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As a regular viewer of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse thanks to my three-year-old daughter, I routinely anxiously await new episodes; when one watches every day one goes through the series' entire catalog quite quickly and as fun as they may be, by the 12th viewing they have lost some intrigue. Therefore it was with great pleasure that I sat down this week to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse – Mickey's Adventures in Wonderland, a brand new, nearly hour-long episode (it is styled a "full-length movie" on the box) being released this week to DVD.
Mickey's Adventures in Wonderland is, as the title indicates, based in the Lewis Carroll created land (it is not, strictly speaking, a play on Carroll's tales of Alice). The episode features Mickey Mouse Clubhouse-ified versions of a handful of the most popular Carroll characters interacting with Mickey and Donald as they do their best to retrieve the cuckoo bird from a cuckoo clock which Donald intends to give Daisy for her birthday.
The episode includes all of the main Mickey Mouse Clubhouse characters including the aforementioned Donald, Mickey, and Daisy as well as Minnie, Pete, Goofy, Clarabell the Cow, Chip, Dale, Professor Ludwig von Drake, and Toodles. Some, such as Chip and Dale appear as Carroll-esque characters – in the case of Chip and Dale they are Tweedle Chip and Tweedle Dale. Other characters like Mickey and Donald remain unaltered by being in Wonderland (except physically as they become small following some magic from Professor Ludwig von Drake).
While it is twice as long as a normal episode, Mickey's Adventures in Wonderland only features a standard number of Mouskatools, four (see reviews of other Mickey Mouse Clubhouse DVDs here and here for a more in-depth explanation of the series' basics). There is no sense from watching the episode though that there is a need for more tools nor that Toodles' character was given short shrift in it, even if Toodles was a fully fleshed out character, which he isn't.
Watching the episode, any fan of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, be they young or old, will find themselves entranced. It contains all the elements that have made the show as popular as it is. If, however, one is looking for a retelling of Carroll's stories of Wonderland, they will be sorely disappointed. While characters and situations from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass and what Alice Found There are present, there seems to have been a conscious effort made on the part of the producers to ensure that Mickey & Donald's adventure in Wonderland is separate and distinct.
The main feature here on the DVD is, unlike the reviews linked to above, optimized for 16:9 televisions, playing out in widescreen (as the series does if watched in HD). It is exceedingly odd that the extra episode of the show included as a bonus feature, "Goofy Goes Goofy" is presented only in the traditional 4:3 format. The other special features are two separate "Adventure Modes" for watching Mickey's Adventures in Wonderland which ask viewers to answer questions about what they're watching.
Mickey Mouse Clubhouse – Mickey's Adventures in Wonderland will be released on September 8, and for those who can't get enough of the series is unquestionably a must-have.
