Grade: B
Entire family: Possibly
2015-16, 1355 min. (32 episodes), Color
Documentary
Lionsgate
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Featured audio: Dolby Digital 2.0
Teaser/trailer
No online purchase link available

Sharks are to the Discovery Channel what Mickey Mouse is to Walt Disney Studios. And every year the cable network celebrates their viewers’ fascination with all things shark with a special televised Shark Week that has all the hoopla of a Super Bowl. This past year’s theme was “Shark ‘n’ Awe,” and you can pick up the Shark Week: Shark ‘n’ Awe Collection on DVD now—but only at Walmart and only in-store, no online sales.

What you’ll get in this six-disc, 32-episode collection is the usual blend of episodes: some of them documentaries about scientific studies (including one, pictured, where scientists and shark experts devised a way to accurately measure sharks underwater), some “in search of” adventures, some of them attempts to capture certain shark behaviors on film for the first time, some spotlighting acrobatic aerial attacks, others chronicling an increase in shark attacks worldwide, others habitat-centered, and a bunch of them dealing with Great White Sharks, whose popularity skyrocketed with the summer 1975 release of Steven Spielberg’s Jaws. As clichéd as it sounds, there’s literally something here for everyone, and tastes will vary. I found the Mythbusters episode to be the most boring of the bunch, but that won’t be the case for everyone.

I mostly enjoyed the scientific studies, many of them focused on the tagging of sharks so they can be monitored via satellite. Such episodes were largely pure research-based, but one of them sought to pinpoint the movement of enormous Great Whites along beaches in order to alert officials to keep human-shark contact at a minimum when they’re in the area—kind of like a sophisticated cowbell. The most interesting of these may have been “Tiburones: Sharks of Cuba,” because it involved a collaboration between Cuban and U.S. shark scientists working frantically during the limited window that both governments had given them.

But the daredevil episodes were also pretty engaging, including ones where shark chasers experimented with new underwater cages and methods of goading the sharks to strike so they can study their behavior. And there’s a train wreck factor to episodes where shark attack victims are interviewed . . . or we see them go back into the water again because they’re as addicted to sharks as many viewers.

I could have done without the clip shows with their teasers, because the networks already run so many sequences over again when they return from commercial breaks that it can get a little old. Though some might want to start by watching an episode like “Sharktacular 2016” to get some idea of which episodes they want to watch first, I would imagine that most fans would just pop these in one disc at a time and watch them from beginning to end.

Best way to watch? Rig up a backyard screen and use a projector. Invite the neighbors over to a pool party where everyone floats in innertubes as you run through the most harrowing episodes!

Some episodes—like “Blue Serengeti” with its limited shark footage—may disappoint, but for sheer volume, you can’t beat this set if you’re a shark lover (or fearer). Below are the episode titles, separated according to discs:

Shark Trek
Island of the Mega Shark
Monster Mako
Return of the Great White Serial Killer
Alien Sharks Close Encounter

Bride of Jaws
Tiburones: Sharks of Cuba
Super Predator
Ninja Sharks
Sharks of the Shadowland

Sharksanity: The Return
Shark Island
Shark Alley: Legend of Dynamite
Air Jaws: Walking with Great Whites
Mythbusters vs. Jaws

Sharktacular 2016
Tiger Beach
Return of the Monster Mako
Isle of Jaws
Shallow Water Invasion
Jaws of the Deep

Sharks Among Us
Wrath of the Great White Serial Killer
Air Jaws: Night Stalker
Deadliest Sharks
Sharks vs. Dolphins Face Off

Nuclear Sharks
Jungle Shark
Shark Bait
Blue Serengeti
Sharksanity 3
The Killing Games