Justice League: Doom Blu-ray Review

Posted February 23rd, 2012 by Brandon A. DuHamel

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), French Dolby Digital 5.1, Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish
Region: ABC (Region-Free)
Rating: PG-13
Discs: 2 (1 x Blu-ray + 1 x DVD + UltraViolet Digital Copy)
Run time: 77 Mins.
Studio: Warner Home Video
Blu-ray Release Date: February 28, 2012
List Price: $24.98

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Overall

The Film

Video Quality

Audio Quality

Supplemental Materials

Click thumbnails for high-resolution 1920X1080p screen captures

(All Blu-rayDefinition.com 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)

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The Film

While it is fine to have these original DC universe films on Blu-ray from Warner, that fact that many of them are rarely very inventive and often show some major flaws in their plot development is disheartening to say the least. The animation style is also rather straightforward, offering nothing so adventurous as a lot of the numerous anime features that seem to get churned out on a daily basis. So, the strength in these superhero stories has to be in their adherence to the comic world. Justice League: Doom falls very flat in that regard.

The story regards the immortal Neanderthal villain Vandal Savage (Phil Morris) who brings together a group of supervillains, including Bane (Carlos Alazraqui), Cheetah (Claudia Black; TV’s Farscape), Queen of the Royal Flush Gang, Star Sapphire (Olivia D’Abo), and Mirror Master (Alexis Denisof; TV’s Dollhouse; TV’s Angel) in order to topple the Justice League of America and cull two thirds of the world’s population with a doomsday device. The JLA – Superman (Tim Daly) , Batman (Kevin Conroy), The Flash (Michael Rosenbaum), Wonder Woman (Susan Eisenberg), Martian Manhunter (Carl Lumbly), Cyborg (Bumper Robinson), and Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion; TV’s Castle; Serenity) – with their lives in jeopardy due to contingency plans developed by Batman himself must stop them before they succeed.

While Doom has its moments of good action sequences, the underlying dialogue is stilted, despite some good actors coming on board, and the glaring plot holes in the story are a bit too much to overlook. Case in point, during one action sequence in which the members of the JLA take on the League of Doom, Superman is confronted with Metallo (Paul Blackthorne) who weakens him with a heart of kryptonite. Now, one might expect that someone not weakened by kryptonite would come to the Man of Steel’s defense and they’d tag team, you know, trade sparring partners. Well, it’s all for naught anyway, because Superman eventually gets tired of the fight, somehow manages to overcome his “weakness” and blast Metallo’s head off with his heat vision. Yeah. Do we even need to mention that the whole doomsday device bit has been used to death?

Video Quality

Justice League: Doom arrives with a high quality video encodement in AVC/MPEG-4 1080p/24 from Warner Home Video that really doesn’t have much to find fault with. The colors are brilliant, detail is sharp, line art crisp, and there doesn’t appear to be artifacting of any sort.

Audio Quality

Audio is equally engaging in the English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz/24-bit) soundtrack. There are big lows, airy and natural highs, clean dialogue with a strong use of the surround channels for atmospherics and some discrete panning.

Supplemental Materials

Supplements are all in high definition and offer additional Justice League animated adventures, featurettes with the crew, a digital comic book and more.

The supplements:

A League of One: The Duane McDuffie Story (1.78:1; 1080p/24; 00:36:35) – A commemoration of the late comic book writer Duane McDuffie.
Guarding the Balance: Batman and the JLA (1.78:1; 1080p/24; 00:18:54) A discussion of Batman’s plan to counter a theoretical abuse of powers by the Justice League.
A Sneak Peek at Superman vs. The Elite (1.78:1; 1080p/24; 00:06:32)
Cyborg: His Time Has Come (1.78:1; 1080p/24; 00:06:08)
Bruce Timm’s Top Picks:
- Justice League Unlimited: Wild Cards, Part 1(1.78:1; 1080p/24; 00:20:40)
- Justice League Unlimited: Wild Cards, Part 2 (1.78:1; 1080p/24; 00:21:42)
Audio Commentary: Justice League Doom
DC Digital Comic Book – Justice League of America: Tower of Babel
DVD
UltraViolet Digital Copy

The Definitive Word

Overall:

A less than average and weak stop off in the DC Universe, Justice League: Doom is a disappointing original feature, to say the least. While the Blu-ray does offer a very strong amount of home theatre entertainment value, it’s probable best to pass this one up.