Back To The Future (The Ultimate Trilogy) (4-Disc Set) [Blu-Ray]

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Cast: Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd

Release Date: October 20, 2020

A Review By: Kevin Lovell

Disc Rating: 9.5/10

Synopsis:

Experience one of the most popular movie series of all time like never before with Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy! Join Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox), Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd) and a time traveling DeLorean for the adventure of a lifetime as they travel to the past, present and future, setting off a time-shattering chain reaction that disrupts the space-time continuum! From filmmakers Steven Spielberg, Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale, this unforgettable collection features hours of bonus features and is an unrivaled trilogy that stands the test of time.

The beloved time-travelling trilogy is back and better than ever with ‘Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy’! Now you can revisit all of Marty and Doc’s adventures throughout time including Marty’s original journey back to 1955 where his accidental interactions with his teenage parents results in a threat to his very existence, as well as their eye opening visit to the future year of 2015 (which is hard to believe is now technically in our past), and of course their unforgettable adventure way back into the Old West in the year 1885. Now, the entire trilogy returns home once again and newly remastered (as well as additionally making its debut on 4K Ultra HD) in this new 4-disc Blu-ray collection celebrating its 35^th Anniversary!

‘Back to the Future’ has remained a timeless piece of cinema since its debut in 1985, a fact that’s even more surprising and impressive considering its heavy focus on time travel and the fact that we’ve already passed the year they visit the future in the sequel at this point. With all three films directed by notable filmmaker Robert Zemeckis and benefitting immensely from the talented cast led by Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd, ‘Back to the Future’ still delivers all of the excitement, heart and rewarding fun that it did back in the 1980’s, now with all three films newly remastered for ‘The Ultimate Trilogy’ Blu-ray release which provides impressive high definition video and audio presentations, along with hours of great bonus content including some brand new supplements available for the first time ever in this collection. Dedicated fans of the series that are fully 4K capable should also be thrilled to see the trilogy making its 4K Ultra HD disc debut and those fans may want to consider picking up a copy of the 4K release if they haven’t already done so.

Overall, the new ‘Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy’ 4-disc Blu-ray collection from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment serves up all three films in the classic saga newly remastered with gorgeous high definition video presentations complimented by great multichannel soundtracks for each film and a healthy collection of bonus content including some brand new extras exclusive to this release. Altogether it’ll likely make this one well worth a purchase for many diehard fans, especially those who don’t already own one of the previous Blu-ray releases of the trilogy or don’t mind double dipping for the new transfers and bonus content. Those of you that are fully 4K Ultra HD capable may also want to consider going that route as the ‘Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy’ release also marks the 4K disc debut of all three films and is also available in a 4K Ultra HD collection that many will surely want to see included in their collection.

VIDEO:

The Blu-ray release of ‘Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy’ features newly remastered, full 1080p High Definition presentations of all three films with their original 1.85:1 Aspect Ratios. Another bonus of the newly remastered video presentations this time around is that all three films now sport AVC encoded presentations where the 25^th Anniversary and 30^th Anniversary Trilogy Blu-ray releases included VC-1 encoded video presentations of the first two films. These newly remastered presentations look great and even while the other releases were far from disappointing, there’s still some clear improvement noticeable on each film and every installment delivers sharp, clean and beautifully detailed presentations that look outstanding. They hold up impressively even during the various darkly lit and fast moving sequences throughout and never suffer from any notable faults or issues along the way. Overall, these are wonderful new high definition video presentations that shouldn’t have any trouble whatsoever pleasing the fans.

AUDIO:

The Blu-ray release features a 5.1 channel DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack for all three films. These multichannel soundtracks are quite similar to the previous two Blu-ray releases of the trilogy and offer crisp, clean and frequently aggressive audio presentations that never fail to please. They frequently take advantage of all five available channels in order to send music, vehicle activity, along with some nature and action/sci-fi effects plus crowd chatter and much more throughout the various speakers whenever fitting and never allowing any dialogue or other audio elements that might be occurring simultaneously to become distorted or rendered inaudible in the process. Overall, these are top notch 5.1 DTS-HD MA soundtracks that are consistently clean, smooth and immersive every step of the way while also regularly contributing plenty of extra fun to the overall viewing experience.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

The new Blu-ray release of ‘Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy’ includes a great collection of extras featuring some brand new supplements on the Bonus Disc that are new to this release. The majority of the extras are carried over from the previous two releases. The extras included on the discs for all three film’s are identical to what was included on the 30^th Anniversary Blu-ray release minus the U-Control Interactive Extras (please see our review of the 30^th Anniversary Blu-ray Trilogy release HERE for a full list of those extras) whereas the dedicated Bonus Disc features all of the brand new extras debuting on this release. Those all-new extras include: ‘The Hollywood Museum Goes Back to the Future’ (running approximately 10 minutes in length), plus ‘Back to the Future: The Musical – Behind the Scenes’ which includes a ‘Cast and Crew Creative Q & A’ (approximately 28 minutes) and two songs: “Gotta Start Somewhere” (2 minutes) and “Put Your Mind to It” (3 minutes). The release also offers a couple of other noteworthy new extras including ‘An Alternate Future: Lost Audition Tapes’ (approximately 4 minutes) and ‘Could You Survive the Movies? Back to the Future’ (20 minutes).

The Ultimate Trilogy’s Bonus Disc also carries over a handful of extras that were additionally included on the bonus disc for the 30^th Anniversary Blu-ray; those carryover extras include a ‘2015 Message from Doc Brown’ (running approximately 1 minute in length), and the 2015 short ‘Doc Brown Saves the World!’ (running approximately 10 minutes) both of which feature Christopher Lloyd reprising his famous role of Doc Emmet Brown. Other previously released extras on the disc include ‘Outatime: Restoring the DeLorean’ (22 minutes) and ‘Looking Back to the Future’ (46 minutes), along with 2 hilarious ‘2015 Commercials’; the ‘Jaws 19 Trailer’ and a ‘Hoverboard Commercial’ (running approximately 1 minute apiece), plus two episodes of ‘Back to the Future: The Animated Series’: ‘Brothers’ and ‘Mac the Black’ (each running approximately 23 minutes).

*Please note that the above images are taken from the Blu-ray and resized. They will additionally suffer quality loss as a result of .jpg compression. Larger versions of each image can be viewed by clicking on the image. All images and content included on this Blu-Ray release are the property of their respective owners.

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Disc Rating: 9.5/10

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‘Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy’ is Now Available to Own on 4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment

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