Burst Angel Volume 5

Details

 Director: Koichi Ohata
 Catalogue Number: MVD2122
 Certificate: 15
 Date Released: September 11th 2006
 Screen: Widescreen 16:9
 Languages: English 5.1
 Additional Languages: Japanese (Dolby Digital 2.0)
 Subtitles: English
 Duration: 100 minutes

Special Features

• Audio commentary on the 'Dueling Angels' episode
• Radio drama vol.5
• Interview with members of the Japanese cast
• Interview with the CGI artist
• Interview with the character designer

Synopsis

The only way for humans to evolve further is through the brain....

And the body will follow suit. The streets have cleared for a showdown, and Jo will learn more about her past than she ever wanted to know. Will Jo rise to the challenge or will her own fate bring a dark cloud over her destiny?

Meanwhile, a new cybernetic police unit is put into commission in order to patrol the highways and keep the peace, but the malfunctioning unit has set its lethal eyes on Takane! Will the girls be able to fight off the powerful force holding her under its control?

Episodes comprise:
17. Dueling Angels
18. The Immortal Classmate
19. Hour Strategy
20. Blood Red Highway

Cover

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Review

After a decent set of episodes on the last volume, with one disc to go Burst Angel suddenly becomes a bit of a bore again.

Audio:
I opted to listen to a mix of both tracks for this review. The Japanese 5.1 track sounded really good when the action kicked in with the sound effects making nice use of the channels. Music and dialogue sounded crisp and clear as well, and I didn't notice any dropouts or distortions during regular playback.

The English dub, produced by FUNimation, is fairly well cast with all the girls fitting their roles quite well, although there's something about Jo's voice that bugs me a little bit (perhaps her being the focus of this disc brought that to the fore). I also love that FUNimation continue to dub songs, and dub them quite well.

Video:
Being a fairly new show from GONZO, we get a really nice anamorphic widescreen transfer for this series. I noticed no compression problems, no anti-aliasing and colours came out really vibrant and life-like. The series has quite an interesting look to it with its blend of a Western and sci-fi vibe, and it just looks really nice and helps you focus on the show itself.

Subtitles are in a nice yellow font, and are a good, clear size. Thankfully the subtitle problem that reared its head on the last volume seems fixed here.

My only issue with this disc is that, unlike the US release, for some reason Madman (who author the discs) or MVM decided not to include alternate angles. Although we again get the Japanese opening on this disc, I find it annoying that now we get no translation for the credits at all. Why can't we just have alternate angles like on Full Metal Alchemist and the US release?

Menu:
The menus are all static, with the main menu featuring a very cute image of Meg and Jo. On the right hand side we have the individual episode selection and the "Setup" and "Extras" options. The show's logo and volume title are just above them, with the funky opening theme playing over it. The two sub-menus are also static, with just text on the menu background. While they're definitely functional, they're also somewhat dull.

Extras:
This volume we get a familiar but nice selection of extras, including another dub commentary, which I always find fun but not too deep. We also get more radio dramas that appeared on the Japanese releases, presented here with subtitles as super-deformed images of the cast appear on screen. We get the lengthier "On Air Selection" 11 and 12, with three shorter bonus tracks as well. They're a lot of fun since we don't get to see these sorts of extras often, and it's great to hear the cast having a bit of fun! As an added bonus this volume we also get some interviews, one with the Japanese cast, one with the character designer and one talking about the CGI. Surprisingly, these are quite lengthy and pretty good to watch. We also get the textless opening and endings (both the English and Japanese versions) again.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Burst Angel is such a strange series. Every single time it seems to be improving with a good batch of episodes, and you really start thinking it's going to build on its momentum and actually start going somewhere, it lets you right back down and you're left wondering what was really going on when the creative team were coming up with these ideas. Of course, it's not the first GONZO series to suffer this kind of up and down fate, but it's disappointing for one that had a lot of potential.

The first episode on this disc focuses on Jo, picking up from the end of the last disc where Jo was left facing off against a giant demon with an unknown ally. The demon turns out to be a cybot, the same one that came after her in the last episode, and the pilot, Maria, triggers some more flashbacks for Jo. Although Jo doesn't recall who she is, Maria knows her intimately and has plenty to say as they showdown for a fight. They may be equals, but Jo needs to get the upper hand in order to put this fight behind her.

It all starts out well enough, but as the episode drew on I found myself want Maria to just stop with all the babble and get on with things. After all, there are only so many times we need to be reminded that Jo doesn't remember her past and so that gives Maria the upper hand. The continuing flashbacks to said past are interesting and occasionally revealing, but do get somewhat tiresome when they keep cropping up during key moments. But where the episode really starts to fall apart is when things go into the cyber world it's all apparently because they're fighting so intensely that they tore open a gateway in the fabric of space. OK, sure, how about something slightly more believable, since even in this world it's far-fetched. For an episode with some promise it's a big disappointment, as the potential of Jo's past finally coming back on her and Maria's appearance just aren't fully realised.

And then we get to the next three episodes, which were something of a bore. They're not the most awful episodes you'll ever see, in fact I'm sure many fans of the show could find them enjoyable, but the big problem with them is that they retread too much familiar ground and don't even attempt anything new. First we get an episode focussing on Kyohei, which in itself is a nice gesture since he's been sidelined so much recently, but it's a rather dull affair as he runs in to an old schoolmate who was bullied just like him. As they reminisce, Kyohei finds out that he has got hooked up with the local yakuza and is in trouble again (trouble apparently follows him around). When his adversaries finally come after him the whole thing is totally predictable, especially the person who tries to hand him over, but even funnier is that the boy is a cyborg now and isn't going to take the attack lying down.

As if that wasn't dull enough, the next episode sees the return of Takane from Osaka, and she goes to watch a filming of her favourite soap opera. But it's all disrupted when she mistakes the filming for reality and starts fighting on the set, and something sinister seems to be afoot. It turns out that some evil man and a few minions are sending messages out using the TV to try and control the minds of the citizens. Joy! And finally, to rap up the disc, we get a totally preposterous story about RAPT deploying a new cybot that deals with traffic enforcement, but it seems to be going out of control when it kills innocent people. But it turns out it's actually just weeding out some of the down and outs and you just know it's going to be left to the girls to deal with it.

Sound underwhelming? That's because it is! I found myself longing for the days of Meg getting captured and Jo coming to the rescue, as those earlier episodes were far more fun than the four on this disc. After the first episode went downhill and fizzled out, I was worried how the next ones would do. My fears were sadly realised as literally the episodes are all simple ideas we've seen a dozen times before, which wouldn't necessarily be a problem if they were well executed. After all, much of anime, and indeed TV in general, is just a rehash of other ideas with a slightly new twist. But these episodes here offer nothing new to the table, and are tried and tested stories without an ounce of spice in their execution.

It's just a huge disappointment to get a disc like this at this point, as we now have just four episodes left in the series and there's a sour taste in my mouth. Even the usually fun characters couldn't save the episodes here, and it certainly didn't help that they were completely sidelined for a whole episode here. The only good thing, knowing there are only four episodes left, is that there's no overall story to tie up (except maybe Jo's past) since nothing has really developed and there's certainly not an overall story here.

In Summary:
This is one of the most disappointing discs of Burst Angel, not just because it's the penultimate volume of the series, a point at which it should be at its best, but also because the episodes just ended up falling flat with none of the usual flair or fun character moments that usually make the episodes worthwhile. This disc almost completely turns my opinion of the series around, as I didn't really enjoy it much at all. I only hope that there's something redeeming in the final disc. (Anime-on-DVD)