DVD
REVIEW: BLOOD+ VOLUME TWO
06/15/08
In March 11, 2007 Blood +
made its day view in Cartoon Networks’ Adult Swim. It
fascinated a great amount of anime fans, for its plot and
action. The show consisted of 25 aired every Sunday between
12:30 am to 1:00 am, and with 7 episodes to the end it was
moved to the 1:30 - 2:00 am space. Blood+ was last shown in
March 23, 2008. Nonetheless, the series obtained a great
amount of fans who were captivated by its fascinating and
intelligent story, along with a beautiful animation. It made
sense for Sony Picture Television that after its success to
Release the DVD series. In March 8 2008 two different
options were released to the public a collectors Box set
including the whole first season, 25 episodes, along with
special features and a more affordable single DVD with the
first 5 episodes of the series. Blood+ Volume Two is the
second disk with the next 5 episodes of the series, in which
continues to mesmerize the audience with Saya’s epic
adventure.
In Blood+ Volume Two, Saya found out about her powers,
allies, enemies, and mission. It was an small but convincing
introduction filled with a lot of action to catch the
audience interest. In Volume two the story gets more
elaborate becoming a great ride of adventure, action,
romance, friendship, lost, and blood. As the series
progresses the viewer begins to understand more of Saya’s
past along with the other characters, since each episode
shows us a deeper characteristics and background of each
character, without interfering in the main story, also new
characters are introduced at this point to refresh and build
up the series, and one loved character leaves the series in
this volume. The settings of the story are also in constant
change, during these five episodes the audience is moved
from high tech top Secret army bases in Okinawa to beautiful
gothic monasteries in Vietnam. All the characters and
settings are well drawn and animated in a way that it is
impossible to not feel something for them, they add their
share to the plot. In this volume a new characteristic is
known about Saya’s annoying little Brother, Riku that seems
to be linked with the Chiropterans. As in the first volume,
the animation is fantastic and remarkable, the animators and
writers did a great job depicting countries like Vietnam and
the consequences of the war in its people, and of course the
action sequences are magnificent. Aside the animation and
story another impressive point of the series is its sound,
which has been produced by Academy Award Winner Hans Zimmer
and equally talented composer Mark Manzina.
Blood + is an exceptional anime series, the way is written
and displayed extraordinarily. The second volume is charming
and amusing, each episode would submerged you into a
beautiful fantasy world with imaginative, enigmatic, and
charismatic characters that would leave the audience
pleased. The only letdown of the DVD is that it is in full
screen version, and as in the first volume, 5 episodes are
not enough. It begins by solving the problem left in the
first volume, and then it enters in a batch where we meet
new characters and learn something about old ones, then it
starts moving rapidly and when everything seems to be
getting to its apex: it finishes. leaving the audience
asking for more, it is without a doubt a marketing strategy.
I recommend this DVD for fans of the series who have not yet
bought the box set, or have the first volume. For new
watchers, this is a great series, but I recommend to watch
the first volume before seeing this one since it will help
in understand the plot.
VIDEO:
Video: Full screen 1.33:1 Mastered in High Definition
AUDIO:
Audio: Stereo,
English and Japanese
Subtitle: English, French and Korean
SPECIAL FEATURES: It is
a shame that the Volume Two, as its predecessor, does not
have any Special features, but then again the series by
itself is more than enough for the anime fans. What I really
like, and I always say this, is that the default format is
in Japanese with English Subtitles, but if you are lazy and
do not want to be reading you can set it in English as well.
RATING BREAK DOWN:
| FILM REVIEW |
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VIDEO |
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AUDIO |
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| BONUS
FEATURES |
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Review
By Milo
milo@smartcine.com
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