DVD Review: Bleach Season 16, Part 1

This season finds the show’s hero, Ichigo Kurosaki, adjusting to normal life after losing his powers at the end of the previous story arc. No that that means things are quiet. He might not be able to see ghosts and he may be out of the Soul Reaper loop, but he still has plenty of teenage boy type stuff to worry about, from pushy bosses to annoying little sisters. Plus he’s hoping to cash in on his finely honed reflexes by hiring himself out to the school soccer and basketball teams…

All of this is handled brilliantly by the show’s creative team, with plenty of rambunctious comedy and scripts littered with cutting one-liners. After the sprawling, plot-heavy finale of the previous season, it’s a relief to see the show narrowing its focus onto the earthier territory of Ichigo’s domestic circle and high school buddies. This leaves plenty of space for the introduction of some extremely enjoyable new characters, a motley crew dubbed Xcution who hang out in a darkened nightclub. Whether they’re good guys or bad guys is hard to tell, but they put a proposal to Ichigo that might help him get back his powers. Cue some madcap scenes as Ichigo undergoes training by battling an angry talking pig and a sarcastic chicken.

Throughout this half-season, the show never puts a foot wrong. It’s full of winning humour and wild invention, and the great scripts are matched by frantic, high energy visuals. Last time round, there was a tiredness to some of animation, but here it’s top-notch – in a lanky, angular, gritty, gnarly way – from start to finish. It all culminates in an extraordinary transformation moment for Ichigo which is one of the standout sequences of recent seasons.

In short, the first half of Season 16 sees Bleach at its best, and feeling as it does like something of a new beginning for Ichigo, it’s also a great place for newbies to discover this constantly surprising and entertaining anime. 10/10

DVD Review: Samurai Bride

For those who missed it, Samurai Girls was a harem comedy set in an alternative Japan about a guy, name of Muneakira, who has the ability to turn hot girls into super-powered samurai vixens with a kiss. Actually, that’s the easy part. Getting them them to tow the line and work as a team … yeah, good luck with that, dude.

Having defeated the forces of evil in the first series, you’d expect things to look bright for the show’s ass-kicking heroines in this belated sequel, but instead some bad investments have left them seriously cash-strapped. Answer: turn their dojo into a maid cafe! Plus there’s the small matter of some reincarnated dark samurai who want to challenge the girls to a battle. Trouble is, their top warrior Jubei has temporarily lost her master samurai powers. Can she get her mojo back in time to save the dojo?

Not that there’s any great feeling of urgency in the first half of the series, which devotes itself to a series of whimsical plotlines – a competition to see who’s the No 1 maid, an early showdown with the dark samurai in a maid cafe challenge, a visit from a rowdy training instructor who teaches them to channel their ki, and an episode in which a panty-thieving monkey comes into contact with Muneakira’s lips and becomes the latest recruit to his team.

In the second half, though, the plot thickens and things become more action-orientated as the girls square up against a black, blobby evil spirit (to look at, a bit like No Face in Spirited Away) which is seeking a mystical stone vital for the protection of Japan. Cue a surprisingly hard-hitting and full-blooded denouement, with displays of suicidal heroism … and a few panty shots, of course.

Because there’s no doubt that the show’s raison d’etre is the fan service, with the scriptwriters forever taxing their brains for new reasons for the girls to take their clothes off (and uncensored nudity very much the order of the day). But to its credit, if there was ever a show that turned fan service into an art form, this is it. A lot of that is down to the quality of Studio Arms’ animation, which mixes grainy, grey pen-and-ink type backdrops with stained glass-style thick outlines and glowing colours to create visuals that are sumptuously rich and layered. The girls’ costumes may be barely there, but what there is of them is beautifully detailed, as is everything you see on screen. The show may be silly in concept, but it’s virtuoso in execution.

And the characters are genuinely funny, with brains of the team Yukimura and Sen shamelessly scheming, plotting and cheating their way through the maid cafe competition, and the hapless misfit Kanetsugu always there to throw a spanner in the best laid plans. Plus the dark samurai emerge as sympathetic characters in their own right as fractures appear between them and we learn more about their plight. Not the most politically correct of anime, but with its sharp one-liners and distinctive look, it’s sure to appeal to fans of the first series. 7/10

EXTRAS
Six 2 ½ minute-ish nicely animated comical shorts in which you get to see yet more of the main characters. There’s a swimsuit episode, a visit to the public baths, a piece in which Yukimura learns to use ki to expand her bust, another swimsuit episode … you get the idea. 6/10

DVD Review: RWBY Season 1

This American-made anime (from webseries maestros RoosterTeeth) centres around a character named Ruby Rose, who rocks a demure Little Red Hiding Hood outfit but who has an ungirlish passion for large, deadly weapons, her favourite being an oversized scythe-cum-sniper rifle that goes everywhere with her. Together with her older sister Yang, she’s packed off to a special academy where she can learn to hone her fighting prowess, and a good thing too, as all kinds of social discontent and criminal activities are brewing in the background.

The story is solid, if not very original. Once at the academy, the students are divided into teams and sent on training missions, a la Naruto, with a tournament or two for good measure. Battling gigantic monsters, the students have to cease bickering and get in some serious team bonding, while Ruby has to stop being such a weapon geek and become more of a people person. It’s a tale zestfully told, however, with voice acting and music both above average, and the series is given a real lift by the quality of the wise-cracking dialogue and the liveliness of the subsidiary characters, such as class bitch and know-it-all Weiss and Jaune, a hapless wimp who suffers from motion sickness and a lack of confidence but who gets taken in hand by Xena-type warrior girl Pyrrha.

Ultimately, though, how much you enjoy RWBY will depend upon whether you can take the show’s 3D CG animation, which has a decidedly cheap and cheerful look – stiff shoulders and banana fingers are the order of the day. Still, if you can get past that, there’s a lot to enjoy in this bright, good-humoured series. 6/10

EXTRAS
2-mins of footage of some cosplayers dressed up as the characters. ~ 7-min behind-the-scenes with the director, writers and producers, with some insights into the thinking behind the show, its development through the script stage and the 3D modelling. ~ 2 audio commentaries, one with the director and writers, the other with some of the voice cast – both are chatty and lively, although with the amount of in-jokes and laughter, it’s a bit like eavesdropping in on a private conversation in a bar. 7/10

DVD Review: Red Vs Blue Season 11

Machinima phenomenon Red Vs Blue returns for an eleventh outing, and this time the ill-fated grunts have crash-landed on a remote alien planet, where the two teams set up separate camps and are then left with nothing to do but get on each other’s nerves. Actually, that’s not quite fair – the long-suffering Washington tries to fix the radio and keep his team in check, the depressed Caboose gets himself a pet attack droid called Freckles, and Sarge – who seems to be growing more senile and unreasonable by the minute – discovers a passion for interior design.

At first glance Red Vs Blue can seem like a bit of a one trick pony, getting repeat laughs from the incongruous sight of the heavily armoured marines losing it, falling out, bickering like children and being prone to all kinds of foibles. But the show’s writers keep the wisecracks coming thick and fast, and the tone of the humour – knowing, wry, with an undertone of existential melancholy – is very cool and engaging, reminiscent at times of the old John Carpenter classic Dark Star. Plus, as well as the various absurdist situations which occur, there’s a slow-burning plot of sorts which eventually erupts in a genuinely exciting way. All in all, a season that should delight fans and promises plenty more enthralling colour-coded misadventures to come. 6/10

EXTRAS
7 mins of jokey extras with the Red and Blue teams. ~ A brief (5-min) but interesting behind-the-scenes, in which the creative team discuss their approach to the series, and you get to hear the actors speaking in their normal voices. ~ An audio commentary with the writer/director and cast, with some technical chat about making the show and using graphics from Halo. 7/10