Toy Story 2

The sequel to Walt Disney Studios' and Pixar Animation Studios' groundbreaking hit is "Toy Story 2." All the favorites are back with some terrific new toys. This time, Woody (Hanks)—now a valuable collector's item—is kidnapped by a toy collector (Knight). Buzz (Allen), and some of the other toy box friends take off to rescue him before their owner, Andy, returns from camp. (Gary Reber)

Special features include commentary by Director John Lasseter, Co-Directors Lee Unkrich and Ash Brannon, and Co-Writer Andrew Stanton; Buzz Lightyear Mission Logs: "International Space Station" (HD 03:45); "Paths To Pixar: Technical Artists" (HD 04:24); "Studio Stories: Toy Story 2 Sleep Deprivation Lab" (HD 01:27); "Studio Stories: Pinocchio" (HD 02:16); "Studio Stories: The Movie Vanishes" (HD 02:34); "Pixar's Zoetrope" (HD 02:00); "Celebrating Our Friend Joe Ranft" (HD 12:47); the "Toy Story 3" sneak peek (HD 02:07); all the classic DVD bonus features; Maximize Your Home Theatre tutorial; sneak a peeks; and BD-Live functionality.

The previously reviewed anamorphically enhanced 1.78:1 DVD in Issue 104 exhibited a beautiful digital-to-digital transfer, with superb image quality in all aspects. Like the original "Toy Story," colors were rich and vibrant, with excellent balance. Images were sharp and finely detailed into "backgrounds." The amount of detail seen in this movie was absolutely breathtaking and revealing of how much care went into its creation. Contrast and "shadow delineation" were superb, with excellent visual information in the darker scenes. The visuals were absolutely stunning. This new 1080p AVC Blu-ray Disc™ Special Edition tops all previous releases. The transfer faithfully duplicates Pixar's pristine digital source. As with the new "Toy Story" Special Edition, the color palette is exceptionally vivid, with rich and warm hues that will dazzle your eyesight. The striking and bold colors pop off the screen! Blacks are deep and solid throughout. Resolution is incredibly detailed, sharp, and clear. Every element, whether in the foreground or background, is perfectly descriptive and defined with excellent dimensionality. The picture is absolutely pristine, with no noticeable artifacts, for a perfect visual experience. This is truly a reference-quality picture that deserves the highest praise. This is what high-definition is all about! (Gary Reber)

The previous DVD reviewed in Issue 104 featured Dolby® Digital EX™ and DTS-ES® matrix 5.1-channel soundtracks mixed by original re-recording mixers Gary Rydstrom and Gary Summers. They were fully engaging, with a good use of the surrounds for music and atmospheric effects. Dialogue was generally held to the center channel, but was occasionally directionalized across the front three screen channels to match on-screen locations, and was generally done with precision. As with the new "Toy Story" Special Edition release, all this is true for the new remastering of Rydstrom's and Summers' work in 5.1-channel lossless discrete DTS-HD Master Audio™. Creativity in rendering the spatial soundfield is downright impressive. Sonic imaging is superb and fully-involving, with compelling split surround activity that dramatically opens up the soundstage. Pans are delivered from the front of the room to the rear, with a good use of the center surround channel, to complete overhead pans. Sound effects have been recorded with remarkable clarity and convey a compelling sense of poignancy. Dialogue is directionalized across the front stage, with good imaging, to match on-screen locations. Dialogue sounds even more natural and intimate, with good articulation. The dialogue production is exemplary, with well-recorded voices that sound very natural and remarkably well-integrated with the visuals. Somewhat surprisingly, there is some directionality with voices, with off-center dialogue being rendered in between the screen channels. Randy Newman's music is very nicely recorded, with an involving, expansive presence that is better resolved in terms of instrument timbre and positioning. Fidelity is pristine—a definite upgrade over the previous releases. The .1 LFE channel is used extensively, with an extremely deep presence at times that develops the low end well, consisting of both subtle low-end foundation to the music and poignant, significant moments with substantial sub-25 Hz extension that is system threatening. The split surrounds are used liberally throughout to wonderful effect. While the EX and/or ES center back surround channel (here retained on the French and Spanish EX versions) on the previous DVD added an increase in surround envelopment, with pans across the rear stage much more well defined, the phantom sense of center back surround is still intact, though, not as prominent. This soundtrack still stands as a superb sonic presentation with consistently satisfying holosonic® soundfield envelopment and an essential for the surround sound listening experience. This is definitely a superlative example of what creativity and a production of par excellence can do to optimally refine the experience of surround sound for movies. (Gary Reber)