Ah, Tuesday. New DVD day. I'm going to be blowing my paycheque quite a bit over the next few weeks, because this is when the summer blockbusters start hitting DVD. Plus, with the new TV season, and most shows debuting their "x" season, that means a lot of "The complete (x-1) season" are starting to come out, too.
First up, let's not forget that I'm one of the 8 people who thought that Speed Racer was an absolutely brilliant film. Look, all the Wachowski Brothers did was exactly the same thing that Robert Rodreiguiz did: use the latest cutting edge digital technology to create a film that's 100% faithful to its source material. The difference is that Rodreiguiz brought Sin City to the big screen...one of the most critically-acclaimed series of graphic novels over the past 10 years. The Wachowskis, however, gave us a fondly remembered 2-dimensional anime dating from the 1960s.
I love this movie because it is truly a live-action Japanese cartoon. The acting, the editing, the storylines...this is every technique you see in anime applied to a live-action film. And you have to be a specific kind of geek to get it. I'm one of those geeks.
Anyway, because of it's status as a bomb, they went incredibly cheap on bonus features. All you get are two featurettes. But that's not going to stop me from buying it and watching it over and over and over!
Also on DVD today is The Love Guru. You know, I've traditionally been a fan of the comedic stylings of Mike Myers, but the overwhelmingly negative reviews for The Love Guru kept me away from theatres. I guess now I can finally give it a chance on DVD. And that's OK, becuase it was on DVD, or rather, it's predecessor VHS, where I first embraced Wayne's World and the first Austin Powers.
For bonus materials, you get the usual assortment of featurettes, deleted scenes and bloopers. You also get a running commentary with with Myers in-character as the Guru Pytka.
I'm one of the many people who thought that Pushing Daisies was one of the most brilliant new TV shows of last year. Well, Pushing Daisies: The Complete First Season is out today, for those who may have missed it last year.
If you did miss it, the show is about Ned, a humble piemaker with the power to bring dead things back to life with his touch. There are a few rules to his power: if the dead thing is alive for longer than 60 seconds, then something nearby will die to preserve the balance. If he touches the dead thing a second time, it'll die permanently.
Well, a private investigator, Emmerson Cod, discovers Ned's power, and they use it to make money. Ned resurrects a recently murdered person, Emmerson and Ned ask him how he died, they return him to death, they split the reward money.
And then things get complicated when a murder victim that they resurrect is Ned's childhood sweetheart. He can't bring himself to return her to death, so she stays alive, and they begin a romantic relationship where they can never touch each other.
Trust me, this show is freakin' fantastic. Season 1 was only 9 episodes long because of the writer's strike. For bonus materials, you get a whole bunch of featurettes about the show.
Oh, and season 2 premieres on October 1.
And finally, for those who know me, you know that, ever since I got my DVD player, I've been slowly amassing the filmography of Tim Burton. It's been going slowly because I've been waiting for super-mega-ultimate-special editions of his films before buying them. Well, today, I might finally break down and buy Beetlejuice which is out today in a brand-new 20th Anniversary Edition.
Sadly, though, they've gone kind of cheap on bonus features. All you get is a vintage featurette from 1988 and 3 episodes of the Beetlejuice cartoon. But it's got beautifully restored picture and sound.
And that's what I'm buying today!
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