Anime Catalogue
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Aquarion Volume 4 
Details
Director: Shôji Kawamori
Catalogue Number: MVD2289
Certificate: 12
Date Released: March 15th 2010
Screen: Widescreen 16:9
Languages: Japanese; English
Subtitles: English
Duration: 150 minutes
Extras
Music videos
Manga style silent movie
Trailers
Synopsis
Betrayal and death raise the stakes of this end-times battle that is systematically destroying two species. Each believes itself just and moral, the passionate humans and the ancient Shadow Angels. The smoldering debris from the collision of two souls over 12,000 years past has rained destruction for the ages, eons of legends and pain meeting up with the truth as Aquarion soars over Atlandia, on a collision course with fate.
Contains episodes 21-26.
Cover
click image to view large version
To view the whole cover... click here
Review
Ah! My Goddess’s first season draws to a close, with more of a whimper than anything else as the show is still steering clear of doing anything that might annoy fans of the franchise. The end result is okay as far as it goes, but somehow lacking…
Audio:
Audio for this release is provided in Japanese and English 2.0 stereo
- I listened to the Japanese track for this review. The soundtrack is
clear, with dialogue being easy to pick out over the background effects,
and good use is made of the soundstage to give direction to speech. There
were no obvious encoding problems.
Video:
Video is presented in 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen, and after the disappointing
quality of the OVA's release is a joy to watch. The quality of the animation
is high, with good use of colour and detail to give a very vibrant feel
to the series. The encoding does justice to the source material, too,
with no noticeable problems to spoil one very good-looking release.
Menu:
A flurry of feathers brings the main menu into view, with an image of
Belldandy taking centre stage and a series of clips from the show drifting
past in bubbles. Submenus are provided for Setup and Extras - these are
each static screens, with Belldandy featuring on the Setup menu. Options
are also provided for Play All and for direct access to each episode.
Extras:
Art galleries are the order of the day again – three this time,
one each for production artwork, cover artwork from the Japanese DVD release,
and screenshots from this release.
Content: (please note that content portions of a
review will contain spoilers)
Urd's awakening as the Lord of Terror leads to problems in heaven, as
the resulting power surge crashes the Yggdrasil system and leaves heaven
open to attack by demonic forces. Belldandy's aware of what that could
mean, so takes it upon herself to break the seal on her own powers - an
act that could cost her more than just her Goddess license - and try to
deal with the problem herself. Urd, meanwhile, is enjoying tormenting
Keiichi and Marller, and plotting to unleash the Ultimate Destruction
Program - a way of releasing the demon hordes upon Earth. Activating the
Program involves unleashing a very specific amount of chaos first - Belldandy's
determined that Urd's not going to get the chance to do that, but she
hadn't counted on the Lord of Terror's deviousness...
It’s not often that Ah! My Goddess does anything that could truly be life-threatening for some of the characters, but that’s what we get here, and it’s done really well. While it’s not really what the series is “designed” for, if you like, the two episodes that deal with the Lord of Terror are almost action stories. Perhaps I’d just reached my tolerance limit for romantic comedy, but this story pushed all the right buttons with me – and there was enough humour dropped into the mix to make sure that it didn’t feel too out-of-place compared to the rest of the series.
The final two episodes take the opportunity to take a slightly different look at Urd and Skuld, with Urd taking on the form of a young girl in one and having to deal with a young boy who quickly falls in love with her, and Skuld becoming a full-grown woman in the other and discovering that her feelings for Keiichi aren’t just grounded in jealousy.
The Skuld episode is probably the better of the two – I haven’t really liked the way that Skuld was portrayed in this series (too much of a spoilt brat), but her episode here finally begins to address that and brings her personality more into line with the image I had in my head of her from past exposure to the A!MG universe. Her “date” with Keiichi provides some good moments of fun, while also giving her a few touching little scenes that show that while she’s still a little girl, she’s maybe beginning to grow up on the inside.
Urd’s episode is almost the opposite of that – she’s just a big kid at heart anyway (bottle of sake notwithstanding), and her chance to be a little kid and play with other little kids is something she seizes with both hands, as she knows it isn’t going to last for long. The story here is enjoyable enough, but didn’t grab me quite as well as the other episodes on the disc did.
If you’re looking for any of the fringe characters to get a decent run out, this isn’t the disc for you – Marller features briefly in the first episode, but most this release is all about Keiichi and the three goddesses. As the final disc in the season, that’s appropriate enough, but it does limit things a bit.
Of course, while it’s the final disc in the season, it’s not the final disc in the series, as 2nd season Flights of Fancy will be arriving in the UK in January, courtesy of ADV That means I can’t really criticise for the lack of any Belldandy / Keiichi resolution (which has never going to happen, anyway), or the way the season didn’t end on a real high but instead almost petered out with the Urd & Skuld stories – there’s no need to do anything really special when you’re not done yet. In a way, that’s Ah! My Goddess’ biggest failing – it’ll never be done, really. While I do enjoy the series, I’m also used to my anime eventually coming to an end, and we don’t get that here.
In summary:
As another disc in a long-running series, this volume of Ah! My Goddess
delivers exactly what you’d expect from it, with the added bonus
of some real action as the Lord of Terror is dealt with. From that point
of view, it’s perfectly enjoyable and, if you’ve enjoyed what
you’ve seen so far, it’s well worth picking up. I can’t
help but feel that I’d enjoy it more if there was an end in sight,
though – and as yet, there isn’t. (Mania)