Kung Fu Panda Blu-ray Review

Kung Fu Panda

Blu-ray Review
Dreamworks Home Entertainment
Released: November 9, 2008

DreamWorks Home Entertainment have joined for the release of one of the best animated films of the year to be released on both DVD and Blu-ray, Kung Fu Panda, and it sure kicks some tail!

Kung Fu Panda released this past year and was an absolute smash hit at the box office.  The film tells the story of Po who is voiced by none other than Jack Black.

Po is an overweight panda who is having trouble trying to learn how his family’s business works.

Po is looking beyond everything, even the fact that he is adopted, and is the type of person that likes to dream big.  He ends up making Master Oogway (Randall Duk Kim) think he is the Dragon Warrior.  This leads Master Shifu (Dustin Hoffman) to try and train Po in the art of kung fu.

All is not easy though, as Po has to go up against some tough competition with some crazy characters such as Monkey, Tigress, and others.  Eventually, Po will have to save them all.

Kung Fu Panda is a fantastic animated film with tons of laughs, great entertainment value, and a well-done story.  This is a must-see for both kids and adults.

The Blu-ray release of Kung Fu Panda presents the film in 1080p and is picture perfect.  The black levels are extremely deep, and the colors have a great deal of pop allowing the film to really jump off of the screen.  You can’t get much better than this!

The audio is equally as impressive as it is presented in Dolby TrueHD 5.1 and is extremely crisp and clear, using the front and rear channels in an effective and useful manner in each and every scene.  This is just amazing stuff on both the audio and video ends.

The Blu-ray version of Kung Fu Panda packs in plenty of extras that fans are surely going to enjoy.  Things get kicked off with a great audio commentary from directors Mark Osborne and John Stevenson.

From there, you get a nice 20-minute featurette which allows you to get a bit closer with the voice talent, with some entertaining interviews.

One fun featurette kids are sure to enjoy is a feature that actually introduces kids to the whole world of kung fu.

Up next is a set of featurettes which show kids how to use chopsticks, looks at the Chinese calendar, animals that inspired the movie characters, how to make noodles, all fun stuff for kids.

As you can tell there is plenty of stuff here that kids are going to enjoy in these extras, this is not your typical set of documentaries one after the other.

Up next is the Po’s Power Play Activities which allow kids to do a variety of things such as little games called Learn to Draw, Dumpling Shuffle, and others.

As for the extras on the Blu-ray release, a picture-in-picture video commentary is included with plenty of behind-the-scenes stuff, a great featurette that fans of the film will enjoy as it goes very in-depth with the production of the film.

There is also an exclusive trivia track for the Blu-ray release, and BD-Live functionality with trailers and more for download.

Kung Fu Panda is a must-buy on Blu-ray for both kids and adults with its great entertainment value, audio/video transfer, and extras.  This is the total package on Blu-ray!

Film: 9.2 An extremely entertaining animated film for both kids and adults, just awesome!

Video: 10 I dare you to find something to complain about with the transfer.

Audio: 10 About as good as you can get on Blu-ray.

Extras: 8.5 Nice Blu-ray exclusive extras and great stuff for kids.

Final Score: 9.5

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