I watched this on BLU last night. What a strange film. I really don't know what to make of it. The opening and ending were superb. The animation was superb – I would class it above all Pixar animation bar Monsters, Inc (note: I have not seen Cars or Ratatouille at this time). But... but…
What the hell was going on in the middle?
It's strange that it appears the middle segment is the only segment taken from the book the film was based on. I can't really see why Disney would chose to option such a book in the first place. I know studios often have to rework books or stories dramatically when films are made (look at Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and the Beast or even Dreamworks' Shrek) but I'm not sure what they saw in the original book here. The "Disney" bits at the start and the end (especially the end – from the Helping Hat's future onwards to the very, very end) were top notch, I would say. The middle just – well, frankly – it annoyed me. It would have been so much better with the crazyness toned down – even with the same characters. For me only the Frog and Dinosaur slaves really worked in the middle 30-40 minutes. That's a low hit rate, considering how many ideas there were… forced? Yes, forced onto us in that small period.
Also to nit-pick the Time-Travel aspects, like Bowler Hat Guy's plans, weren't really thought through.
Jake Lipson wrote:As I mentioned when it was announced as such, I do feel really cheated knowing there are more deleted scenes out there that I'm not allowed to see. Including something on the Blu that can't be on the DVD is to be encouraged, but when it's something so normal like deleted footage, then yeah, I feel cheated. Not cheated enough to not buy it, obviously, but it does disappoint me. Could anybody who has the Blu-ray describe the other deleted scenes and why they were cut for the rest of us? Thanks.
Well, I can't describe which ones are missing, because the disc doesn't label which are on the DVD and which are BD only (Unlike Chicken Little BD which proudly proclaims "Additional Deleted Scenes" or similar). But all in all, you're not missing much. No deleted subplots. No real deleted character defining moments. I must admit I didn't watch all the deleted scenes (only those with titles that seemed appealing to me - it was late and I had to be up at 5:15am next morning) but... meh.
The presence of such additional deleted scenes is no major plus point for the Blu-ray at all. And the Bowler Hat game is crap too. Worse than mediocre Flash animation games. I don't know why Disney insists on putting these substandard BDJava games on their discs because they're not going to attract the attention of anybody, no matter what their age, if they're played on a PS3 which has access to games so much better (and let's face it, the bulk of Blu-ray discs will be played on PS3s at this moment in time). I'd rather they just, you know, put the THEATRICAL TRAILERS on, or similar.