Legends Of Chima Season 1, Part 2 DVD review
Posted by rocao,
Fresh on the heels of our Legends of Chima DVD giveaway was its official retail release on Tuesday. Titled "Chi, Tribes, and Betrayals", the disc comprises the second half of the first season -- 10 episodes which originally aired on the Cartoon Network from September to December of 2013.
I was given a copy for review, so without further ado, let's have a look!
Packaging:
The cover art is colorful and dynamic as we would expect from a LEGO product and appears to have been created by the same artists that produce various LEGO print and promotional material.
Upon removing the DVD from the padded mailer in which it arrived, I noticed that it was curiously flimsy. Opening it revealed the reason: a recycle symbol was cut out of the front of the case so that the entire middle section is essentially covered only by the plastic sleeve and paper cover.
Contents:
The DVD consists of two discs, each containing five episodes. Disc 1 has an image of Laval, and Disc 2 has an image of Worriz. Both are printed monochromatically rather than in color.
There was no paper insert that might offer an episode guide or the typical advertising inundation to which we as LEGO fans are accustomed.
Technical aspects:
"Chi, Tribes, and Betrayals" is only offered as a standard definition DVD and not as a high definition Blu-Ray. This was somewhat surprising to me because the TV show is available as a 720p broadcast. For HD snobs such as myself, Amazon Instant Video, Netflix, and cable on-demand services have the high definition format. The DVD is widescreen format and has Dolby Digital audio though, so all is not lost.
The DVD menu reeks of being a careless after-thought. The root menu has the same graphic from the cover art. The episode list is text on a stock blue background. There are no chapter menus to jump through an episode. It's not a huge loss because each episode is only divided into two chapters, but two wrongs don't make a right.
With all that being said, I don't view any of these shortcomings as complete deal breakers. Most modern DVD/Blu-Ray players, A/V receivers, and TVs have video up-scaling to convert from standard to high definition. Though up-scaling will never be as good as the native format, I actually compared the DVD image to the high-definition counterpart from my on-demand service and the difference was negligible.
Critical Review:
Since the popular Ninjago TV series was stopped abruptly in 2012 and Legends of Chima was advanced as the next big thing, it's natural that the two be compared. In my view, the situations and themes present in Legends of Chima are targeted at a slightly younger audience than that of Ninjago. Moreover, the diversity of the animals and the inclusion of a female in every animal tribe seems like the hope was to have a broader appeal, and that is certainly the case with my five year old daughter who is Chima obsessed. As a parent, I appreciate the principles of balance, harmony, and nature that are being advanced, even if it comes with the cost of the constant conflict.
The computer graphics are excellent. The animation is lively and action-packed, and the environments are detailed and vivid. In this facet, Legends of Chima is unequivocally superior to Ninjago. This could simply be due to the technological advancement and experience that comes with the year separation between the two shows, and I haven't seen the 2014 Ninjago episodes to see if they've improved similarly.
I find the writing to be slightly inferior to Ninjago, but still reasonably good. The humor is generally slapstick, which allows it to be accessible to all ages. The voice-acting is done well, and helped my daughter to easily grasp the attributes and alignment of the characters.
I did not find the product placement distracting and in fact, I quite enjoyed the appearances of the LEGO sets in the cartoon. The disclaimer here is that I own all the sets, and so I'm not pressured into buying anything I otherwise wouldn't have intended.
Conclusion:
While I recommend checking out the TV Series, I have more reservations about saying the same of the DVD offering. The packaging and presentation are disappointing and greatly diminishes one of the few remaining reasons to own the physical media in this day and age. Nevertheless, there still will be situations where a physical copy is preferred -- such as when using portable DVD players or when giving a gift -- and ultimately the content shines through.
At the time of this writing, the DVD price is half that of the digital download, so if you don't have access already through a subscription service, that very well may be the only reason you need:
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3 comments on this article
I actually like the Chima show better than Ninjago, I just wish they showed it on TV in the UK.:P
Never watched an episode of CHIMA. I watched about half of the first episode of Ninjago, but I couldn't really get into it. How long are these episodes? Cuz' $13 seems a little high for a kids' TV collection.
Has anyone else had any problems with the LEGO Legends of Chima Season 1, Part 2 ("CHI, Tribes and Betrayals") DVD – such as the Bonus Features (which are the supposed "13 bonus LEGO Legends of Chima adventures") in being COMPLETELY ABSENT from both DVD discs, the picture quality in being sub-par at times or anything else – especially with the Bilingual (English and French) Canadian version??? [I know that I had this problem, so I returned it to where I bought it (Best Buy) and got my money back there. Also, when I looked in HMV for this DVD, one of the store employees said that they don't have this DVD in stock because it has been recalled by the manufacturer in due to a manufacturing defect – has anyone else heard and/or read something about this, as I can't find anything about this on the Internet??? (I live in Canada, by the way!)]?