Rhino Entertainment

Kid Rhino is the children's entertainment division of Rhino Entertainment, an American record and home video label. During the late 1990s and early 2000s, Rhino held the North American video rights to The Transformers: The Movie and the Generation 1 cartoon. The movie and a few episodes were first released on VHS, branded as The Original Transformers. Eventually they were released on DVD for the first time (keeping the same branding) and the movie's soundtrack album was rereleased on CD. Rhino likewise issued full DVD boxed-sets for Beast Wars, Beast Machines, and Armada.

In 2003, Rhino remastered the Generation 1 cartoon series for release on DVD, to subsequent controversy. As the original broadcast masters (the tapes used for broadcast) had degraded to an unacceptable level of visual quality over the years, Rhino opted to use pre-broadcast masters that had far superior clarity and picture quality. Unfortunately, as these pre-broadcast tapes used unfinished animation, the episodes included on Rhino's DVDs suffered from animation errors, missing special effects and colouring mistakes that did not occur in the original 1980s broadcasts.

Additionally, Rhino contracted post-production studio Magno Sound & Video to remaster the monaural soundtrack to a 5.1 surround soundtrack worthy of a DVD release. Unfortunately, Magno's engineers added in some 30 tracks of new sound effects to this new soundtrack, and once again Rhino's DVDs introduced new elements that were largely seen as undesirable. Rhino representatives rather disingenuously attempted to claim that these sound effects were there all along and that fans had simply been unable to hear them before, despite evidence to the contrary.

The new sounds include abnormally loud and glossy stock sound effects for lasers, explosions, and swooping jets layered across numerous scenes. The show's commercial bumpers were also altered, with motor, laser, and transforming sound effects added where there had originally been only music and Victor Caroli's voice.

Releases

The Original Transformers

VHS

• The Original Transformers — Volume 1: Prime Threat (1999)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 2: Revenge of the Decepticons (1999)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 3: Programmed for Evil (1999)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 4: The Key to Vector Sigma (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 5: Return to Cybertron (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 6: Evolution Revolution (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 7: The Return of Optimus Prime (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 8: Evil Experiments (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 9: Grimlock the Hero (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 10: Megatron's Master Plan (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 11: The Decepticon Possession (2000)
• The Original Transformers — Volume 12: Size Matters (2000)
• The Original Transformers — More than Meets the Eye (2001)
• The Original Transformers — Heroes: The Rebirth (2001)
• The Original Transformers — Villains: The Ultimate Doom (2001)

DVD

• The Original Transformers — Heroes: The Rebirth (2001)
• The Original Transformers — Villains: The Ultimate Doom (2001)
• The Original Transformers — Season One (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Volume One (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Volume Two (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Volume Three (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 1 (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 1: Vol. 1 (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 1: Vol. 2 (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 1: Vol. 3 (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 1: Vol. 4 (2002)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 2 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 2: Vol. 5 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 2: Vol. 6 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 2: Vol. 7 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 2 Part 2: Vol. 8 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 3 Part 1 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 3 Part 1: Vol. 1 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 3 Part 1: Vol. 2 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 3 Part 1: Vol. 3 (2003)
• The Original Transformers — Season 3 Part 2 & Season 4 (2004)

Beast Wars and Beast Machines

Rhino's releases of Beast Wars and Beast Machines each included a 5.1 audio track and a handful of special features.

• Beast Wars: Transformers — The Complete First Season (August 12, 2003)

4-disc box set containing all 26 episodes of the first season, plus interviews with Larry DiTillio and Bob Forward.

• Beast Wars: Transformers — The Complete Second Season (March 23, 2004)

2-disc box set containing the 13-episode second season, plus some animation test footage.

• Beast Wars: Transformers — The Complete Third Season (September 7, 2004)

2-disc box set containing the 13-episode third season, plus a deleted scene and the full animatic from "Nemesis Part 2".

• Beast Machines: Transformers — The Complete Series (February 28, 2006)

4-disc box set containing all 26 episodes of the series, plus interviews with Bob Skir, Marv Wolfman, David Kaye, and Susan Blu.

Also includes audio commentaries by Bob Skir on the episode "Fires of the Past" with Marv Wolfman, and the episodes "Endgame Pt. II: When Legends Fall" and "Endgame Pt. III: Seeds of the Future" with Steven Melching.

• 
  Beast Wars 1st Season
• 
  Beast Wars 2nd Season
• 
  Beast Wars 3rd Season
• 
  Beast Machines

Armada

• Transformers: Armada — Season One: Part One (November 9, 2004)

4-disc box set containing the series' first 26 episodes: "First Encounter" through to "Linkup".

• Transformers Armada — Season One: Part Two (September 26, 2006)

4-disc box set containing the series' remaining 26 episodes: "Detection" through to "Mortal Combat".

Unlike the previous set, the discs of Part Two did not include chapter searches for the individual episodes.

• 
  Armada Part One
• 
  Armada Part Two

External links

• Rhino Entertainment at Wikipedia
• Official homepage