DVD Review: Merry Winter Wish

THESE ARE SOLEY MY OPINIONS AND NOT FROM THE THOMAS & FRIENDS FAN BASE

MERRY WINTER WISH

Written by

Miranda Larson 

Jessica Sandys Clarke

Sharon Miller

Episodes:

- Merry Winter Wish

- Thomas and The Snowman Party

- Henry's Magic Box
- Merry Misty Island

- Let It Snow

- Surprise, Surprise

Special Features:

- Guess Who? Puzzles

- Down at The Station: Coal 

- All You Need Karaoke Music Video

Distributed by

HIT Entertainment 

This DVD was to be released for the year 2011. However, due to the controversial Winter Holiday/Christmas issue in British newspapers and with word of mouth by older fans, church groups and Hilary Awdry, the DVD was held back until this year and here it is. Though Australia was the only country that released the 2011 version of the DVD with two non-winter episodes from S13. Also this is the first UK DVD since 'Heave Ho!' (2009) to have more then four episodes as SiF had conducted a poll about the CGI Thomas DVDs that has been released and also this is the first DVD to have no Mr. Perkins, though I can see why. But anyway, let's look and see if this DVD is it worth the money with six Thomas episodes, despite being written terribly? Let's find out.

EPISODES

I can tell that the last two episodes were from the 'Merry Christmas Thomas' DVD that was released to the US last year. I believe that was the DVD that HIT was going to release this year after this was originally intended last year, as the UK audience get the episode DVDs a year after the US, however, due to the reports about the controversy, they probably kept 'Merry Christmas Thomas' for a 2013 release since this was delayed. But that's my theory.

The UK aren't the first country to have more then four episodes on the DVD, Australia has many CGI DVDs with six episodes too, though on this DVD, the last two were not Christmas themed, maybe next time if they release a new DVD focusing on Christmas, they should bring newer episodes?

As stated in my reviews of S13, S14 and S15, there are the bad episodes, filled with the dreaded formula that is very obvious to see in the recent series. I have to say 'Surprise, Surprise' is the decent one here, yes I know I said it's bad, but you can see it sometimes that it tried to be good.

HAPPY 'CHRISTMAS' HOLIDAYS

As mentioned on Roll Along Thomas, the entire DVD has mention the word 'Christmas', due to the outcry from religous groups, older fans and Hilary Awdry. I'm not going through the whole relgious thing about it. But despite that its great to hear the word again, HIT should at least have more episodes focused on more celebrations from different religions.

SPECIAL FEATURES

Despite that there is no Mr. Perkins, it is obvivous why he wasn't shown on this DVD. With the two US releases back in 2010 and 2011, there are two different learning segements and since that this DVD was not released as intended last year, they didn't re-shot the whole thing. But despite that, the features are enjoyable such as the 'Guess Who' and the 'Down At The Station' segements about the importances of coal. And its good to see 'All You Need' having a DVD release as well.

OVERALL

Even though the episodes aren't great and the special features are good, the DVD is of course recommendable to the target audience of the show for Christmas. I give the dvd the rating of:

Rating: 3/5

There are more DVDs coming your way! Australia will get 'Curious Cargo' on November 7th. I'm still awaiting on 'A Very Thomas Christmas' from the US and I'll be getting 'Sticky Siutations' as well from the US for Christmas. This will be the final Thomas DVD release for the UK for 2012 and now we await for more DVDs in the year 2013.