Rumble - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Rumble



Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:


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Movie
Ok, I’m going to admit something. I didn’t think much of Rumble going into the film from the trailer alone, but I’m a huge fan of wrestling from back in the day. During the late 90s and early 2000s I was sitting there cheering Hulk Hogan in his comeback vs. Vince McMahon, and watched Kurt Angle lay waste to his victims. My buddies and I in college pooled our meager funds together and ordered the pay per view matches for Wrestlemania 2000, and even though we knew it was pure cheese, cheered and laughed every friday night to see Eddie Guevera kick some butt. Not to mention Ready To Rumble is one of my favorite comedies of all times (please, for the love of all that is holy, bring that movie to Blu-ray or 4K please!!!!).

That being said, Rumble isn’t exactly high art either. It’s an amalgamation of pretty much every animated film ever, with a paint by the numbers plot, the typical platitudes of just being yourself, and basic level animation while we cheer on the plucky loser to victory. Every scene is plucked straight out of a “by the numbers” playbook, with no surprises or really interesting fights to keep it entertaining.

In this reality humans and monsters live among each other, and one of the biggest ways that monsters make their way in the world is through the WMW (World Monster Wrestling) Federation. The town of Stogere basically LIVED on the back of wrestling, being home to one of the biggest wrestlers of all time, Rayburn and his coach Jimbo. Even today they’re on top of the world as up and comer Tentacular (Terry Crews) is the next living legend. However, Tentacular decides to leave Stoger and go on to bigger and better things where he can make all that big game money.

This leaves Stoger in a pickle. Their entire existence revolves around monster wrestling, and without a monster in the house to keep butts in seats, there is no way to survive. The mayor agrees to sell the stadium so that it can be turned into a parking lot and hopefully save the town, but Jimbo’s daughter Winnie (Geraldine Viswanathan) decides that she’s going to take up the mantle of her father to coach a new monster to be the hero that Stoger needs, and lead him to victory. The only thing is, she’s kind of a nobody and no monster wants to work with her.

Depressed and ready to give up, Winnie stumbles upon her perfect opportunity in the form of Steve The Stupendous (Will Arnett) who is making do throwing underground fights for chump change. The thing is, Steve is not just a loser. He’s also the son of the infamous Rayburn, Rayburn Jr., and trying to live outside of his father’s shadow by slumming it. Well, Winnie isn’t going to take no for an answer, and soon she and “Steve” are using their unique set of skills to try and win ban Stoger’s chance at keeping their stadium.

Yeah, it’s pretty much a rote children’s flick. The animation is top notch for a straight to streaming video, but like most of those streaming only titles, it’s kind of a dud. The humor falls flat, and as I said above, it’s pure cookie cutter story telling. The story has some fun things going with it thanks to Will Arnett’s comedic timing, and Terry Crews is fantastic at playing a bloviating heel. But even with all of the wrestling inside jokes the story is just flat and rather boring.




Rating:

Rated PG for some action and rude humor.




Video:

The 1080p disc looks stunning through. IN fact, this and the audio mix are probably the highlights of the entire package. The digital animation is bright and shiny, with deeply saturated neon colors. The monsters are glistening red, shiny black, and bright neon blue with wonderful pop and clarity to them. Fine details are resplendent, and although it isn’t Pixar level of detail, it still shows a TON of information. Bitrates stay in the mid 30s, and there are very few signs of any artifacting outside of some minor background banding. Black levels are deep and inky, making this one impressive looking disc.









Audio:

The singular 5.1 DTS-HD MA track is no slouch either. It’s a rocking WWE (errrr….. WMW) track that is hard, heavy and full of POWERFUL bass. When the monsters are a rocking, the entire sound stage is shaking and pulsating. The pop songs aren’t always super bassy, but they’re loud, aggressive, and the dialog is still perfectly intelligible. One thing I noticed was that the track is mixed a bit on the low side, so I have to boost a good 5-7 DB over my normal listening setting to get it up to par, but once it’s level matched the track has zero problems whatsoever. Great sounding audio experience and probably as good or better than the video.












Extras:

• The Super-Secret Playbook — Winnie (Geraldine Viswanathan) narrates this exciting exploration of her dad's championship-winning plays for Rayburn, Sr. The playbook comes to life as the pages turn and reveal exciting moves with fully animated wrestlers that leap off the pages.
• The Mon-Stars of Wrestling — For a sport to capture the imagination of fans, it needs superstar athletes with larger-than-life personalities. Meet the hulking behemoths inside the six-sided Monster Wrestling ring who keep the world mesmerized.
• Salsa with Rayburn, Jr.— In this unique tutorial, Rayburn invites viewers to learn some of his signature moves step-by-step. Families can learn to Salsa like Rayburn… and get a good workout with the hero of the film!
• Massive Monsters, Wrestling Moves, and Dazzling Dances — Director Hamish Grieve takes center stage in this behind-the-scenes look at creating the monsters, their textures, and their signature arsenal of moves.
• Four Rounds in the Animation Ring
• Deleted Scenes

Final Score: ​

Rumble isn’t horrible, but it’s not great either. Young kids shouldn’t have a problem with the movie as it’s completely inoffensive, but anyone looking for a top notch animated film will have to look elsewhere. The Blu-ray looks and sounds great (most Paramount movies do), and the extras are reasonable, but at the end of the day I’d leave this as a cheap kids rental or watch it on Paramount+.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Terry Crews, Geraldine Viswanathan, Will Arnett, Tony Shalhoub
Directed by: Hamish Grieve
Written by: Matt Lieberman, Rob Harrell (Graphic Novel)
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1, French DD 5.1
Subtitles: English, English SDH, French
Studio: Paramount
Rated: PG
Runtime: 95 minutes
Blu-Ray Release Date: October 18th, 2022

Recommendation: Rental