Tinkerbell attempts to give the backstory of everyone's favorite little sprite. The film is interesting in that there's only the slightest passing reference to anyone in the original Peter Pan story. Instead we get Tink from her "birth" (such as it is for fairies), to her arrival at Pixie Hollow in Neverland, her discovery that her "special talent" is tinkering (which of course she isn't happy about), to several misadventures, to, of course, her realization that she's fine just as she is. This is most certainly not the impish mischief-maker of Peter Pan, and in fact there's only one brief moment where Tink really erupts into that angry demeanor that anyone who's seen Peter Pan will associate with the character. There are the equally patented goofy sidekicks (two male Tinkers, one of whom is voiced to sound like a certain large green DreamWorks ogre), a gaggle of female fairies who befriend Tink, and, of course, one sort of bad little sprite who does something she shouldn't and gets Tinkerbell in trouble for it. The basic plot surrounds the work of the fairies, who manage the seasonal changes in the "real world" (called the Mainland here), with Tinkerbell unhappy that her Tinker class doesn't get to visit the to her magical realm beyond that second star to the right. It's all pretty trite, tried and true, but younger kids especially will probably love Tinkerbell, if only for the resplendent visuals.

And, ah, what visuals! This CGI wonderland is full of some of the most gorgeous colors you've ever seen--beautiful shades of red, purple, green and gold that are magically combined to present an array of stunning vistas and beautifully detailed landscapes. If the character designs suffer more than a bit by comparison (all of the female fairies seem like some long forgotten line of Barbie dolls), there's so much to see here that younger eyes especially will be wide open with glee. I was a bit less impressed with the voice work, although Mae Whitman brings some native spunk to her Tinkerbell. Other, better known voice talent, like Kristin Chenoweth and Lucy Liu as Tink's fairy friends, or even the redoubtable Anjelica Huston as Queen Clarion, are either woefully underutilized (as in the case of the fairies) or strangely unemotive (as in the case of Huston, who perhaps was going for regal detachment).

Aurally the best thing Tinkerbell has going for it is the Celtic inspired score of Joel McNeely, full of glorious quasi-reels and jigs, with some evocative instrumentation. This subtle reminder that fairies were originally a Celtic cum Irish "tribe" is reinforced with the narration and song by Celtic superstar Loreena McKennitt.

Tinkerbell's creative crew will need to beef up the story aspect if this series is ever to seriously take wing (no pun intended). There's an obvious setup for a romance toward the end of the film, as well as the brief introduction of one character from Peter Pan (as mentioned above), but some of these stereotypical Disney plot points really should be rethought--this is, after all, a magical realm where anything can happen, and revisiting a basic storyline that's been recycled in one form or another through various Disney features is more than a little disappointing.

The Blu-ray

Video:
Tinkerbell arrives straight to video in a sparkling 1080p AVC MPEG-4 1.78:1 transfer that is beautifully rendered, with bright, brilliantly saturated color, excellent contrast and sharp as a tack detail. If there's some disappointment with the actual character design, there's enough else to look at in virtually every frame to keep most viewers completely delighted.

Sound:
Both a PCM and DD 5.1 mix are offered, featuring excellent fidelity and reasonable, if not exceptional, separation. There's not much ambient soundscape here, but McNeely's score is imaginatively placed at times with the occasional sound effect making use of various channels.

Extras:
On the plus side, all of the extras on Tinkerbell are in HD. On the minus side, they're all pretty standard fare for this kind of release. "Creating Pixie Hollow" is a making-of featurette, "Magical Guide to Pixie Hollow" is a tame, borderline interactive feature with Tink and Clarion giving facts about various areas of the fairyland, "Tinker Trainer" allows kids (I would imagine, anyway) to try to spot hidden items in clips from the film, "Ever Wonder" is a kind of neat live-action mixed with CGI segment with fairies interacting with kids, and "Fly to Your Heart" is a rather lame music video. The best extra is the deleted scenes, two of which are completely animated, but all of which contain finished voicework and underscore. There are also BD Live options available.

Final Thoughts:
This is a middling to fairly good first Tinkerbell feature which will most likely delight younger kids, girls especially. There's more than enough visual splendor here to warrant a BD purchase of this title. Recommended.

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"G-d made stars galore" & "Hey, what kind of a crappy fortune is this?" ZMK, modern prophet