Pucca: Spooky Sooga Village (DVD)

Connect to Facebook/Twitter, recommend via email and much more.

---

"Pucca: Spooky Sooga Village" contains an assortment of eleven spooktacular shorts on a single DVD:

1) "Them Bones." It's Halloween in Sooga Village, and it seems there aren't any costumes scary enough to spook Garu out of his skin. That is of course, until Pucca shows up dressed as a beautiful bride-to-be...

2) "Ghost of a Kiss." In this spoof on Asian horror, Pucca buys an antique photo resembling herself and Garu as a gift for her love, except that it's also a haunted relic from the past. Garu turns to Abyo in hopes of banishing the terrifying spirit once and for all.

3) "The Usual Ching." Ching's personality shifts from good to evil when a bad sock belonging to Doga finds its way into her laundry.

4) "A Force of Won." Tobe discovers that the eggs of a magical chicken hatch into Godzilla-like monsters. The next logical step is to crash the local Sooga carnival and steal the bird for his own sinister plans.

5) "The Cursed Tie." Garu receives a gift of one ugly bowtie. To make matters worse, it's actually from his nemesis Tobe and grants nothing but bad luck to its wielder. The only remedy is the feather from an extinct bird... but where will Garu find such a thing?

6) "Invisible Trouble." If Garu thought he had his hands full with Pucca's affection, just wait until he's tormented with hugs and kisses from an unseen assailant.

7) "High Voltage Ninjas." In this tribute to "Mortal Kombat," Tobe is accidentally struck by lightning which gives Garu's ultimate nemesis an electric personality.

8) "Ninjasaurus." Abyo spins a merry-go-round a little too fast teleporting all of his friends back to a time where dinosaurs ruled the earth. Will they be able to return to the present before a giant asteroid collides with the planet?

9) "Unfortunate Cookies." The messages in Turtle's fortune cookies always come true, so Tobe and his band of ninjas hijack the factory to create a deadly fortune for Garu...

10) "Itsy Bitsy Enemy Within." Garu ingests a super-small ninja submarine commanded by Tobe, who hopes to travel through the boy's bloodstream and destroy the section of his brain controlling martial arts expertise.

11) "Funny Love Eruption." Sooga will fall victim to the wrath of an ancient sleeping volcano unless the sacred moon cake-topper can be found for the sacred ceremony before it's too late.

Video:
The aspect ratio for the "Pucca" animated series is presented in the standard 1.33:1 format. The colors look fantastic-especially on upconverting players-and I didn't really notice any flaws in the transfer. The animation itself is quite the eye-grabber, but the exceptional backdrops is what makes the whole package truly stunning.

Audio:
The audio format doesn't appear to be documented anywhere, but it seems that "Pucca" features a Dolby Digital stereo track. It's nothing flashy, but for what it is I don't have any complaints, either.

Extras:
There are no bonuses on the disc itself, but the packaging contains a stencil of Pucca's face to carve on a pumpkin for Halloween. There's also a sheet insert listing all of the episodes found on "Pucca: Spooky Sooga Village" including a synopsis for each on one side, and a concise set of instructions for using the pumpkin stencil on the backside.

Lastly, there's a booklet advertising other Shout! Factory titles, plus a few trailers on startup for "Pucca," "Oban Star-Racers," and "Sonic Underground."

The Final Cut:
Sometimes, less is more. Obviously the creators of "Pucca" kept that statement in mind when they created this cute little animated series that is simple yet fun. The show bursts with vibrant colors to firmly lock onto the short meandering attention spans of youngsters, while adults can appreciate the gorgeous animation and humor.

Be sure to stay on the lookout for other "Pucca" collections on DVD from Shout! Factory: "Pucca: Kung Fu Kisses" and "Pucca: Ninjas Love Noodles."