In 1936, years before Superman or Batman arrived on the scene, Lee Falk created the first comic costumed hero, The Phantom.  Falk's newspaper comic strip told the adventures of a purple clad hero who had protected Bangalla, a fictional country in Africa, for hundreds of years.  Deemed "The Ghost Who Walks" by the natives, The Phantom seemed to be immortal.  In reality, the story of The Phantom started in 1566 when a ship was attacked by pirates.  Everyone on the ship was killed with the exception of one child, Kit Walker.  Kit was adopted by a local tribe and trained in the ways of the jungle.  He vowed to avenge his parents death at the hands of pirates by protecting the innocent and helpless as the Phantom.  The Phantom passed his mantle down the generations from father to son, each named Kit Walker, the current Phantom training his son from birth.  In the present strip, still running, the 21st Phantom still fights for justice wielding twin .45 automatics and aided by his wolf, Devil and his horse Hero.

In 1994, Hearst Entertainment created a cartoon based on this world famous comic strip but updated it and moved the narrative to the future.  The Phantom 2040 lasted two seasons, and between these seasons the first four episodes were edited together into a ninety-minute movie.  This movie has now been released on DVD as The Phantom 2040: the Ghost Who Walks.

The Phantom 2040 tells the adventure of the latest Kit Walker, the 24th generation of masked crime fighters.  Unfortunately, Kit Walker's father, the 23rd Phantom, died in before he could start training his son, who grew up ignorant of his heritage and destiny. But when he turns 18, Kit is visited by Guran, the Phantom's traditional aid, who revealed everything to the young hero.  In order to make up for lost time, Guran outfits Kit with a new Phantom costume filled with the latest technology.  (Guran doesn't know how to drive a car, but he can apparently incorporate state-of-the-art electronics into an outfit.) The suit has the ability make the Phantom invisible to both people and cameras and has genetically engineered plants that shoot out from his gauntlets allowing the Phantom to swing from building to building like Spider-man.  Armed with twin psychically controlled handguns and riding a flying motorcycle, the 24th Phantom patrols a modern jungle; the city streets of Metropia.

This hour and a half movie covers the origin of the 24th Phantom, and how Kit came to accept his destiny as the Ghost Who Walks.  The main plot involves the Phantom's battles against Maximum Inc. and its CEO, Rebecca Madison.  Madison is using her corporation to cause havoc in Metropia as a way to gain more power.  She plans on exterminating 90% of the world's life, making the Earth only inhabitable by humans who can pay her price.  But the Phantom is there to thwart her nefarious schemes.

Fans of the Phantom comic strip will most probably not enjoy this poor excuse of a sequel.  The only connection this cartoon has with the comic strip is the name and look of the Phantom.  Instead of battling villains with his wits and muscles, this Phantom relies on gadgets that give him super-power like abilities.  He isn't even in the jungle any more, they have moved the setting to a metropolitan city.  Why they felt the need to change many of the aspects that made the Phantom such a popular comic strip is beyond me.  All they have done is take an interesting character's name and slapped it on an action cartoon.

Even if the had called this by another name, I still wouldn't have liked it.  The show is filled with stupid plot elements that make no sense.  It isn't only the big things, like the fact that he could have captured many of the main villains, but lets them walk away after they've lost the battle.  There are a lot of smaller things too that hurt the show.  For example, there is a suit of battle armor that has an unlocked panel on the back that accesses the suits control electronics.  Luck for the Phantom it was there, because that's how he destroys it.

The Phantom's suit also a great source of surprises.  Like Batman's utility belt from the 1966 series, anything a writer needs is contained in it.  But unfortunately this isn't supposed to be a comedy.  In one part the Phantom is captured and has his hands tied behind his back.  How does he escape?  By mentally commanding a miniature saw to emerge from his wrist and cut the cords.  Holy Deus ex Machina Batman!

The animation is not too bad, it's fairly standard for mid 90's shows.  There are a couple of CGI shots that are show quite often that don't mesh well with the traditional animation style, but that's not a big deal.  The main defect this show has are the horrible scripts.

Audio:

This show has a two channel soundtrack that is adequate.  It's nothing to get excited about, but the audio is clean and there are not any major defects.  I was hoping that the show would have been a little more dynamic, but it sounds good for a cartoon.  There are no subtitles.

Video:

The full frame video quality is disappointing.  The image is very soft and blurry throughout.  This was rather irritating and really harmed my enjoyment of the movie.   The colors are not as vivid as I would have liked with everything looking a little washed out, but the lack of definition is the main culprit here.

Extras:

There are no extras on this disc.

Final Thoughts:

This isn't a DVD that fans of the Phantom newspaper strip should purchase.  I enjoyed the live action movie much better, and that is universally reviled among Phantom fans.  This show just doesn't have anything to do with the character that people have loved for generations.  On top of that the video quality is poor.  This is a disc you should just Skip.