La Cour de récré: Rentrée en classe supérieure

I know it's a cartoon but why is the first day of school on Halloween? Aside from that small detail, it's pretty nostalgic. Not a bad movie.

Just for the record, I love Recess. It is fun and entertaining with great characters and writing as well as one of the catchiest theme tunes of any animated series. Taking the Fifth Grade is decent, but it is lacking something compared to the overall standard of the show. I did feel as though All Growed Down and School's Out captured the show's spirit better as well. I'll start with the good things as there are enough. I did think the voice acting was good, TJ's voice is naturally different and lacks spunk but everybody else is voiced very well, Prickley and Miss Finster are especially well voiced. The music manages to be both catchy and dynamic, good characteristics for music. The writing is on the most part fun and engaging, maybe a little preachy for my tastes in the first story but the second story especially has some great moments. The characters largely are true to those of the show, Miss Finster being a class teacher is odd, but that didn't bother me too hugely. TJ lacks his characteristic spunk at times but like in the show he does have a sense of fun and his heart in the right place. The rest of the gang I can't think much of a problem with. On the other hand, the animation is rather basic, the colours lack real vibrancy and the character designs do look very sketchy at times. Taking the Fifth Grade's story is three stories into one, and I have to agree that the second story is the only one that properly captures the show's spirit. The first one means well but over-patronises for me towards the end and the third, while having some funny moments like seeing Miss Finster as a fairy princess and Randall as a fairy prince, is rather forgettable and somewhat predictable too. I also really dislike the character of King Freddy, I do find him annoying and rather incompetent as a king of the playground, mainly because King Bob(who you do see briefly) has better rules and more of a command over the rest of the kids whereas Freddy comes across at times as a whiny brat. All in all, a little tired but not bad. 6/10 Bethany Cox

Thankfully better than 'Recess: All Growed Down', but 'Recess: Taking the Fifth Grade' is still a bit of a chore to watch.

This again features a couple of different stories, though to be fair their integration into the film is much improved if still a bit messy. The cast are as they've always been, solid but not exactly memorable. Animation-wise it's decent.

This is more on the level of 'Recess Christmas: Miracle On Third Street', yet still miles off 'Recess: School's Out'. I simply don't understand why they didn't create three unique stories for these sequels, as they did for the original production. Compiled stories are, in my opinion, lazy.

Not a series of films that I'll be revisiting, but they are ones that have pretty respectable ratings across a few platforms so it seems I'm in the minority. Each to their own, as always!

Production shut down on ABC's "Recess" series after it reached 65 episodes, as is mandated by producer Disney. But "Recess" proved to be so popular that an additional 13 episodes were commissioned. For some reason, though, ABC never broadcast the new episodes and they were instead edited into three direct-to-video movies. This entry, comprised of three episodes loosely joined together, finds the "Recess" gang finally being promoted to the fifth grade. But it seems they've lost some of their magic with the change in grades. First of all, there are distracting problems with character voices. Courtland Mead (Gus) and Jason Davis (Mikey) don't quite sound like they usually do, and Myles Jeffrey has replaced Andrew Lawrence as TJ (Lawrence's voice was sounding pretty deep in the final episodes of the series, so this change is understandable). Jeffrey is OK, although he hasn't captured TJ's spunk the same way that Lawrence did. The real problem, though, is that the stories just seem...tired. The first, in which TJ becomes a truant to protest changes at school, is simply boring. The last one, in which Spinelli decides she is too old for Halloween, seems like a rehash of previous stories. Only the middle entry, in which the kids join a secret club, comes close to the series' standards. Fans of the series will understandably want to catch up with their favorite characters, but this movie may make them realize why all good things must come to an end.

Despite being touted as a 'movie' in the style of 'School's Out' this is in fact three episodes of the show sandwiched together, and although you can't really see the join, the quality of the animation and story telling isn't on a par with that of 'School's Out'.

It's not a bad collection of tales, but the new voices in the cast take a while to get used to, and the writers have taken some liberties with believability that are a bit daft.

Watchable, yes, totally enjoyable, no