Member bratty Posted July 14, 2010 Member Share Posted July 14, 2010 hey bros , I was thinking of picking up the SB Collection II set as I noticed that I don't yet have any of the films (Brave Archer and His Mate, Journey of the Doomed, Brothers Five, Holy Flame of the Martial World). I have a nice collection of IVL releases and generally I'd prefer those , but picking this set up would be way cheaper and I wouldn't have to 'double dip' on anything. Any remarks on quality? Other than a few Dragon Dynasty and Tokyo Shock releases I am not super familiar with R1 SB releases. I know they are PAL-NTSC transfers, which sucks when it is done poorly. So are these titles a blurry mess or should I do it? thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Fang Shih-yu Posted July 14, 2010 Member Share Posted July 14, 2010 hey bros , I was thinking of picking up the SB Collection II set as I noticed that I don't yet have any of the films...Brave Archer and His Mate...Brothers Five...Any remarks on quality? In my opinion, the Well Go USA DVDs compare favorably to DD discs. (Tokyo Shock reissues are superior to both!) Sometimes, the soundtracks for these do come into issue because some have been "enhanced" by Celestial with newly-added music (usually a synthesizer) and sound effects; it's easy to tell when this has been done, and you've likely picked up on the phenomenon if you've sampled enough IVLs like I think you have! As for the two movies I have (out of the four included in that set), The Brave Archer and His Mate has the saving grace of "Venoms" in the cast; there's Chiang Seng, Lu Feng, and Kuo Choi/Philip Kwok inherits the lead. Fu Sheng is also on board (demoted?) in a supporting role, yet his picture is on the front cover of the IVL and Well Go releases! How misleading! (One reviewer has said the story arc started 3 films prior was pretty much wrapped up in the first 30 minutes of TBAaHM; I believe that guy!) Anyway, it's much better that Brothers Five, one of the last films Lo Wei directed for Shaw before going over to Golden Harvest. The main selling points for buying this are Cheng Pei Pei, Yueh Hua, Lo Lieh, fight choreography (and a cameo) by Sammo Hung, and a final battle with a weird climax you won't forget! I do know Kuo Choi is also in Holy Flame of the Martial World, so he's a strong reason for getting that; I do not know about Journey of the Doomed!... If the price is right for this set, purchase it without hesitation, I say! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member masterofoneinchpunch Posted July 14, 2010 Member Share Posted July 14, 2010 All of those sell separately as well (I have all those releases). I don't quite agree that Well Go is about the same as DD since they tend not to come with mono and the extras on DD (except for the last couple of ones) are easily better than Well Go and Tokyo Shock combined. The mistakes for the Shaw films from DD have ranged from poor subs on 36th Chamber of Shaolin to missing the Cantonese dub on My Young Auntie. Most of DDs prints issues have been with several of the non-Shaw releases and their BD releases. Plus Tokyo Shock released The Master as Non Anamorphic . Journey of the Doomed is the worst Shaw film I have ever seen. If you check the worst Shaw thread it pops up from several different users. It really feels like a bad softcore B film. I loved Holy Flame of the Martial World because it is crazy and fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Fang Shih-yu Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 Sure, the extras DD have [for whatever DVD/BD reissues contain them] easily makes these releases better than what Well Go USA and Tokyo Shock (actually, theyre a strong second to DD) offer; my comments were limited to the movies themselves! All U.S. labels handling Shaw reissues (and other martial arts movies) have made mistakes of some kind, no doubt! I hope up-coming DD releases include Bey Logan (and more), Tokyo Shock gets releases back on schedule, and that future Well Go Shaw reissues have the original mono English and Mandarin (with comprehensible subs) soundtracks, not to mention 1080p on their BDs! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member inframan Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 hey bros , I was thinking of picking up the SB Collection II set as I noticed that I don't yet have any of the films (Brave Archer and His Mate, Journey of the Doomed, Brothers Five, Holy Flame of the Martial World). I have a nice collection of IVL releases and generally I'd prefer those , but picking this set up would be way cheaper and I wouldn't have to 'double dip' on anything. Any remarks on quality? Other than a few Dragon Dynasty and Tokyo Shock releases I am not super familiar with R1 SB releases. I know they are PAL-NTSC transfers, which sucks when it is done poorly. So are these titles a blurry mess or should I do it? thanks Wellgo is not doing any remastering or extras as DD and MB have, they are the same as the R3 releases but with english audio tracks as an option. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member chen lung Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 The following distributors bother with matters of: DD: Video, audio and extras. WG: Nothing. MB: Video, audio, subtitles and extras. DD annihilates Well, but MB scores more points than DD overall. With the next set of releases, Well Go could potentially beat DD and MB (bare in mind there probably won't be any extras though). MB are better overall. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Pai Mei Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 I don't know if you would consider this a deal breaker, but the DVD cases in the WellGo box sets are the thin type (as in they are about half the size of a regular DVD case). Many pictures of the box sets on the internet are deceiving because they look like they contain the standard dvd size cases. The only thing that really bothers me about WellGo is their "enhanced audio" and implementing a 5.1 surround sound that Brother Fang was talking about. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe these four titles have this flaw. However, I think their newer releases have an original audio option. As far as video goes, I think they are very comparable to the IVL discs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Fang Shih-yu Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 The Mandarin soundtrack on The Brave Archer and His Mate is in its original mono, and (from the sampling I listened to) the same can be said for the English track. Interesting note on the subs: when you choose "English" on the menu, you wind up with a strip of Chinese subs above the English ones, and the Chinese subs can't be removed! The two sets block the screen a bit more, but not excessively so! Brothers Five does have the Mandarin track tampered with, but I've no notion:ooh: if this extends to the English dub! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member bratty Posted July 15, 2010 Author Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 I'm almost positive all of the DVDs in this set are just ports of the IVL discs anyway .. right? - my question is, do they look decent or do they look like a bad transfer - with ghosting (motion blur), shimmering digital edges, visible staircasing etc? as for Journey of the Doomed, I watch a lot of crap 80s movies so I'm all set for that. I saw the trailer on youtube and it looks good to me. and the slim cases - my hallway is literally about to collapse in on it'self with the amount of DVDs I've got lining the walls in there. Slimcases are fine at this point. The artwork on the R1 standalone releases isn't anything to write home about anyway. thanks guys! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Pai Mei Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 The Mandarin soundtrack on The Brave Archer and His Mate is in its original mono, and (from the sampling I listened to) the same can be said for the English track. Sorry guys:sad: It has been awhile since I've watched those four movies and I apologize for assuming the worst out of WG. Last week I had rewatched their first box set Shaw Collection and I'm pretty sure they all had the "enhanced audio" (but now I doubt myself). Thank you Fang for the correction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Morgoth Bauglir Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 Holy Flame also has the both audio tracks in mono. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member chen lung Posted July 15, 2010 Member Share Posted July 15, 2010 Visually, they're all shit at the moment. It's only with the recent announcement from Gfanikf (I also called them) that they'll try to do not only 1080P, but re-translated subtitles too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member vengeanceofhumanlanterns Posted July 16, 2010 Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 Even if the video transfer is shit, which I don't think it's that bad, by the way. WellGo released these films with english dubs remastered somewhat decently, Heroic Ones was a major score for us. I have no problems with WellGo. I would just pick up Holy Flame and Brave Archer out of these. Brothers Five is a bit dull despite the cast. Journey Of The Doomed is a later production of Shaws and is post good Shaws. Despite the obvious flaws with Brave Archer And His Mate, I liked the film. If you don't have WellGo's Heroic Ones you should definitely get it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member bratty Posted July 16, 2010 Author Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 If you don't have WellGo's Heroic Ones you should definitely get it. Will do, if you say so. But the artwork on the IVL release is so cool! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member vengeanceofhumanlanterns Posted July 16, 2010 Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 The artwork on IVL's is more cool. Coolerer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member chen lung Posted July 16, 2010 Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 The UK 'Heroic Ones' (although non-anamorphic) doesn't suffer conversion issues, has better subtitles and mono. It doesn't suffer from frame-cuts. The IVL artwork is better, although the two pictures stuck next to each other should be separated with something, or blended. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member bratty Posted July 16, 2010 Author Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 I like the collage style of the IVL disc. It's understated and cool. I got to say the Wells Go cover for Heroic Ones is not bad at all. Kind of generic compared to the IVL but still much better than most of the R1 SB covers in my opinion. Whatever d on't judge a DVD by it's cover... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Fang Shih-yu Posted July 16, 2010 Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 I like the collage style of the IVL disc. It's understated and cool... I got to say the Wells Go cover for Heroic Ones is not bad at all.Well Go's The Heroic Ones DVD cover certainly evokes a mood; however, the title refers to more than one person, and frequent co-star David Chiang (at least) could've been included in this! (There are enough still images about for this movie that could've been used here in a collage that better reflects the size of the film's cast.) IVL's cover image is a slight improvement, but the two images should be blended together for a better looking design! The UK cover is a touch more interesting.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member chen lung Posted July 16, 2010 Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 The UK cover is a touch more interesting.... Too right:ooh:! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Fang Shih-yu Posted July 16, 2010 Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 For those who've yet to see the UK sleeve for The Heroic Ones, here it is! Enjoy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member bratty Posted July 16, 2010 Author Member Share Posted July 16, 2010 It's cute, I like it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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