Enjoyable, hilarious and all out awesome! “Wreck-It Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition” is possibly one of the best animated film on Blu-ray 3D released so far. Vibrant, colorful, wonderful PQ and lossless audio…a fantastic Blu-ray release!
TITLE: Wreck-It-Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition
FILM RELEASE: 2012
DURATION: 101 Minutes
BLU-RAY DISC INFORMATION: 1080p High Definition, 2:39:1 aspect ratio, English 7.1 DTS-HDMA and DVS 2.0 Dolby Digital, French and Spanish 5.1 Dolby Digital Language Tracks Subtitles: English SDH, French and Spanish
COMPANY: Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment
RATED: PG (For Some Rude Humor and Mild Action/Violence)
Release Date: March 5, 2013
Directed by Rich Moore
Story by Rich Moore, Phil Johnston, Jim Reardon
Screenplay by Phil Johnston, Jennifer Lee
Additional Story Material by Sam J. Levine, John C. Reilly, Jared Stern
Produced by Clark Spencer
Executive Producer: John Lasseter
Associate Producer: Monica Lago-Kaytis
Music by Henry Jackman
Edited by Tim Mertens
Casting by Jamie Sparer Roberts
Art Direction by Ian Gooding
Featuring the voices of:
John C. Reilly as Ralph
Sarah Silverman as Vanellope
Jack McBrayer as Felix
Jane Lynch as Calhoun
Alan Tudyk as King Candy
Mindy Kailing as Taffyta Muttonfuudge
Joe Lo Truglio as Markowski
Ed O’Neill as Mr. Litwak
Dennis Haysbert as General Hologram
Edie McClurg as Mary
Adam Carolla as Wynnchel
Horatio Sanz as Duncan
Prepare for adventure when ‘the most original film in years’ (Bryan Erdy, CBS-TV) that thrilled audiences of all ages drops on Blu-ray! From Walt Disney Animation Studios comes a hilarious, arcade-game-hopping journey in Disney’s Wreck-It Ralph. For decades, Ralph has played the bad guy in his popular video game. In a bold move, he embarks on an action-packed adventure and sets out to prove to everyone that he is a true hero with a big heart. As he explores exciting new worlds, he teams up with some unlikely new friends including feisty misfit Vanellope von Schweetz. Then, when an evil enemy threatens their world, Ralph realizes he holds the fate of the entire arcade in his massive hands. Featuring an all-star voice cast and breakthrough bonus features that take you even deeper into the world of video games, Disney’s Wreck-It Ralph has something for every player.
In 2012, the 52nd animated feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series came out in theaters.
“Wreck-It Ralph” is film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and is directed by Rich Moore (“The Simpsons”, “Futurama”) and features a screenplay by Phil Johnson (“Cedar Rapids”, “A Thousand Words”) and Jennifer Lee.
Featuring an all-star cast as voice talent including John C. Reilly (“Step Brothers”, “The Aviator”, “Magnolia”), Sarah Silverman (“There’s Something About Mary”, “The School of Rock”), Jack McBrayer (“30 Rock”, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”), Jane Lynch (“Glee”, “Role Models”, “The 40 Year Old Virgin”), Alan Tudyk (“I, Robot”, “Serenity”), Mindy Kailing (“The Office”, “The Mindy Project”), Joe Lo Truglio (“Superbad”, “Pineapple Express”), Ed O’Neill (“The Bone Collector”, “Married with Children”), Dennis Haysbert (“24”, “Heat”) and many more.
The film received positive reviews from film critics and would be successful in the box office earning over $435 million (the film was budgeted at $165 million) and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and Academy Award for “Best Animated Feature” and won an Annie Award for “Best Animated Feature”.
And now “Wreck-It Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition” featuring the Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D, DVD and Digital Copy will be released in March 2013.
“Wreck-It Ralph” begins with the Litwak’s Arcade closing up for the night. The video game characters are seen leaving their video game and head home or travel to visit friends from other video games.
We are introduced to Ralph (featuring the voice of John C. Reilly), the villain of the game “Fix-It Felix, Jr.”. Ralph wrecks a building and Felix, Jr. (voiced by Jack McBrayer), with his magic hammer, fixes it all up.
But for Ralph, as much as he enjoys his role in the video game, Felix, Jr. receives all the credit and is often celebrated, while he goes home to a junk yard and just watches Felix, Jr. getting noticed all the time.
Ralph explains to his support group of video game villains/antagonists that he wishes that he could be a good guy, but his fellow antagonists in the support group are worried that Ralph is turning “Turbo”.
One day, as Ralph is watching Felix, Jr.’s building from afar, he notices that he is having a 30th anniversary party and is shocked why he wasn’t invited.
Ralph decides to crash the party and Felix, Jr. allows him to show up and eat some cake. But other Nicelanders at the party are not thrilled that he is there because he causes nothing but trouble and breaks things. But Ralph tells them that he wants to be a good guy but no one believes him, They tell him to leave because Felix, Jr. is going to be presented with a medal.
Ralph vows he will get a medal but no one pays him any mind.
As Ralph goes to the pub, he is told that he may be able to find a medal at the lost and found but while he is looking, he sees a hysteric soldier complaining about finding cybugs for a medal. This automatically catches Ralph’s attention and when the soldier accidentally runs into a wall and knocks himself out, Ralph takes the soldiers uniform and dresses up as a soldier and enters the “Hero’s Duty” video game.
Ralph meets Sergeant Calhoun (voiced by Jane Lynch) who gets the soldiers ready for their upcoming battle. And as the soldiers fight against the Cy-Bugs, Ralph decides to climb the game’s central beacon to collect his medal, so he can show the Felix, Jr. and the Nicelanders that he received a medal. But Ralph ends up hatching a Cy-Bug and it clings to Ralph and activates a space craft and both escapee from the “Hero’s Duty” video game and ends up flying to the “Sugar Rush” video game and runs into a girl named Vannelope von Schweetz (voiced by Sarah Silverman), a girl who takes his medal and plans to use it for her upcoming race. Ralph tries to chase after her in order to get the medal back.
Meanwhile, back at the “Fix-It Felix, Jr.” video game, at the arcade, a teenage girl tries to play “Fix-It Felix, Jr.” but without Ralph back in the video game, there is no villain and so, Litwak puts a malfunction sign to the game and this causes Felix, Jr. and the Nicelanders major concern as a malfunctioning game that is quite old and it could be the end of their game.
So, Felix, Jr. goes to look for Ralph and meets with Sgt. Calhoun to find out that Ralph has led a Cy-bug to another video game.
This causes Sgt. Calhoun great concern because Cy-Bug’s can replicate and infect other video games and take over the game. We see her back story comes to show that her fiance was killed in a video game when she didn’t check on Cy-Bugs before her wedding.
Feeling the need to stop them, she is determined in going to “Sugar Rush” to kill the Cy-Bug and Felix, Jr. decides to accompany her.
Meanwhile, on “Sugar Rush”, as Vanellope uses the medal to purchase a new race vehicle. As Vanellope plans to compete, the racers at “Sugar Rush” refuse to allow her to race, claiming that she is not part of their game and that she is nothing but a glitch/mistake and is not supposed to exist.
Ralph finds out that she lives by herself and realizes like him, no one wants to be around her. So, the two become good friends and Ralph is determined in seeing Vanellope win the race and prove to the others that she is real and that she is a winner.
But when King Candy is determined that a glitch should not win the race, so he hack’s the “Sugar Rush” code to get Ralph’s medal and warning him that if Vanellope wins the race, it will be disastrous not just for “Sugar Rush” but can end up killing Vanellope as she was never meant to be part of the game and that is why she is glitching. It could also cause problems to his own video game.
But with Vanellope’s heart set on winning the race with the car that she and Ralph had built… Will Ralph help Vanellope win the race or will he sabotage it? And what will happen to the game he belongs to, now that he’s not in it?
VIDEO:
“Wreck-It Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition” is a film that looks incredible on Blu-ray. Because of the way each video game setting is created, their is wonderful depth in the 3D presentation. I have to say that this film is one of the better looking animated films in 3D.
And as the Blu-ray 3D is quite impressive, the Blu-ray is also fantastic with its vibrant colors and its overall color palette. Colors and detail are incredible, especially to see various video game characters animated and some with metallic to shiny textures, the animation for this film is fantastic. You can see the detail on the character’s skin tones to the textures of Sugar Rush, such as sugared candy hills, the textures of Ralph’s clothing and more.
And with a film with so much color, you would think that with pinks and reds, you would see banding. This is not the case with “Wreck-It Ralph”, this is a pristine looking film in HD and definitely one of the better, modern animated films on Blu-ray.
AUDIO & SUBTITLES:
“Wreck-It Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition” is presented in English 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and DVS 2.0 Dolby Digital.   Let me just say that this is one of the most immersive soundtracks I have heard for an animated film. The surround channels are heavily utilized during the action sequences, may it be the racers in “Sugar Rush” or the soldiers taking on the Cy-Bugs. There is great use of directional, cross-panning sound and thunderous LFE that the film is immersive.
Dialogue is crystal clear and understandable, as with the musical score by Henry Jackman to the “Sugar Rush” song by AKB48. Â One of the best sounding animated films on Blu-ray!
Subtitles are in English SDH, French and Spanish.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
“Wreck-It-Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition” come with the following special features:
- Paperman: Theatrical Short – (6:34) For those who watched the film in the theater (in 3D or 2D), “Paperman” is a theatrical short and a love story about a man who sees the woman he fell in love at first sight and tries to get her attention at a building across from his, by throwing paper airplanes. The short is featured in both 3D and 2D.
- Bit by Bit: Creating the Worlds of Wreck-It Ralph – (16:40) A featurette with director Rich Moore, Producer Clark Spencer and the “Wreck-It Ralph” crew discussing the development, design and animation of the film.
- Alternate and Deleted Scenes – (15:26)Â Featuring a total of four deleted and alternate scenes (all are not fully-rendered but featured via animated sketches) with optional commentary from director Rich Moore, co-writers Phil Johnston and Jim Reardon.
- Video Game Commercials – (2:39) Promotional commercials for “Wreck-It Ralph” for “Fix-It Felix Jr.”, “Sugar Rush”, “Hero’s Duty” and “Fix It Felix Hammer”.
- Disney Intermission – (9:23) Whenever you pause “Wreck-It Ralph”, comedian and “The Nerdist”, “Talking Dead” and “Attack of the Show” host Chris Hardwick, discusses the video game references and Easter eggs featured in the film.
EXTRAS:
“Wreck-It Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition” comes with a lenticular slipcover case and the Ultimate Collector’s Edition comes with a Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D, DVD (presented in 2:39:1 aspect ratio, English 5.1 and DVS 2.0 Dolby Digital, Spanish and French 5.1 Dolby Digital Language Tracks) and digital Copy, which works with iTunes and Windows Media Player.
When I first watched “Wreck-It Ralph” in the theater and then watching it again on Blu-ray 3D/Blu-ray, there were so many things about this animated film that I loved.
For one, it dealt with video games and featured video game character cameos throughout the film, it also featured a song from Japan’s AKB48 but for the most part, the story was clever about characters having the ability to cross over to other video games (when an arcade is closed for the day).
While not as deep or emotional compared to a Disney/Pixar film such as “Toy Story 3” or “Up”, the film is exciting, full of imagination, humorous and so much fun thanks to its characters, character situations and for the most part, there are lessons to be learned from this film.
For one, it’s protagonist Ralph is a video game antagonist but he’s a guy with a good heart, but because he’s different from everyone else, people from his own video game, try to distance themselves from him. Vanellope is also in the same situation, but it’s how these two people viewed as different, find each other and become good friends despite the challenges they each face in their video game life.
You also have the strong female soldier Sgt. Calhoun which is a pretty cool female character to be seen on an animated film. She kicks butt but yet we learn that she is not a perfect video game character as she is trying to move past the death of her fiance (who was killed by Cy-Bugs because she failed to check the perimeter). And then you have Felix, Jr., the hero of the old school “Fix-It Felix Jr.” video games with a magic hammer that can fix things and also a major crush towards Sgt. Calhoun.
The voice acting of “Wreck-It Ralph” also benefits from having talents such as John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jack McBrayer and Jane Lynch in the main characters roles. But you also have other talent such as Mindy Kailing, Joe Lo Truglio, Alan Tudyk, Ed O’Neill, Dennis Haysbert and many others as voice talent for the film.
As for the Blu-ray release, I have to say that this is one of the best, if not the best animated film to be presented in Blu-ray 3D. Also, the Blu-ray itself features a colorful and vibrant scenery and full of detail. Picture quality alone is fantastic and as for the lossless audio, definitely one of the better, immersive animated films on Blu-ray. Solid PQ and AQ really makes this film worth owning in HD but if there was only one thing that I wished was on the Blu-ray release was more special features. From the “Sugar Rush” video by AKB48 shown on YouTube on the “Wreck-It Ralph” channel, audio commentary or even more special features would have been nice.
Granted, I know I’m spoiled to expecting a lot from Disney animated films on Blu-ray as Disney tends to deliver. And while there are a good number of special features in this “Ultimate Collector’s Edition” of “Wreck-It Ralph”, I was hoping to see many more and kind of takes it away from being a 5-star Blu-ray release.
Overall, Enjoyable, hilarious and all out awesome! “Wreck-It Ralph: Ultimate Collector’s Edition” is possibly one of the best animated film on Blu-ray 3D released so far. Vibrant, colorful, wonderful PQ and lossless audio…a fantastic Blu-ray release!
