"Necessary Evil: Super-Villains of DC Comics" (unrated, Warner): Debuted at the San Diego Comic-Con, this documentary spotlights comic-book villains, from The Joker to Lex Luthor to Sinestro, and attempts to uncover the reasons why they fascinate fans. Narrated by Christopher Lee, the film includes interviews with DC comic book writers, artists and executives, critics and historians and celebrities.

"Monsters University" (G, 103 minutes, Disney): Pixar has a pretty solid track record when it comes to sequels (think "Toy Story"). But until "Monsters University," a new origin story set several years before the action of "Monsters, Inc.," the acclaimed animation shop had never attempted a prequel. The characters Mike (voice of Billy Crystal) and Sulley (John Goodman) are funny enough and their relationship rich enough to make the back story worth telling. Set at the titular Monsters University, the film is the story of how freshmen monsters Mike and Sulley - aspiring students of the fine art of scaring - met and became fast friends. It's also the story of how they became, more essentially, themselves. Where "Monsters, Inc." was a heavily plot-driven tale, "Monsters University" is a two-monster character study. Monsters University gets underway when Mike, the tiny, cyclopean, chartreuse-skinned cueball, and Sulley, the jumbo-size, furry blue beast, are both kicked out of the scaring department at MU, where they've enrolled to learn how to make kids scream. To get back into the scaring program, Mike and Sulley are forced to team with a fraternity of losers to compete in the Scare Games campus competition. If they win, they'll be accepted back in the department. If they lose, they're out of the school for good. It may be children's terror that powers the movie's fictional universe, but it's the energy of its stars that lights up "Monsters University." Contains brief, mild spookiness. Extras include commentary and "The Blue Umbrella" animated short from Pixar. Also, on Blu-ray: "Campus Life" featurette from the characters' point of view; "Story School" making-of featurette; "Scare Games" and "Welcome to MU" featurettes; "Music Appreciation" documentary on Randy Newman's scores; behind-the-scenes with the animators, and other cast and technical featurettes; and deleted scenes.

"R.I.P.D." (PG-13, 96 minutes, Universal): This comic book-based dud squanders a decent cast and succeeds neither as the comedy nor the action film it purports to be. Ryan Reynolds plays Nick, the newbie, and Jeff Bridges takes the role of his partner, Roy, in the Rest in Peace Department. They meet when Nick is sucked into a CGI vortex just after his evil partner, Bobby (Kevin Bacon, playing the caricature of a villain), offs him. The first few minutes of the movie, Reynolds does what he does best: toss off sardonic one-liners. But as soon as Nick meets his new partner, it's the Roy Show. The problem is that Roy is not nearly as funny as the movie's writers think he is. There is also some sense that director Robert Schwentke told Bridges to do an imitation of himself portraying Rooster Cogburn in "True Grit." With the exception of the eye patch, the resemblance is uncanny, as is the garbled lilt.Contains action violence and language. Extras include deleted and alternate scenes, gag reel and making-of featurette. Also, on Blu-ray: alternate openings, "R.I.P.D Motion Comics: Bringing the Avatars to Life" and four other making-of featurettes.

"Byzantium" (R, 118 minutes, MPI Home Video): The human-vampire romance at the center of "Byzantium" has less in common with emotional roller-coaster "Twilight" than with the sweet but creepy relationship in "Let the Right One In." Like that 2008 Swedish film, "Byzantium" is about the friendship between a gawky human boy and a preternaturally poised teenage vampire girl. The marvelous Saoirse Ronan plays Eleanor, the undead adolescent bloodsucker whose narration guides the moody and visually stylish film by Neil Jordan ("The Crying Game"). For two centuries, Eleanor has been forced to move from town to town, accompanied by her mother, Clara (Gemma Arterton), whenever too many dead bodies start piling up. Still, Eleanor doesn't cruelly murder humans; she gets their permission before drinking their blood, seeking out mainly the elderly and the infirm. Clara, too, has her own idiosyncratic moral code. The mother-and-daughter relationship is just as interesting as - and a lot more fraught than - the one between Eleanor and Frank (Caleb Landry Jones), the sickly teen who befriends Eleanor when she and her mom turn up at a British seaside resort. Eleanor has a kind of purity that her mother, who opens a brothel in the seedy Byzantium guesthouse, lacks. Contains violence, blood and gore, obscenity and sex. Extras include cast and crew interviews.

Also: "American Experience: War of the Worlds" (PBS documentary), "Free Samples," "La Notte" (1961, The Criterion Collection), "Margarita," "and "Line of Duty Series 1, Masters of Money" (BBC documentary that explores the lives of influential economists, Athena)," "Heartland Christmas" (2010) and "Move Me Brightly: Celebrating Jerry Garcia's 70th Birthday."

Television Series: "Damages: The Complete Series," "Family Tree: First Season," "Agatha Christie's Poirot Series 9? (four feature-length British TV mysteries, Acorn Media) and "Cook's Country, Season 6."

- – -

Washington Post staff writer Kay Coyte contributed to this report.