Sharks, Flipper & Lopaka (TV Animation)

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: D     Episodes: C+

 

 

While considered a studio brand name for adult, mature productions and despite being a subdivision of The Disney Company, Miramax launched a family entertainment division and Sharks, Flipper & Lopaka is one of the resulting series.  This was a hit of some sort, offering a young male lead in Lopaka who has a dolphin friend named flipper (no kidding) and their adventures at a nondescript tropical island.  There are eight show here that are mostly harmless, but also rather nondescript.  It is safe-enough entertainment, but not much more.

 

Oddly, the animation in the 1.33 X 1 image has been clearly overdigitized while artificial zoom-ins throughout each episode that makes the decent animation look unnecessarily cheap look like bad old pan and scan work.  This gets obnoxious very quickly and gets in the way of whatever does work on the show.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo has no real surround information, which is odd for a TV production so recent and you get no extras.  Only get this one if you child really wants it or you are a very hardcore animation fanatic.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo