The Dreamstone

I hope this release does at least get round to Season Four. It was my favourite season and it always got screwed, even during the VHS era. Let's just hope Germans Love Der Traumstein.

On the plus side this is the first time "Megattack" has ever been released on physical media.

edited 1st Dec '17 2:38:28 AM by Psi001

Sorry to double post, but if anyone's still interested, it seems the German Season One DVD is now out on Amazon's Germany site, and has gotten at least two good marks by buyers:

https://www.amazon.de/Traumstein-Staffel-Dreamstone-Fantasy-Zeichentrickserie-Animation/dp/B077NXB8Z4

Also shows screenshots and artwork for inside cover and discs.

edited 27th Feb '18 8:00:33 AM by Psi001

I very much appreciate your updates, Rainbow Dash poster.

The second season will release 18.05.2018

Really? At this pace they'll stream through the whole series in a year.

And we've had six badly remastered episodes put on Youtube in over twice that time.

EDIT: PIDAX has officially confirmed it, along with cover art: https://www.pidax-film.de/Kinder/Jugend/Der-Traumstein-The-Dreamstone-Staffel-2::1299.html

I see they're going the old misleading route with promoting, having Rufus and all sorts of mystical stuff on every cover over the Urpneys in any form.

edited 7th Mar '18 3:52:37 PM by Psi001

Sorry for a second double post, but for non-importers, it looks like Amazon Prime Video has started streaming the series:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07BL1B66G?ref_=imdbref_tt_wbr_piv&tag=imdbtag_tt_wbr_piv-21

Thus far it has 12 episodes (all of Season One besides Megattack).

edited 23rd Mar '18 6:44:56 AM by Psi001

Nah, it's german DVDs for me.

edited 23rd Mar '18 1:44:31 PM by KlarkKentThe3rd

Amazon prime UK has the first season apparently there were like four seasons

And it doesn't even have the full first season, since the last episode isn't listed.

Still, better than nothing. Just hope they at least fix that error. (I'm interested by the two pilot episodes having longer run times though. Are those the original full edits?)

I do hope Season Four gets some sort of release eventually. It consists of most of my favourite episodes and only the two episodes Monster uploaded apply as anything of an official release (even most of Season Three got VHS release in Australia).

edited 23rd Mar '18 2:57:04 PM by Psi001

Heh, this year I noticed that just as none of the bootleg streams have the last seven episodes of season 1, none of them seem to have the first episode of season 4 either.

Der Traumstein Season Three DVD confirmed for 27 July:

https://www.pidax-film.de/Kinder/Jugend/Der-Traumstein-The-Dreamstone-Staffel-3::1339.html

Looks like Germany might get the whole series by the end of the year.

Once again an English track option seems to be advertised.

edited 8th May '18 3:38:26 PM by Psi001

Season Four also confirmed for 28th September. Germany is indeed getting the entire series.

https://www.pidax-film.de/Kinder/Jugend/Der-Traumstein-The-Dreamstone-Staffel-4::1372.html

edited 23rd Jun '18 3:06:50 AM by Psi001

Man, how is it licensing can get so screwed up that a foreign language edition comes out long before it's released in it's native country?

I suppose we should be thankful one region finally did it at all, and that it was one that bothered to add in an English track option.

I question why Monster Entertainment haven't bothered to upload anymore episodes within all this time however. It took Germany less than a year to release the whole series, while it's been three years and we've still only got six episodes.

edited 23rd Jun '18 11:33:02 AM by Psi001

This kind of reminds me of The Equalizer. The UK releases are complete, and in good quality (if you don't mind the 4% PAL speedup). The US releases are missing some of the original songs (and even some of the score), and (at least what I heard) a channel logo is in every episode (first season at least).

Needless to add, I bought season 1 from the UK.

Some companies seem really behind the times in terms of releasing shows, especially older '90s cartoons. I mean, I don't think it would cost much to have all the Disney Afternoon on Disney's own upcoming streaming app, yet somehow those elude us, too.

It's even stranger since they bothered to remaster some of their own shows to be pristine, and yet only released them in foreign countries. I haven't seen anything of The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh in ages, and yet this widescreen remaster exists that's similarly only been available in parts like Germany and Japan.

Monster Entertainment seemed dead set on getting The Dreamstone rerun on TV, but when they found out the appeal wasn't there (if Disney shows don't gain network interest then it didn't stand a chance) they slowly lost interest. They made it bluntly clear on the now defunct Facebook page that a DVD likely wasn't going to happen.

I think they were a bit deluded to how much support a release would get. Not to say the show doesn't have fans, but it's been pretty unexposed since it last aired, even in it's home country. Hell even when it was airing they didn't exactly try to make a cash cow out of it.

Edited by Psi001 on Aug 1st 2018 at 1:34:33 PM

The last I ever saw it was the now-defunct Jaroo steaming service airing the first two season...

Yeah, apparently the copyrights between the first and last two seasons were divided at the time (granted most UK releases rarely got past the first twelve episodes anyway for some reason). Now Monster has the rights to the whole series....but isn't doing anything with it. Even worse it's mowed down any fan uploads on Youtube as well, before hand we at least had a large amount of the series through fan videos, now we have six random episodes uploaded officially (and they actually have worse sound quality than the unofficial videos).

Monster did curiously advertise the German Season One DVD before the Facebook page went though, maybe they were hinting to getting support through export sales.

edited 24th Jun '18 3:09:45 PM by Psi001

"Widescreen" "remaster"??? That does not look like a """remaster""", instead it looks rather poor. And the "widescreen" is most likely due to cropping, since not a single one of those shows were made NOT in 4:3.

It is just a cropping, but the image is definitely crisper. Disney have a habit of cleaning up their animations to the point of antiseptic quality these days.

Either way they went out of the way to make it and then didn't do anything with it.

Anyone know what the quality is on the German Dreamstone DV Ds by the way, since they are apparently based off of Monster's masters.

edited 24th Jun '18 3:51:51 PM by Psi001

Damn I wish Disney didn't play hard to get with The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. That's one of those cartoons I look back on with a bit of amazement at how genuinely good it was for its time.

Yeah, Pooh seems to be among the few things Disney milks correctly, and yet none of the actual shows have been released in full. (Book of Pooh is pretty good too. Basically Sesame Street with Pooh characters in all the right ways).

I find it a shame The Dreamstone didn't take more notes from Disney's stuff like Pooh, which is often the right way to make a saccharine fluffy cartoon while still having a snarky twist (might come from Pooh also being Britain originated :P).

edited 24th Jun '18 4:30:56 PM by Psi001

Yeah, it helps the 100 Acre Wood is basically a child-friendly Dysfunction Junction. Plenty of stories to be had just from the clashing personalities alone.

New Adventures of Pooh was also the only interpretation to use real villains as well, and even then sporadically. It seems to be a rule that when shows put in comical villains, they completely take over the writers' brainwaves.