THE VENTURE BROS. THE COMPLETE SERIES DVD [Review]

It seems odd to think that The Venture Bros. has been around for twenty years. It is even odder to think that the show has been around for two decades, yet only numbers seven seasons. This is because series’ creators Doc Hammer and Jackson Publick were committed to their vision and oversaw every element of the production personally. Fans might have to wait years for a new season, but the team at Astrobase Go! always made it worth the wait.

The Venture Bros. started out as a satire of boys’ adventure fiction, with a particular focus on The Hardy Boys and Johnny Quest. In the first season, the titular twin brothers, Hank (Jackson Publick) and Dean (Michael Sinterniklaas), are shunted around the world from one misadventure to another by their father, second generation super-scientist Dr. Thaddeus Venture (James Urbaniak), and their bodyguard, Brock Samson (Patrick Warburton). The show soon expanded beyond this premise, however, with less emphasis on Hank and Dean and more focus on the increasingly large supporting cast of colorful characters.

The Venture Family

Watching the early seasons of The Venture Bros. is somewhat surreal now, given how superheroes have come to dominate the cultural landscape. When the series first aired, only the most devout comic readers would recognize that the Doctor Oprheus was a parody of Doctor Strange or that Brock’s love-interest Molotov Cocktease was a tribute to Marvel Comics’ Black Widow. The show still holds up, however, thanks to smart writing and a fantastic cast of voice actors, spearheaded by Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer themselves.

The show was unceremoniously cancelled in 2020, but fan demand has led WB to produce a Venture Bros. film to resolve the cliffhanger ending of the show’s seventh season. They have also released a Complete Series set, available on DVD or digital download, just in time for the show’s grand finale and 20th anniversary.

The Venture Family In Season 7

The good news is that the DVD set has sturdy, attractive packaging and all the extras featured in the original Venture Bros. DVD season sets. The bad news is that there is no Blu-Ray edition. (At present time, the first two seasons of The Venture Bros. have only been released on DVD.)

This leaves the die-hard fan who already owns the discs little reason to invest in the new set. However, for those who have yet to give the show a try and are in need of a fast way to catch up before the release of the finale film, The Venture Bros. The Complete Series box set is a fantastic deal.

The Venture Bros. The Complete series releases on June 13, 2023.

rating 4

7 thoughts on “THE VENTURE BROS. THE COMPLETE SERIES DVD [Review]

  1. This review reads like someone who didn’t actually buy or open the set. No details or pictures about the packaging or layout besides “it’s sturdy”. How are the disks held and organized? How are the season separated? Ect… Lazy review

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    1. To be fair, it’s a pretty lazy release and I didn’t have more to say about it beyond what was said. Brevity is the soul of wit and all that.

      I probably could have gone into more detail on the packaging, but my main concern was the content of the discs and whether or not there were any extras beyond what was in the earlier sets. I figured that would be the main concern for most other fans as well.

      For the record, there are 14 discs, 2 for each season, stored on hard plastic pages, two per page, back to back, with one thin book outlining the contents of each season set in a hard plastic clamshell box. As I said, sturdy. No cardboard sleeves or loose disks. All perfectly balanced.

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    1. They do, but as noted, it is only “all the extras featured in the original Venture Bros. DVD season sets.” So if you already own the previous single-season DVD releases, there’s nothing new here.

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