Beast Machines: Transformers-Season 1-Volume 1 (1999)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Animation	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1999
Running Time	123:35
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4,5	Directed By	George Samilski Sebastian Brodin Greg Donis Raul Inglis
Studio Distributor	Sony Pictures Home Entertain	Starring	None Given
Case	?
RPI	?	Music	Robert Buckley William Gordon Kenneth Sherman

    Title of Show : Transformers - Beast Machines

    Title of Disc : Season 1 - Volume 1

    Year of Production : 1999

    Country of origin : Canada

    What's included? :  The first 6 episodes of the first season (There are 13 episodes in total in Season 1).

    Episode Length : About 20 minutes each.

    Details of episodes : 

This DVD includes six episodes which tell a continuing story

1. The Reformatting
2. Master of the House
3. Fires of the Past
4. Mercenary Pursuits
5. Forbidden Fruit
6. The Weak Component

    Style of Production : Computer Animation

    Premise of show : Beast Machines is a later entrant into the various Transformers series which have been regularly trotted out since the original series aired in the early 1980s. This series was a direct sequel to another Transformers series, Beast Wars and takes the main good guys from that series back to the Transformers home planet of Cybertron. They arrive back but have lost their memories and their powers to transform into robots. The four main good guys (The Maximals) hook up in the first episode and are stuck in the form of animals. They are Optimus Primal (a gorilla), Rattrap (a rat), Cheetor (a cheetah) & Black Arachnia (a spider). Cybertron is now controlled by Megatron and his army of robots called the Vehicons. The Maximals must evade Megatron's armies while they try to regain their power of transformation and work out what is going on.

    Age Group : 5-12

    Related to any other children's shows? : A direct sequel of Transformers : Beast Wars and obviously related to the original Transformers series (and all the other various sequels).

    Adult's view : This is a really average animated show with dodgy animation and bad dialogue. The episodes regularly make very little sense and a big serve of religious mysticism has been added to this show that was never in the original show. I find this very hard to watch whereas the original show is at least watchable. It was not well received by Transformers fans on its original release.

    Child's view : My young boys enjoy this disc. The like the fast moving action and are already fans of the Transformers concept. They seem to prefer the original series but also find this one enjoyable.

    Other Releases of this show available? : Both Seasons of this show have been released locally on DVD on four separate discs.

    Overall : Two hours of content but unfortunately it is hardly of great quality.

Video

    The video quality is very good.

    The feature is presented in a 1.33:1 aspect ratio non 16x9 enhanced which is the original aspect ratio (although I believe it was also produced for widescreen).

    The picture was quite clear and sharp throughout and with no evidence of low level noise. There was some minor macro blocking here and there.

    The colour was very bright and vibrant throughout.

    Artefacts included some jagged edges.

    There are subtitles in English and English for the Hearing Impaired along with 8 other languages. They are easy to read.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    The audio quality is good.

    This DVD contains an English Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s.A track of the same format is also available in German. Although it is not encoded as surround, the original show had a surround soundtrack and the transfer here includes quite a bot of surround activity including some mild effects and atmosphere.

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

    The subwoofer added bass to music and effects.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    Nothing   

Menu

    The menus are still and silent but functional. A skippable anti-piracy ad precedes the menu.

     The Region 1 version is one set for all 26 episodes of this series over 4 discs. Extras include a commentary for one episode and a variety of interviews. It also has a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack. Region 1 is the choice here.

    The video quality is very good.

    The audio quality is good.

    No extras at all.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall