Bruce Von Stiers

I have been checking out the Reboot DVD collection from ADV Films. This collection features DVD discs with selected episodes from the third season of the computer generated animated series. The last one that I watched is called The Viral Wars. The caption on the DVD cover tells us that “The Battle Comes Home.”

With this being a DVD disc, there are a few extra things thrown in, along with the series episodes. These extras include trailers for other titles like Gunsmith Cats, Arc the Lad and AD Police. There is a Toy Preview of characters in the show. Line drawings and sketches of the characters are found in the Concept Designs section. Check out a few screen shots in the Character Gallery.

This collection was produced by John Ledford and Sharon Papa. Erika Offutt was in charge of Menu Design for the disc and the encoding was done by Cinram/ POP DVD Center.

Some of the Voice actors who were in lent their talents to the episodes are Kathleen Barr, Tony Jay, Long John Baldry, Gary Chalk and Michael Donovan. There was also Christopher Gray, Scott McNeil, Shirley Milner, Louise Vallance and Ian James Corlett.

The first episode takes up where the last on the previous disc left off. This episode is called Megaframe. The crew of the whip Saucy Mare finally reaches its destination of Mainframe. Crew members Matrix, AndrAia, Frisket and Bob have been trying to get back there for a long time. Between getting caught on the Net and traveling the Web, these weary warriors just want to get back home. But the Mainframe they find is engulfed in a viral war. The dastardly Megabyte is forcing the system elder, Phong, to help him access code that will allow him to escape to the Net. Bob and Matrix try to find a way to get Mainframe back online.

The second episode is Showdown. The group tries to storm the Principal’s Office, which is the command center for Mainframe. This is also where Megabyte is holding Phong, trying to extract the Net code from him. A battle ensues and Matrix ends up fighting it out with Megabyte on the roof of the Principal’s Office.

In the third episode, System Crash, Mainframe is fading fast. There are system tears all over the place, with undeleted RAM popping up all over the place in the form of User’s game characters. Bob is desperately trying to figure out a way to get Mainframe back online and avoid a system crash.

End Prog is the last episode. An incoming game finishes crashing Mainframe. Bob is gambling on the User rebooting the entire system. If that happens, then Mainframe will go back online and everything will be as great as before the virus Megabyte ever diluted any pixels. The end is really corny as there is a musical finale.

Reboot: The Viral Wars nicely wraps up season 3 of the series. We get to see Bob finally back home in Mainframe. The system gets rid of the virus Megabyte and gains a new friend in Hexadecimal. Bob and Dot get to become a couple and Matrix gets reunited with AndrAia. And Mouse finds a new beau in Ray Tracer.

People who are into computers will appreciate this series and especially the episodes on this disc. Getting rid of a real computer virus can be just as hazardous as the fight Matrix had with Megabyte. And who hasn’t dealt with a system crash and having to reboot? The graphics are superb and the storyline is not too bad, even though it gets kind of mushy at the end. Matrix is a tough looking dude and both Dot and AndrAia are pretty hot for just being computer generated animations. Mouse isn’t too bad either, except her hair is a little too much.

You can find Reboot: The Viral Wars at retailers like Best Buy. You can also order it online from ADV Films. Their web site is www.advfilms.com.