Presented in HD. "Golden Stinkers: A Treasury of Deleted Scenes" are a series of 5 deleted scenes presented in HD that can be viewed individually or with a 'Play all' option and include: - "Dolomite Hill" which runs for 30 seconds, in this scene Dolomite Hill, the galaxy's hardest rock is destroyed. - "Matcluck" which runs for 32 seconds, in this scene General Brannigan is challenged in court. - "Paint?!" which runs for 27 seconds, in this scene the Planet Express ship is painted, Dr. Zoidberg helps. - "Morbo Solo" which runs for 37 seconds, in this scene Morbo reads the news alone reporting his co-anchor has been arrested. - "Mind Reading" which runs for 43 seconds, in this scene Fry reads the minds of several characters. "Matt Groening and David X. Cohen in Space!" featurette is next, the two creators test zero gravity on this home video clip, running 4 minutes and 23 seconds. "How To Draw Futurama in 10 Very Difficult Steps" featurette, the title says it all, 10 steps to draw your "Futurama" favorites! Presented in HD and running 11 minutes and 10 seconds. "3D Models with Animator Discussion" featurette runs for 4 minutes and 19 seconds of the animators discussing the ins and outs of creating the film through computer animation. Also in HD. "Bender’s Movie Theater Etiquette" featurette sees everyone’s favorite character Bender describes what he think is proper behavior in the theatres. Funny, since this was never in theatres. In HD and runs 1 minute and 16 seconds. "Zapp Brannigan’s Guide To Making Love At A Women" is the final featurette, and is a Zapp Brannigan blurb about how to treat that special lady Brannigan style! Pretty funny stuff and a fun extra. Presented in HD and running 2 minutes and 49 seconds. Included in the case are 4 bonus postcards that feature some cool "Futurama" artwork.
Overall
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