Thomas & Friends-Calling all Engines (2004)

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General		Extras
Category	Childrens	Main Menu Audio Game-Interactivity Featurette-Scenes One And Two Karaoke-Dream Song Game-Which Things Are The Same?
Rating
Year Of Production	2004
Running Time	60:02 (Case: 67)
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	David Mitton
Studio Distributor	Roadshow Home Entertainment	Starring	None Given
Case	Handle
RPI	$19.95	Music	Junior Campbell Andreas Fehrle Graeme MacArthur

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (384Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.78:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	None	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Title of Show : Thomas & Friends

    Title of Disc : Calling All Engines!

    Year of Production : 2004

    Country of origin : UK

    What's included? : 1 extended episode.

    Episode Length : 60 minutes

    Details of episodes : Calling All Engines is an extended episode of the series rather than a new feature like the disastrous Thomas & The Magic Railroad. Sensibly, they have used the same format as the normal episodes and just extended it, including more songs and interactivities along with the story about an airport being built on Sodor and tension between the steam engines and the diesels. Nearly every engine that has ever been on Thomas is included, even ones which only appeared in the aforementioned movie; Lady & Diesel 10.

    Style of Production : Models

    Premise of show : One of the best children's shows ever, especially for boys. A group of engines both steam & diesel work on the railways of the Island of Sodor having adventures and trying to be really useful. The long term engines are the most famous including Thomas, Henry, Edward, Gordon, James & Percy. Many new characters have been added over the years to this long running series.

    Age Group : 2-10

    Related to any other children's shows? : Not really, although many other shows have adopted a similar concept such as Busy Buses.

    Adult's view : Great children's television. Likeable characters, good stories, messages which are not beaten over your head. There are a couple of pieces in this story which many scare the youngest viewers especially if they remember Diesel 10. This episode feels like a concept for a 10 minutes episode stretched to one hour but the kids won't care.

    Child's view : My boys enjoyed this show, but I got the impression that they prefer the shorter episodes where there is one clear story rather than the story being interrupted by songs and interactivities.

    Other Releases of this show available? : There are numerous releases of Thomas available including a 60th anniversary box set.

    Overall : Recommended.

Video

    The video quality is very good.

    The feature is presented in a 1.78:1 aspect ratio 16x9 enhanced which is probably the original aspect ratio.

    The picture was very clear and sharp throughout, with no evidence of low level noise.

    The colour was wonderful, rich and solid throughout.

    There were no noticeable artefacts.

    There are no subtitles.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The audio quality is very good.

    This DVD contains an English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo soundtrack encoded at 384 Kb/s.

    Dialogue was clear and easy to understand and there was no problem with audio sync.

    The music is fun and catchy as usual with Thomas.

    The surround speakers and subwoofer were not used.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

    The menu included music and a nice train motif for the cursor.

Interactivity (3:01)

    Kids need to pick the differences between steam engines and diesel engines.

Scene One (1:01)

    A couple of deleted scenes from the show.

Scene Two (0:47)

    More deleted scenes from the show.

Dream Song (1:57)

    An extra song (with karaoke lyrics) removed from the show. Good choice because it's a bit scary, involving the engines dreaming about being scrapped..

Which things are the same? (2:26)

    Another interactivity showing which parts of diesel and steam engines are the same.

    The Region 1 version of this disc includes a great many extras including games and read along stories not included on our local version, although you would also have to contend with the American rather than the British voiceover. To my mind, this means the local version is better but the choice is obviously up to you. I own one of the American releases of this series and found the voiceover quite annoying. The Region 2 release is the same as ours.

    The video quality is very good.

    The audio quality is very good.

    The set has a few minor extras, none of which are overly exciting.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall