This week’s home entertainment releases include the Michael Bay-produced live-action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film, the new Netflix-financed fourth season of Arrested Development, the Steven Spielberg-produced sci-fi series Extant, the Cartoon Network’s wildly surreal Uncle Grandpa, and the Blu-ray debut of the classic anime series Cowboy Bebop.
 
Theatrical Movies
 
This week’s highest-grossing release is the Michael Bay-produced Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Paramount, “PG-13,” 101 min., $29.98, BD $39.99, 3-D/BD $54.99).  Bay’s TMNT movie, which made $191 million in the domestic market, demonstrates the producer/director’s formula that has earned him millions for films like this and his Transformers movies that are based on beloved “childhood” properties.  Bay doesn’t make these movies for hardcore fans, most of whom don’t like what he does to their favorite property.  He keeps the plots ridiculously simple, spends enough on his productions to make them bombastically impressive in their destruction, and targets the mainstream audience who watched the TMNT or Transformers characters when they were growing up.  Despite its “PG-13” rating TMNT is not a kids’ movie—sexy starlet Megan Fox is more of a focus than the Turtles, who don’t even appear until 45 minutes into the film, plus the humor is mostly sexual, fired through a blunderbuss of brain-dead nostalgia into the befogged minds of its mainstream audience, which will gradually come to its senses as subsequent Bay-produced TMNT movies garner smaller and smaller grosses.  Nevertheless from the Business School point-of-view there is little doubt that Bay has an enviable track record that may eventually make him a sort of turn-of-the-century Cecil B. DeMille, at least in terms of conjuring up crowd-pleasingly vulgar spectacles.
 
Another financially successful film due this week is the teenage dystopian saga The Maze Runner (Fox, “PG-13,” 113 min., $29.98, BD $39.98), which like The Hunger Games films is based on a popular YA novel.  The twist here is that the hero of this tale from a genre that primarily appeals to teenage girls is, in this case, a boy.  While The Maze Runner was not a success of the same order of magnitude as The Hunger Games, it did earn a 63% positive rating from review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, which is a solid mark for a film from this genre.
 
Less successful, but no less interesting, is Shawn Levy’s comedy/drama This Is Where I Leave You (Warner Bros., “R,” 120 min., $28.98, BD $35.99), a surprisingly personal film from the director of the big budget Night at the Museum comedy series.  A strong cast led by Tina Fey, Jason Bateman, and Jane Fonda make this uneven film worth watching—in fact, the film’s meandering pace and lack of polish lend an air of authenticity to the character comedy bits that are at times truly revealing.
 
Woody Allen’s Magic in the Moonlight (Sony, “PG-13,” 97 min., $28.98, BD $34.99) has been criticized for being “slight” and not measuring up to his “masterworks,” but those who enjoy his films will find this romantic comedy with its delightful Riviera setting a lot of fun.  Emma Stone and the always reliable Colin Firth lead a cast in a clever little film that will delight most “art house” movie fans.
 
TV on DVD
 
There are not a lot of releases this week, but there are some very interesting ones including The Americans: The Complete 2nd Season (Fox, 617 min., $39.98), which collects all 13 episodes from the second outing of the Cold War era series about two deep cover KGB agents (the luminous Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys) living in suburban America, the Netflix-revived Arrested Development: Season 4 (Fox, 493 min., $29.98), which returned after a 7-year hiatus with new episodes, each of which is focused on a different character, and the Stephen Spielberg-produced science fiction series Extant: The First Season (Paramount, $59.99, BD $69.99).  Extant, which stars Halle Berry, was a summer “fill-in” series, and along with Under the Dome provided some hope that the summer season, once strictly the province of brain-dead “reality” shows, could serve as a potential incubator of interesting genre fare like the two aforementioned series.
 
Speaking of which, animation fans should take note of the release of Uncle Grandpa: Vol. 1 (Warner Bros., 132 min., $14.97), the latest bid of surreal nonsense from the Cartoon Network.  Created by Peter Browngardt, Uncle Grandpa displays a visual debt to Mad’s Don Martin in its character designs as well as to Gary Larson and Tex Avery in its bizarre juxtapositions and zany cast of characters that includes Belly Bag, Pizza Steve, and Giant Realistic Flying Tiger.
 
Also due this week is a non-limited edition of the campy 1960s Batman TV series. The standard BD edition of Batman: The Complete Television Series (Warner Bros. 3019 min., $239.99) includes the same content as the Limited Edition (see “DVD Round-Up: Batman TV Series, Etc.”) minus the toy Batmobile, the cards, the “Adam West Scrapbook” and the UV codes.
 
The only vintage release is The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis: Season 4, The Final Season (Shout Factory, 870 min., $29.93), and it’s a good one, though it is the weakest season of the show, which was based on a series of short stories that Shulman had published (that had also inspired a movie adaptation).  Dobie Gillis was the first series on American TV in which teenagers were the main characters, and as such something of a landmark, but it was also very smart about laying out the issues of “class” in a society, which was in terms of income at least, a lot more equal than what we have in the U.S. today.
 
Anime
 
Although there are several anime titles that have never been released in North America before coming out, this week’s top release is the Blu-ray version of the classic Cowboy Bebop anime series, one of the most popular anime shows of all time in the North American market thanks to repeated showings on the Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim.  This 26-episode saga of a misfit gang of bounty hunters operating on the fringes of space is the perfect example of the “outer space” western and a great companion piece in its tone and kinky narratives to Joss Whedon’s Firefly.  Cowboy Bebop is the masterpiece of director Shinichiro Watanabe and composter Yoko Kanno, who have never topped their superb work on this series, which still holds up amazingly well.  The new release will be available on DVD (Funimation, 650 min., $49.98), Blu-ray ($59.98), and in a limited edition BD/DVD combo ($89.98) that features tri-fold packaging in the style of a vintage record cover, a display easel, plus exclusive art cards.
 
Also new this week is A Certain Magical Index II: Season 2, Part 2 (Funimation, 300 min., BD $64.98), which contains the final 12 episodes of the 2010-2011 anime produced by J.C. Staff and based on the action-packed fantasy light novels written by Kazuma Kamachi (and published here by Yen Press).
 
Another anime series based on a light novel, The Ambition of Oda Nobuna Complete Collection (Sentai Filmworks, 300 min., $59.98, BD $69.98), which includes all 12 episodes of the Madhouse-produced 2012 anime series that was simulcast on Crunchyroll.  Sentai’s new release features an English language dub along with the original Japanese soundtrack.
 
This week’s other new (to North America) release is Bleach Uncut: Set 23 (Viz Media, 325 min., $44.82), which includes episodes 317-329 of the 366-episode series based on Tite Kubo’s supernatural action/adventure series.
 
Then there is Reideen: Collection 1 (Sentai Filmworks, 325 min., $49.98), a subtitles-only release that collects the first 13 episodes of the 26-episode 2007 series from Production I.G. that is based on the vintage 1975 Super Robot anime Brave Reideen.
 
Sentai is also releasing a subtitles-only Blu-ray of Detroit Metal City (Sentai, 150 min., BD $39.98), which it issued on DVD in 2010 as well as a subtitles only Blu-ray of Hidamori Sketch SP (Sentai, 50 min., BD $24.98).
 
--Tom Flinn
 
The opinions expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect those of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.