This short review will be split into two sections. The first about the contents included in the package and the second being the technical criticisms of the DVDs themselves.

S.M. Entertainment have finally come out with their second Girls' Generation photobook which includes 44 pages of our girls in beautiful scenery (Phuket, Thailand....anyone wondering how it's pronounced: 'Pu-ket' not 'fuck it'). But not only did they provide us with a beautiful book, but 715 minutes of footage of the girls spread out between 6 discs. These discs include, a variety show that they filmed during their stay on the Island, each individuals 'free time' with the camera, all their music videos, the making of their music videos, back stage footage before their live performances, interviews and footage of their best live performances. It has to be said- while you're watching through those 6 discs, you cannot help but smile and at some points feel a bit teary for the girls as they show how much they've been through and what they had to do to get to this point in time. Anyone who watches these DVDs will immediately fall in love with their charms- it's a known fact that Girls' Generation are one of the most lovable girl groups out there. The DVD gives enough screen time for each of the members to show off their personalities and make you fall in love or if you've just become a fan, this 6 disc set will leave you begging for more!

Now I have bad things to say about the DVD encodes themselves. S.M. Entertainment always seem to provide their videos in INTERLACED format rather than Progressive! Even though they've been shot on high end video equipment, they seem to always give us SONES quite inferior quality. The menus themselves are cute and easy to navigate through but who cares much about that if the videos themselves are at times ATTROCIOUS to look at!? Take for example on Disc 2, the 'Gee' dance version music videos look like someone recorded them from their TV onto a VHS tape. S.M. really needs to sort this out because interlacing was used during the tube TV era and now we're in the flat panel era which display PROGRESSIVE images. Even if the variety show on disc 1 was filmed using DV cameras, they could have at least deinterlaced the footage for us without artifacts. The video bitrate for the discs stay between 8.6-9.2Mbps which is great but the audio bitrate is terribly low at 192kbps (Dolby Digital 2.0 encode). Also, there is another bad point to pick out, some of the older music videos are still in their 4:3 aspect ratio. I'm sure those music videos were aired in that format back then as many people still owned 4:3 tube televisions. However most of the world now own widescreen Plasma, LCD and LEDs! They could have opened up those music videos to the new standard, 16:9 aspect ratio to get more detail in each shot. S.M. Entertainment, you're a great company, but sometimes you really do annoy us when you give us poor quality DVD encodes (as with all your other music video DVDs). 

In conclusion, 'All About Girls' Generation: Paradise in Phuket' is probably the best deal you will get that S.M are providing here for new fans (and old). The £50 price tag may seem a little daunting at first, but once you see how much content there is that you are getting, you will change your mind. It's a shame about the interlaced video though.