Review of Kung Fu Panda Secrets of the Furious Five

While “Kung Fu Panda” definitely is a good movie, I think it may be a tad overrated. Kids will love it but speaking as an adult, I doubt most parents will think it is anything better than average. The film does mix solid animation, some great kung fu action, and a decent amount of humor. However, as someone who grew up loving “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” I was just a bit disappointed.

“Kung Fu Panda” tells the story of Po, a panda who works at his father’s noodle shop but dreams of becoming a kung fu master. A prophecy is made and Po suddenly becomes the chosen one to save his town from the formerly imprisoned Tai Lung. Considering he has absolutely no kung fu training and very little confidence, this is quite a shock indeed. With the help of his master Shifu, he must learn quickly how to become the Dragon Warrior.

Like most animated films “Kung Fu Panda” is obviously targeted at kids but it does do a solid job of catering towards adults as well. Like I said earlier, I doubt adults will think it is anything better than average but at least the film won’t make them dread watching it with their kids. There are a lot of fighting sequences but obviously there is no blood or death. Still, I’m not sure I would let really young children watch it.

I thought the story was pretty good despite having a familiar message. The humor was a bit lacking compared to other animated features like “Shrek” and all the Pixar films but the action does somewhat make up for it.

Considering most animated films look spectacular even on DVD, I was a little bit disappointed with the video quality. I’m not sure what was wrong with it but I didn’t think the film looked very good on DVD. It could be that I’m just starting to get used to Blu-ray and thus DVD’s look worse than usual. I didn’t get a chance to check out the Blu-ray version but I’m going to guess it looks awesome. Animated films always get a big boost from an upgrade to hi-def and I’m sure this will too.

A lot of nice bonus features are included on this DVD. I won’t go through them one-by-one because they are pretty similar to the ones available on nearly every animated DVD. They are all very solid and fans of the film will get quite a bit of enjoyment out of them. The one “extra” I will talk about is “Secrets of the Furious Five.” It is technically a separate DVD but the only way you can get it is to buy it with “Kung Fu Panda.” It’s pretty much a longer version of the shorts that are usually included on animated DVDs. This one is 24 minutes long and adds some background information about the Furious Five, five kung fu masters who were supporting characters in “Kung Fu Panda.” While the animation isn’t quite up to par (most of it is hand-drawn instead of computer-generated), this is a nice addition (and easily the best “bonus feature”) for fans of the film.

Overall, despite being slightly disappointed with “Kung Fu Panda” I can still feel confident recommending it for children and families. Parents may not enjoy it as much as their kids but they probably won’t be as bored as they are during most family films.

Kung-Fu Panda Review provided by The TV Legion.

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