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Chip & Dale's Rescue Rangers Volume Two Review
Reviewed: 11/16/2008
Talk about running out of steam....
Welcome kiddies; it's time for another Disney Television Animation DVD Box Set Review and this one is for one of the biggest cult hits in DTVA called Chip & Dale's Rescue Rangers. Since the pilot episodes were on Volume 2 and I do pilot episodes first; this was the first volume that I decided to do. This was Tad Stone's first real supervising job at DTVA in terms of original work that he did so how did this DVD set do compared to the other box sets I have done recently. The answer is below.........
The DVD Box
Like all DTVA box sets; this one comes in a plastic wrapped cardboard box with a hole to place the disc covers on the right side. On the front of the box we see Chip and Dale wearing their Rescue Rangers clothes sliding back to back of each other taking a glance to us against a white background which is really cute in my humble opinion. I must point out something about the art work choice. When the DVD box set was announced; the front of the box did contain the same pose; but the pose itself doesn't come from Chip & Dale's Rescue Rangers. It actually comes from Chip & Dale Classic Shorts in which shows Chip and Dale without any clothes whatsoever. I raised this as a concern on the grounds of false advertising since customers would believe that Chip & Dale's Rescue Rangers were the classic shorts which it is not. Plus; as I discovered, there are people out there who have a lot of hate for Disney Television Animation in general and it would smack as an insult to them if seeing the original classic Chip & Dale pose in a DTVA box set. So to Disney's credit; they added clothing to the two chipmunks when the final box art was shown. Although that probably insulted the purists; I actually like the pose and the clothing only added a more symbolic parody to the whole incident so the purists can kiss my butt for all I care. The Rescue Rangers logo is in the middle; but it's off centered towards the bottom to avoid having it placed right on Dale's mouth. I should point out that the logo itself is pretty cheap when it's shown on television compared to the TaleSpin and Ducktales logo; but I do like it for Dale's wave pose to the camera trick; so I'll let the cheapness slide here.
The volume number; number of discs and episode numbers are directly below the logo and the Disney DVD logo is below Dale's butt. There is also a red trim on the bottom which in white letter states that it includes the bonus five episode pilot to indicate that the pilot is the second run syndicated version. Although in this case; scenes were added for the most instead of the utter chaos and editing done to Plunder and Lightning in order to get it down to one hour and 28 minutes; and a lot of editing to fix blown spots done in the movie. The red trim extends to the bottom of the box. The left side of the box has a dark blue color scheme and has the logo (minus the picture) centered perfectly (and placed on it's side) in the middle along with the Disney logo on the left beside the logo. The Disney DVD logo is at the very top; the episode numbers, volume number and number of discs are placed in the middle below the sided logo; but above the thumbnail picture of the Chip & Dale pose we saw at the front of the box along with the stock number below it. It looks pretty impressive for the most part. The dark blue color also extends to the top of the DVD box itself and has the same information minus the stock number, thumbnail and the rest of the information is on it's side similar to the perfectly centered logo. The back of the DVD box has a white background with a strange picture of bush in the background of the background. The UPC code is on the top right corner (but not quite stuck to the right for some odd reason) and on the left is the statement that they are back for more high flying fun and there are 24 laugh-packed episodes on three discs. I approve of this although high-flying better suits TaleSpin then it does Rescue Rangers.
In the middle on the right side is the overall summary of this disc set and sadly they picked two of the weaker episodes in making their case for new customers to buy the set. I would have gone with Dale being a super spy, Gadget meeting her evil twin and matching wits against Professor Nimnul's bratty son. Plus; the banana yellow scheme is pretty ugh in my opinion. The middle left side contains three screen grabs from the television series and all three of them are from episodes in this disc set. In fact; the number of artwork errors for this set are zero which is a huge plus here. The picture quality is good for this round too. The bottom below the pictures and summary is the usual useless information we all come to see from DTVA box set including the logos for NTSC, SDH, Region 1, Dual Layer, DVD Video, WD Home Entertainment logo, the Ontario General Rating (since this is a TV-Y production; although it's not 100% unedited as you will see.), the total running time (at 549 minutes or 9 hours and 9 minutes!) and the usual copyright information and warning information. Nothing really special here. I should point out that the specs only have mono sound and full screen which is a bad sign for the setup features that I will discuss later on in this review.
My Rating on the DVD Box: **** ¾ - A better summary and color scheme for it would have made this one perfect; but I cannot fault them for at least maintaining continuity in the artwork and doing a otherwise perfect job on the box art in general .
Disc One:
Like all DTVA box sets before it; each disc is wrapped in a transparent plastic case. The front of this disc's case has Chip with his fedora hat on the top left corner and super imposed about 40% of the top of the case in general. The bottom right corner of the box contains the Disney logos for Disney and Disney DVD along with the shows' logo, volume number, the disc number and episodes 28-35. To it's left is actually a screen grab from the pilot episode To The Rescue. In fact; every single piece of artwork minus the superimposed Chip on both the front and back of the disc cover are from the pilot episode To The Rescue. Some of the screen grabs look good; but the one involving Gadget thinking about something while Chip and Dale slobber over her is a bit much for me tastes; and the grab seems a bit off quality wise. The back of the disc cover has a summary of the disc contents on the top; just below the proof of purchase white labels that appear on the first disc cover of all DTVA sets; although they only seem to care more about the pilot episode than anything else. They call it “Over Three Hours of Nutty Adventures” and since Dale is involved in all eight episodes; I concur. The episode selection appears below it in the middle right portion of the cover next to two framed screen grabs on the left side, one below it and one unframed foreground picture on the bottom left side. And they just had to make the best quality screen grab involve Monty didn't they? Doesn't this prove my point about DTVA trying to get him over in every way that they can. Also; it is using that same banana yellow color scheme as they did with the box cover which I do not like very much.
At least there are no artwork errors here. In fact; there are zero artwork errors in the entire box set. The bottom uses a lavender color scheme and has the rating (if you live in Ontario of course), the DVD logo, the Disney Home Entertainment logo and the copyright/address on the bottom left corner of the disc cover. The bookend edge of the disc uses a lavender color scheme and almost the same as the bookend edge of the box cover with the Chip & Dale's part put to the left of the Rescue Rangers part , Disc 1 added, Volume 2 (3 Disc Set Episodes 28-51) and Dale's mug part removed. The whole side looks off-center compared to the box end of the cover. The inside of the disc cover uses the four triangle push button that I don't like very much since the plastic could break off easily and scratch the disc easily. The disc is 185 minutes long which is barely over three hours and 5 minutes long. It contains Chip on the left side about 30% of the disc covered; the Rescue Rangers logo on the top right side, the disc number and episodes numbers on the middle right; and the bottom contains all the similar information from the back of the DVD box; only the running time is based on the disc itself and it's missing the dual layer logo, the DVD logo, the Disney Home Entertainment logo, the SDH logo, and most of the text information found on the box cover. The top of the disc seems to have a metallic shine which looks cool; but it doesn't make the disc look less cheap; nor the plastic cover sheet that contains the information.
Episode Rants For Disc One:
To The Rescue Part One Rant- Sometimes, Some Crimes, Go Slipping Through The Cracks....
To The Rescue Part Two Rant- But These Two Gumshoes; Are Picking up The Slack.
To The Rescue Part Three Rant- Disney should get a medal right here!
To The Rescue Part Four Rant- Should Monty Get a Raincheck on that apology?!
To The Rescue Part Five Rant- A Jello FruitQuake?! SHOOT ME NOW!!
A Creep In The Deep Rant- Will Scooby Doo show up...for real this time?!
Normie's Science Project Rant- Someone's been watching TaleSpin too much!
Seer No Evil Rant- Because It Could Kill You Right?!
My Thoughts: If there was one major disappointment in this set other than the usual second run syndication episodes being used it was the picture quality as it varies from slightly below average to really good. The other DVD box sets had more constant visual quality than this set. There is the usual wear and tear of the tape quality due to time; but I'm not going to complain about it since I highly expected it to. With Toon Disney being almost dead until Disney XD comes out; the DTVA shows aren't going to be shown much if at all; so this is as close to getting something from Disney. The audio quality is pretty good for the most part though. As I mentioned before; this uses the second run syndication episodes which means that scenes added from the pilot movie were added and certain episodes were edited for whatever reason. Strangely; the Toon Disney version of Dirty Rotten Diapers includes the infamous “Trash the brat!” line from Gadget which is missing from this version. Like the Gummi Bears DVD set; the episode selection screens use different music from the opening menu although unlike Gummi Bears; it's the background music from the actual show. Oh; and the constant switching between opening theme 1 and 2 was annoying as well.
As for the first disc set of episodes; this is the best one of the set with only Creep In The Deep being the real stinker. I just could not get into the storyline of land Vs. sea animals war and trying to take Captain Finn seriously was next to impossible for me. I also thought the middle portion where Monty agrees with Chip's deduction was really forced and Chip acted completely out of character even for him. Normie's Science Project was a near good one as Normie was pretty tolerable compared to Norton Nimnul who I felt was pretty whiny and too dorkish for my tastes. I also liked it for hearing Don Karnage's voice being voiced for a child and Baloo's favorite song in Double or Nothing. Like Creep in the Deep though; the logic breaks were annoying including what would prove to be Monty's cheese addiction breaking logic to pieces that it's difficult to pin-point how the psychology works for it. Seer No Evil was pretty much the only Chip focused episode on this set; which was a pretty clever twist to the Barely Alive plot line and I like this one better than Barely Alive. The conflict between Chip's cynicism and Cassie's prediction made for some really entertaining television so much so that I could forget about the lame sub story of a carnival barker and his pet monkey stealing money and stuffing it into teddy bears. Hey; I would rather ask Cassie for predictions on anything than see Michael Pachter or any reviewer in the real world for that matter since her batting average is about .950 or so.
To The Rescue was a middle of the road pilot in terms of quality from 1985-1993. On the one hand; there was an awesome Act III with the introduction of Gadget Hackwrench and her innocent sadist routine that was so funny that the male Rangers are forced to take it. Chip and Dale were Chip and Dale as usual; but the other hand is that the Jello Fruitcake Earthquake plot device was so bad that it makes me want to punch whomever did the final episode with a straight face. I mean; the tank laser was right there and it's not the main weapon?! Fat Cat didn't start out so well as he was still trying to work out the kinks to his character; but he slowly improved once Act II and Act III came into play. If only Norton and Klordane could say the same thing. Monty Jack dragged this pilot down by doing a really contrived quit job on the Rangers (all due to cheese of course) and then comes back without any indication that he was suffering in anyway when he left. Zipper was okay; but didn't do much to really impress me. Donald Drake does win a mention for his: “I'll kill Klordane; I swear to God.” blast and Plato's Crime Bite did provide a neat visual at the end of Act V.
My Rating for Disc One: *** ¾ – Again; visual quality was off a bit and Creep in the Deep dragged this disc set down quite a bit which is not a good sign since this one was the best disc of the entire set quality wise.
Disc Two
The overall design of the disc cover and disc itself is pretty much the same; only with different television screen grabs and Dale is superimposed on the front cover. I was tempted to say that the artwork guys made a slight error with Dale not wearing his shirt; but the neck portion sticking out also appears in the edited artwork on the front of the DVD box; so it's not an error overall. The front of the disc looks really awesome with the screen grab blended well into the background and the screen grab being as clean as possible. Sadly; the back one looks really dark and a lot less clean. Figures; that it comes from the Last Leprechaun episode. The remaining pictures look fine and the side uses a blue/green tint color. Personally; I would have picked Monty meets an old friend of hers that might splintered the Rangers for good over the deserted island though. This disc is 182 minutes long
Disc 2 Episode Rants
Chipwrecked Shipmunks Rant- Okay; this is really pushing it guys!
When Mice Were Men Rant- Doesn't Eric Realize That Means The Mice WON'T Fight Back?!
Chocolate Chips Rant- Okay; I'm declaring this series NUTS!!
The Last Leprechaun Rant- Uncle Scrooge must be rolling in his grave right now!!
Weather Or Not Rant- Here comes Monty not sucking.....!!
One-Upsman-Chip Rant- That sums up Chip and Dale well; doesn't it?!
Shell Shocked Rant- You just knew the TMNT bashing would continue.
Love Is A Many Splintered Thing Rant- I love real comments that aren't supposed to be real comments.
My Thoughts: The middle disc was a real long road in terms of quality as more than half of the first disc contained mostly middle of the road episodes and two stinkers. The best one of those five was Weather or Not in which Norton had probably his finest hour in the entire disc set as I enjoyed him being game to making look like a dork of himself plus using his tiny laser to try to kill a bunch of rodent. Monty actually was decent as the focus character here mostly due to the other characters; Gadget most of all acting really dumb to make up for Monty's insanity. Chocolate Chips wasn't all that good as the logic breaks with Chip being a zombie and a silly villain was frustrating; but the zombie angle was a lot better than Nightmare of the Living Spud (thanks to using flies which humans don't like) and Dale kicking and screaming to make this episode not suck. In fact; Dale carrying episodes was a theme for the entire box set in general since Gadget seems to do little of that herself. When Mice Were Men was another example despite being another Monty focused episode. It was half decent and the bull was pretty good; but the whole story of Monty's heroic acts was BS including the real story of what happened to the bull itself was even more so. Also; Eric Lewald had a funny joke in Dale carrying the episode in an attempt to defeat Lemon Pio as Dale would say and yet the finish didn't take advantage of the joke and it didn't involve lemons. It also didn't redeem Monty as he did the old WCW Fingerpoke of Doom to win over the bull to the point where only one child gave credit to the real hero of the story which was Dale.
Chipwreck Shipmunks was just asking for a pounding and it was a disappointment for the most part as I just couldn't stand the logic breaks and animation was the worst I have seen this side of Kennedy Cartoons. The finish would have meant a lot more if Dale was the one who did the act of breaking the croc's mouth to protect everyone from the hurricane. Jolly Roger would have been all right if he wasn't so stupid and stereotypical. Stormy was actually a better character than he was. The Last Leprechaun was plain awful and would have been worse if Dale wasn't putting on his usual awesome effort to carry this one. Druella was an interesting character design as a banshee; but her dead scream didn't really do any damage and was rendered lame by BS&P's do not make contact with a female rule. Darby was bad though as he just couldn't decide to be heel or face; and I couldn't get behind him as a babyface since he was pretty slimy and did little to redeem himself in my eyes. David Wise also wrote a pretty bad logic in the finish since Dale was supposed to have powers (and I have already discussed the logic break in both the rant and my defense of the accusation in my Live Journal since I got some criticism over the argument.) and Darby was supposed to lose them and then ended up getting them back before he switched back with Dale. Gadget did little except defeat Druella in the most lamest fashion possible. The last three episodes were much better as One-Upsman-Ship was a riot as Chip screws Dale into a contest that nearly gets Dale killed. Dale was game to play the absolute idiot in this one and Fat Cat had probably his best performance in the entire box set. While Chip was a mean little bugger; the payoff was awesome and Dale was absolutely funny. The only thing preventing a ***** episode was Mr. Fat giving up a little too easily to Chip's trick near the end.
Shell Shocked was also really good; but Sun Woo tainted the experience a bit with animation mistakes and while Fat Cat's logic of getting fish was really creative; it would have worked better if the shells were placed in the middle of the ocean rather than the seashore; plus use different kinds of shells. Dale was a riot as usual in trying to be the leader to make us laugh at Chip for being a no fun fuddy duddy; and then screw it up being getting nearly drowned in a tied up boot thrown into the ocean. And don't forget the product tie in Shell joke. Finally; a near **** episode effort from Love Is A Many Splintered Thing (which is an awesome title name by the way) gave us probably Monty's best focus episode ever. As much as I cannot stand Monty; the gullible mean mouse angle really worked here as Desiree was really on her game in this one despite the bad French accent. Erol and his ilk weren't really good villains as Rob Paulsen just wasn't Gilbert Gottfried which the later would have fit a lot better than the former. The episode is also historic because Desiree actually foreshadowed Rebecca Cunningham's look before she was changed into the bear you see today; and Desiree was foreshadowing quite a bit of Kit Cloudkicker's character design himself; although Kit's version of the character would turn out vastly different and would not have the same reaction I had with Desiree.
My Rating On Disc Two: *** ¾ – While the aspects of the first five episode being average to below average; none of them stank enough to destroy the disc like Darkwing Duck episodes did with their negative star episodes in Volume 2; or the DUD's in Volume 1.
Disc Three
This disc cover uses the same scheme as the first two discs; only the color scheme is more towards the green color on the sides and the back. which is a nice touch. Sadly; they used Monty superimposed on the screen shot which looks really creepy and perverted due to the screen grab below which is from Gadget Goes Hawaiian. If they really wanted to make it look symbolic; an angry Gadget Hackwrench overlooking the scene would have been much more symbolic and funny. The picture quality is darker; but at least it works here. The back pictures are mixed with the Dirty Rotten Diaper ones looking blurred all to heck while the Gadget Goes Hawaiian ones are near perfect. I would have picked either the Gadget goes insane after trying to make her friend solve cases the non-violent way or the Gadget meets her twin over the maiden voyage of the Ranger Wing for reasons I will explain in the episode thoughts below. This disc is also 182 minutes long.
Disc 3 Episode Rants
Song of The Night'N'Dale Rant- Enter the Ranger Wing....
Double'O'Chipmunks Rant- Stirred and Shaken as Dale is around....
Gadget Goes Hawaiian Rant- Surfin Gadget Hackwrench....
It's A Bird; It's Insane; It's Dale Rant- The episode which drove me insane....
Short Order Crooks Rant- If only my rants could be done in short order....
Mind Your Cheese's & Q's Rant- Geez; you don't think this won't turn into a Monty focused episode....?!
Out of Scale Rant- ...And Out of My Mind!!
Dirty Rotten Diapers Rant- Trash Those Censors!
My Thoughts: This is probably the most loaded lineup in the entire box set with a few surprise episodes; two Gadget focused episodes, lots of Dale being insane and even two episodes for Monty focused fans. Even Chip and Zipper had their funny moments. Of course; I thought the two Monty focused episodes were as stinky as smelly cheese. Short Order Crooks was pretty dull and setting up Ma to leave the diner was contrived and forced since Ma was supposed to be above stupidity as she demonstrated with the police officers and then lost her brain when she saw obvious crooks in her shop and bought their stupid story. Fry and Cook's heel Chip & Dale act was pretty silly as well. Wang Films also stank the joint with recycled scenes and a lot of gravity defying logic with Gadget. Now if Monty had just done all the work here instead of going for help ten minutes into the episode; maybe it would have been better. Mind Your Cheese & Q's was the worst episode in the entire series thus far as we got two rookie writers writing an episode animated by Sun Woo who was at their worst; about something that is difficult to write about without being offensive and using a character like Monty who has failed to get over much in any way by more experienced and much better writers. The good stuff involved Dale trying to be a serious gangster and the Gadget/Francis angle which had mall jokes and Gadget almost killing Francis (I know he's called Rat Capone; but he was in Double'O'Chipmunk so darn it; he's Francis) with a gold coin. Monty just sucked the meat missile with gusto here.
The Gadget focused episodes were much better as Dirty Rotten Diapers was historic not only for Disney's panicking of when Gadget want to shake a baby until he rattles; but for Gadget's sadism bubbling up to the front for everyone to see. She acted all innocent for 23 episodes on the matter; but when a bunch of dirty human ladies with baseball bats creamed her and her friends, she didn't hide her sadistic attitude as it was always there; but she was masking it with her innocent charm. This was a pretty good episode and the editing from the original did drag it down; but not nearly as much as Puffed Rangers would. Strangely; the Toon Disney version actually has Gadget yelling to her friends to Trash the Brat instead of Trash the Bum which made no sense since Thaddeus (who was a pretty good sadist character himself) was a legit baby who was ultra smart; and Monty still called him a brat later on anyway. Dale was also awesome as he was game to panic when the baby went rabid on shaving cream and dressing up as a Raggedy Ann doll. The other one is Gadget Goes Hawaiian which should have been the first perfect episode; but the ending where Chip and Dale miss kissing each other and blow the gay kiss spot ruined it. A few contrived spot also hurt it a little; but Gadget and her evil twin just stole the show as I expected them to. Lawhinie is probably the best one shot heel in the entire series and her charm (and looking almost like Gadget minus the voice) helped a lot. Plus; it showed Darkwing Duck and even TaleSpin to a much lesser extent on how to make a forbidden word fest episode awesome with about eight references to god in this episode alone. I also liked Shakabaka's name even if he was a bland dumb surfer dude.
Dale had three episodes focused on himself and Double'O'Chipmunks was the best episode in the entire set and the only one to get the ***** episode rating. It was a mess animation wise; but Dale's performance was so on along with the Rescue Rangers trying to play the evil ones and then being victims later on. Zipper was cute and Dale's taking pictures with his bow tie was so priceless and classic that the villains were secondary despite doing a real decent job. I also liked the shoot aspect of it and only Captains Outrageous topped it because Dale knew it was work before it turned into a shoot; unlike Oscar Vandersnoot who thought the whole thing was a shoot; but he realized that Kit and WildCat were working him; but it turned into a shoot when Don Karnage got involved. And there was a kidnapping a kid plot involved too which helped it even more. Chip needs to watch more spy movies and less westerns methinks. Dale also performed miracles in It's A Bird, It's Insane; It's Dale! He had to since the writers and animators were in two different books in this one. The contrived spot when Dale stops the crook (a recycled Fry from Short Order Crooks) with his flex powers has him wearing a costume on television when the Rangers see him; but Dale wasn't supposed to wear it until AFTER the incident! Sadly; they booked themselves into a corner because if Wang did animate it logically; then the writers would have to make the other Rangers look really stupid in order to make the logic work. Plus; the writers and animators couldn't properly sync which landmarks to use and therefore some landmarks were reported stolen; but didn't show up and some landmarks weren't reported stolen; but did show up. And then Wang Films screwed up the creditability of the episode by showing a piece of footage where it was clear that a human was stealing Lady Liberty and not Dale; but Dale still gets the blame. It reeks of Double Darkwings; but it could have been easily fixed by reanimating the scene and taking out the human features. Thankfully; Dale's act overcame it all and he got a near **** episode out of it.
Song of the Night'N'Dale was a middling episode which had an awesome sequence in the beginning with the Ranger Wing debut albeit no real reason why they needed it; and then it fell fast as Dim Sun wasn't impressive; but he had some sympathy moments with Chirp Sing which I thought was pretty impressive with the name and the It's all my fault act Kit would later steal and fanfic writers would pound into the ground. Su Lin was awful as she basically telegraphed her heelish presence right from her debut (since she was the only one attacking Chirp Sing) when we were not supposed to know she was a heel until after she is declared the new leader over Dim Sun. Her mental illness drugging act was pretty good for shock value and it allowed Dale to do what he does best in being insane. Still; I felt a bit cheated since it was supposed to be an important episode. Finally; there was the surprise episode which is Out of Scale as we got a better heel than Klordane in Ratso who was mean, nasty and really funny in every way against a couple of chipmunks who were game to give me the amusement of seeing them fight like a bunch of girls despite all the attempts by the mice and blue bottle fly to stop them from doing so. Moose and Rocco (recycled Percy and Fry) were pretty good as Ratso's henchmen and Buffy was pretty mean and good when she was a sadist; but her voice was way too old to be taken seriously. Ratso was pretty good and he was at his best when he finally blew off Buffy in an act Kit would later steal himself. Ratso's was haha funny while Kit was just plain awesome, but really sad in other sense. While the apology was a little too early to do; the bumping and funny stuff inside Buffy's room was hilarious. However; it was the bad in a good way spots that really cements this as an awesome episode capped off by Zipper using his leg to trip three big heels in succession which was so funny that I couldn't help but laugh at it. Gadget was prepping for Dirty Rotten Diapers I see too.
My Rating For Disc Three: *** 3/4 - Monty ruins a chance for the best set as Mind Your Cheese's & Q's was the worst of the entire series; but at least he didn't drag it down like Drake Mallard would. Still; if you want loaded laughs with Dale; this is the disc set to watch.
Extras
It is exactly like most of the other DTVA DVD sets. There are no extras present so therefore no rating.
Set Up
Like most DTVA box sets; the only things on setup is for subtitles which can be set to English or no subtitles. That's it. No French audio, no French subtitles at all. TaleSpin had French audio in Volume One and subtitles in French for Volume 2. Even worse; the audio is all in digital mono sound version 2.0 compared to Dolby Stereo surround in Volume 1 (English version only) and just stereo sound in volume 2 of TaleSpin. There is simply no excuse for this; even in a no-frills DVD set. On the other hand; at least this volume has four-five chapter stops per episode and the captions team was really on their best behavior as there were few if any errors in their work. And there are the usual crappy ads that we saw in the beginning of the first disc all in one option on the first disc which shows what Disney was really using the DVD box sets for.
My Rating for Set Up: ***- This might be the worst set of the lot in terms of set up with only one option to change from no subtitles to English subtitles.
My Rating for the Entire DVD Set: ***3/4 (75%)
The Review Line:
I think the package was a little deceptive since the end product didn't turn out to be as good as the box art was in sense of quality episodes and the audio and video wasn't quite up to snuff compared to the other DVD Box Sets that I have seen. The episode selection has a lot of great episodes; but only one of them got the full monty and only about five episodes got over **** ½. There was also as many thumbs down episodes as in Darkwing Duck; but it did have the advantage of not having any negative star episodes so the quality was kept from spiraling out of control. Also; the lack of French audio, subtitles and even stereo sound hurt this set even more and it's not completely uncut as Gadget's Trash the Brat line from Toon Disney doesn't appear in this set. I don't know how Volume 1 of this series is going to turn out; but it better be a vast improvement over the second volume; or we might actually see it tied or worse than Darkwing Duck was at this point. Still; even if the quality could have been better; I would still buy it in a heartbeat anyway since Youtube is known for taking stuff down and really this is the only other legal way to enjoy Rescue Rangers or any DTVA show you love outside of tape traders. It's good enough for new customers to get use to and become fans of the series and they can always go on-line for the really juicy stuff anyway since there is already a good fan base on the internet. Still; considering that Disney has pretty much either been silent on future releases of DTVA sets; or has pretty much nixed the idea on grounds of poor sales, I think Disney blew it quite a bit on this set compared to TaleSpin and even to lesser extent the Gummi Bears and Darkwing Duck sets with the setup. So....
I give this DVD set a thumbs in the middle; and I'll see you next time.