Open Season 3

For every awesomely amazing and fun CG kids movie that comes out there are dozens of snooze-worthy, unfunny counterparts. 'Open Season 3' yet another insomnia-smasher. Now, I have to confess to not seeing 'Open Season' or 'Open Season 2' so maybe I'm missing out on all the inside jokes. Maybe, because I haven't seen the other movies I'm completely lost. Or maybe, just maybe, the 'Open Season' trilogy just isn't any good at all. Judging by my experience enduring number three, it doesn't give me much hope for one and two.

Boog the bear wants to take a guys-only trip, only all his guy friends of the animal kingdom are snubbing him. Poor Boog can't even get his best friend Elliot to join him on his all-bachelor weekend. Elliot is married (assuming deer can get married) and has three children. Elliot can't shirk his duties as a father, and that causes a rift to form between the two.

Boog finally leaves by himself with his trusty stuffed bear, and heads off on his own bachelor journey. He finds a convenience store that I'm assuming has been in all the other movies, and the running gag is that the animals keep destroying the place. Funny right? After breaking into the store and ransacking the goodies Boog notices a poster advertising a circus. He also notices that the circus has other bears. Huzzah! Other bears! They'll understand his plight. They'll commiserate with him.

Boog finds his way to the circus where he meets another bear, Doug, who looks exactly like him. What transpires is the same “Prince and the Pauper” storyline we've seen a hundred times before. The two switch places because they both think that they'll be better off in the other bear's situation.

As with all CG animated movies featuring talking animals, there's a wide variety of eccentric animals with various accents. How a squirrel living in America grew up having a Scottish accent I have no clue. There's also a group of dogs and cats who do their best to save Boog. There's a member of that cat clan that I'd love to strangle. With wild eyes, and a floppy tongue, this cat talks in incoherent grunts and slurps, "Waa blug gaaaa lug." I'm sure there was some dialogue in there, but who knows. I couldn't hear any.

This is just another studio attempt to try and get parents to shell out more money when their kids see it on the shelf at the store and demand to have it. I will admit that I laughed – hold on I have to look at my notes – yes there it is. I laughed, well giggled slightly, a total of three times. The movie did have some oh-so-brief flashes of funny, but they were soon swept aside for a sleep-inducing story, and ridiculously unfunny characters like the spitting llama.

Do yourself and your kids a favor and just skip this one altogether. Maybe the other movies in this franchise were funny and charming. Maybe the whole rabbit fight thing was hilarious when it was first used, but now 'Open Season' needs to be put down.

The Disc: Vital Stats

'Open Season 3' comes to Blu-ray on a 25-GB disc. It also comes with a DVD version of the film. And if you're really lucky your copy will also have a $5 coupon for Red Robin.

There's nothing inherently wrong or ugly with 'Open Season 3's 1080p Blu-ray video presentation. As with most CGI animated features we expect a clean and precise picture and that's what we get. Being the third movie in the franchise it seemed like this one was made with a lower budget and you can see that this affected the overall look of the movie. There are previews for the first two movies before the menu and you can see that there definitely is a difference in animation quality. Here the animation is more stilted and rigid. It feels somewhat lackadaisical and cheap. It doesn't look nearly as bad as 'Alpha and Omega,' but it isn't the best CG animation around.

With that said, the video presentation, considering the source material, is clean and near perfection. Colors are bright and very vibrant. From the lush greens of the forest to the bright reds and blues of the circus the colors are certainly vibrant. Fine detail is also well done, with individual strands of hair and fur on the animals perfectly visible. Still, this isn't the type of fur rendering you'll see in 'Monsters, Inc.' but for the type of animation 'Open Season 3' is, the fur works well here. Textures in signs, clothes, and wood grain is also visible and nicely rendered.

Overall, if for some unexplained reason you do end up picking this up, you'll know that it does have an above average looking video presentation.

The 5.1 DTS-HD audio mix is about on par with the above average video. There were a few times where I thought the mix itself was too front-centric, like during the circus scenes where there should have been clapping and cheering crowds booming from the rear channels. Still, most of the movie features a well rounded audio mix that tries to use every channel. Dialogue comes out clean and clear through the front speaker (except it's almost impossible to hear anything that stupid cat or spitting llama say. This has nothing to do with the mix itself, and everything to do with the insipid way the voice actors were told to do the character).

There are quite a few scenes that offer a mighty sonic blast from a trailer rolling end over end down a hill, to a circus cannon firing off an LFE-laden shot. When there's action there is a great sound stage in which that action takes place. Ambient sound produces well through the rear channels with birds chirping and other sound effects taking place off screen. Although your kids won't much care for the nitty-gritty of the audio details, at least you'll know that they're listening to a worthwhile presentation.

• Runaway RV Game — Yup it's just how it sounds. Control a runaway RV.


• Progression Reel — Just a brief look at the evolution of the animation from storyboard to finalized CGI rendering.

I chuckled three times. At least that was three times more than I chuckled during 'Alpha and Omega.' Still, 'Open Season 3' is just so tedious, unfunny, and dull. There are plenty of other options out there for parents to let their kids watch. Please, just let them watch anything else. Anything. This is for sure one to avoid. Good disc, bad flick.