Friday 29 May 2015

DVD Review: The Complete Series 16

I was really debating reviewing this DVD. There's little I can really add as I've reviewed the series already. But then I got the DVD, and I thought... Yeah, why not? So here's my review on the series 16 DVD!


Episodes
As the name suggests, this release includes all 20 episodes from the sixteenth series. But like all complete series releases since 2011 (including the series 1-7 re-releases), the episode names are nowhere to be seen. Not that you'd want to remember them as, in all honesty, this is the worst crop of episodes that the show has produced. It's only rated slightly higher than series 15 because the animation was at its best and the two good episodes were some of the best from the Nitrogen era.

Bonus Features
There's nothing really to talk about here; the only addition is the advert for a push along toy and the trailer for Sodor's Legend of the Lost Treasure, which was on the previous release.

Presentation
The visuals are really good. There are a few errors here and there, but for their swansong series, Nitrogen did a good job with the episodes they were presented with. However, on the DVD, the footage seems to have been shrunk slightly, as there's a small black border around all the episodes:

It's a real oddity, especially since no other complete series release has this.

Price
The RRP for this release is £12.99, with the cheapest price going to Amazon at £7 (but you have to pay extra for postage due to Amazon's new regulations). The only other alternative is this eBay seller, where it's a much more reasonable £5.99.

Final Thoughts
I'm really conflicted on what my final verdict is. On the one hand, you get 20 episodes for a great price, on the other, you get some of the worst episodes of the lot. If you really want to complete the collection of DVDs from 1-16, then yes, you should buy this release, but for the cheapest price you can get it for (check the link I posted previously).

Should you buy it? No, I don't think so. If you just want to watch these episodes, get Netflix. It's £6.99 a month (with a free trial for new customers) and you can get the first four series as well as this and the fifteenth and Calling All Engines! and The Great Discovery. Not to mention great shows like Top Gear, Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh! and many others, as well as some really good films and original Netflix shows.

So yeah, unless you're really desperate, give this release a miss.


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