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Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp’s Adventure — Special Edition Blu-ray Review

  • Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
  • Video Codec: AVC/MPEG-4
  • Resolution: 1080p/24 (23.976Hz)
  • Audio Codec: English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz/24-bit), English Dolby Digital 2.0, French & Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1
  • Subtitles: English SDH, French, Spanish
  • Subtitles Color: White
  • Region: ABC (Region-Free)
  • Rating: G
  • Run Time: 69 Mins.
  • Discs: 2 (1 x Blu-ray + 1 x DVD)
  • Studio: Walt Disney Video
  • Blu-ray Release Date: August 21, 2012
  • List Price: $39.99

Overall
[Rating:4/5]
The Film
[Rating:3/5]
Video Quality
[Rating:4.5/5]
Audio Quality
[Rating:4/5]
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:3/5]

Click thumbnails for high-resolution 1920X1080p screen captures

(All TheaterByte screen captures are lightly compressed with lossy JPEG at 100% quality setting and are meant as a general representation of the content. They do not fully reveal the capabilities of the Blu-ray format)

The Film

[Rating:3/5]

O, Disney, why did you get into the business of making these direct-to-video knock-offs of your classic animated features? Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp’s Adventure is yet another sequel that taints the legacy of one of the great films from the Disney canon, Lady and the Tramp. Granted, this one at least appears to have been done with far more effort put into the animation work, as opposed to Pocahontas II, which just looked awful in comparison to its theatrically released original. Animation is one thing, however, story is another entirely. The story for this sequel, though claimed by the creators in the making of on this very disc as being entirely different from the original, actually goes as far as to steal the famous spaghetti scene from the original.

Putting that major gaffe aside, Lady and the Tramp II, as hard as it tries to, never really captures the charm and romance of the original film. Set some time after the adventures of Lady and Tramp in the first film, the two are now well-settled into their life of domestic bliss raising their family of four, three girls and a boy named Scamp (Scott Wolf). Scamp is going through some growing pains; he doesn’t feel like he fits into the life of being a pet and living with a family. He wants to be a wild dog, go run through the streets, and not have to take baths. After being chained up outside in the doghouse by Jim Dear (Nick Jameson) for tracking mud all over the house, Scamp breaks loose and goes to find a group of junkyard dogs he spotted running from a dog catcher. There he befriends the cute Angel (Alyssa Milano) and is in awe of the Doberman leader of the junkyard dogs Buster (Chazz Palminteri). Buster takes Scamp on, making him go through some tests before he can become a true junkyard dog, but none of this sits well with Angel whose true wish is to be just the sort of family dog that Scamp really is. Buster also quickly turns from a mentor to an antagonist when he finds out who Scamp really is. Meanwhile, Tramp must reignite some of his old streetwise ways in order to find and save his son from the hard knocks of the street.

The magic and romance of Lady and the Tramp, while it appears in bits and pieces here and there in this sequel between Scamp and his own girlfriend Angel, is muddled up by the teen angst that hangs over the entire affair. It is also not lost on viewers that the writers were trying rather hard to offer a moral about how wonderful family life is, and so forth. Ultimately, this film doesn’t ever rise above the level of being a rather slight story about a boy and father at odds with one another.

Video Quality

[Rating:4.5/5]

There isn’t much at all to complain about in this transfer of Lady and the Tramp II. The image is clean with no signs of noise or aliasing in artwork and the colors look fantastic. Perhaps at times there is an ever so slight amount of softness, but it’s hardly anything to get too worked about.

Audio Quality

[Rating:4/5]

A lossless English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz/24-bit) soundtrack has been supplied alongside an English Dolby Digital 2.0 and French and Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 dubs. The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track doesn’t do much with the surround channels other than add in a rather fair amount of ambience, but the overall mix is well done nonetheless. It has a good dynamic range with spacious stereo panning, lots of depth on the low end of the spectrum and natural sounding high frequencies. The dialogue is clear as well.

Supplemental Materials

[Rating:3/5]

Mostly everything here has been ported over from the original DVD release, but they have been transferred in high definition, so the Pluto shorts (and the sing-alongs) can now be viewed in glorious 1080p.

The supplements:

  • Puppy Trivia Tracks
  • Classic DVD Bonus Features:
    • The Making of Lady and the Tramp II: From Tramp to Scamp (1.33:1; SD; 00:16:34)
    • Sing-Along Songs (1.78:1; 1080p/24; Dolby Digital 5.1):
    • “(Prologue) Welcome Home”
    • “World Without Fences”
    • “Junkyard Society Rag”
    • “I Didn’t Know I Could Fly This Way”
    • “Always There”
  • Bonus Shorts:
    • Pluto, Junior (1.33:1; 1080p/24; 00:07:08)
    • Bone Trouble (1.33:1; 1080p/24; 00:08:42)
    • Pluto’s Kid Brother (1.33:1; 1080p/24; 00:06:51)
  • Audio Commentary with Director Darrell Rooney, Animation Director Steve Trenbirth, and co-director/producer Jeannine Roussel.

The Definitive Word

Overall:

[Rating:4/5]

Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp’s Adventure will most likely appeal to younger audiences despite all of its flaws, but for all of those out there familiar with the wonder of the original, this one is a pale comparison, even if it does sport some of the better direct-to-video animated productions from Disney.

Additional Screen Captures

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Purchase Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp’s Adventure on Blu-ray Combo Pack at CD Universe

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[amazon-product]B0081XTWWK[/amazon-product]

Purchase Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp’s Adventure on Blu-ray Combo Pack at CD Universe

Shop for more Blu-ray titles at Amazon.com

Overall
[Rating:4/5]
The Film
[Rating:3/5]
Video Quality
[Rating:4.5/5]
Audio Quality
[Rating:4/5]
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:3/5]

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