Avatar: Extended Collector's Edition
Avatar I've covered a lot before, from the film's 2009 blockbuster release and last April's Blu-Ray release that while it had top notch Audio/Visual quality, it was lacking in any kind of bonus material.
Well, enter stage left this new 3-disc Blu-Ray release, but it can't be said that consumers weren't warned that this was coming, as director James Cameron took every effort to tell consumers when the original disc hit stores that a new special edition disc would come in November, thereby giving them the chance to either wait for this disc or buy both, well it would seem that the vast majority of consumers chose to buy just the first release and not bother with this one.
But before I get into the nitty gritty, you're going to ask "but is there anything new?" and my answer: you bet, not only do you get the original theatrical release, you also get the recent Special Edition which graced cinemas back in August as well as the new Collector's Extended Cut that contains not only the new footage from August but an additional 8 minutes on top of that, most notable is a new opening of the film set on Earth, as well as some additional scenes regarding Sigourney Weaver's character, Dr. Grace Augustine.
The Blu-Ray:
April's bare bones release of the film was hailed for its top notch Audio/Visual Quality and rightly so, it was one of the 2 or 3 best Blu-Ray's I'd ever seen in terms of A/V Quality behind Hot Fuzz and Blade Runner, here well time to take a deep breath as we go into this new release in detail and explore the behind the scenes material that goes behind the making of Avatar:
Video and Audio:
Disc 1 comes with three movie versions which I outlined earlier, the theatrical release which broke just about every box office record around the world, the recent Special Edition re release from August and the new Collector's Extended Cut with the long awaited Earth footage.
Miracously, despite having three full versions of the film on the one disc, there doesn't seem to be any loss in the A/V Quality, the previous disc was very well detailed in its visual quality and well mixed audio wise, here you get the same visual quality and the same mix which is a DTS-HD 5.1 mix, to be honest though I don't really know if there is any real difference apart from the compression on the disc so it will depend on what setup you have to watch the disc on.
Extras:
Alright, time to take a deep breath as there is A LOT of extras on this disc, two full discs worth as well as some minor extras on the movie disc so here we go:
Disc 1:
Direct Access to the New and Additional Scenes: A very very cool feature is that if you only want to watch the new scenes separately of the two extended cuts you can, all you have to do is go to the extras section and then go to "From Collector's Extended Cut" and boom, all of the new scenes are there for you to watch from the main menu, is that good customer service or what.
As for my take on the new scenes (and yes, I have watched them all), personally I'm very split on them, the new Earth opening and the scenes involving Grace's school and what happened there are terrific and could have gone back into the main feature without damaging the slightly lyrical pacing the final theatrical release has but the vast majority of them aren't that good and are probably best left out of the film, even though the CG work is very impressive, arguably more impressive than the final film, best shown in the extended death of Tsu'Tey played by Laz Alonso, this bodes well for when the film's inevitable sequel hits cinemas in a few years time.
Disc 2:
Four menu items are here on disc 2
"Deleted Scenes: Never Before Seen"
"Capturing Avatar"
"A Message from Pandora"
"Production Materials"
With that, let's start to look at each of the items individually:
Deleted Scenes - Never Before Seen: About 70 minutes worth of deleted scenes feature here which also include a user's guide for viewing the unfinished shots, which these are combining live action footage with template CG work which is very interesting to watch as a fan of the film.
As for my favorites, well they would have to be "Pandora Rules", in which Stephen Lang's Col. Quaritch gives the full safety briefing and "You're a Long Way from Earth" in which Giovanni Ribisi tries to stop Quaritch from attacking only to get confronted big time, apart from that the other scenes were okay and probably best left out, one nice part of this section is that you only get the user's guide foisted on you when you select a deleted scene for the first time, after that you're off and running to the races.
Capturing Avatar: A 4 part making of documentary that runs just an hour and a half and covers almost everything you would want to know about the movie from the initial conception, the casting, creating the performance capture technology even the reaction to the teaser trailer and inevitable release which is sadly slightly overlooked, it's rumored that about an hour was cut from this doco which I would like to see as it might have plugged some of the holes and covered some of the topics like the release in a little more detail, but it's still a great documentary and if you're a fan, check it out.
A Message from Pandora: A 20 minute Featurette where Cameron talks about his love of nature and his journey to the Amazon Basin where a massive hydro electric dam was planned to be built but it would also displace about 25,000 natives who depend on the area, watching this featurette two things came to mind: first, the parallels between that and the plot of the movie and also the city deep within the basin reminded me very much of the base that the humans occupy in the movie, a good watch.
Production Materials: A lot of stuff here, from a 17 minute art reel from 2006, a motion capture test with two different actors, a slew of VFX progression reels, even a crew film called "The Volume", but my favorite has to be the motion capture test based on another project called "Brother Termite" as it showed a CG character in the real world pretty damn convincingly, hopefully Cameron gives that challenge a go soon, the runner up would be seeing Zoe Saldana get her life cast, good lord I couldn't believe it as this purple and green goop was going on her face
Disc 3:
I said there was a lot and we have one last disc full of extras, here though there are only 3 menu items:
"Scene Deconstruction"
"Featurettes"
"Avatar Archives"
With that out of the way, let's get started:
Scene Deconstruction: Using your Blu-Ray remote you can select 17 different scenes from the film and have a look at three separate options: The original performance capture material, the template CG and the final film with the Performance Capture material in a PiP reference square, this was unbelievably fun to watch as you get a firsthand look at how some of the CG scenes with the push of a button as well as seeing how just dead on the performance capture really was, the buttons you want for this section are Red for the Final one, Yellow for the template CG (which looks like an old N64 game) and Green for the Performance Capture, well worth watching.
Featurettes: 17 Production Featurettes here on a range of different subjects, from the creation of some of the film's creatures such as the Ikran (Banshee), the Thanator, the gunships, the AMP Suit, the various cameras developed for the film and even down to the scoring and editing of the picture, some pretty cool stuff here which is worth checking out.
Avatar Archives: Possibly my favorite section of the entire set, there is all sorts of fan goodness here that I will be covering one item at a time, so read on dear reader:
Teaser Trailer: The film's Teaser Trailer is presented here in full 1080p HD and 5.1 sound, containing some different angles and unfinished CG work, this teaser gathered a very mixed reaction when released last year, although I'll never forget the pure glee at seeing this in a cinema when I went to see (500) Days of Summer late last year, something from my cinema going days that will stay with me for a long time.
Theatrical Trailer: If the Teaser Trailer garnered a mixed response, the Theatrical Trailer won over a whole slew of new fans, this fantastic trailer (which I must have watched 1000's of times prior to the film's cinema release) is also in full 1080p HD and 5.1 sound and I must say that it's absolutely delightful to see it here on this disc as it wouldn't have been the same without it, or the Teaser for that matter.
The Original Scriptment: Pretty much where it all began, James Cameron's original 1995 treatment for Avatar, and it's an utterly fantastic read especially as it goes into much more detail about Josh's (Josh was later changed to Jake) life on Earth which is more grim than in the final film, there's also a character who doesn't appear in the film at all, someone who's Avatar died, terrific stuff.
Screenplay Written by James Cameron: Pretty much the film's shooting script, a good read but not as good as the Scriptment.
Pandorapedia: Pretty much everything (and I mean everything) you could ever want to know about Pandora and it's inhabitants both human and Na'vi is covered here in massive detail, you could spend hours and hours in this although as I write this I haven't found the section on Toruk Macto, again great stuff.
The Songs: Here the Na'vi songs are translated into English as well as the original Na'vi language, I never really picked up on the Na'vi songs but it's heartening to see them here.
The Art of Avatar: An Extensive collection of artwork, photos and blueprints on just about everything in the film from the various weapons, the AMP Suit (VERY cool to see the blueprints of this baby) and more, what else is there left to say expect check it out.
Any further objections:
Actually, no apart from the lost hour on the making of which would have made this set feel a little more definitive but I will say in a very nice touch that at any point you stop any of the discs and eject them from your system, when you put it back in you will be asked to resume playback from wherever you left off, now that's good thinking.
Final Thoughts:
If you are an Avatar fan, you HAVE to have this disc, even if you bought the April release like I did to satisfy yourself in having the film then and there, to be quite honest the last time I remember being satisfied with a top notch special edition release was the Blade Runner set from 2007 and although it isn't as good as that set (and it will be a long time if ever before I see an SE as good as that one) it's the best one since as far as I'm concerned, so Go get it, Now I say.
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