The Ultimate Underdog Collection Vol. 1-3 (My Hands-On)

[CyberFox]

When i first heard of this i was expecting another DVD set with prints from the recent syndicated version
but, When I recently acquired them at my local Bi-Lo... My expectation has ended
Despite the fact that it's a tie-in to what it appears to be a seriously crappy movie adaptation to a well-beloved cartoon classic, The DVD is well done


Quality: The transfrers are seriously great, It contains the original intro and everything especially mixing King and Odie, Tennessee Tuxedo, etc. between each episode is a excellent plus on Classic Media/Genius Entertainment's part. even though it has a few grains here and there, It's still quite decent

Special Features: The features are a mix of good and meh (in my true blue honesty) There's a compilation of all of Underdog's "Secondary" characters and an Interview of Underdog's co-creator on Vol. 1, 3 Archival Promos and a Sing-A-Long of the Underdog Theme Song on Vol. 2, A Trivia Challenge and a Special Narrated Storyboard of the episode "The Nug of Nog" on Vol.3

Is it worth my hard earned moolah?: I'll be true blue about this, Classic Media did mess up during their Sony Wonder era (even though I never own the Dick Tracy DVD...yet!) but now that they switched distributors, It seems Classic Media is turning a new leaf. I can assure since this is a very decent collection, We can imagine that the upcoming Archie Show DVD will be seriously great

[MarkTheShark]

I picked these up this morning and I have looked at the first disc so far. Here is what I saw:

This stuff is presented in the form of "shows," and there are six "shows" on each disc. Now, I confess that I have not seen the Boomerang airings of "Underdog," so I don't know what they are like, and the following may be old news...

The shows are of varying lengths. Of the six on the first disc, two have "Commander McBragg" shorts and the others don't. I can report that although the two McBraggs do have the cheap, phony remade titles, the rest of the cartoons have their legit original title cards and music (from what I have seen). However, for the other individual segments (Hunter, Tooter, King & Odie, Tuxedo, Gophers, Klondike Kat) they do not have the individual intros/outros which usually accompany them in syndicated TV airings.

The structure/format of these shows is similar to the syndicated Underdog shows that aired on Me-TV and the Black Family Channel, but these are new compilations and new masters compared to those versions (it might be the old issue of "General Mills owns the rights to the syndicated versions, so we have to create a different version").

The opening is the same one that's adorned the syndicated Underdogs for years, with him flying through a starlit sky and creating puffs of clouds forming the words "The Underdog Show." There originally were two versions of this segment, by the way, with different animation at the end. Each originally ended with some satellite-type thing bumping into Underdog, then tapping him on the shoulder and opening up, with a banner popping out reading either "Go Go Gophers" or "The Hunter." This originally was an interstitial clip used to introduce one of those two segments. The final shot of Underdog is different in each one (they fade down before any of the above described action happens). The version on these shows is the one that appeared on the old (pre-1994) syndicated half-hours (the other one was on the Nickelodeon/Cartoon Network masters). His face is slightly different. A lot of trivia and minutae about a short segment, but anyway...

The next thing you see is the Underdog segment intro, with the Underdog song. There are three different versions of this, each of which appears on two of the six "episodes." One features Simon Barsinister, one has Riff Raff and another has a giant stomping through a city (this is a clip from one of the cartoons, but I don't remember which one). The Simon one appeared only a few times in the syndicated half-hours, with the other two alternating for most of the episode run.

The Underdog cartoons themselves are presented in their original cliffhanger format, and are not cut into one long cartoon. I remember the one at the top of the show (in the syndicated shows) usually had some kind of short intro at the beginning, with Underdog crashing into big block letters spelling out his name, or flying through the air and getting caught in a banner, or flying by and leaving a trail of puffs of smoke which then form the word "Underdog." One of these intros appears at three different points in each of the shows. One at the top of the show, one in the middle (introducing a non-Underdog cartoon) and at the very end, just before the closing credits.

The two middle segments feature other (non-Underdog) cartoons. Whoever compiled these shows just tossed together a selection of Total TV cartoons, featuring characters that may or may not have appeared specifically on the Underdog show. One of the shows has two consecutive King & Odie segments (they were two-parters). Again, they are not cut together into one long cartoon, and they do have the original title graphics. But it's kind of odd to see them back to back, separated only by a short Underdog intro, which was originally produced to lead into an Underdog cartoon. One of these also appears at the end of the show, in the spot where you'd see the former "Cartoon Cut-Ups" teaser in the syndicated shows. ("Looks like this is the end...") Then the closing credits; the credits are the same version which appears on the previous DVD releases, which is all Underdog (not edited with parts of the Tennessee Tuxedo closing like the syndicated shows) but all three of the shows I saw had the version which pans across credits written on the side of a building..they don't have the "Post No Bills" part. (Those were two separate closings; both appeared on the UAV VHS tapes released in the early 1990s, but I believe only the "panning" one has been on DVD.)

The picture and sound are virtually flawess. These discs look and sound great, although they do seem somewhat slightly sped up, as if they might originate from a PAL video source somewhere down the line. There is a little bit of film artifacting (some spots, scratches etc.) which really isn't bad at all, and I look at that as a good thing because it seems to indicate that they didn't futz around with the visuals with DVNR or who knows what.

Overall I'd recommend these discs, and I think they are a considerable improvement over the previous ones.

Almost forgot...there are a couple of extras on the first disc. One is an interview with Joe Harris. The other is called "The Underdog family of characters." The description states that this presents the original segment intros for the other Total TV cartoons, but that isn't what this is. It's a compilation of theme songs accompanied by a bunch of clips from the cartoons. I think this was on one of the old DVDs.

[BobAnthony]

This is my first post to this forum and it has to be some bad news. I bought the discs first at Target and then Best Buy. THEY ALL DID NOT PLAY IN OUR DVD PLAYERS.

In one, the disc icon just kept spinning until it said "Unknown Disc." In another, the DVD display read "NO DISC."


I contacted Classic Media about this and a Robert Mayo contacted me a day later.


"if the problem persists we will determine if there is some issue with our DVDs and the make of your DVD player."



Well I sent my name in and now it's wait and see. For the record, all our DVD players are Zenith, including a DVD Recorder/VCR combo. Wonder if anyone on the board can help out.

:confused::confused::confused::confused:

[CyberFox]

Maybe you have..
1. Faulty copies
2. A Faulty DVD Player

This is my first post to this forum and it has to be some bad news. I bought the discs first at Target and then Best Buy. THEY ALL DID NOT PLAY IN OUR DVD PLAYERS.

In one, the disc icon just kept spinning until it said "Unknown Disc." In another, the DVD display read "NO DISC."


I contacted Classic Media about this and a Robert Mayo contacted me a day later.


"if the problem persists we will determine if there is some issue with our DVDs and the make of your DVD player."



Well I sent my name in and now it's wait and see. For the record, all our DVD players are Zenith, including a DVD Recorder/VCR combo. Wonder if anyone on the board can help out.

:confused::confused::confused::confused:

[BobAnthony]

I'm more inclined to believe Number 1 rather than number 2. When I bought the :woody: set and played it--NO PROBLEM AT ALL! I would think there may be something wrong with the discs like wrong format or something like that.