Mr Bean - The Animated Series Vol.4 (DVD)

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Indifferent to it
Story	Satisfactory
Characters / Performances	Satisfactory
Special Effects	Standard
How does it compare to similar films?	Satisfactory

Advantages:	Cartoon entertainment for kids
Disadvantages:	not as funny as the original, bad graphics, poor comedy

Recommend to potential buyers:

no

Full review

As I am sure most of you will know straight away who I mean when I mention the name Mr Bean. He's the love him or hate him guy played by Rowan Atkinson - as was his adopted comedy project after he finished doing Black Adder in the 80's.
However if you're not aware of who he is I'll give a brief break down. Mr Bean is a 40-50 year old man who lives alone and dresses in a shirt and tie, complete with tweed jacket everyday dispite the day, month or occassion. The only time he wears anything different is when he goes for a bath, a swim, or to bed when he wears his long PJ's which feature Teddy. Mr Bean also mumbles and bumbles his way through life. Which, in the first and original clips done by Rowan, made humourous incidents out of quite mundane things like going to the dentist, packing for a trip, or attending church were transformed into the most hilarious of misadventures.

He rarely speaks and mumbles all the time. Mr Bean the original used used body language as apposed to words, to deliver the major portion of his dialog. He also brought out a full length film in 1997 entitled ''Bean The Ultimate Disater Movie'', so having mastered both the big and small screen how else could they 'milk' Rowan's genius character... Well animation of course. What other way to perfectly destroy what was done and dusted in the 90's. I personally think the film was good but in parts was pushing the unique Mr Bean character.

COST: £9.99
PLACE OF PURCHASE: Blockbuster
NUMBER OF DISCS: 1
CERTIFICATE: U

For almost a tenner you get one dvd with a handful of extras and trailers, also one interview with rowan atkinson on the making of animated Mr Bean. DVD Also includes seven 'smashing' stories; 1. Neighbourly Bean, 2. Nurse, 3. Dead Cat, 4. Super Trolley, 5. Magpie, 6. Cat Sitting, & 7. The Bottle. By 'smashing' i think they must be refering to the clumsiness of the Beanmeister and not the quality of the comedy. Although the soundtrack is fairly impressive, especailly for something which appears to be aimed at kids. The ochestral music makes up most of the dialog for all the episodes as Mr Bean just mumbles and grunts every now and then. However other characters do speak for example Irma Gobb (mr beans romatic interest) and also the post man and other neighbours. Teddy however doesnt say anything, but then again why would he?
Graphics are very basic and they've made his head way too big for his body. He looks like an orange on a toothpick! However i'm sure this is done on purpose and to appeal to kids. As the enlarged head allows his facial featured to be overexpressed and magnifies his 'geekiness'.

Overall a 3 star rating, it's not awful as kids actually like it quite a bit. I know my niece loves Teddy and has a luch box with cartoon mr bean and his Teddy. Yes I know - even more ways to make money, lets merchanidise Mr Bean. Theres no end really, is there. Anyway I wouldn't suggest purchasing this if you liked the original as you will be severely dissapointed and at £9.99 is not cost effective comedy, not even for the kids. At that price they can watch it when it's on t.v. and i doubt that if the dvd was bought it would never get viewed. Perhaps once or twice. but not more than that i'm sure.
Thanks for reading, best wishes, mintz x