Family Guy - Blue Harvest

(aka 'Family Guy - Blue Harvest' or 'Family Guy presents Blue Harvest')

Directed by Dominic Polcino
USA 2007

"Blue Harvest" was the season premiere of the Sixth season of the FOX series Family Guy, which originally aired on September 23rd, 2007.

The episode was a retelling of Star Wars, recasting the show's characters into Star Wars roles. For this purpose, and for the first time in the history of Family Guy, this episode was an hour long (with commercials). It was also made to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Star Wars franchise.

This episode drew 10.7 million viewers, and earned the highest Nielsen rating of any Family Guy episode since the show returned to air in 2005, making it the second most-watched episode in the series behind "North by North Quahog" which garnered 11.9 million.

NOTE: Several scenes were cut from the FOX release of the episode due to either time restraints or profanity, but will be available with the uncut DVD version of the episode.

Excerpt from Wikipedia HERE

Promo

DVD Release: January 15th, 2008

DVD Reviews

DVD Review: 20th Century Fox (2-disc) - Region 1 - NTSC

DVD Box Cover		CLICK to order from:
Distribution	20th Century Fox Home Video - Region 1 - NTSC
Runtime	47:32
Video	1.33:1 Aspect Ratio Average Bitrate: 5.9 mb/s NTSC 720x480 29.97 f/s
	NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate:
Audio	English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
Subtitles	English, Spanish, French, None
Features	Release Information: Studio: 20th Century Fox Home Video Aspect Ratio: Original Aspect Ratio 1.33:1 Edition Details: • Commentary by cast and crew • Conversation with George (Lucas) • Making of... • Animatic version • Family Guy Stars Wars Clip Show Disc 2 - digital version of the film (compatible with ITunes or Windows Multimedia) DVD Release Date: January 15th, 2008 Keep Case Chapters: 10

Comments:

They call this a double-length episode - I guess it is at 47 minutes (aired for an hour with commercials). But some people are going to feel a little gypped here. The image quality is fairly good but the transfer is interlaced (see last capture) with combing evident every third frame. This can be common for modern TV broadcast standards. I thought 20th Century Fox DVD might spend the effort bumping it as it is such a short feature.

As this series is as addictive as heroine to some it could be possible that they are taking a bit of advantage with this limited (although dual-layered) DVD presentation. But I don't want diminish the humor or work put into Blue Harvest. It's damn funny (I'm not even a Star Wars fan) and I'm glad I watched it. Screen caps below will indicate the image quality (not crispy sharp but colors are excellent). It did have some stunning Star Wars recreation scenes.

Audio is in a buoyant 5.1 track. It has some moments where it is tested and sounded strong to me. There are optional subtitles if you require or prefer. Supplements include a fun commentary with many of the voice actors and some production anecdotes. Fans should enjoy it. There is a conversation with icon Lucas, a 'making of...' featurette, the 'animatic version which I kind of enjoyed although it is not much more than a black and white, basically still, version of the film (many different lines etc.), a brief 'Clip Show' and promo segment.

So who wants the digital version? Not I. A strange 1 Gig - separate disc - inclusion but it may benefit some I guess (it's both PC and Mac friendly). I don't want to come down too heavy on this but after the feature - I wasn't too keen on the 'filler' extras. I certainly don't want the 'trinkets' version HERE. Anyway, did this give me $16 worth of laughs and enjoyment? - I guess it did. Now how about some more.