Reviewer's Bias*
Loves: Animation, Noggin
Likes: Music
Dislikes: Most kids programming
Hates: Tasha

The Story So Far...
The Backyardigans are five animal-children (Austin the Kangaroo, Pablo the Penguin, Tyrone the Moose, Tasha the Hippo and Uniqua...the Uniqua) who share a backyard due to the positions of their families' homes and who play pretend, imagining grand adventures for episodes that air on Nickelodeon and Noggin. There have been 14 random episode collections released on DVD, and DVDTalk has reviews of three of them.

The Show
After a flight-based title and a basketball against the gods-based title, this collection is a bit more down-to-earth, offering four stories based on classic adventure tales, offering up takes cultivated in the imaginations of the five titular kids, which makes them a bit softer and sillier. The first one, which gives the disc its name, sees Pablo take on the role of Robin Hood, but he's not fighting for the poor, but for the dirty, as the town of Filthingham is kept exceeding dirty by Mayor Stinkypants (portrayed by the usually forgotten Austin.) The desire of the people to just take a bath is scored by what's described as "Countrypolitan" music, but I can't quite nail down what the means, outside of perhaps country pop. Either way, it's not as annoying as country, and does right by the story.

The second adventure is a retelling of the Three Musketeers, but with just two, as Pablo and Tyrone try to steer clear of the Empress' guards. You see, Pablo and Tyrone aren't big fans of the Empress, who, with her opulent hot-air balloon, they see as stuck-up and entitled (and thus naturally played by Tasha.) But they are soon being elitist when a new masked adventurer appears and wants to join them. There's also the issue that this new swashbuckler doesn't understand why they feel the way they do about the Empress. Though the whole judging a book by it's cover story is a bit weak, the music is solid, and the idea that making balloon animals is key to being amusketeer is a great bit.

The legend of Zorro gets a tweak in this story based in Viejo, California during the town's early days, as the most important man in town, Don Austin (who's getting much more work lately) is trying to skip town with an overdue library book. The town librarian, Uniqua, won't hear of it, and uses her costumed alter ego of The Masked Retriever to stop his efforts to escape to Mexico. While the story peters out, the repetition of the word Viejo might get to you and the main song, The Masked Retriever is annoying, the flamenco music backing the episode is a lot of fun.

Things wrap up with "To the Center of the Earth," a Tyrone-focused episode, as he drops his lucky penny and it falls to the center of the Earth. Though it was the least entertaining of the four, with the jazzy pieces lacking the oomph of the other scores, watching Pablo and Uniqua invent their way deeper beneath the crust is amusing, and the two kids work well off each other as characters, while Tyrone focuses on his penny.

The DVD
Packed in a standard insert-less keepcase, the DVD features a static full-frame main menu with options to play all, select episodes and check out the extras. There are no audio options and no subtitles, but closed captioning is included.

The Quality
If there's one guarantee when it comes to the Backyardigans it's the quality of the video. Once again, the full-frame episode transfers look terrific, with bright, vivid color and a sharp image with a nice level of fine detail. Naturally, since it's computer animation, there's no dirt or damage but there are no compression artifacts that pop out either.

The audio is presented as Nickelodeon-standard Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtracks, which are fine for the material, allowing for clean dialogue and clear music. It's hardly the most exciting mix you'll hear, but it does the trick.

The Extras
The extras are more like precise chapter stops, but are listed as music videos, with three episodes represented by "Everything is Filthy in Filthingham," "How Great is it to Be a Musketeer," and "I am Going to Get That Book Back." If your child really enjoys these songs, then maybe it's a worthwhile extra, but otherwise, it's not adding much.

The Bottom Line
It's a rare Nickelodeon DVD that sticks to a theme, much less sticks to a theme isn't even articulated in the disc title. But these four adventure stories are some of the best Backyardigan episodes I've seen so far, toning down the series' more annoying elements, while maintaining the impressive taste in music and quality animation. While the DVD looks and sounds solid, there's not really any extras to enjoy, so in the end, it's still just four more episodes you could probably just record off TV.

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*The Reviewer's Bias section is an attempt to help readers use the review to its best effect. By knowing where the reviewer's biases lie on the film's subject matter, one can read the review with the right mindset.