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Tick Vs. Season Two (The)
R1 - America - Buena Vista Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Noor Razzak (27th August 2007). |
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The Show
 It's no secret that I love "The Tick" based on my review for the first season, Buena Vista's decision to finally release this series was met with great cheers by fans. However the overall package was a minor let down: missing one episode due to rights issues, the image wasn't great and extras were nowhere to be found. But alas the big blue avenger was finally on DVD! I guess it's the best we're going to get for some time. After a long wait the second season debuts on DVD to much the same disappointments as the first season. This time the second episode of season two is missing entitled "Alone Together", a classic episode where our hero battles a world-eating villain in space! I suppose the only way to see this episode is online or if someone happened to keep a videotaped copy from the original broadcast. After the initial disappointment wore off, I sat down for 255 minutes of cartoon madness; "Spoon!" it's like being a kid again. The series had its ups and downs in the first season, a few episodes were not great but the majority was great fun. The same trend continues here, many of the episodes are faithfully conceived carrying overt the tone of the original comic book series (of course making it more kid-friendly as well). The show expands its reach by adding new villains to the fray including, my favorites - Venus and Milo who appear in "Armless but not Harmless", an episode in which Tick and Arthur loose their arms. Some villains return including El Seed in another ridiculously funny episode. The best of the season will have to be episode 8 (listed as 7 because the missing episode is not counted) "Heroes" which follows Tick and Arthur in pursuit of The Deadly Bulb in a "Cops" (1989-Present) style episode. The second season carries on from the previous in marvelous fashion, as I said in my review for the previous season: "It's also not hard to see why this was one of the most popular cartoons of its time, the witty and often satirical humor was a hit with both kids and adults, the kids can enjoy the stupidity of the show's comedy and the adults enjoyed the stabs at modern pop culture and also on the comic book industry as a whole" : this comment also applies to this season and although the extras are thin (or virtually non-existent) and there appears to be an omitted episode it's still a must buy for fans of the comic and this animated series plus if you already own the first season then it's a no-brainer purchase. In fact I'm going to have a Tick marathon as soon as I'm done with this review. So until season three remember chums: "Eating kittens is just plain... plain wrong! And no-one should do it, ever!" "The Tick" Vs. Season Two includes 12 of the 13 Season Two episodes, below is synopsis for each episode included on this DVD release: Episode 1: "The Little Wooden Boy And The Belly Of Love" Arthur falls for a new flying girl, Carmelita, so the Tick carves himself a new sidekick. In the mean time, the city is in the path of the giant whale Blow Hole who is running across the country. Episode 2: "Armless But Not Harmless" The Tick and Arthur defeat Venus and Milo with the help of the janitor. The villains later disarm our heroes, and use the arms to make robots that look like our heroes. Episode 3: "Leonardo Da Vinci And His Fightin' Genius Time Commandos!" Famous inventors from throughout history help the Tick fight a super-villain who wants to change history. Episode 4: "Coach Fussell's Lament" The Tick's self-styled arch-enemy Charles makes his nanny robotic. Episode 5: "Bloomsday" El Seed returns, and wants the 400-year-old bloom. Episode 6: "Evil Sits Down For A Moment" The Ottoman can control furniture, and wants to rule with Die Fliedermaus. Episode 7: "Heroes" The Tick and Arthur are followed by a Cops-style cameraman as they pursue the Deadly Bulb. Episode 8: "Ants In Pants!" The Tick seeks therapy after being wigged out by a super-villain made of ants. Episode 9: "The Tick Loves Santa!" A criminal disguised as Santa learns he can make electric duplicates of himself and decides to take over the City. Episode 10: "The Tick vs. The Big Nothing" The Tick and Arthur are abducted by aliens who are trying to stop other aliens from ending everything. Episode 11: "The Tick vs. Reno, Nevada" Sister and brother performers, Fred and Soren, beg for Arthur's help after their dolphin, Mr. Smarty Pants, is kidnapped by The Cult of the Fin, which has sinister plans for Reno, Nevada. Episode 12: ""Grandpa Wore Tights" The Tick and Arthur visit a home for retired superheroes, and hear the story of the Desire-O-Vac. Arthur doesn't believe a word of it, but the old super-villain The Terror wants it, and is using his son to find out all about it.
Video
Presented in the show's original broadcast ratio of 1.33:1 this full screen transfer is very similar to the first season in the sense that it's a direct port from the broadcast master tapes. Aside from transferring them to a digital format for this DVD there was no additional care taken to re-master or at the very least clean up the overall image. Color quality fluctuates, while some are bright and vibrant others tend to be dull. Some of the animation lines are pixilated and exhibited a moire effect, there are also some compression artefacts and sharpness was not always consistent. Some of the flaws can be attributed to the crude animation style but overall these episodes are no better than broadcast quality.
Audio
Two audio track are included on this DVD, and English Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround as well as a French Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround. For the purposes of this review I chose to view these episodes with their original English soundtrack. This track is a offers fairly good presentation, as good as can be expected for an animated series. The dialogue is clear and distortion free and is in sync with the animation; the music cues are also loud but never overbearing. This track does the job and should please most people. Optional subtitles are included in English for the hearing impaired and French.
Extras
Buena Vista Home Entertainment have released this Season Two DVD without a single substantial extra, in fact the only thing we do get is a series of bonus trailers on the first disc that start-up before the menu, these can be skipped and are for: - "Underdog" which runs for 1 minute 12 seconds. - "The Invisible" which runs for 2 minutes 31 seconds. - "The Muppets: Season 2" which runs for 1 minute 33 seconds. - "TV on DVD" promo which runs for 1 minute 42 seconds. Also included is a "lithograph" which is a insert card with a Tick drawing by Edlund on it...that's it! Much like the previous season I'm disappointed that Buena Vista did not take the effort to produce some extras for this release, I'm sure a series of commentaries could not be that hard to arrange?
Packaging
This 2-disc set is packaged in an amaray case that is housed in a cardboard slip-cover.
Overall
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