This week’s home entertainment offerings include an often brilliant science fiction road movie that will remind many of John Carpenter’s Starman, the sequel to My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the latest comedy from Sacha Baron Cohen, a chance to get the first season of the revived Doctor Who on Blu-ray, the second half of the BBC’s excellent adaptation of Shakespeare’s history plays featuring Benedict Cumberbatch as Richard III, and for the first time ever here in North America, the complete, uncut 1976 super robot anime Gaiking.

Theatrical Movies

This week’s highest-grossing release is enjoyable, but light weight My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 (Universal, “PG-13,” 188 min., $29.98, BD $34.99), a reprise of the 2002 hit, which should please fans of the original, though no sequel could match the “breath of fresh air” quality of the original indie film, especially since we have seen lots of films with quirky ethnic characters since then.  It is no surprise that the sequel earned just 25% of the $241 million that the original film amassed in the domestic market.

A far better bet is Jeff Nichol’s science fiction road film Midnight Special (Warner Bros., “PG-13,” 111 min., $28.98, BD $29.99).  When a father (well played by Michael Shannon) discovers that his eight-year-old boy has special powers, they take to the road to avoid both government agents and religious fanatics in this intriguing road movie that will remind many of the considerable charms of John Carpenter’s Starman.  Midnight Special, which also features strong performances from Kirsten Dunst and Joel Edgerton, is not without flaws, but it is a science fiction sleeper with considerable “cult film” potential, and one of the most intriguing films of 2016 so far.

Midnight Special has earned an excellent 84% positive rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, which is far better than the 38% rating of Sacha Baron Cohen’s The Brothers Grimsby (Sony, “R,” 83 min., $26.99, BD $30.99), an action comedy about a dumb-as-a-post football hooligan (Cohen), whose search for a long lost brother, who just happens to be MI6’s top assassin, puts the world in grave danger.  There are some very funny moments here, but plenty of the jokes fall flat as well, and the combination of humor and violence gives The Brothers Grimsby a very uneven and problematic tone.

This week’s “art movie” release is Terrence Malick’s Knight of Cups (Broad Green, “R,” 118 min., $26.98, BD $29.99), which features a star-studded cast including Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Natalie Portman, Imogen Poots, and Brian Dennehy in a consistently picturesque film that has almost no dramatic drive, only visual impetus.  This one is for Malick devotees only—if you liked the director’s The New World, you will no doubt find the longeurs of Knight of Cups to your liking as well.

TV on DVD

This week’s top geek release is the Blu-ray debut of Doctor Who: The Complete First Season (BBC, 585 min., $59.99).  Unfortunately back in 2005 when Russell T. Davies relaunched the series, the BBC was still filming in standard definition, so although the video quality on this new BD release is better than the previously-released DVD, it is not the equal of say the Matt Smith BD releases, which were originally filmed in high-def.  However Christopher Eccleston was a superb Doctor Who and this series introduced Rose Tyler (Billie Piper), one of the Doc’s most memorable companions, who makes her debut in the series’ first episode appropriately entitled “Rose.”  This material was previously released, but only as part of a Doctor Who: Series 1-7 Giftset, and is now available in a format that at least some of us can afford.

The week’s overall top release is The Hollow Crown: The War of the Roses (Universal, 364 min., $44.98, BD $49.98), which contains second half of the BBC’s superb production of Shakespeare’s history plays adapting Henry VI, Parts 1, 2, and 3 as well as Richard III, which stars Benedict Cumberbatch as the hunchbacked monarch.  The first part of The Hollow Crown aired in 2012, while The War of the Roses, which was produced by the same team, began airing in the UK last month.

Other contemporary series of note this week include the Shonda Rhimes-produced How to Get Away With Murder: Season 2 (Disney, 630 min., $39.99), which earned actress Viola Davis the first “Lead Actress in a Drama” Emmy ever awarded to an African-American, and the Comedy Central sitcom Workholics: Season 6 (Comedy Central, $19.99).

Kid-targeting releases include Power Rangers Ninja Storm: The Complete Series (Shout Factory, 750 min., $22.97), which contains all 38 episodes of the eleventh season of Power Rangers series, and the first to be shot in New Zealand, and the single-disc Transformers: Rescue Bots—Vol. 10: Heroes of Tech (Shout Factory, 110 min., $14.93).

The only vintage TV series is McClain’s Law: The Complete Series (Warner Bros., 778 min., DVD-R, 40.99), which contains all 16-episodes of the short-lived series starring Gunsmoke’s James Arness as a retired cop who returns to duty after injury and earns the respect of his much younger peers.

This week’s best entry from overseas is the Australian drama Janet King (Acorn Media, 474 min., $49.99), an intriguing saga about a crown prosecutor who returns from maternity leave and gradually unearths a scandal that could shake both the police department and the judiciary to their very foundations.

For fans of Nordic Noir there is Wallander: Season 4 (BBC, 270 min., $44.98), which stars Kenneth Branagh as the all-too human hero of Swedish novelist Henning Mankell’s series of police procedurals.  Series 4, which aired in the UK last month, is the final go-round for this superbly produced and well-acted show.

Anime

This week’s top new release is Cross Ange, Rondo of Angel and Dragon: Collection 1 (Sentai Filmworks, 325 min., $59.98, BD $69.98), which collects the first half of the 25-episode 2014 mecha anime series from Sunrise that was streamed on Crunchyroll.  The protagonist of the series is a princess of the Mitsugi Empire who is bent on exterminating the underclass until it is revealed that she is one of them, and she is forced to take up arms.  Cross Ange is an original saga that was written specifically for the screen, though it has spun-off a manga adaptation.

Also new on Tuesday is a Blu-ray version of the And Yet the Town Moves: Complete Collection (Sentai Filmworks, 300 min., BD $59.98), which collects the highly entertaining, consistently quirky 12-episode genre-mashing series, much of which takes place in the worst Maid Café ever, that was released here on DVD in 2012.

For fans of classic anime there is the 44-episode 1976 anime Dino Mech Gaiking Complete Collection (Discotek, 1100 min., Subtitles Only, $59.98), a super robot anime (the first to have a mobile carrier for its top robots), which was produced by Toei Animation and which was seen in part here in the U.S. where a 26-episode cut down version was part of Jim Terry’s Force Five syndicated show that aired in New England, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Texas (Dallas), and where its chief mecha made appearances in  Mattel’s Shogun Warriors lineup during the 1970s.  Shout Factory has released a trio of anime features that were crafted out of the original 44-episode series, but this will be the first time that this classic early super robot series (the first that was an original story and not adapted from a manga) has been available here uncut, and in its original form.