Welcome to Elmore, home of 12-year-old Gumball Watterson and his colorful family and friends. The animated series originally ran on Cartoon Network for six seasons and two miniseries starting in 2011, and was revived last year on Hulu in the new ongoing series The Wonderfully Weird World of Gumball. This new DVD box set contains just the original series and miniseries, so if you’re looking for a box set containing the new show, hang on for about 14 more years.
Buy The Amazing World of Gumball: The Complete SeriesGumball the catboy usually hangs out with his adoptive brother, Darwin, a goldfish on legs, as they get into all kinds of good-natured juvenile shenanigans. Genetics are wonky in Elmore, with Gumball’s younger sister Anais following their dad’s pink-bunny nature, while Gumball mirrors his mom’s blue-cat features. That’s the least of the weirdness, as the series experiments wildly with varying animation formats including traditional cel animation, stop-motion, CGI, and even live action. Backgrounds are typically photo-realistic, but anything goes in Elmore.
Each episode is self-contained, so viewers are welcome to pop in at any point of the run without missing any narrative arcs. The kid hijinks are typical, as are their family interactions, although refreshingly wholesome, making for a series that sometimes feels just as sugary as it looks.
I had never seen the show before receiving the box set, so went into my viewing with no idea of its freewheeling inventiveness. I really enjoyed the fantastic blend of disparate animation styles, a fascinating visual showcase further enhanced by super-vibrant colors. The characters are likeable, and the voice actors are well matched to their characters. The writing is primarily aimed at a younger after-school demographic, although it’s accessible enough and not so manic that oldsters are excluded. There’s never really much plot to keep track of, just a nice way to unwind with familiar characters in relatable, non-perilous situations. In short, it’s cozy animation.
The box set is housed in one of Warner Bros.’ industrial-strength thick clamshell cases, with the 15 discs stacked on hinged trays inside. DVD image quality is adequate, with color presentation lacking a bit due to the limitations of the format, but resolution is decent thanks to the overall absence of fine detail in the series. Audio is presented in suitably immersive Dolby Digital 5.1, but has received considerable fan pushback due to long-time mastering issues that apparently failed to receive any quality assurance check.
The principal issue appears to be that the UK/U.S. co-production originated in the UK, mastered in their standard 25fps format instead of the 24fps U.S. standard. Bizarrely, while the Cartoon Network broadcast run was reportedly correctly formatted, Hulu has apparently been using the unadjusted UK masters for the first three seasons, basically streaming 25fps at 24fps, resulting in audio and video being slowed down about 4% and subsequently increasing episode lengths. The DVD set continues the trend, instead of remastering all seasons to format the original time signatures at 24fps. It’s easy to hear the pitch difference between the early episodes and the later ones on both DVD and Hulu, but apparently nobody at Warners cared enough to address the seemingly easy fix before pushing the DVD box out the door.
While it’s great to have the entire series in one concise package, including the two miniseries produced after the six-season run, the lingering mastering issues and the failure to release on Blu-ray take this set from a fan must-have to a questionable missed opportunity.
