Product Details

• Format: Animated, Color, NTSC
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Number of discs: 1
• Studio: Vision Video
• DVD Release Date: December 1, 2005
• Run Time: 120 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000CR7J32
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #225,793 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great "vanilla" Releases!, February 10, 2006

By 

B. Lammey - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Superbook Volume #1 (DVD)

Good video/audio quality, none of the episodes appear to be edited, and the menus, while not flashy, present the show well in both English and Spanish.

Ok, that's the boring technical stuff. YAAAAAY!!!! Superbook!!!! on DVD!!!! It is great to have this quirky, Japanese-animated, time-travel, Bible-story show released on DVD. The show often had interesting angles on important Biblical events (did you know a robot from the future tried to stop Eve from committing "original sin"? :) ) while still sticking to the important message.

Apparently they plan to release both seasons, since Volume 2 says "2 of 13," there are 4 eps per disc, 13 * 4 = 52, and each season had 26 episodes...

I'm hoping that either the "last" DVD in each set has special features (though Spanish-language versions are more special than you'd think), or they're going to plan for a deluxe version later on. Either way, this is a must, for families and churches alike...dive into Superbook!

21 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars I'm a Christian parent and I watched this with my kids..., January 19, 2007

By 

P. Rownd (Iowa) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Superbook Volume #1 (DVD)

...and I have mixed feelings. I grew up watching Superbook on TV, so it was great to see Chris and Joy getting into Bible adventures again. The animation is pretty good for a show that came out in 1982. And naturally, I'd rather my kids watch something that's teaching them about God than something trashy. There are lots of good moral lessons here.

But at times I cringed watching this show with my kids because:

1. It shows Cain beating on his brother Abel, and then cruelly turning on Chris and smacking him in the face so that he falls to the ground unconscious. My son's jaw dropped and he got the idea that he'd go beat on his sister. My son's pretty impressionable. If your kids copy everything they see then maybe Superbook probably isn't the safest choice.

2. The stories liberally add major subplots that aren't in the Biblical account. For example, in Superbook, Cain is mad at Abel because he was lazy and forgot to water his crops, and then he overwatered the plants, and he blames Abel for it. This leads to the story's lesson about doing your very best. It's a good lesson and one that kids need to learn, but I'm not sure twisting the story of Cain and Abel is the right way to teach that particular lesson. It's not the lesson you'd naturally get from a reading of the Genesis account. Then there's the bit where the serpent uses a mind meld to talk to Eve in the Garden. A small detail, but Biblical purists will question the necessity of making up all this stuff.

3. The way Chris talks to his father is extremely sassy most of the time and the dad is portrayed as a sniveling idiot. In almost every episode Chris and his dad start out as enemies, yelling and bickering. The dad is unreasonable and overbearing, and I understand there are some parents like that in real life. It just would have been nice if the dad wasn't always the bad guy in these shows.

So there you have it. Just be aware of what you're getting into before you blindly purchase these Superbook DVDs. It's great to have some good Bible DVDs for the kids, but maybe the Focus on the Family ones would be safer for your family: McGee and Me, Adventures in Odyssey, etc.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 23 years strong, January 18, 2008

By 

D. Williams (United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Superbook Volume #1 (DVD)

Just as Chris and Joy are transported back in time each episode, I too am taken back to my impressionable youth and realize that a lot of my Biblical framework as an adult was outlined by these very shows.

With two preschoolers and no TV, we watch a lot of DVDs. The Veggies have made a large part of the rotation, but when I got them Superbook Vols 1-3 this Christmas, I'm realizing how important it is to see more literal interpretations of the Bible. The Veggies are incredibly creative and parent-watchable, but rather abstract in their connection to the Bible.

There's obviously a good bit of creative license taken with having two twentieth century kids and a robot involved. Yes, a few stories are a bit off in the details, but getting kids immersed into that world is still a great thing. There could never be a video that you can just set your kids down with and let them soak up without any further clarification. This is true of any subject matter.

I have yet to see a successor in creative effective biblical storytelling. The kids love it and I love sharing it with them!