Blu-Balled: It's in the Game -- Tron (1982)

Before its animation branch got its act together in 1989 with The Little Mermaid, and well before it discovered tweeners in the early-2000’s, Disney’s main bread and butter was live-action tent pole movies. Not all were successful, but many were interesting, and later became mainstays on The Disney Channel (again, before Disney discovered tweeners). One such movie was Tron, an 80’s cult classic that has since gained a following among nerds and a very expensive sequel.

Tron has a fairly complicated and meander-y plot, but here’s the long and short of it: while digging around his old employer’s computer files, Flynn (Jeff Bridges) is transported to cyberspace by the Master Control Program, an ornery AI who is basically intent on world domination. Once inside, Flynn must work with Tron (Bruce Boxleitner), a security program, and Yori (Cindy Morgan), a testing program, to defeat the MCP and get back to reality.

I find Tron to be immensely appealing, but not for traditional, “This movie is good” reasons. Tron was released in 1982, and almost everything about this film is steeped in 80’s movie –isms, from the general look of the film (a grainy, almost modern appearance common in many other flicks of the time) to the “Gee whiz, we’re making a movie!” attitude that permeates most of my favorite 80’s entertainment. Perhaps I’m simply weary of so many grim, “serious” takes on popular entertainment, or the uber-hip, modern school of film-making, but Tron simply wants to try something new, and I’d be a damn cold b@%#$ if I gave it a rap on the knuckles for its desire to be different.

Dudes who wear hockey helmets and glow-y leotards while playing Ultimate Frisbee. Eh, I'll take it.

You can’t discuss Tron without also discussing the special effects, and Tron is a real feast for the eyes. Even if the effects have aged significantly since its initial release in 1982 (and believe me, they have), the film’s look is so startlingly different that it’s easy to take the primitive effects at face value; you get the impression that the movie is supposed look that way, deliberately like it’s inside of a computer. The characters all have an otherworldly glow to them, and all look as if they were filmed in black and white, giving even the most mundane of scenes a trippy and compelling visual style. Buying the film on Blu-ray only accentuates the “OMG PRETTY!” level of an already-gorgeous movie.

The acting is split down the middle. Boxleitner and Morgan are kinda wooden, but charitable fans could explain that Tron and Yori are programs, and aren’t capable of fully human emotions (uh huh). On the other hand, I do enjoy Jeff Bridges as a hotshot, nerdy guy who loves coding as much as he loves video games. The biggest star of the film, though, is Warner, who uses his wonderfully unctuous, British dialect to give his character, Sark, an effortlessly villainous edge. Warner also plays the Master Control Program, though his voice is digitally lowered, Talkboy-style.

Warner also plays "The Lobe" on the old WB series Freakazoid. If you haven't seen it, please open another tab and add it to your Netflix queue now.

Make no mistake, Tron is definitely not what you’d call a Great Movie. Tron’s plot takes quite a while to get going, setting up several story-important details, but mostly trudging around. Even when the movie finally enters The Grid, the computer setting where most of the film takes place, much of the action is rather unevenly paced, alternating between special effects-driven set piece scenes and awkward bits of dialogue.

Still, for what it is, Tron is a fun, if slow, bit of 80’s nostalgia for evenings that require 80’s nostalgia. It’s not the most exciting film available on Blu-ray, but for fans of 80’s flicks or for those that remember when The Disney Channel actually used to play old Disney shorts, Tron is a worthwhile purchase.

Blu-ray Breakdown:

Where purchased: Target in Bozeman

How much: $20 (first week special)

Favorite character: Sark

Favorite scene: Flynn, Tron, and RAM race the Lightcycles

Rating: ***/****

...dammit.

Our Feature Presentation (19/50) -- Hercules (1997)

The 90’s, as anyone can tell you, was a snarky, snarky time. Sitcoms like Married… With Children and Friends threw around sarcastic quips from every angle, and even children’s series like Animaniacs couldn’t help but feature dry jokes and retorts. In this way, Hercules undeniably a product of the 90’s: the humor rests largely on wisecracks and one-liners, and its many pop culture references (yes, it has pop culture references) place it firmly during the second Clinton administration. That said, Hercules, while quite dated in places, has aged better than most mid-90’s snark, and still makes for an entertaining film.

Hercules starts with a bold narration (from Charlton Heston, no less) about the heroes of ancient Greece, and how the greatest of the entire pantheon was the mighty Hercules. The voiceover is interrupted by the Muses (five gospel-singin’ women who act as this film's version of the Chorus), who assert that they can tell the story in a more entertaining fashion. The Muses spin a tale of Hercules, born with much fanfare to Zeus (Rip Torn) and Hera (Samantha Eggar) as Olympus’ new God. Not everyone is chuffed at the little guy’s appearance, though, as Hades (James Woods) shows up to voice his disapproval of the new boy and his general lot in life (indeed, his first appearance reminds me of Maleficent’s first scene in Sleeping Beauty).

I always like to pretend the middle one's Beyonce.

Hades has a plot to overthrow the gods and reign over Olympus, but he needs to have Hercules out of the picture in order for the plan to work. Hades sends his two lackeys, Pain and Panic (Bobcat Goldthwait and Matt Frewer) to kidnap Hercules, turn him mortal, and put him out of commission. P&P go two for three, but aren’t able to seal the deal on the young boy’s demise, and while Hercules survives the ordeal, he isn’t allowed to rejoin his parents, because only gods can enter Olympus. Hercules is found and adopted by an elderly farming couple (Jonathan and Martha Kent, no doubt), and the only mark of the young god’s Olympian origin is his incredible strength, a leftover from P&P’s botched attempt at infanticide.

Hercules (Josh Keaton) grows up awkward and outcast, derided by others as a “freak” because of his unnaturally strength (he also often breaks whatever is around him). After a particularly disastrous trip to the agora, Hercules sets out to find his real parents, and eventually learns of his divine parentage. Zeus is overjoyed that Herc has discovered his real family, but informs him that he needs to become a hero in order to reclaim his godliness (hint: start at cleanliness). Hercules seeks out Philoctetes, a Mickey Goldmill-esque trainer of ancient epic heroes (“Odysseus, Perseus, Theseus, a lotta ‘yeuses’.”), and in no time at all (though enough for his voice to change to Tate Donovan’s), Herc is ship-shape and ready for action. With help from the flying horse Pegasus and the lovely Megara (Susan Egan), Hercules sets out to become a hero and restore his place on Olympus.

Part of the fun is watching Hercules overcome his initial dorky-isms.

A casual glance at the plot summary reveals that the film is not a blow-by-blow retelling of the Heracles myth. Duh. The myth is grim, dark, violent, and tragic (like its contemporaries), and wouldn’t suit a Disney picture at all; like “Aladdin’s Wonderful Lamp” or “The Little Mermaid” before it, Hercules would see its source material altered to suit the film. Good thing too, I say—as big a fan as I am of Greek mythology, I will acquiesce that the Heracles myth as it is most often told wouldn’t lend itself well to film in general, let alone a musical from the Disney Renaissance. What the film does do is include several sly winks and references to the actual myth, such as Hercules taming the three-headed dog Cerberus or blinding a Cyclops with fire. It’s this attention to detail that lets the audience know that, yes, the filmmakers did their research and, no, they don’t care that, in the myth, Hercules actually kills Megara and their children in a fit of Hera-driven rage.

Hercules is good, but not great. Many of the elements of the movie are reasonably pleasing, but never reach the height of other films from the era (which is a cheap complaint to make, but Herc has The Hunchback of Notre Dame on one side of it and Mulan on the other, and I’ll be damned if it’s not hard to make comparisons). That said, it is a member of the Renaissance, and possesses several memorable qualities, and even if the finished product is uneven, it’s still reasonably distinctive.

Definitely not perfect, but there's a lot to like about Hercules.

First are Hercules’s visuals. Informed, I guess, by Grecian statues and artwork, Hercules has a unique art style that works… most of the time. More often than not, the angular nature of the characters and extra lines on the backgrounds give the film a quirky visual appeal, but the movie occasionally segues into overly-busy, most noticeable with the periphery characters (the group of five from Thebes, the discus-playing teenagers, Pain & Panic, etc.). The movie does make good use of color (especially on Mt. Olympus, where the many-colored gods remind me of a bag of Skittles), but this only adds to the busyness.

Hercules is also arguably Disney’s most “Dreamworks” film to date. I mentioned earlier the use of pop culture references, and if you thought that Aladdin went overboard by including Arsenio Hall, you will be struck dumb by the film’s reference to a then-current American Express commercial, or Hercules’ brand of footwear called “Air Herc.” I could go on. Fortunately, and unlike Dreamworks until very recently, Hercules never loses sight of its heart, resulting in a sense of humor that, while dated, still holds up reasonably well under scrutiny, if only because the snark is never more caustic than it needs to be.

Yep, they went there.

One thing Hercules does have is an impeccable voice cast. Rip Torn’s deep, booming voice gives Zeus a decidedly Big Cheese bravado, though he also supplies a nice, encouraging father feel (which the real Zeus probably couldn’t produce if his thunderbolt depended on it). Susan Egan’s performance as Meg reminds me significantly of Rosalind Russell, with her low key zingers and dry delivery—she turns Meg from a potentially banal Love Interest character into a wonderfully witty match for Hercules’ heroism. Phil is about as amusing as you would expect from the phrase “Danny DeVito plays a talking goat,” using his “two words” bit to great effect.

The real standout of the cast, though, is James Woods. Hades’ constant quips and throwaways (“You look like a fate worse than death”) make him a riot to watch, but Woods is able to throw and underlying menace into his performance, giving the impression that the guy is constantly bubbling under. In fact, the only “weak link” is Tate Donovan, and he’s not even that weak; he manages to play both sides of the security fence, alternately convincing as a mighty hero and a guy who just wants to be accepted. In the face of his supporting cast, though, he gets overwhelmed.

Woods clips along at a mile a minute, and leaves me in stitches every time.

Hercules is criminally underrated by nearly everyone when it comes to its music. Let it be said that Alan Menkin performs well when he’s wearing hats: he won an Academy Award while wearing his Calypso hat during The Little Mermaid, and another one for the Middle East/40’s Big Band hat he wore for Aladdin. Hercules gives him a Baptist Gospel Choir hat to wear, and the results are tasty, lead primarily by the Muses. The songs are energetic, fast, and fun, the best being “Zero to Hero” and “The Gospel Truth.” The character-sung songs are pretty good too, with Phil’s “One Last Hope” being the only dud. “I Can Go the Distance” is one of my favorite Disney Yearning Songs, and Meg’s doo-wop-influenced “I Won’t Say I’m in Love” works as both a character moment for Meg and a catchy little ditty. Menkin’s score is rousing and makes great use of themes, but what did you expect?

The package adds up to a movie that, while not the best that Disney has to offer, is still one of the better comedies in the canon. No one will argue that it’s art, but Hercules has all the potential for a great Movie Night film, where you can revel at the McDonalds “Over 5 Billion Served” reference, and remember what it was like in the 90’s when Disney could do no wrong.

Top 3 Songs:

1. “I Can Go the Distance”
2. “Zero to Hero”
3. “I Won’t Say I’m in Love”

Favorite scene:

• Herc vs. the Hydra, part II

Favorite character:

• Hades

The Jar Jar:

• Pain & Panic (like the Tweedles, they function as a unit)

How I Watched It

During this retrospective, I’ve looked at several old, out-of-print editions that were later replaced by shinier, newer versions. Hercules is in dire need of one of these upgrades, judging by the DVD I viewed it on (which I picked up brand new from Amazon). The picture is presented in 4:3, non-anamorphic widescreen, which is rather undesirable for folks with widescreen TVs, and the picture quality could use a facelift. I didn’t bother to turn on the surround sound once I realized that the menu looked like it was made in iDVD, but I imagine the movie’s sound, like the picture, is fairly unremarkable.

Hercules has an odd set of extras. The first is a small, cheerleader-y Making Of featurette, which lasts all of six minutes and provides precious little substance; there are some chats with the voice cast, and it’s fun to watch the gospel choir perform in a studio setting, but there’s not much here to work with. Next is a music video of Ricky Martin singing the Spanish (!) version of “I Can Go the Distance,” and last is a set of Movie Recommendations, which is a series of stills advertising The Lion King II: Simba’s Pride, or other such sundries. Of the movies I’ve looked at so far, Hercules cries the loudest for a newer version; call it the Zero To Hero edition or whatever you want, but let me have it, and soon!

Our Feature Presentation (18/50) -- Alice In Wonderland (1951)

What a strange, strange movie. This is seriously the only opener I can come up with when discussing Alice in Wonderland, Disney’s 14^th Animated Feature based on Lewis Carroll’s duo of books, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. The film is so wildly weird and incredibly unconcerned with making any sense (narrative or otherwise), it’s something that you can only sit back and goggle at, an experience that makes Fantasia look positively grounded in storytelling.

To describe the plot of Alice in Wonderland is to miss the point, but here goes anyway. Alice is receiving study lessons from some woman who could be her sister (I could very well be wrong; the movie never explains who she is), when she sees a rabbit with in a waistcoat and trousers rush past her. Curious, and eager to be rid of her studies, Alice follows the rabbit down a very deep hole and into a Technicolor mindf@$# of a place called Wonderland. The movie then spends the next 70 minutes following Alice around as she gawks at everything she meets, before concluding so abruptly that I was reminded of the Package Films and their tendency to trail off, rather than end.

If you’re looking for a movie that follows a concrete “A then B” story, you should give Alice a wide berth, because this is not a movie where anything, in a sense, happens. There’s no conflict, there’s no overarching character development—it’s pure spectacle from first to last. But what a spectacle it is! Singing flowers, size-changing foods, anthropomorphized doorknobs, the whole movie is one big acid trip, and I have very little doubt that Alice, similar to Fantasia, saw a great following during the “Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out” days of the 60’s.

This was a poster from Alice's 1974 re-release. Apparently it was marketed alongside Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit." Indicative much?

The movie tumbles head-first into psychedelic territory almost the moment Alice falls down the rabbit hole. As she drops, the colors start to turn funky, her shape distorts from wide to thin like a funhouse mirror, and she tumbles by several bits of levitating furniture. The extra bright picture afforded by the Blu-ray release (which is how I watched it) makes the film seem even more trippy.

Suffice it to say that the visuals are an absolute boon to this picture. The art direction is superb, blending the otherwise unfilmable images of Carroll’s books and the soft, lovely animation style of Disney’s Silver Age—the movie is undeniably strange, but is made all-the-more inviting by the charm Disney brings to the table. In particular, the doorknob is a fun and inventive piece of animation, and would be heavily referenced during Beauty and the Beast’s preproduction as an example of how to get inanimate objects to behave like humans.

The art style leans on the squash 'n' stretch a bit more than in most films, resulting in a more "cartoon-y" looking film.

Alice in Wonderland is the most song-heavy film in the Disney canon, with 14 (!) tunes played throughout the experience. Of course, not all of them are full-length Disney Tunes, and less than half of them break the two-minute mark; the rest are small blink-and-you-miss-them ditties, and even the famous “I’m Late” song lasts all of 45 seconds. The Did That Just Happen nature of having so many songs only adds to the sense of strangeness and befuddlement brought on by the movie.

Perhaps the most unusual thing about the movie (to its detriment, I think) is how Alice reacts to the oddities around her. Specifically, how she doesn’t react. Alice is undoubtedly the most English protagonist out of any film in the canon, as she meets even the strangest sights by cocking her head and going, “Hmm, isn’t that peculiar.” Her distance as a character makes her hard for the audience to identify with, though her occasional deadpan remarks are fairly amusing (“Goodness,” she observes as she falls down the rabbit hole for a minute and a half, “after this, I shall think nothing of falling down the stairs.”).

The film also has the weirdest habit of periodically becoming super dramatic. Most of Alice is played as a lark, but occasionally, and sporadically, it will zoom in on one of the characters while the music becomes very loud and intense. Most of these moments involve either the queen or the Caterpillar (who is a bi-polar bug if there ever was one), but the most out-of-place one comes during the scene where the Mad Hatter “fixes” the White Rabbit’s watch by covering it in sugar, jam, and butter (don’t ask). The watch begins to spin and bounce about, while the camera zooms, the characters yell, and the music reaches an almost unbearable crescendo—it’s as if the movie is terribly frightened of rogue timepieces, and is trying to convince us of how scary they actually are.

The horror... the horror!

There are a few other flaws too. For all I have been raving and ranting about in regards to the movie’s unmitigated weirdness, I personally don’t have much use for it, and I find the movie’s total lack of any coherent narrative more than just a bit off-putting. The aforementioned songs also don’t leave much of an impact, with only “Golden Afternoon” and “Painting the Roses Red” really standing out as catchy to me.

Still, Alice in Wonderland is worth a look, if only under the pretense of being “arty.” Disney’s interpretation of Alice is arguably better-known than Carroll’s books, and Alice’s characters and imagery persist in popularity even today (culminating with, I think, Tim Burton’s live-action take on the franchise last year). Though the film can be disappointingly slipshod and absent of conflict (it also lacks anything related to the Jabberwocky, apart from a short poem sung by the Cheshire Cat), Alice in Wonderland is a cemented classic in Disney’s canon, and should be checked out if you haven’t seen it yet.

Top 3 Songs:

1. “Golden Afternoon”
2. “Painting the Roses Red”
3. “The Sailor’s Hornpipe”

Favorite scene:

• Alice's trial
  

Favorite character:

• The Dodo

The Jar Jar:

• Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum (they function as a unit)

How I Watched It

I picked up the Blu-ray edition of Alice in Wonderland on first week special at Target, which comes with both the Blu-ray version of the movie and a DVD copy for the kids to use in the car. The film looks great in high def, and though it’s not as mind blowing as Beauty and the Beast or Fantasia are, Alice’s bright colors and clever art direction benefit greatly from the picture upgrade.

Alice in Wonderland has a good chunk of special features, the biggest of which is a movie-length documentary called “Through the Keyhole: A Companion's Guide to Wonderland.” “Through the Keyhole” plays the movie like normal, but is intercut with footage of Disney historians and animators (including Will Finn, animator of Aladdin’s Iago!), pencil tests, concept art, and live action reference footage; it’s basically a commentary, but taken to a whole new level, and is among the coolest special features I’ve seen in a Blu-ray release so far.

Also included is a host of deleted scenes, pencil tests, and even a few TV specials: “Operation Wonderland” is an excerpt from an old TV show, and details the process of how animation is created, while “One Hour in Wonderland” is a bit of a variety show designed to showcase Alice in Wonderland, featuring Katherine Beaumont and several guests, as well as a slew of Disney shorts. Lastly is the Mickey Mouse short “Thru the Mirror,” a Through The Looking-Glass-inspired cartoon where Mickey dreams that he goes through his bedroom mirror and dances with a set of playing cards. “Through the Keyhole” by itself would have been enough for me, but the well-over two hours of other bonus features also included on the Blu-ray are just icing on the cake.

Our Feature Presentation (17/50) -- The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949)

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad may be the most uneven film in the Disney Animated Feature canon. There are worse films, to be sure, and certainly there are better ones, but I’m almost positive that none of them go from “meh” to “pretty good” as sharply as Ichabod and Mr. Toad. Ich-y and Mr. T was created one year before Disney would bootstrap itself into profitability with Cinderella, and many Silver Age techniques can be seen employed here. However, the IT crowd still clings to many shortcuts and cheap-isms that hallmarked the previous five package films, making for a wild ride of sorts (heh heh heh).

The film begins in what appears to be someone’s study, as Basil Rathbone’s ear-buttering timbre explains that English literature has produced many memorable characters throughout the years (Robin Hood, King Arthur, Frodo Baggins, etc.), and that his favorite is a toad. J. Thaddeus Toad, to be precise, from Kenneth Grahame’s classic novel The Wind in the Willows. A disembodied hand, or perhaps friendly poltergeist, pulls the book from its shelf, and Rathbone begins to read the first of the film’s two narratives.

Fun bit of trivia: The Wind in the Willows was the first book I ever read with over 200 pages. My third grade self was rather proud.

Mr. Toad’s portion of the movie tells of four animals making their way in the Victorian England countryside: a badger, a water rat, a mole (whose names, respectively, are Badger, Rat, and Mole), and J.T.T. himself. Toad is a fabulously wealthy entrepreneur who fritters away his money on various fads and pleasure-seekings. Badger and co. desperately plead with him to control his “manias,” but Toad spots a motor car for the first time and succumbs to the mother of all manias. Toad declares he simply must have a motor car, despite not having any more money for it, and is soon arrested for attempting to steal a car.

The movie then becomes Twelve Angry Men for a spell, during which Toad is tried and witnesses are presented. Toad insists that he traded the car for a deed to his estate, Toad Hall, but his key witness testifies that Toad instead sold him a stolen car belonging to some weasels, and Toad is locked away. Toad eventually breaks out to find that his key witness and the weasels were in cahoots, hoping to steal Toad Hall away (court appeals, real estate—sounds like this book was written as a bedtime story for aspiring bookkeepers). In a climactic ending, the group breaks into Toad Hall and steals the deed back from the weasels, proving Toad’s innocence.

For a movie about talking animals, Mr. Toad is far less fun or bouncy than it should be, owing to a surprisingly slow pace. Several sections drag out interminably, and only during the ending sequence where Toad, Badger, Rat, and Mole retake Toad Hall does the film’s energy pick up. The movie alternates between Rathbone’s narrations and the characters’ onscreen antics, which gives the film a jarring, hurry-up-and-wait feel to it. It’s a shame that Disney couldn’t make an entire film out of The Wind and the Willows; surely the added screen time could help the picture feel less congested.

Aside from an especially manic ending, Mr. Toad's portion of the film is not quite as fun as it could be.

After Rathbone concludes his story, the wonderfully dulcet tone of Bing Crosby pipes up (this movie is not wanting for pleasant voiceover talent), who asserts that we ‘Mericans have some pretty good characters too. He rattles off a few (almost all of which were covered in Melody Time) before finally settling on Ichabod Crane, the poor, unfortunate soul who met his end (or did he?) in Washington Irving’s short story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”

Crosby thrusts us right into the story, as we follow Ichabod’s first visit to Sleepy Hollow. The town Man’s Man, Brom Bones, thinks the guy is a joke, but everyone else is absolutely smitten by Ichabod’s charm. Despite the fact that he looks like a vulture’s carcass warmed-over, the womens of Sleepy H. can’t help but throw themselves at “ol’ Icky,” and he soon feels right at home in his new hamlet.

Now I ain't sayin' he a gold digger...

Yes, it turns out that Ichabod is not the nice guy his nerdy appearance indicates, but is instead a cunning womanizer, who preys on ladies’ affections to fill his larders with food and pockets with money. Brom, too, is not quite what he seems; rather than a thuggish, John Hughes-ian jock type, Brom is a regular dude, no more cruel or unkind than anyone else in town (indeed, from the way he acts, he could very well be called Bro Bones *ba dump tish*). Everyone goes about their merry business, until the movie’s best argument against pining after women waltzes into view.

Her name is Katrina, and she is the kind of girl who likes to watch boys compete over her; a woman whose feminine wiles and callous man-ipulation have doubtlessly inspired many an emo song. Anyway, Katrina rides into town on a horse made of sex appeal and cotton candy (I’ll stop now), and everyone in town is smitten with her. Naturally, both Brom and Ichabod pursue her affections, and the movie has a good time playing Unstoppable Force And Immovable Object between the two characters.

The comic timing in the courtship scenes is razor-sharp.

Ichabod eventually gains the upper hand, though, and is invited to a party where he will inevitably propose to her, gold-digging his way into a comfortable living (the movie makes no effort to hide his ulterior motive). Brom, in a last stroke of effort, notices Ichabod’s superstitious nature, and weaves a tale about a horseman who patrols the back roads of Sleepy Hollow, no doubt because he enjoys the cool night breeze on his headless neck. On his way home, Ichabod encounters the horseman, and after a furious chase, disappears forever; whether he died or merely decided he’d move the Cleveland instead, the movie does not say.

In contrast to The Wind and the Willows, which felt like a full-length feature hastily shoehorned into a 30 minute short, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow feels exactly as long as it needs to be, telling the story as best it can while still padding the film with comic relief. Sleepy Hollow also opts to have Crosby narrate the whole thing, which helps sell the story’s appeal; even when characters speak, Crosby takes over for their voices (there is a portion where Ichabod croons to several women of the town in The Groaner’s signature manner).

Sleepy Hollow even looks better. While The Wind and the Willows looked more like a Donald Duck short, with characters squashing and stretching every which way, Sleepy Hollow’s visuals appear to be a not-too-distant cousin of Cinderella; humans are realistic while looking slightly cartoony, and the comic timing hints at what the silver age will bring.

It's definitely not as polished as the Cin-city, but it's definitely a step-up from the other package films.

If it wasn’t already apparent, I enjoyed “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” FAR more than I did “The Wind and the Willows,” which saddens me. I read “The Wind and the Willows” when I was in grade school, and remember enjoying it quite a bit. The concept even sounds more fun: a madcap toad gambols about in several high-priced toys, causing vandalism and collateral damage before finally learning to straighten up and fly right (emphasis on the “fly,” haha). As it stands, though, “The Wind and the Willows” is short, ploddy, incredibly concerned that we understand the legal system of Victorian England, and overall a rather half-baked attempt at adapting what is otherwise a rather charming story.

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed “Sleepy Hollow,” and I think most of it came from the characters. As I mentioned above, Ichabod is an anti-hero at best, which helps make Brom’s potential d-bagginess less of an issue. These two combined with Katrina, who is a total harlot, make for a story full of slightly despicable characters, which is a change of pace for Disney. The knowledge that every one of these characters “deserves” each other makes it easy to and soak in the story.

Then, of course, there’s the Horseman, who I would rank right under Chernabog on Disney’s Genuine Horror Animation Characters list. The Horseman’s laugh, jet black color, and sword-brandishing demeanor sell him as an actual threat to Ichabod, and if he weren’t used as a gag during several parts of the chase, I would say he is easily one of the most terrifying characters in a Disney feature.

Uh, yeah, you're boned.

Disney completists will want to rent The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, but it is FAR from a necessary viewing (it’s not even the best Package Film. THE BEST PACKAGE FILM!). That said, the Sleepy Hollow segment is surprisingly entertaining, and worth a view during your next Halloween get-together.

Top 3 Songs:

1. “The Headless Horseman”
2. “Ichabod Crane”
3. “Nowhere In Particular”

Favorite scene:

• Brom’s story of The Headless Horseman

Favorite character:

• The weasels

The Jar Jar:

• Cyril Proudbottom (the horse with buckteeth and what sounds like a bad Mel Blanc impression)

How I Watched It

This'll teach me to order some place only for Super Saver Shipping--while the disc looks just fine, the packaging looked faded enough that I had to check to make sure it was bootlegged (it wasn't, much to my disappointment). This is the standard edition of The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad available for average every day purpose. Since this is a Gold Collection DVD, the transfer is pretty blocky and blah in places, with noticeable dirt and scuffs on the negatives, making me appreciate the Robin Hood and Saludos Amigos transfers (which I thought were pretty paint-by-numbers).

Aside from a pretty blah picture transfer, the DVD also comes with a few extras. Most of them are pretty unworthy: a Sing-Along, a DVD storybook of Mr. Toad, and a Mr. Toad's Wild Ride game (which I can only assume tries to ape the Disneyland ride). Rounding out the package is the Mickey Mouse short "Lonesome Ghosts," which casts Mickey, Donald, and Goofy as mid-30's Ghostbusters. The short itself isn't bad, and a decent idea to whip out at your next Halloween party.

Gold and Silver! Silver and Gold! (c) Yukon Cornelius -- Pokémon Gold and Silver -- The Pokémon Retrospective

After playing the ever loving crap out of Blue, getting my paparazzi on in Snap, and owning fools in Stadium, I discovered that Nintendo was hard at work on a Game Boy continuation of the Pokémon franchise. The bullet point list of improvements was incredible: 100 more Pokémon, a day and night cycle, eight new Gyms, and the entire region from the first game available for unlock after joining the Pokémon League. For a series that, to me, was not in need of major renovations, Nintendo came out swinging with a laundry list of upgrades.

Pokémon Silver takes place in the Johto region, a western province based on the Kansai region of Japan, and it’s full of new sights to see. Like the first game, the player is a young boy setting out on an adventure to become the world’s greatest Pokémon trainer, with only the shirt on your back and the Pokéballs at your belt. Along the way, players will travel to new cities (all named for different species of plants), battle new trainers, and capture all sorts of new Pokémon.

New town, same ol' Pokémon Center.

The biggest change to Pokémon Silver comes in the form of an internal clock, which tracks the time of day. The environment changes depending on what time it is (if the game is played at night, the areas will become darker), and gameplay is affected by the time as well. Certain Pokémon only come out at night or in the morning, and several moves are more effective when used during a particular time of day.

While they do add a fair bit of gameplay variety, I was never too chuffed with the day/night cycle. It took the deep, fantasy world which I loved and tied it too strongly to the real world, and gave it a “game-y” edge to boot. Not to mention it was now impossible to try to find wild Pokémon; I wasn’t sure if certain creatures were rare, would only come out during the evening, or both. This probably could have been helped if I had bought a strategy guide, but catching ‘em all still seemed like far too daunting a task.

Though it added depth, I didn't care much for the addition of night.

Of course, more was brought to the table than just the clock. After players beat the Elite Four, they could take a bullet train to the Kanto region, where the first game took place. From there, players could journey back through old haunts and re-challenge the likes of Brock, Sabrina, Giovanni, and other old Gym Leaders.

I was super excited for this feature, but it turned out to be slightly less than advertised. When I finally reached Kanto, it had been waaayyyyy downsized from the way it was in Blue. I understand that it would have taken far too much memory to include such a huge map into an already enormous game, but I was still slightly disappointed. That said, I enjoyed grinding through 16 Badges was way more than I did grinding through eight, so the Johto/Kanto split was ultimately a good thing.

You hop on the metro to get to another region. Did I mention this game was made in Japan?

The last major shakeup was the Pokégear, a set of gadgets at the player’s disposal that functioned as a watch, map, radio, and cell phone. The cell phone part is the real kicker—players could now save the phone numbers of other trainers and call them for rematches, helping earn extra experience points.

Gold also took advantage of the Game Boy Color’s IR port with a feature called Mystery Gift. Once a day, players with two copies of Gold or Silver could Mystery Gift each other and receive a special, randomized item; the item could be something as simple as a Potion or as fabulous as a Rare Candy. Sadly, since I didn’t know anyone with a copy of either Gold or Silver, I never got to use this feature (I was now in 8^th grade, and Pokémon was now for Pokélosers).

There was also the usual assortment of new TMs (devices that taught Pokémon different moves), health items (Pokémon could now hold items called Berries, which restored HP or cured status ailments in battle), and Pokémon techniques to try out, making for a fresh experience overall.

Folks like this old bloke helpfully explain the new mechanics like berries, which is right nice of them.

My favorite additions to Silver, though, were the fixes to my minor complaints from the last one. Pokémon Box full? Someone will call you and swap it! Need to level a weak Pokémon so it can evolve? Have it hold the Experience Share! Hoping the Pokémon you’re trying to catch won’t dodge the Ultra Ball you’re throwing at it? IT WON’T NOW! If nothing else, Silver was a polishing experience that made me realize how much room for improvement the first game had.

Unfortunately, I think the Pokémon franchise suffers a bit from the law of diminished returns, and while I enjoyed the crap out of my time with Silver, it wasn’t quite as memorable as Blue. Though I had a good time travelling around, I wasn’t able to remember very many of the city names (I think the original’s decision to name each town after a different color was a solid one). I also found myself falling back on old, G-1 ‘mons instead of trying the new, fancy ones introduced in Silver.

There were a few cool-looking monsters I adopted, but I mostly stuck to what I was familiar with.

Still, as a follow-up to the wildly popular original, Silver was about as ambitious as you could hope for, and succeeded in many places the original didn’t. It also helped keep the Pokéstoke going in my heart, letting me know that this series wasn’t just a fad. It wasn’t the revelation that Blue was, but it was a damn fine game, and sometimes that’s all I need.