The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.0

The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! Blu-ray Movie Review

Down for the count...

Scooby-Doo and The Flintstones have a long standing history of incorporating real-world celebs into spooky mysteries and pre-history misadventures, but lately, those crossovers, particularly the direct-to-video movies featuring the wrestlers of the WWE, are getting thinner and thinner. The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! is a knock-down, drag-out... bore. Even at a brisk 52-minutes, it's slow, sluggish and falls flat as often as its jokes and references. "Mess" is probably laying it on a bit thick -- kids will crack a few much-needed smiles -- but anyone with affection or fondness for the Flintstones of old will find their nostalgia is being pile-driven into the mat, again and again and again. The animation isn't much better, favoring squat, strangely pinched character designs that, whether hurried or stilted, look "off", and hitchy movements with only the briefest hints of dynamic wrestling spins and slams. Add in the generic cartoon score, the bone-dry dialogue, the hit or miss voicework, and the go-nowhere story and you have an original movie that plays like a glorified pre-viz pitch. For young wrestling diehards only.

The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Unlike other direct-to-video Warner Bros. animated movies, The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! is so bright, simply colored, and free of computer-generated lighting or shading that banding isn't a factor, inherent or otherwise. Instead, the studio's 1080p/AVC-encoded video presentation is as pristine and proficient as a fan could hope for. Reds, blues and yellows are vibrant, without exception, primaries pop, black levels are inky, and contrast is suitably vivid. There also aren't any shortcomings when it comes to clarity either. Lines are razor sharp, background textures are crisply resolved, and there isn't any artifacting, aliasing, noise or other anomalies to speak of. The animation is another story -- it's not great, that's for sure -- but that's hardly a reflection of the technical encode.

The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The animated movie's sound design is as flat and two-dimensional as the animation, but Warner's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround track at least packs decent punch. LFE output is simple but strong, bolstering the WWE wrestling scenes with plenty of power. Rear speaker activity is sparse but playful, kicking in when crowds roar but remaining subdued whenever Fred and company step outside of the ring. Voices are clear and intelligible throughout, and prioritization is more than competent, leaving very little to complain about. It's not remarkable -- far from it -- but it's more than up to the task at hand.

The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Superstars of Fred Flintstone Entertainment: The FFE (HD, 10 minutes): Meet the real wrestlers whose voicework is featured in The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown!
• How to Be a Stone-Age Superstar (HD, 5 minutes): Another featurette with the filmmakers and voice actors.
• The Engagement Ring (HD, 26 minutes): An episode of the original Flintstones cartoon.
• Take Me Out to the Ball Game (HD, 26 minutes): Another classic Flintstones episode.

The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Blu-ray release of The Flintstones and WWE: Stone Age Smackdown! isn't much in the animated movie department, but between being geared for kids and boasting a solid AV presentation, there's enough here to justify a bargain-priced purchase. Just don't expect anyone but grade-school wrestling fans to get any enjoyment out of this dud of a stone age crossover.