Cheap Superman - The Lost Episodes (DVD) (Max Fleischer) Price

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Customer Reviews of Superman - The Lost Episodes

Good content; Could have been packaged better
Finally, these so-called "Lost Episodes" are available. But if you're a preservationist, lookout! The "Paramount Pictures" logo is not included, and the closing shot isn't there, either. If you're just looking at this for entertainment, fine, but if this sort of butchering bothers you, this will bother you quite a bit. Also, yes, this does depict Japanese and German characters in a bad light, but for crying out loud, this was war! And these cartoons really weren't meant that much for kids, anyway, at least not like a Saturday morning cartoon today or a movie serial from the 40s was. Still, this is relatively obscure material seeing the light of day. If you're from a younger generation, you'll get to see the excitement that was Superman in his earliest days, before robots, time travel, and so on started to bog him down.

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Superman - The Lost Episodes DVD
Superman's first major visit to the big screen is finally captured on DVD and preserved. This DVD is the project of WinStar, not Paramount. I don't think Paramount in any way even sanctioned this or their logo would appear somewhere in the viewing of the DVD.

Be aware! This is not the full collection of the Fleischer cartoons. Only the eight episodes produced by Famous Studios are on it. The Episodes included are:

1) Jap O Tears
2) Showdown
3) Eleventh Hour
4) Destruction Inc.

5) The Mummy Strikes
6) Jungle Drums
7) Underground World
8) Secret Agent

If you want the full collection or the rest of the collection you'll have to purchase the DVD's listed below:

Complete Superman Cartoons: Diamond Anniversary Edition
The Superman Cartoons of Max and Dave Fleischer
Max Fleischer's Superman/ Superman: The Lost Episodes
(For all the episodes)

Superman (1998) (For the other nine not on this DVD)

All are available here at Amazon.

This restoration is a very noble attempt. The film is very much cleaned up and more enjoyable to watch. The colors, particularly the reds, are very vibrant now. Images hard to make out on older VHS copies are now crystal clear. The sound quality is another story, however. You can choose three different sound settings: Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic, and Stereo. They all still sound like they're in a can to me. In fact, when you watch the restoration demo on the DVD the sound beforehand is cleaner and clearer than the restored sound, in my opinion. New sound effects have been blended with the old ones. Try to picture the old sound effects (in a can) blended with digitally crisp ones. Do you see my point? They do not blend very well and that can be distracting.

I'm not trying to talk you out of buying this product, just be aware of what you're buying.

Bonuses for this DVD:

It's a DVD and will never wear out - That's a bonus in itself.

It does have a very interesting history of the Fleischer Studios and the all the Superman shorts they created.

It also has the very first "Mighty Mouse" short that is known of included on it. You'll note that Mighty Mouse's colors were different.

This is a worthy investment if you're like me and love any and all things that are Superman related.

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Only for Nostalgia
Comparing these episodes to new animation is like comparing a bicycle to a space shuttle. Obviously, these cartoons are not as good as todays', say Titan AE or Batman: The animated series. But comparing this to their contemporaries, this is really fantastic.

So if you are a Superman fan, but not an animation fan, get this. It's like getting a piece of history.

Too bad, I got this DVD before the Complete Episode series came out. Check out the other DVD before buying this one. You'll get more of the same price.