Blu-Ray Review: Winnie The Pooh Springtime With Roo: The Hippity Hoppity Roo Edition

Mitchell Stein- When this movie was initially released on VHS, marking the first home video release of this movie, I owned a copy of this movie, which I kept watching over and over even when it was way beyond Easter time. I loved this movie as a kid, so this film means a lot to me. 

Fast forwarding to March 2014, the direct-to-video movie is about to celebrate its ten-year anniversary from when it was released publicly a whole decade ago. I made sure to revisit this movie for the first time in years and to give my entire thoughts on this release. 

While Winnie the Pooh has his name in the title, he takes a major backseat in this movie, giving the stage over to Roo, Tigger and Rabbit who easily steal the show. 

Its Roo’s second Easter in the Hundred Acre Woods, and he can’t wait for it. Until Rabbit decides its “Spring Cleaning Day” instead. Everyone is disappointed, so they try to cheer Rabbit up with a bit of Easter fun. But Rabbit doesn’t want any part in in this “Easter” business and bans the word in a style worthy of Ebenezer Scrooge. 

In fact, the film has a big Christmas Carol style feel to it, with Rabbit seeing the past Easter and what will happen in the Easter to come, as shown to him by the narrator, who plays quite a big part in the story as well. 

This marks another return of the legendary Jim Cummings, best known for his work on the classic Disney Afternoon television shows, as Tigger and Winnie the Pooh. Other great voice actors include Jimmy Bennet as Roo, Peter Cullen as Eeyore, and Kath Soucie as Kanga. Sadly this film marks one of the last works of both John Fiedler as Piglet and Ken Samson as Rabbit, who he brilliantly plays once again in this movie, and Rabbit steals the whole movie by far. This movie focuses more on Rabbit then it does on Roo, so I’m quite surprised that the title didn’t have Rabbit’s name in it. 

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The music is great too, with very bouncy songs that will stick inside your head, but doesn’t quite live up to the music in The Tigger Movie or in Pooh’s Heffalump Movie but is still enjoyable in general. Not a big fan of the song Pooh sings before he sneezes (yep, he sings about how he is about to sneeze) because it felt pointless and annoying, but other than that, the music was great. 

Sadly, after 20 years, my VCR decided to quit on us last week so I had nothing to compare this to, but I will say that the Blu-Ray looks crystal clear and the audio is great. It’s for sure an improvement from the original VHS and DVD release. As for bonus features, it’s incredibly bare. The only bonus feature available is a sing-along to the movie’s music. They could’ve included anything that would’ve made fans happy, like behind-the-scenes looks at any Winnie the Pooh films, concept art for this movie, interviews with some of the voice actors, audio commentaries, interactive videos, or anything else simple. 

Disney knows how to make their fans happy, as they've shown in the past,f it just seems that they’re too lazy to do it some of the time. I’m super glad that I could now own this film in stunning-high definition, but a few bonus features would've been nicer, and I’m sure would have attracted more people to purchase this release. 

If you were previously a fan of this film or a fan of the Winnie the Pooh franchise (who isn’t?) I suggest you check this release out! It’s a well-done Pooh film and ties in great with Easter next month!

Overall, I enjoyed this release a lot. This movie has always meant a lot to me, and this release really managed to restore that love again and this time in high-def. Make sure you pick up a copy for Spring Cleaning Day -er, I mean Easter! 

Winnie the Pooh: Springtime With Roo is available March 11th, 2014. 

Why Darkwing Duck is Such a Great Show

Michael Wermuth- Darkwing Duck is one of Disney’s greatest animated shows. It’s one of my favorites from the Disney Afternoon (and the only one I’ve bothered to get the DVDs of). I watched it during it’s run on The Disney Afternoon, and occasionally caught the ABC episodes. I even had all of the action figures (not sure whether I still have them all). But why is the show so good? Because it is! 

The characters are great. I can identify with Darkwing Duck, wanting to be in the spotlight, though he does a better job at it. Launchpad McQuack, who debuted on DuckTales, is a funny sidekick to Darkwing. Darkwing’s adopted daughter, Gosylyn, is a good character for him to have adopted. And her brainy best friend, Honker, is a good character, one of my favorites when I was younger (though watching it now he does seem a little weak). I also like Darkwing’s girlfriend, Morgana, a lot better now than when I was a kid.

And of course there’s the villains. My favorite villains from the show are Megavolt, Quackerjack, and Steelbeak. Megavolt and Quackerjack are both funny and colorful characters, and it’s a shame he wasn’t in the action figure line-up (but Tuskernini was, and he was only in five episodes. Fun fact: The Tuskernini figure was the first one I had gotten, and I hadn’t even seen any episodes with him. And I chose that one over the others that were in the store that day, can’t remember who else was there but I know the ones I wanted most weren’t).  Steelbeak is also a great villain, kinda the leader type though he’s not really a leader, just a top agent at F.O.W.L ,  the type who could be the big bad of the show, if he did lead the other villains (although the video games and other merchandise imply otherwise, the other major villains weren’t part of F.O.W.L.). And he’s perhaps the shows most notable villain to not be part of The Fearsome Five, which consists of Negaduck (the leader, and another character who could have been the main villain), Quackerjack, Megavolt, Bushroot, and The Liquidator. There’s also some great villains who didn’t appear in many episodes, including the theatrical Tuskernini, hillbilly Jumbalaya Jake, and a group of hat-shaped aliens who take over the bodies of whose who wear them.

Some of my favorite episodes include: “Comic Book Capers”, where Darkwing tries to write a Darkwing Duck comic book but other characters (including Megavolt) manage to add their own creative input. “Twitching Channels”, where Darkwing and Megavolt get zapped into the TV and land in the real world, with humans who are fans of the show (wouldn’t it have been great if this episode could have mixed live action with animation?). “Clash Reunion”, which reveals Darkwing and Megavolt’s back stories (well, one of at least four back stories that reveal how Drake Mallard became Darkwing Duck). “Batttle of the Brain Teasers”and its sequel, “Return of the Battle of the Brain Teasers, Too!”, which feature the hat-shaped aliens and Honker becoming a hero. The two-part “Just Us Justice Ducks”, featuring the debut of The Fearsome Five as a team (and it really is the debut of Negaduck, and due to the episodes airing out of order, Liquidator’s first episode). “Trading Faces”, where the main characters switch bodies. And “Water Way to Go”, in which Darkwing agrees to let Launchpad be the hero for once. And there’s a lot more episodes I’d like to list but won’t here.

I would also like to acknowledge the voice cast, especially Jim Cummings, who voiced Darkwing as well as many other characters on the show. It seems to me like Cummings was the only voice actor on this show to do multiple voices, even though some of the other voice actors did multiple voices on other shows. Other voice actors included Rob Paulsen (Steelbeak), Dan Castlenetta (Megavolt), Michael Bell (Quackerjack), Tito Insano (Bushroot), Terry McGovern (Launchpad), Christina Cavanaugh (Gosylyn), Katie Leigh (Honker), and many other wonderful voice actors.

So Darkwing Duck had a lot going for it. It had great characters (especially villains), a great voice cast, great episodes, I didn’t mention the comic book series from Boom! Because I’ve only seen the first story arc but that was a great comic. At 78 episodes, it’s one of the few Disney Afternoon shows to have more than 65 episodes (though DuckTales has it beat by 100).