This week’s top home entertainment releases are Hidden Figures and Lion, films that earned a slew of Oscar nods and critical kudos, but which also connected emotionally with audiences in a big way, and there are a few other delights as well including the hard science Nat Geo miniseries Mars and TV series that deftly satirize the tech economy (Silicon Valley) and our political system (Veep).

Theatrical Movies

This week’s top release is Hidden Figures (Fox, “PG,” 127 min., $29.98, BD $39.99), Theodore Melfi’s biographical film about three female African-American mathematicians, who played a crucial, but unheralded role in the Space Race.  Melfi doesn’t let camera tricks or directorial flourishes get in the way of what is a wonderful (and surprisingly, for Hollywood, quite accurately portrayed) true story.  Hidden Figures was one of a handful of 2016 Oscar contenders (also including La La Land and Lion) that pleased both audiences (it made $149 million at the domestic box office) and critics (it has a 93% positive rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes).  If you haven’t seen it yet (and you don’t have a visceral antipathy to all screen bio-dramas), don’t fail to catch this one.

As luck and the timing of the Oscars would have it, another excellent biographical film, Lion (Lionsgate, “PG-13,” 120 min., $29.98, BD $34.98) is due on Tuesday.  The protagonist of Lion is a five-year-old Indian boy who accompanies his brother to the freight yards to steal coal to trade for food, but falls asleep at the train station, and becomes an “orphan” when he awakes and sneaks onto a train bound for Calcutta, where he can’t understand the local Bengali dialect.  Adopted by an Australian woman he eventually begins to search for his roots (starting with Google Earth), a journey that leads to an emotionally powerful conclusion.

This week’s other offerings are not quite so edifying.  While 2017 has already seen the release of two excellent horror films, M. Night Shyamalan’s Split and Jordan Peele’s Get Out, not every 2017 horror movie has been great.  Case in point The Bye Bye Man (Universal, “PG-13,” 97 min., $29.98, BD $34.98) , which received only a 23% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and even worse could manage only a 2 out 5 stars from the horror mavens at the Bloody Disgusting Website.  The mainstream critics are not necessarily the place to go for horror movie recommendations, but when both they and the hardcore horror aficionados hate a film, it is a sign that you ignore at your own financial and entertainment peril.

Another pretty good predictor of bad films is a number of postponed release dates.  Case in point this time is Monster Trucks (Paramount, “PG,” 104 min., $29.98, BD $39.99), which was originally supposed to be released in May of 2015, then moved to December of 2015, and finally to January 13, 2017.  Paramount took a huge write-down on this film, which cost $125 million to produce and made just $33.4 million here in North America and $31.1 million overseas.  Young boys who are enthralled by big trucks and monsters will likely find this saga entertaining, but few others will.

TV on DVD

The top geek TV releases this week include the six-part National Geographic science fiction series Mars: The Complete First Season (Fox, 331 min., $19.99, BD $29.99), which mixes the documentary and fictional in a “hard science fiction” saga about the exploration (and terraforming) of Mars, the very funny Mike Judge-created satirical comedy series Silicon Valley: Season 3 (HBO, 450 min., $24.98, BD $34.98), and the political satire Veep: The Complete 5th Season (HBO, 450 min., $24.98, BD $34.98), which features Julia Louis Dreyfus in a career-defining role.

Animated TV offerings this week include the final season of the 2003-2006 Saturday morning martial arts cartoon Xiaolin Showdown: The Complete 3rd Season (Warner Bros., 276 min., $24.99), the single-disc Tangled: The Series, Vol.1: Before Ever After (Disney, 55 min., $19.99), and the French series Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Chat Noir, Vol. 4: Ladybug (Shout Factory, 132 min., $14.98).

Vintage TV offerings include the final season of the 2007-2011 ABC Family college life series Greek-Chapter 6: The Complete 4th Season (Shout Factory, 420 min., $29.99), and the archetypal 1950s patriarchal sitcom Father Knows Best: Season 5 (Shout Factory, 960 min., $34.99).

Anime

It’s a light week for anime releases, the only new release is Is the Order a Rabbit?? (Sentai Filmworks, 300 min., Subtitles Only, $49.98, BD $59.98), the second 12-episode TV anime series based on the 4-panel comedy/slice-of-life manga by Koi. 

This week’s only other release is Toriko: Parts 1-4(Funimation, 1250 min., $44.98), which includes the first 50 episodes of the Toei-produced anime based on the action/adventure/comedy manga series created by Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro about a “gourmet hunter” searching for the rarest of delicacies, often capturing his elusive quarry by himself.  Funimation had previously released these episodes in two parts.  This release provides a better value, but it still only represents the first third of the 147-episode series that features crossovers with One Piece, and Dragon Ball Z.  Let’s hope that Funimation releases the final 97 episodes (with subtitles only, if necessary).