Righteous Recommendations
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If you've read the other Batman Beyond guides you know what to expect from season 3. It's more of the same even if the overall quality has fallen a bit. It feels thrown together to have something on the shelves. It’s better than bare bones, but there isn’t the care some releases have put into them.
Essentially you have the season by itself, bundled with the rest of the series as individual seasons, and in a series box set. All of them are DVD; there is no high-def release.
The Season 3 set includes 2 DVD's.
Video:
1.33: This is the TV standard. It's far from perfect, but it's clear and looks good except for some noticeable grain and a few flecks of trash.
Audio:
2.0 Dobly: The digital stereo surround sound is clear and strong. There is a pleasant bass rumble and enough fill in the rear channels to keep from feeling like everything is coming from the front.
Packaging:
Like the first season I once again have a problem with the packaging. Is there a worse case design than stacking DVD’s on top of each other? No, there is not. It’s a 2 disc set. How hard would it have been to have two trays facing each other? Instead you have to remove disc 1 to get to #2.
The box contains some colorful artwork. It's shiny and full of Batman. What's not to like?
The inside flap offers an episode list with details on the extras.
The interface features some music. It isn't as interesting as the season 1 interface but could be worse.
You’ll have to deal with some previews playing automatically on the second disc which is pretty annoying.
Extras:
-Behind the Scenes:
-There’s a general behind the scenes feature that talks about some of the unused ideas, character moments, and ending the series.
-There are some behind the scenes features for some of the episodes which I will mention in the next section.
-Previews: The Ed Edd & Eddy one is funny.
Other Editions:
Box Set:
If I had known they were going to release the complete series as a box set I would have waited on it rather than buying the seasons individually. The box set has some extra extras with it which appears to be roughly an hour and a half of documentaries, some behind the scenes videos, and an art book. Otherwise you get everything I mentioned above except for different packaging.
Final Thoughts:
There isn't all that much here to sway you if you're unsure about buying or streaming though if you've gotten the first two you'll surely want the rest. If you don't have any of the seasons yet I recommend going with the series box set.
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Episodes:
There are 13 episodes around 21 minutes each.
Each episode has only 1 chapter which is annoying if you don't want to see the same opening every time you watch an episode. With no chapter skip available you have to fast forward like a VHS tape.
A play all option minimizes trips to the menu between episodes.
5) Out Of The Past
-Behind the Scenes: This feature talks about the inspiration for the musical, the twists, and the acting.
7) The Call Part 1
-Behind the Scenes: This one talks about the origins of the episode, the characters, and the voices.
8) The Call Part 2
-Behind the Scenes: This time we get into the various related ideas, problems with it, disagreements that arose from that, and an amusing resolution.
10) The Curse Of The Kobra Part 1
-Behind the Scenes: The last feature is only for part 1 but talks about details in part 2 including the distaste of it.