:: theLogBook.com DVD Reviews ::

Normally, I “just say no” to two-disc DVD re-releases. If the movie comes out the first time on two discs - i.e. Star Wars Episode I, The Abyss, Independence Day, Star Trek: The Motion Picture - I don’t object. But I’m not planning on replacing my copy of The Fifth Element with the upcoming deluxe edition.

And typically, I’d react this way with any title - except, of course, for Tron, one of my all-time favorites, truly a seminal influence in my pop-culture consciousness. And this is really a case where the new material helps out a great deal. (more…)

Season two of Star Trek: The Next Generation doesn’t get the credit it deserves. Most fans like to sum it in three words - Shades Of Grey, a dreadful clip show that capped off the season and came to exemplify everything that was wrong with the second year. Admittedly, season two had its share of writing and budget problems, thanks to a crippling writers’ strike that delayed its debut in 1988 and infighting among its staff, but it remains one of the show’s crowning achievements, producing some of Star Trek’s finest character episodes. (more…)

A lot of effort went into creating the boxed sets for the classic anime series Robotech. Much more than you would expect for a cartoon nearly 20 years old.

The entire series is collected in seven boxes, with each box containing a bonus disc of materials, which are not available if you buy the series as individual discs. I’ve seen the episodic discs priced at around $14. The box sets normally run around $35, which includes two discs of episodes and a disc of bonus materials.

Whether the bonus discs and the boxes are worth the extra few dollars is your call. But I found the bonus discs extremely interesting, for a wide variety of reasons we’ll get to shortly. (more…)

The Prisoner is one of those TV shows whose fans tend to take it very seriously, and so if you’re talking about releasing The Prisoner on DVD, with bonus features, you’d better get it right. Fortunately, this early example of A&E’s increasing prowess with releasing the entirety of a television series on DVD gets it right.

The episodes themselves have been digitally remastered, resulting in a sharp digital version of the original episodes, preserving the show’s ironically colorful look. (more…)