There aren’t a lot of home entertainment releases this week, but they are certainly some choice offerings due on Tuesday including the highest-grossing animated film of all time in North America (and the current 2016 box office leader), the latest season of the most popular geek TV series on cable, a glorious new Blu-ray edition of Star Trek: The Animated Series, and perhaps the most exciting season of Sailor Moon S, which is finally available here in its uncensored form.

Theatrical Movies

This week’s bestselling release will undoubtedly be Pixar’s Finding Dory (Disney, “PG,” 97 min., BD/DVD Combo $39.99), the sequel to Finding Nemo that has earned $485 million at the domestic box office, making it the #1 box office hit of 2016 so far.  Creating great sequels is a difficult task, and Pixar has always succeeded (Cars 2), but when it has, as was the case with the Toy Story sequels and now Finding Dory, the results can be magical.  Andrew Stanton, who directed Finding Nemo in 2003, returned for Finding Dory and once again he provides the heart to go along with the film’s superb visuals, boatloads of humor and its occasionally thought-provoking themes.  With the ascendancy of the blockbuster mentality in Hollywood, we are not exactly living in a “golden age” of cinema, but there is one category of films, animated features, in which some of the best work in cinema history has been done in this new century, and Pixar is right in the middle of this renaissance of the animated feature—and movies like Finding Dory demonstrate why Pixar remains the #1 North American player in the genre.

Largely out of deference to the appeal of Finding Dory, it is a very light week for home entertainment releases, but a lot of music fans will want to own Ron Howard’s documentary, The Beatles: Eight Days a Week (Universal, Not Rated, 107 min., $19.98, BD $24.98), which contains all sorts of great footage from the Fab Four’s early years, including 30 minutes of full restored 35mm film of The Beatles famous Shea Stadium appearance.  This one is a must for Beatles fans and rock-and-roll aficionados.

TV on DVD

This week’s top release is Game of Thrones: The Complete Sixth Season (HBO, $59.99, BD $74.99).  Season Six set new ratings records with some 23.3 million people viewing the finale across multiple showings and platforms (see “Game of Thrones Finale Ratings”), and GOT remains the most “pirated” TV current series (see “Geek Shows Take 4 of 5 Top Most Pirated Spots”).  But hardcore fans who acquire the Season Six set will also receive a multitude of fascinating extra features including an in-depth look at “The Battle of the Bastards,” a snapshot of how all three production units for the show function on a single day of TV’s most elaborate production, audio commentaries, an In-Episode Guide, plus an intriguing collection of 18 history pieces about the mysteries and lore of Westeros and Essos. 

Also of great interest is the Blu-ray debut of Star Trek: The Animated Series (Paramount, 525 min., $), which includes all 22 episodes of the 1973-1974 animated series that was first released on DVD in 2006.   The new Blu-ray contains all the extras from the 2006 release plus 22 collectible postcards, one for each episode of the series.  After the original Star Trek series did extremely well in syndication, Paramount decided to produce an animated version in conjunction with Filmation.  Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry reportedly turned down a boatload of money by rejecting Filmation’s concept of a “kiddie version,” and forced the animators to use a version of the same “Bible” used on the original series.  The result was a surprisingly watchable show that won the first Emmy every awarded to a Star Trek series for the episode “How Sharper Than A Serpent’s Tooth.”  While the animation is often lacking in fluidity, the stories are solid and the vocal work from the original cast members (with the exception of Walter Koenig’s Chekov, who was cut for budgetary reasons) does make The Animated Series seem like the natural extension of the original Star Trek series.  This new Blu-ray edition is an excellent gift idea for Star Trek fans.

Also of great interest to geek viewers are Better Call Saul: Season 2 (Sony, 459 min., $45.99, BD $55.99), the often hilarious, and typically gritty prequel spin-off from Breaking Bad starring Bob Odenkirk, and Community: The Complete Series (Sony, $149.00), which collects all 117 episodes of Dan Harmon’s quirky, ground-breaking, single-camera sitcom set at Greendale Community College.

Contemporary series due on Tuesday include the blue collar sitcom The Middle: The Complete Seventh Season (Warner Bros., 528 min., DVD-R, $34.99), The Mindy Project: Season 4 (Universal, 606 min., $22.98) starring the irrepressible Mindy Kaling, and Looking: The Complete Series and the Movie (HBO, $39.99, BD $49.99), which chronicles contemporary gay culture in San Francisco by following the adventures of three friends living in San Francisco.

Vintage TV releases include the sitcom The Lucy Show: The Complete Series (Paramount, $63.98), which contains all 156 episodes of the post-I Love Lucy series starring Lucille Ball, and the ensemble cop series NYPD Blue: The Complete 11th Season (Shout Factory, 945 min., $34.99).

The lone offering from overseas is the excellent Australian prison drama Wentworth: Season 1 (Acorn, 470 min., $59.99), a sort of re-imaging of the iconic Prisoner series with an all-female cast led by Danielle Cormack as Bea Smith, who rules the Wentworth Correctional Center with an iron fist.  More than two hours of bonus features plus all 10 episodes of the prison drama that TV Guide opined was “better than Orange Is the New Black,”—well maybe not “better,” but certainly equally good in its own way.

Anime

This week’s top release is from 1995, Sailor Moon S: Season 3, Part 1 (Viz Media, 300 min., $39.99, BD $69.99).  Viz Media is presenting this series uncut in contrast to the original American broadcast versions from DIC, which ignored the relationship between Sailor Neptune and Sailor Uranus, who are in the original Japanese series, a couple, not “cousins” as they were portrayed in bowdlerized American TV version.  Now the series is available uncut and in superb high definition.

The rest of this week’s new releases have never been released in North America on disc before.  The trove of recent releases includes the supernatural comedy Castle Town Dandelion (Funimation, 300 min., BD/DVD $64.98), which contains all 12 episodes of the 2015 series from Production IMS that is based on the 4-panel seinen manga by Ayumu Kasuga about a family of nine super-powered siblings whose father is the King that one of them will be chosen to succeed.

Those who enjoyed GTO or Assassination Classroom might want to check out The Ultimate Otaku Teacher, Part 1 (Funimation, 300 min., BD/DVD Combo $64.98), which collects the first half of the 24-episode 2015 TV anime produced by A-1 Pictures and based on the shonen manga by Takeshi Azuma about a super genius, who only wants to indulge in his otaku passion for anime and manga, but is talked into becoming a teacher at his former high school where he  uses non-traditional methods (usually involving anime or manga) to help students in need.

Other new releases due on Tuesday include; Chaos Dragon: The Complete Series (Funimation, 300 min., BD/DVD Combo $64.98), which collects the 12-episode 2015 Silver Link anime, which is part of the multimedia franchise based on the Japanese RPG Red Dragon; and the Aoharu x Machinegun: Complete Collection (Sentai Filmworks, 325 min., $59.98, BD $69.98), which collects the 13-episode 2015 Brains Base series based on the military comedy/action manga created by NAOE.