More Fire & Ice Good News!

We recently announced the upcoming launch of the latest Fire & Ice spin-off comic book series by Dynamite Entertainment starring Dark Wolf, the brooding sword & sorcery cousin of the Duke, John Wayne himself. Fans will be happy to learn that the Fire & Ice goodies keep on coming with the release of a premium 4K edition of Fire & Ice this June.

We have been waiting a long time for this. Many fans will have watched, rewatched and watched again that cult classic over the years, from its original VHS release all the way to the more recent Blu-ray edition. Given Fire & Ice’s enduring cult legacy and perenniality, a 4K edition was in the cards, and we are getting it from one of the best labels in the industry.

The **Blue Underground** Limited Edition Steelbook features a striking 4K restoration of the original **Frank Frazetta** theatrical art.

Why is Fire & Ice such a cult classic?

Because of two names: Ralph Bakshi and Frank Frazetta.

Both artists are legendary figures of the fantasy genre. Bakshi brought sword & sorcery and epic fantasy to animated life on the silver screen with Wizards and The Lord of the Rings. Both movies are cult classics. He is not only a giant of animation, but also the creative genius behind the advancement of rotoscoping animation. Frank Frazetta achieved legendary status during his lifetime. He will continue to leave his mark on fantasy art in general and inspire generations of artists to come, including genre writers who only need to look at his paintings to find inspiration.

There are regular 4K studios and then there are elite boutique labels such as Blue Underground who are known for releasing highly attractive, feature-rich versions of classic movies on 4K discs. The limited edition steelbook restored version of Fire & Ice promises to be just as irresistible. The 3-disc release packs a lot of material, but the technical work that went into it is what sets it apart from standard 4K releases. This edition is a brand-new restoration scanned in 4K 16-bit from the original negative, with Dolby Vision HDR and a new Dolby Atmos audio mix thrown in.

Standard studio releases often use an existing digital master that might be several years old. Whenever possible, Blue Underground goes back to the original 35 mm camera negative (the film that was inside the camera during filming).

Also, while most studios scan at 10 or 12-bit, Blue Underground often performs 16-bit 4K scans. This captures a massive amount of data, which preserves the fine film grain of the film – a technique that is particularly beneficial for Fire & Ice, since it will preserve the “painterly” textures of the Bakshi/Frazetta backgrounds that a lower-resolution scan might blur.

Major studios often try to “clean up” old movies for modern audiences by using Digital Noise Reduction (DNR). This can remove the organic film grain. Blue Underground treats film grain as a detail, not a defect. It’s a frame-by-frame digital cleanup that respects the grain. Its restorations are famous for being “film-like.” Its meticulous restorative works makes 4K releases of 1980 movies look like 1980 movies.

While a standard studio 4K might just come in a plastic case, Blue Underground builds a collector’s object encased in steel with aesthetics simply far above standard 4K releases, and VODs can never hope to compare.

Also, because they aren’t trying to save space, they use the highest capacity discs (100 GB) and push the bitrate to its physical limit. This is the most significant advantage. Think of bitrate as the amount of data being “poured” into your screen per second. VOD 4K usually streams at 15–25 Mbps. To fit through your internet “pipes,” the file is heavily compressed. This often leads to macro-blocking (pixelated squares) and color banding, especially in dark scenes or complex animation.

Physical 4K (UHD) can reach bitrates of 80–128 Mbps. Because the data is read directly from the disc, there is no need for aggressive compression. For a film like Fire and Ice, which relies on Frank Frazetta’s painterly textures and subtle color gradients, the disc preserves the “film grain” and brushstroke detail that streaming often smears away.

Despite VODs being increasingly popular, some still prefer the collectible cool of physical copies. And the appeal of upscale steelbook collector’s editions goes well beyond the simple pleasure of holding a physical copy in your hands and of displaying it on your shelf. In short: A standard studio 4K is a “product,” but a Blue Underground 4K is a curated restoration.

This 4K release has a lot of new extras to offer. There is a new segment, The Art of Fire and Ice: The Frank Frazetta Legacy, hosted by Sara Frazetta, Frank’s granddaughter. This new documentary is expected to dive into the archival side of Frazetta’s work and how Fire & Ice helped solidify his aesthetic in the ’80s.

The other documentary, Frank Frazetta’s Fire and Ice with Robert Rodriguez, will undoubtedly be very well received by the famous director’s many fans. Rodriguez has long been attached to a potential live-action remake of Fire & Ice. So, his take on why the seminal film’s visual style remains unmatched will be particularly interesting to watch. The poster & still galleries have been expanded for this edition, promising a look at more memorabilia and art from the film.

But the extra that has me really jazzed is the addition of the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack CD. This is a rare perk, a “physical only” jewel that VOD simply cannot match.

There are also numerous other legacy extras carried over from previous releases, including Blue Underground’s gold standard features that were on their previous high-end editions:

Audio Commentary with Ralph Bakshi – this remains the core “making-of” resource, where he discusses rotoscoping and working with Frazetta.
Bakshi on Frazetta – A focused video interview where Bakshi talks specifically about their collaboration.
Sean Hannon’s Diary Notes – A unique piece where the voice actor reads from his personal journals kept during the recording sessions, giving a “fly-on-the-wall” look at the production.
The Making of Fire and Ice – The original 1983 promotional documentary.

In an era where digital convenience often comes at a cost, Blue Underground’s treatment of Fire & Ice reminds us why we collect. We aren’t just buying a movie; we are archiving a 16-bit piece of fantasy history that looks as sharp on our screens as Frazetta’s original canvases.

Slated for a July 30 release, the steelbook is available now for pre-order on the MVD Shop website: Fire & Ice 4K Steelbook Edition Pre-Order.

Title: Fire and Ice (Steelbook) (4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray + CD)

Format: Ultra HD Blu-ray (2160p) and HD Blu-ray (1080p) Widescreen 1.85:1

Audio: Dolby Atmos, 5.1 DTS-HD, 2.0 DTS-HD (English)

Subtitles: English SDH, Francais, Espanol

Cast (main): Randy Norton, Cynthia Leake, Steve Sandor and Sean Hannon

Director: Ralph Bakshi

Producers: Ralph Bakshi, Frank Frazetta

Label: Blue Underground

Genre: Animation (not Anime/Manga)

Run Time: 82 minutes

Release Date: 06/30/26

UPC: 827058803595

Copyright Notice:

Fire and Ice © 1983 Polyc International BV. All Rights Reserved. Character designs and artistic concepts © Frank Frazetta Properties, LLC. 4K Ultra HD package design and supplementary materials © 2026 Blue Underground, Inc. > All images used for editorial review purposes.

About the Author

Jules-Pierre Malartre currently lives on a small island west of Montreal (Quebec), which is as close to the Great White North that he will ever dare go, but still cold enough to save him from big-ass spiders, alien abductions, undead dinosaurs and tourists who find his French accent charming. In 2005, he quit a promising aerospace engineering career to go into freelance writing, which was a very, very bad idea according to his mother. Since then, he has become considerably poorer, but he has grown much happier. Along the way, he adopted cats—lots of cats! When he is not writing technical manuals, newspaper articles, press releases or blogs on anything from comic books to yoga, he is busy working on his first novel, a semi-autobiographical fictional account of his life that dares to ask the question, “where did God go wrong with me anyway?” His first short story, “The Rest Was Easy,” was published by the online literary magazine Amarillo Bay in 2013. The five people who read it liked it. He’s well aware that it took him over a decade to publish another one, so he’d really appreciate it if you'd cut him some slack about it! He loves coffee, cats and reading, mostly because those three things go very well together.