The League: The Final Fantasy (Season 7) - DVD Review

Title: The League: The Final Fantasy (Season 7)

Movie: :4stars:
Video: :4stars:
Audio: :3.5stars:
Extras: :2.5stars:

HTS Overall Score:74





Summary
Besides “Sunny in Philadelphia”, “The League”, stands up as one of the biggest and best dirty sit coms in quite some time. It’s basically a show that revolves around a group of friends and their love of fantasy football. In fact these friends love their fantasy football SO much that they are willing to make each other’s lives into a living hell in order to win their annual league trophy (Known as the Shiva). The first few seasons were the best I had seen in recent comedy, but seasons 5 and 6 were slowing down just a bit. So what did the creators do? They decide to up the cast list and bring back all of the series greats for one final goodbye as the show wraps up. Not one person is left out of the ribbing, and each and every once gets a final goodbye as the show winds itself down. Season 7 doesn’t rival the first 3 seasons for sheer hilarity, but it stands head and shoulder above seasons 4-6, powerhousing its way to the end zone.

The series is back on track after having a bit of a trip to the beach last year, and we have some classic “The League” humor to fill up the first few episodes. Taco (Jon Lajoie) is back in the McGibblets suit, messing up and around like usual, and we have our usual assortment of football legends who happen to run across our stats obsessed heroes. Like usual, Andre (Paul Scheer) is pretty much the butt of every joke in the series, and kicked around by players and his own tentative friends, but naturally he somehow seems to think that everyone is just joshing him.

The season opens up with a bang, with Andre coming up with yet another ludicrous idea. This time his big idea is to get into fantasy soccer while the football season is in its off season. It doesn’t take much of a clue to realize that the rest of the crew aren’t going to be on board for this, but at least SOME fantasy sports is better than none at all. However it doesn’t take long before everyone is back in line ready for the draft picks to start. Including stabbing each other in the backs to get their trades in and create an unstoppable team this year.

I’ve heard it said that “Fantasy Football is basically D&D for sports fans”, and ironically that’s not very far from the truth in the Schaffer’s portrayal of our ragtag group of friends. We have the nerd, the evil backstabber, and a bunch of grown adults sitting around a board trying to get their characters with the best stats. Such as it is, that tired cliché is played up with great results, as our friends manage to get into more trouble than it’s worth in their pursuit of a winning team. There’s always the side stories revolving around Kevin and Jenny potty training their child (named Chalupa Batman in previous seasons), all the way up to Andre winning his brand new trophy after the destruction of The Shiva.

Then of course we have the all-powerful wrecking ball of the series. Rafi (Jason Mantzoukas) of course crashes the party, as he always does, and manages to ruin everyone’s life by doing the most outlandish and dirty things imaginable. He’s almost always hilarious, and probably the number one reason why I started watching the show, but sometimes he goes a bit TOO overboard. Especially this season where he got a little too much screen time and became a bit of a distraction from the rest of the stories. The inclusion of Meegan (Leslie Bibb) as Pete's ex who's now dating Andre is a great addition and mixes up the scenario quite a bit. Especially since Andre finally has the upper hand over Pete and his emotions for once.




Rating:

Not Rated by the MPAA



Video :4stars:
Like usual, the final season of “The League” spans two DVD-9 discs, housing the entire season and included extras. The show looks nice on DVD, and although there is sadly no HD presentation, the 480p DVD’s look impressive. The colors are well saturated and look naturally balanced, giving the show a bright and cheery look. Fine detailing is excellent to great, with every line of the 480p encode looking really beautiful. Blacks are deep and inky, but there is some macroblocking here and there as well as some crush in the darker scenes. It’s a very solid presentation for the 13 episodes, and if you’ve seen the series before, it looks just as the last few seasons have looked on DVD.









Audio :3.5stars:
The 5.1 Dolby Digital track is exemplary in its presentation, but also limited by the simplistic sound design of the show. All the dialog and jokes come through with great clarity, and there seems to be no distortions or flaws in the mix. There really isn’t a whole lot of panning effects, or surround usage in the show, but every once in a while we get to hear those back channels light up. Most of the LFE present in the show is just there as a few supportive blips in the track, with a door slamming, or a car engine revving. The show is a simple track, and while it isn’t a wildly dynamic track, the audio does everything asked of it no matter the situation at hand.






Extras :2.5stars:

• Alt Nation
• Gag Reel
• Taco Tones
• Deleted Scenes








Overall: :3.5stars:

It’s always sad seeing a beloved series wrap up. There’s a sort of sadness that follows as you realize that you’ll never see these old friends again in new adventures. However, the show goes out with a bang, and maintains the same strong writing that has kept it alive for seven years. I will also remember this as my first introduction to Nick Kroll in a major way, and another reason why I actually checked out his sketch comedy show “The Kroll Show” (and am glad that I did). The DVD set is quite solid, with impressive video and rock solid audio. There isn’t a WHOLE lot of extras on the discs, but there is enough material to keep most fans happy in these days of slim pickings when it comes to new release TV shows coming with ANY extras. Recommended.



Additional Information:

Starring: Nick Kroll, Mark Duplass, Jonathon Lajoie, Stephen Rannazzisi
Creator: Jeff and Jackie Schaffer
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 Mpeg2
Audio: English: Dolby Digital 5.1
Studio: Fox
Rated: NR
Runtime: 326 Minutes
DVD Release Date: June 14th, 2016



Buy The League: The Final Fantasy (Season 7) on DVD at Amazon

Recommendation: Recommended​

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