The Barracuda writes...

There was, at one time, when I resisted making the change from VHS to DVD. I thought I couldn't justify the cost, but as time went on and the VHS format grew increasingly rare and obsolete, I switched. Now, about four years later, Gargoyles has been released on DVD and I couldn't be happier I made that decision.

The video quality is the first thing everyone notices; a crisp, clean, sharp picture without any noticeable grain or fuzziness that most of us had to do with when watching our well-used VHS copies. Every frame is spotless, and only suffers when the animation itself is subpar (which in itself is rare). In an age when most cartoons are produced using computers, Gargoyles breathes new life into fully two dimensional animation. Everything, from the lush painted backgrounds (going from ancient Scotland to modern Manhattan and beyond), the characters, their designs and fluidity of motion, is all hand drawn and looks as good as ever.

But what really stands out is the sound. I have a home theater system and while most animation, even high-quality anime, doesn't match up, Gargoyles utilized all five of my speakers to their full extent, even at times the subwoofer. Voices in tunnels and enclosed spaces had echoes, growls shook the room, and muted sound effects and off-screen dialogue were just as clear. It was like watching it for the first time.

The extras are very well done, and more than I expected for a release that didn't seem to have the best sales drive behind it compared to a lot of other Disney home video releases. Greg Weisman's commentary was informative and fun to listen to, but disappointing in the fact he only got to do the first five episodes. And the Gathering of the Gargoyles was a well-edited featurette, and I was able to put a lot of faces to names I know in the fandom.

The packaging was surprisingly well done. The case, cover, discs and, whereas a lot of big name releases don't even have them, it even included a chapter insert (or in this case, an episode insert).

In short, this was an incredibly well put together collection that holds promise for the much larger second season, and I hope it'll be soon in coming.