Smallville: The Complete Series - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Smallville: The Complete Series



Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:



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Movie
Somebody saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaave meeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

Well, with the release of Superman and Lois: The Complete 1st Season we also get a massive treat that is extremely long in coming to us. That is, the live action DC show that pretty much kick started the post 2000 era of DC live action super hero shows. Smallville. As many of you may know, Smallville was running simultaneously with the birth of the HD-DVD and Blu-ray format war, but was already about half way through the show. Meaning, only seasons 7-10 got released on Blu-ray (Season 6 did get a mediocre HD-DVD release though) with fairly mediocre results. Lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 tracks (640 kbps, but still), soft looking VC-1 encodes, and the first few seasons were initially promised, and then scrapped when we were told that it would be too hard to bring the first several seasons up to snuff visually. So those of who wanted the entire series in HD were left with digital copies on various streaming services, or the DVD boxset.

Well, the time has arrived and I’m going to say this. Usually I’m a little reticent about recent “complete series” Blu-ray sets due to the fact that a lot of the old features are left in the dust, and Warner LOVES recycling old discs. Well, that’s not the case this time. Warner has created brand new discs for seasons 1-5, scrapped the season 6 HD-DVD encode, and even re-done seasons 7-10 with a brand new AVC encoding AND upgraded every single season with lossless DTS-HD MA audio (only season 10 had lossless to this point), AND kept every single special feature from the DVD boxset release (minus one) as well. Basically this is the Blu-ray set we’ve all wanted, just a bit late to the game.

The show itself almost needs no introduction. It stars Tom Welling as our beloved Clark Kent as he grows up as a teenager in Smallville USA. He’s just discovering his true powers, and becoming the framework for what we will one day know as Superman. However, till then it’s just a teenager with a crush on his friend Lana Lang (Kristen Kruek), best friends with the richest kid in town, one Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum), and just enough grasp of his powers to know that he has to use them for good.

The show unfolds as one of the longest running super hero shows in existence, running from 2001-2011 for a whopping 10 seasons, ending just as Clark dons the blue and red suit for the first time in metropolis. Seasons 1-5 are EASILY the best of the series in terms of tone and feel, but seasons 6-10 have a special place in my heart for introducing elements of the Justice League, putting Clarke into Metropolis with Lois Lane (Erica Druance), and re-imagining Zod and other infamous villains in a way that reminds me of how Gotham reimagined and altered much of Batman’s villains to fit into a prequel series. Part of the reason for the tone change was the change over from The WB to The CW right around the season 6 mark, but it was also a a much needed change as the show was starting to become stale at that point. Things got crazier and wilder, and the second half of the show almost feels like a completely different show at times.

I’m actually shocked that we got this set, and that Warner went all out re-encoding everything. Usually we get the recycled disc syndrome with Warner, and maybe we get upscales from the first few seasons to make them fit on Blu-ray. Instead Warner went the extra mile and did it right. They upgraded every season to lossless audio, brand new encodes, and even didn’t fall into the cheapo mode of putting an entire 42 disc series (including the 2 special features discs) into a foldout case, or a stack pack. Instead they put each season into it’s own Viva Elite case (pay attention to this Universal with your cardboard trays) and put in the 2 DVD features disc from the DVD boxset. Bravo Warner, bravo.




Rating:

Rated TV-14




Video:

Smallville sort of ran the gamut of video quality over the years. The first season looks the roughest of the bunch, but don’t worry, it gets better from there. The first year I’m giving a 3.5/5 as it’s a bit grainy and shows some edge enhancement and smearing. That first year was shot on 35mm film but the master was finished on tape, so it was not the best looking. This one looks to be a partial upscale, with the 35mm stuff being HD, but the effects an upscale. It looks pretty decent, but not great.

The next several seasons are much better, as the show was still shot on 35mm film, but finished in HD for modern televisions. The same sort of orange tinge that the show was known for is still in effect, but the upgrade in picture quality is noticeable. I’d give most of the rest of the 10 seasons a solid 4/5 ratings, with minor upticks in quality coming over the years.

Now for the re-dos. Season 6 was infamously an HD-DVD exclusive and crammed into single layer discs, so it never looked that great to my memory. Seasons 7 and 8 were on Blu-ray, but crummily done with mediocre VC-1 encodoes (with season 7 being crammed on 3 discs with tons of artifacting) that were dated even back then. Season 9 got better, but season 10 really shined with lossless audio and a MUCH better picture quality. Honestly, with seasons 6-9 getting a good re-encode the upgrades are pretty decent. Another 4/5 rating for those seasons. Season 10 looks virtually untouched, with a 4.5/5 rating from me as it looks the shiniest and glossiest. Average rating for all seasons balances out to a 4/5 rating (8 of the 10 seasons get that rating with the first season’s 3.5/5 rating and the 10th season’s 4.5/5 rating balancing each other out at the end). Solid upgrades and some very much appreciated additions to Blu-ray for the first time.







Audio:

The audio is similar to the video score, but less aggressive in the bell curve. With the show being re-encoded with lossless from the ground up (previously only season 10 was in DTS-HD MA) all of the seasons sound remarkably similar. It’s a solid action track with lots of swooshes (Clark’s infamous super speed he uses throughout the show), the melodramatic score livening up the surrounds, and a generally all around good mix. Later seasons showed more oomph and polish, with season 9 and 10 probably gaining to 4.5/5 status while the previous 8 years were a solid 4/5 rating.






Extras:

Season 1
• Extended Pilot Episode (In SD)
• Audio Commentaries
• Deleted Scenes
• Storyboards to Screen Comparison

Season 2
• Audio Commentaries
• Deleted Scenes
• Faster than a Speeding Bullet: The Visual Effects of Smallville
• Chistopher Reeve: The Man of Steel
• The Chloe Chronicles Volume 1
• Gag Reel

Season 3
• Audio Commentaries
• Deleted Scenes
• Producing Smallville: The Heroes behind the Camera
• The Chloe Chronicles Volume 2
• Gag Reel

Season 4
• Audio Commentaries
• Deleted Scenes
• Being Lois Lane
• Behind Closed Doors: Inside the Writers Room

Season 5
• Audio Commentaries
• Deleted Scenes
• Smallville's 100th episode: The Making of a Milestone
• Look, Up in the Sky!: The Amazing Story of Superman

Season 6
• Big Fans
• Green Arrow
• The Oliver Queen Chronicles
• Justice and Doom
• Deleted Scenes

Season 7
• Audio Commentaries
• Supergirl: The Last Daughter of Krypton
• Jimmy on Jimmy
• Deleted Scenes
• Kara and the Chronicles of Krypton Mobisodes
• Smallville Visions

Season 8
• Audio Commentaries
• Unaired Scenes
• In the Director's Chair
• Smallville Doomsday

Season 9
• Audio Commentaries
• Deleted Scenes
• Kneel Before Zod
• Absolute Justice: From Script to Screen

Season 10
• Audio Commentaries
• Deleted Scenes
• Back in the Jacket: A Smallville Homecoming
• The Son Becomes the Father
• Music Video

Special Features DVDs
• A Decade of Comic-Con
• Paley Fest 2004
•The Adventures of Superboy: The Original 1961 Pilot
• Aquaman 2006 Pilot
• Secret Origins: The American Story of DC Comics
• A Retrospective Look at the Series with Season Featurettes

Final Score: ​

In some ways Smallville is a breathe of fresh air after living in the Arrowverse for so long. At the time Smallville was considered too “kiddy” and “angsty”, which is where the invention of the Arrowverse came form. Dark, gritty, and full of violence and lacking teenage romance, it blew onto the screens with some EPIC first couple of seasons (for Arrow and The Flash) before the Arrowverse fell into their own versions of angst ridden ruts. Going back and watching Smallville again brings a fresh feeling to the superhero world. Almost as if the light hearted fun of the series makes up for smar alec one liners and dark brooding superheros. Sure, it’s dated with it’s technology, and the first few seasons are a bit rough around the edges visually, but the show is still a blast to watch, and fans of the show are rather pleased that last year’s Crisis on Infinite Earths Arrowverse crossover actually pulled the series into canon (I REALLY wanted to see Welling don the blue and red suit, but sadly that was not meant to be). The new Blu-ray set is very impressive. It features brand new encodes, all the extras (minus the season 7 digital comic book), and is pretty aggressively priced. If you have the DVDs I personally find the upgrade in audio and video very compelling, and for those (such as me, grumble whine) who had the Blu-rays of the 7th through 10th seasons, the new encodes actually do make a measurable difference in audio and video upgrades. Worth it.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Tom Welling, Michael Rosenbaum, Allison Mack, Kristin Kreuk, John Glover, Erica Durance, John Schneider, Annette O'Toole
Created by: Alfred Gough, Miles Millar
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1, French DD 5.1
Subtitles: English SDH, French, Dutch
Studio: Warner Brothers
Rated: TV-14
Runtime: 9606 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: October 19th, 2021

Recommendation: Good Buy for Fans

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. I remember watching the first few seasons but then stop later. I will have to revisit this one.

 

[hg29]

Thanks for the review, I've been waiting a lot for this series on Bluray, but I have a question: is the Boxset subtitled in Spanish? I see that in the specifications you said yes, but on the package box it only says that it is subtitled in English and French, even so it is subtitled in Spanish? or what happened? I would greatly appreciate your answer to buy the package, please.

 

[Michael Scott]

Thanks for the review, I've been waiting a lot for this series on Bluray, but I have a question: is the Boxset subtitled in Spanish? I see that in the specifications you said yes, but on the package box it only says that it is subtitled in English and French, even so it is subtitled in Spanish? or what happened? I would greatly appreciate your answer to buy the package, please.

thanks for pointing that out. that was actually from the DVD set I copied over by accident.... I double checked each season and can confirm that Dutch, French and English SDH are the 3 subtitle tracks across the discs

 

[hg29]

I thank you very much for answering and helping me. It is a total pity that it has not included subtitles in Spanish, I really wanted to have this boxset and now I think I will not buy it.

 

[Michael Scott]

I thank you very much for answering and helping me. It is a total pity that it has not included subtitles in Spanish, I really wanted to have this boxset and now I think I will not buy it.

yeah, I was surprised as the previous releases on Blu-ray (season 7-10 at least) had all of those subtitle tracks, shame to leave them off