German distributor Peppermint Anime is gearing up for their new release of Kill la Kill and they’ve put together a new dub clip for it. They didn’t do a lot of clips during the run of singles previously so it’s welcome to get another new clip this time around as we get some awkward family time. The company has a complete collection set on Blu-ray coming up on November 30th, 2018 and the clip showcases some good pieces from it below.

Check out our review of the first volume of the five-volume North American home video release.

Plot concept: Ryuuko Matoi is a vagrant school girl traveling from place to place searching for clues to the truth behind her father’s death—the “woman with the scissor blade.” The journey has led Ryuuko to Honnouji Academy.

Honnouji Academy—where an elite group of students is granted superhuman power by their special uniforms called the “Goku uniform.” With the power of the uniform, the student body president, Satsuki Kiryuin rules the students with unquestioned power and fear.

Satsuki holds the secret to the “scissor blade” and Ryuuko confronts Satsuki to gain information but… Was their encounter a mere coincidence or fate? The clash between the two will soon consume the whole academy!

© Kazuhiro Fujita · Shogakukan / Twin Engine

The fall 2018 anime series Karakuri Circus is coming to us from Studio VOLN through Amazon with a thirty-six episode plan for it. The official site is rolling out some new promotion for the eighth episode that’s set to land on November 29th, 2018 that gives us a taste of what’s to come. Satoshi Nishimura is directing it based on the series composition by Toshiki Inoue and Kazuhiro Fujita. Takahiro Yoshimatsu is the character designer for it.

The Japanese cast includes Chihiro Ueda as Masaru Saiga, Rikiya Koyama as Narumi Katō, Megumi Hayashibara as Shirogane Saiga, Takahiro Sakurai as Eiryō Ashihana, Nozomu Sasaki as Gii Christoph Resh, Tomoyo Kurosawa as Talanda “Lise” Liselotte Tachibana, Marina Inoue as Vilma Thorne, Hisao Egawa as Shinobu Nakamachi, Ryōta Iwasaki as Noriyuki “Nori” Nakamachi, Kaito Ishikawa as Hiroo “Hiro” Nakamachi, Jun Fukuyama as Arlecchino, Jouji Nakata as Pantalone, Aoi Yūki as Columbine, and Ryūzaburō Ōtomo as Dottore.

The anime project comes from the manga by Kazuhiro Fujita as serialized in Weekly Shonen Sunday between 1997 and 2006 where it had forty-three volumes produced for it.

Fujita’s not exactly a well-known name but he’s had some very popular works. His Ushio & Tora series that finished in 1996 got a big remake recently and he’s currently producing the Sou-Bou-Tei Must Be Destroyed Manga that’s in Weekly Shonen Sunday. His other big series is the twenty-nine volume run of Moonlight Act, which makes us wonder if that’s being looked at as well.

Check out the official site and Twitter.

Plot Concept: The story focuses on Masaru Saiga, a fifth-grade boy who aims to become a puppeteer. After Sadayoshi Saiga — the CEO of the giant home telephone maker Saiga and Masaru’s father — passes away, Masaru inherits 18 billion yen. Masaru is targeted for his wealth, and is saved by two people. Narumi Katō is a man who has studied Kung-Fu and has a weird illness called “Zonapha Syndrome,” and Shirogane is a silver-haired woman who controls the puppet “Arurukan” (Harlequin). Together, Masaru, Narumi, and Shirogane get thrown into various conspiracies by those who would try to steal Masaru’s fortune.

© SORASAKI.F

The fall 2018 original anime series Release the Spyce is getting its home video releases handled by X and they’ve set a standard release pattern for it. With a few weeks to go until the first volume hits we now have a look at the cover in large form as well as the packaging as a whole that will define the run. The twelve episode series is getting a six-volume release beginning on December 19th, 2018. The DVDs are priced at 6,000 yen each while the Blu-rays are priced at 7,000 yen each. Check the full schedule below.

Takahiro is handling the series composition and overall plan while Namori is working on the original character designs with Satoshi Ishino adapting them for animation. Lay-duce is working on the animation production.

The Japanese cast includes Yukari Anzai as Momo Minamoto, Manami Numakura as Yuki Hanzoumon, Akane Fujita as Fuu Sagami, Aya Suzakias Mei Yachiyo, Yuri Noguchi as Goe Ishikawa, Aya Uchida as Hatsume Aoba, Shizuka Itou as Bunchō no Onna, Risa Taneda as Theresia, Aina Suzuki as Byakko, and Saori Hayami as Dolte.

A novelization started previously with Release the Spyce: Golden Genesis in Dengeki G’s as well as a manga from Meia Mizuki in Dengeki G’s Comics.

The opening theme song has several of the actors performing “Supatto! Spy & Spice” with Yukari Anzai, Manami Numakura, Aya Suzaki, Akane Fujita, Aya Uchida, and Yuri Noguchi while the ending theme song will be done as the characters themselves with “Hide & Seek” using the group name of Tsukikage.

Check out the official site and Twitter.

Property Concept: The series is about a girl named Momo who attends high school in the city of Sorasaki. However, she is secretly a member of Tsukikage, an intelligence agency that protects people. As a new member of the agency, she works alongside her colleagues including her senior Yuki and friends. Together, they work to establish peace in the city.

Release the Spyce Japanese Volume 1 Cover

Release the Spyce Japanese Volume 1 Packaging

[Source: Release the Spyce]

The third season of Attack on Titan is on pause until it returns in the spring of 2019 but there’s still promotion to roll out. The folks at Funimation are doing some new bits for it with a new dubbed clip that keeps things in a quieter tone as Eren begins to have more memories from his past surface! Funimation is doing the dub for it soon while also handling the simulcast while Crunchyroll is streaming the series to viewers in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Nordics, Netherlands, South Africa, Central and South America.

Based on the original manga by Hajime Isayama, Tetsuro Araki served as the general director with Koizuka Masashi working on the series composition for the first season. Yasuko Kobayashi worked on the character designs while Kyoji Asano served as the Chief Animation Director. WIT STUDIO produced the animation.

The Japanese cast includes Yuuki Kaji as Eren Jaeger, Marina Inoue as Armin Arlelt, Yui Ishikawa as Mikasa Ackerman, Daisuke Ono as Erwin, Hiroshi Kamiya as Levi, Keiji Fujiwara as Hannes, Kishō Taniyama as Jean Kirschtein, Hiro Shimono as Conny Springer, Romi Park as Hanji, Ryota Ohsaka as Marco Bodt, Shiori Mikami as Christa Renz, Tomohisa Hashizume as Bertholt Hoover, Yoshimasa Hosoya as Reiner Braun, Yu Kobayashi as Sasha Browse and Yu Shimamura as Annie Leonhardt.

Series premise: Centuries ago, mankind was slaughtered to near extinction by monstrous humanoid creatures called titans, forcing humans to hide in fear behind enormous concentric walls. What makes these giants truly terrifying is that their taste for human flesh is not born out of hunger but what appears to be out of pleasure. To ensure their survival, the remnants of humanity began living within defensive barriers, resulting in one hundred years without a single titan encounter. However, that fragile calm is soon shattered when a colossal titan manages to breach the supposedly impregnable outer wall, reigniting the fight for survival against the man-eating abominations.

After witnessing a horrific personal loss at the hands of the invading creatures, Eren Yeager dedicates his life to their eradication by enlisting into the Survey Corps, an elite military unit that combats the merciless humanoids outside the protection of the walls. Based on Hajime Isayama’s award-winning manga, Shingeki no Kyojin follows Eren, along with his adopted sister Mikasa Ackerman and his childhood friend Armin Arlert, as they join the brutal war against the titans and race to discover a way of defeating them before the last walls are breached.

The fall season is underway and things are coming together well across the streaming services. Funimation has a few simulcasts on tap today along with several dubs while HIDIVE is getting their Release the Spyce dubcast underway along with the latest simulcast. Crunchyroll has a lot of shows on tap today that are pretty big including more Sword Art Online and Fairy Tail alongside more Goblin Slayer.

Crunchyroll:

• 7:00am – ACE ATTORNEY SEASON 2
• 7:15am – RADIANT
• 7:30am – CASE CLOSED
• 7:40am – CARDFIGHT!! VANGUARD
• 11:30am – GOBLIN SLAYER
• 11:30am – SWORD ART ONLINE ALICIZATION
• 1:40pm – SSSS.GRIDMAN
• 5:30pm – FAIRY TAIL FINAL SEASON
• 9:30pm – GEGEGE NO KITARO (2018)
• 11:30pm – THE JOURNEY HOME

Funimation:

• 12:00 PM – Sword Art Online Episode 7 Japanese Simulcast Free TV-14
• 12:39 PM – SSSS.GRIDMAN Episode 7 Simulcast Premium TV-14
• 4:00 PM – Conception Episode 5 Simulcast Premium TV-14
• 4:00 PM – RADIANT Episode 5 Simulcast Premium TV-14
• 5:30 PM – Fairy Tail Episodes 284-285 Simulcast Premium TV-14
• 9:00 PM – One Piece Episode 863 Simulcast Free TV-14

HIDIVE:

• 12:38pm – Release the Spyce (Sub), Ep 8
• ??? – Release the Spyce (Dubcast), Ep 1

© Sunrise / Project G-Akito / Character Design ©2006-2011 CLAMP·ST

With Bandai Visual having brought out the Code Geass: Akito the Exiled as a run of singles over several years revealed a few months ago that they’re going to have it all compiled into a final box set to get those stragglers with. The new set is scheduled for a January 29th, 2019 release and we now have a look at the packaging design for it that looks great. The set will be priced at 18,000 yen. The set will have all five installments of the series and will come with both Japanese and English subtitles as it’s spread across three discs. While no on-disc extras have been revealed at the moment it does confirm that a newly illustrated box will be designed for it.

Check out our review of the series.

The OVAs were picked up for release in North America by FUNimation and has been licensed in Australia by Madman. The original Code Geass series was licensed in North America by Bandai Entertainment but had fallen out of print since the closure of the company. FUNimation picked up the rights to both properties back in the summer of 2013 and released the TV series in October 2016.

Plot Concept: Leila Malcal, commander of her very own W-0 unit for the European army, takes on dangerous missions with her powerful and mysterious lieutenant, Akito Hyuga. With a group of rebels on their side, they fight the Britannian army but face more than the typical perils of war. A foe from Akito’s past seeks his life and a dark power threatens all that Leila has worked for.

Code Geass – Akito the Exiled Japanese Box Set Packaging

[Source: Code Geass]

One of the true classics of anime and one of the titles that was a turning point for the industry, Megazone 23 Part 1 delivers the goods.

What They Say
Street racer Shogo Yahagi’s having a lousy week. The military’s after him, the government can’t help him and his new set of wheels is so hot that it may cost him his life! And that’s only the beginning of his problems; the world that Shogo and his friends have lived in for their entire lives isn’t even real, and now their only hope is an artificial intelligence that may or may not be telling them the truth about the fate of the human race!

The Review:
Audio: 
The audio presentation for this release brings us the original Japanese language as well as the at the time new English language dub. Having seen this show so many times over the years, it just doesn’t feel right to listen to it in any other language as I’ve gotten so used to it so we listened to this release in its original language of Japanese. The stereo mix is very well done here considering the age of the materials and it sounds very solid without anything going too high or clipping. We did spot check the English track in a few scenes in its 5.1 mix and liked how that came out a lot. While there isn’t a lot of heavy directionality to it, everything sounds much more crisp and distinct.

Video: 
Originally released back in 1985, the transfer for this OVA is presented here in its original full frame format. With it just nearing its twentieth anniversary, the materials here really shine especially in comparison to past releases. Just in the start of the program it looks so fresh and vibrant that it’s hard to believe it’s as old as it is. Colors look very rich and solid for its time with a wide variety of colors used. There are a few touches of cross coloration in a few areas where the animation is very tight and detailed and some of the panning sequences have some aliasing going on, but most of it is just inherent in something of this age. The only thing that really shows the age of the materials other than the designs in the show is some of the dust and nicks that are on it throughout. These are pretty minimal in general but they do show up and it does give it an older feel, but it also just doesn’t feel right without some of that showing up.

Packaging: 
It took long enough but this series has finally gotten some very good looking covers, compared to both past VHS and DVD releases by other publishers. Going with a green color based off of Yui, there are stripes along the top and bottom that contain a really great shot of the two leads set against the city. The original logo along with a translated one along the top with what I consider a very important phrase kept, “Original Video Animation”. I was so pleased to see that left there since it’s something that’s really fallen into disuse over the years but is very important to this show. The back cover uses the stripe effect a bit more and provides a decent summary of the show and several shots of animation. The discs extras and technical features are all clearly listed and easy to read. The insert is a gorgeous four panel fold-out poster of Eve done as a watercolor style piece by Mikimoto (I think). This looks to be one of the pieces used ages ago by the style and the lettering used and it gives me a warm feeling. The reverse side of the poster has a number of production sketches and a lot of text going over the origins of the show and how it transitioned from a planned TV series to an OVA as well as a look at the various characters and mechanics of the series.

Menu: 
The menu layout uses the varying green stripe effect to a good use here with the logo and some of the sketch designs along the top and the few selections lined underneath it set to some of the strong instrumental music from the show. The layout is easy to navigate and has a few cute 80’s quirks with the computer style with fast access times and now transitional animations to deal with.

Extras: 
The extras are minimal but deep depending on your point of view. The first extra is a series of production sketches that cover a variety of areas. The second extra is something we don’t get often from ADV and one that I just can’t get enough of in general and that’s a commentary track with Matt Greenfield along with David Williams and Janice Williams. Matt’s commentaries, particularly with the older shows, are just so richly filled with trivia and golden nuggets of information that really enhances your viewing of the show. With a show like this, there are tons of in-jokes and “visiting” characters from other series in addition to all the nuances from the creators themselves that I’d almost expect that Matt could do the commentary twice and not cover the same territory twice. While the transfer and new dub are worth an upgrade alone from previous versions, it’s this commentary track that I think adds the most value over all the previous ones.

The premise is pretty straightforward as we’re introduced to young “punk” Shogo and his friends as they live their lives in the city of Tokyo in the mid 1980’s. They’re all young and living the big life in one of the most exciting cities in the world. Shogo’s their leader of sorts with his wild nature and his most excellent motorcycle skills. As we see the small group of friends living their life and enjoying everything, the basic theme of “living in the happiness of the now” is very strong with them and with youth in general at this time in history. Shogo and his friends have the world at their fingertips and are living it up. Shogo’s luck is even looking up after he has a brief run in with a young woman named Yui and she gives in to his charms and gives him the phone number of the store she works at.

But when his luck goes up it also goes down as he later meets up with his friend who works for an important research company in their garage. He shows Shogo a new motorcycle that his company has been building, the Bahamut, a very futuristic and fairly big looking bike that’s nothing like anything else out there. But as Shogo learns, there’s some things you shouldn’t remove from company research labs as the men in black arrive and demand the bike back, shooting first and asking questions later. Shogo manages to snatch the bike and escape but not before his friend is killed and the thugs manage to get a clue as to who he is. Shogo’s now on the run and trying to keep what happened a secret while trying to figure out how to avenge his dead friend.

As it turns out, Yui is the newest roommate with two of his good girl friends so he’s somewhat surprised to find that they’re all together now and he ends up using her garage as a place to store the bike after he gets some other friends to check it out. One thing leads to another and Shogo’s out again with Tomomi on the bike as he tries to figure out how he’s going to deal with this bike. Before they know it they’re being chased by the cops and the head into one of the tunnels, only to find the bike activating some of the guard barriers to disappear and reappear behind them, leading them off into another tunnel that they normally would even think of going down. Tomomi’s got her 16mm camera handy and before they know it, the section of road they’re on starts lowering and moving, before rising again and leading them into a massive area where a dark and empty city is both laid out below them and above them with a power source of some sort in the center.

It’s from here that Shogo starts to learn about what their world is really like and the forces that are operating with in it to try and steer it into a new future. Shogo comes up against various military forces with different goals and a computer presence that’s trying to protect everything and everyone from knowing what’s really going on. Shogo tries to deal with all of them, especially after the computer presence known as EVE tries to get his help, and finds himself being thrust into situations he doesn’t know how to handle well. This comes across particularly well when he goes up to Yui at one point and demands sex from her.

Megazone 23 continues to be an OVA that I have the hardest time trying to express what it is and what makes it so appealing to me outside of some of the basics. There’s a great element of mystery as we learn what’s really going on in this city and that plays a strong point to it. Another is that since it was being done at the same time Macross was becoming so popular there’s the inclusion of the idol singer that’s important to the storyline, so there’s a great mix of music and storytelling going on as well. Even more appealing for me is that for the idol singer character they brought in a guest character designer, Haruhiko Mikimoto. I’ve adored his material for years and his distinctive style is still strongly appealing, so going back to when he was much more active in anime is a huge plus, even for just one character.

One thing that makes this release all the more engaging this time around is that we’re getting the follow-up parts in a timely manner. Past publishers have only had the rights to the first part and never followed up, so knowing that I’m going to get to see the rest again after so many years has me even more interested in it.

In Summary: 
Megazone 23 is old school anime at its height. This is from the time before the animators and studios had to be concerned with things like copyrights and overly protective owners, so you have all sorts of very detailed items from mid 80’s Japan, from the cola cans down to the McDonald’s menu. There is so much in this show that references other shows and gives nods to the big guys at the time that the more anime you watch the more you get. This is even truer now that the US studios are going back and getting more 80’s anime, so things some of us are seeing for the time now only help shows like this even more. Megazone 23 fits the bill of 80’s science fiction anime with its heroic leads, lots of women and plenty of equipment that really makes no sense in how it would actually work, but it’s filled with lots of style and energy of a group of animators and storytellers who were doing something very new at the time.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 5.1 Language, English Subtitles, Production sketches, Commentary with director Matt Greenfield and production staff members David Williams and Janice Williams, LE Item: Megazone 23 mouse pad w/box release

Content Grade: A-
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: A-
Packaging Grade: A-
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: A

Released By: ADV Films
Release Date: June 1st, 2004
MSRP: $24.98/$34.98
Running Time: 85 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

© JD & Tohokushinsha

The 1973-1974 anime series Zero Tester ran for 66-episodes across two different names and was previously slotted for some new DVD collections in Japan. The first set is coming up in a week and we now have artwork for that and the second collection at the end of next month. With an even split of 33 episodes per set, the show is coming out from TC Entertainment with each set priced at 22,000 yen on November 30th, 2018 and December 21st, 2018 respectively.  The show last saw box set releases in 2003.

Based on the original work by Yoshitake Suzuki, it was directed by Ryousuke Takahashi with character designs by Munehiro Minowa. Sunrise handled the animation production.

The Japanese cast includes Akira Kamiya as Shin Fubuki, Iemasa Kayumi as Moebius, Kiyoshi Kawakubo as Dr. Tachibana, Noriko Ohara as Hiroshi, Ryusei Nakao as Gou Araishi, Taichirou Hirokawa as Tsutomu Kenmotsu, and Youko Asagami as Lisa.

Plot Concept:  A series of space accidents turn out to be the work of the Armanoid aliens, who plan to conquer Earth. Professor Tachibana gathers a team around him at the Future Science Invention Center and prepares five state-of-the-art vehicles for Shin, Go, Lisa, and Captain Kenmotsu. Three of the Tester vehicles combine to make the giant Zero Tester robot.

Zero Tester Japanese Volume 1 Cover

Zero Tester Japanese Volume 2 Cover

[Source: Zero Tester]

© Mizuki Mozuki, Akizuki Ichiba / DEF STUDIOS

The summer 2018 anime series Kyoto Teramachi Sanjou no Holmes is getting its home video release being handled Victor Entertainment and they’ve set a decent schedule for it. The second volume has just landed and we now have some larger artwork for it that we can share as we see more of the layout for this series. The show began its release run on October 26th, 2018 where the twelve episode series is getting a four-volume release. The DVDs are priced at 5,800 yen and the Blu-rays at 6,800 yen. Check out the full plan for it below.

Tokiyoshi Sasaki directed it with Kenichi Yamashita handling the series composition. Yousuke Itou served as the chief animation director and character designer with studio Seven handling the animation production.

The Japanese cast includes Miyu Tomiya as Aoi Mashiro, Kaito Ishikawa as Yagashira Kiyotaka, Ryohei Kimura as Akihito Kajiwara, Koji Yusa as Ensho, Sanae Kobayashi as Rikyu Takiyama, Rikiya Koyama as Seiji Yagashira, Yōji Ueda as Takeshi Yagashira, Suzuna Kinoshita as Kaori Miyashita, and Yui Horie as Saori Miyashita.

Based on the novel series by Mai Mochizuki, it began back in 2015 with ten volumes released in print form so far after being published online through Everystar. A manga adaptation had its first volume released in March 2018 from Ichiha Akizuki.

Check out the official site and Twitter.

Plot Concept: Aoi Mashiro, who has been a high school student for six months, came to an antique store Kura in Teramachi Sanjou shopping street to estimate an antique item owned by her late grandfather. The appraiser there is good-looking, elegant, and polite, but is very sharp to the extent that he has a nickname Holmes, and he immediately realized that she brought the antique without letting her family know. Kiyotaka suggested Aoi, who is in need of money no matter what, to work in Kura as a part-timer. Since that day, Aoi experienced various incidents around Kyoto with the antiques.

Kyoto Teramachi Sanjou no Holmes Japanese Volume 2 Cover

Kyoto Teramachi Sanjou no Holmes Japanese Volume 1 Cover

[Source: Kyoto Teramachi Sanjou no Holmes]

The summer 2018 anime series Angels of Death is getting its home video release handled by Kadokawa and they’ve set a shorter plan for it. We’ve got just the first volume out in Japan and now we’re a couple of days away from the second where we have a look at the design and color intent with the run.  The sixteen-episode series is getting a four-volume release that began on October 24th, 2018. The DVDs are priced at 11,000 yen each while the Blu-ray’s are priced at 13,000 yen each. Check the schedule and details below!

The show is being directed by Kentaro Suzuki based on the series composition by Yoshinobu Fujioka. Miki Matsumoto is on board as the character designer and serving as the chief animation director with JC Staff producing the animation.

The previously announced Japanese cast includes Nobuhiko Okamoto as Zack and Haruka Chisuga as Rachel, Takahiro Sakurai as Danny, Natsumi Fujiwara as Eddie, and Mariya Ise as Cathy.

Masaaki Endoh is on board to perform the opening theme song while Haruka Chisuga is handling the ending theme song, both of which will get a CD single release on July 25th, 2018.

Yen Press is releasing the manga in North America.

Check out the official site and Twitter.

Plot Concept: 13-year old Rachel awakens to find herself trapped in the basement of an abandoned building. Without any memories or even a clue as to where she could be, she wanders the building, lost and dizzy. In her search, she comes across a man covered in bandages. He introduces himself as Zack and he wields a grim-reaper like sickle.

A strange bond is struck between them, strengthened by strange, crazy promises…

These two, trapped in this strange building, don’t know why fate has placed them there. But they will work together desperately to find a way out…

Angels of Death Japanese Volume 2 Cover

Angels of Death Japanese Volume 1 Packaging

Angels of Death Japanese Volume 1 Cover

[Source: Angels of Death]

© Yoichi Takahashi / Nippon Animation

TC Entertainment is going back to another slightly older title that’s under the radar these days with the 2002 series Hungry Heart: Wild Striker. While it had several overseas broadcasts in South America and Europe it didn’t get any attention in North America. TC Entertainment has set a January 30th, 2019 release for it as a complete DVD set with 52 episodes. It’ll be priced at 24,000 yen with six discs included and a booklet as well. No on-disc extras are currently listed.

The series was directed by Satoshi Saga based on the scripts by Yoshiyuki Suga. Kenichi Imaizumi served as the character designer with Tetsuro Aoki as the chief animation director. Nippon Animation handled the animation production.

The show is based on the manga by Youichi Takahashi who also created Captain Tsubasa.

Plot Concept: Kyusuke Kanou, a robust teenager of 16 sports orange hair and aspires to conquer the world of soccer as a forward. But somehow the shadow of his renowned elder brother Seisuke, a midfielder for AC Milan falls upon his career. Threatened by inferiority complex, he decides to give up soccer. Yet, destiny reunites him with football as he accidentally becomes the coach of the women’s soccer team of his school . Thus, his journey to fulfill his dream begins portraying his path of struggle. Backed by his helpful teammates and wellwishers like Miki, the girl’s soccer team captain and Mori, the manager, he proceeds forward in life.

[Source: Hungry Heart]

© Kore Yamazaki / Mag Garden

Funimation revealed previously at NYCC that will be coming out early next year with the first part of The Ancient Magus’ Bride. The show will be getting a bilingual DVD/BD/Digital release that will arrive on January 29th, 2018 and now the first trailer for the release has landed. It provides a look at the show in dubbed form with the themes and style of it all. The extras will include the 3-part prequel OVA “Those Awaiting a Star” and the Twitter Q&A with director Kyle Phillips and voice actors Dani Chambers (“Chise”) and Brian Mathis (“Elias”)

The series is based on the manga by manga creator Kore Yamazaki and had Norihiro Naganuma directing it based on the series composition by Aya Takaha. Hirotaka Kato handled the character designs for it.

The English language had had Kyle Phillips directing based on the scripts by Bonny Clinkenbeard with the two leads cast with Dani Chambers as Chise Hatori and Brian Mathis as Elias Ainsworth.

Known as Mahou Tsukai no Yome in its original Japanese form, Seven Seas Entertainment acquired The Ancient Magus Bride manga back in 2014 for release. The manga series comes from Kore Yamazaki, their third professionally published work, and the first North American volume landed in May 2015. The series is currently being serialized in Monthly Comic Garden with six volumes have been released so far in Japan.

Plot concept: Hatori Chise is only 16, but she has lost far more than most. With neither family nor hope, it seems all doors are closed to her. But, a chance encounter began to turn the rusted wheels of fate. In her darkest hour, a mysterious magus appears before Chitose, offering a chance she couldn’t turn down. This magus who seems closer to demon than human, will he bring her the light she desperately seeks, or drown her in ever deeper shadows?

The fall season is underway and things are coming together well across the streaming services. We’ve got a big new week ahead of us tomorrow but until then there’s anime to enjoy. HIDIVE has another new dub up while Funimation runs through a few dubs themselves. Crunchyroll has the most on tap including more Boruto for the fans and the latest Tsurune.

Crunchyroll:

• 4:00am – BORUTO: NARUTO NEXT GENERATIONS
• 10:00am – DOUBLE DECKER! DOUG & KIRILL
• 10:30am – ULYSSES: JEANNE D’ARC AND THE ALCHEMIST KNIGHT
• 12:00pm – ANIMA YELL!
• 12:45pm – HIMOTE HOUSE: A SHARE HOUSE OF SUPER PSYCHIC GIRLS
• 1:00pm – SKULL-FACE BOOKSELLER HONDA-SAN
• 1:45pm – TSURUNE

Funimation:

• 10:30 AM – DOUBLE DECKER! DOUG & KIRILL Episode 8 Simulcast Premium TV-14
• 4:00 PM – Black Clover Episode 57 Simulcast Premium TV-14
• 4:00 PM – ZOMBIE LAND SAGA Episode 5 Simulcast Premium TV-MA

HIDIVE:

• 11am – Tada Never Falls in Love (Dub), Ep 9

Assembling a new group of virgins for the auction, Shirohebi samples the wares and puts them out on the market.

What They Say
In a luxurious theatre, thousands of masked spectators huddle close for a good look at the stage. This is the Virgin auction, where the very richest and most perverse come looking to bid. The sadistic Shirohebi assembles choice women for the auction. She examines them inside and out, teaches them the ropes, and samples their wares. She’s just received a new shipment: Yui, Umi, and Gin. Will they make the grade?

The Review:
Audio: 
The audio presentation for this release brings us the original Japanese language track and an English language dub, both of which are in stereo and encoded at 192kbps. I listened to this show in its English language adaptation since those can be pretty fun to check out sometimes. The stereo mix for it is essentially the same as the Japanese mix which is almost all dialogue driven outside a few musical cues here and there and the opening and closing pieces. Dialogue for it is good and clear through and through and is free of problems such as distortions and dropouts. We sampled the Japanese mix and they both come across well though they won’t really wow in any sense.

Video: 
Originally released in 2005, the transfer for this two part OVA series is presented in its original full frame aspect ratio. The source materials for this look to be in good shape and the end result is that we have a very smooth and good looking transfer for the majority of the release. Colors have a good solid feel to them even across large areas of the same color, black levels look good and there isn’t anything in the form of cross coloration or aliasing throughout it. One area that’s noticeably bad is the epilogue where there is a lot of grey shadows and blacks which are macroblocking like crazy. Combine it with an upward pan and it just looks plain awful but it is fairly isolated compared to the rest of the show.

Packaging: 
The cover art for the show is pretty nicely done as it takes all of the women in various states and has them on the front cover, nicely hiding the nudity while still making it plenty appealing. I also rather liked the way the logo was done with the cherries. It’s not a hard sell cover and doesn’t tell you much but the title tells you plenty. The back cover has better shots of the three main auction girls in different kinds of lingerie as well as a shot of the auctioneer and some action shots from the show. The rest of the cover is fleshed out with a look at the basic production information and the technical grid.

Menu: 
Using artwork from the cover, we get a mix of two different types here as some of the girls are in full color while others are done in a purple filter which matches the checkerboard background used. The logo is cute with the cherries and even the navigation icon uses a cherry. All of it is set to a bit of the standard Vanilla Series music and it’s all very easy to navigate and move around in. The disc didn’t read our players’ language presets though and defaulted to English language and sign/song subtitles only.

Extras: 
None.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Virgin Auction is a two-part show from the Vanilla Series line of adult shows and it’s slightly different than some of their other recent productions which have delved into more cruel and unusual forms of sexual storytelling. In its own way, it’s actually fairly tame compared to some of their releases but it plays up a few differences and that helps it to stand out a bit more.

We’re introduced to Shirohebi and Ragonji who deal in providing virgins for the ultra wealthy who want to do as they please with them. Shirohebi is something of a perverted woman who is involved in all of this as something of a doctor and a trainer as she deals with the virgins who are brought in. Ragonji is the actual manager but he wields less power in all of this and is subject to the whims of Shirohebi of whom he is incredibly attracted to. Shirohebi is amusing in how she’s somewhat sly in her attitude about what she wants and she loves to torture Ragonji. Their opening scene has him tied by the wrists behind his back and she spends her time torturing him with her foot. It’s amusing to see it played out as much as it is but it’s a nice change-up from something a bit more rough or just the usual interplay.

Much of the show though is about the three new virgins that are brought in, each coming here to become sex workers for different reasons, as Shirohebi lays out the rules and starts placing them into trial situations before they can go into auction. The girls stay in the building where Shirohebi operates things out of so they have plenty of things open to them and we get the fun of girl talk as they each explain why they’re there. But then it gets down to business as Shirohebi puts on her gynecological face and gets to work on checking them out and finding more about their pasts and what kind of virgins they really are before they can be sold off. Bring in a bit more interplay between her and the manager and you have a fairly interesting story as you explore each girl.

There are weak areas in the stories but the actual scenes are where they do a bit better. The character designs for the women are pretty attractive, a few notches above the standard designs and in particular, I really love Shirohebi’s design in conjunction with her voice. They do bring in the difficulty of having a foreign looking character and having her look the same as the rest if not for her silver hair but overall there are some good looking characters. The sex scenes themselves are the type that doesn’t stand out all that much but they’re well done with little in the way of repetition but they do play up some minor kinks which normally don’t get touched upon.

In Summary: 
Virgin Auction isn’t a standout title or one that will really gain any sort of serious fandom, especially since it really doesn’t do all that much with the auction itself and the group of wealthy who participate. It’s more about Shirohebi and their preparations for the auction and in that regards it’s fairly fun with some nice character designs and decent sex. It gets an extra couple of points for pulling off an entire foot fetish scene without it coming across as completely hokey though. Virgin Auction is a title that’s probably good for those that are beyond their introduction to adult shows but not so much for those into the more hardcore material.

Features
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 2.0 Language, English Subtitles

Content Grade: C+
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: N/A

Released By: Kitty Media
Release Date: August 29th, 2006
MSRP: $29.95
Running Time: 60 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.

© Naoko Kurono / Mag Garden · PEACE MAKER Iron Production Committee © Kurano Nanae / Mag Garden

The first Peacemaker Kurogane film has landed in Japan back on June 2nd, 2018 now the home video release information from Kadokawa has been set for it. The film is planned for a November 28th, 2018 release and we now have a look at the packaging for it below. The DVD is priced at 7,500 yen and the Blu-ray at 8,500 yen. Each format will come with a full-color booklet, a drama CD, and on-disc extras that include the stage greeting material, promos, commercials, and trailers.

The films are being directed by Shigeru Kimiya based on the screenplay by Eiji Umehara. Sayaka Koiso is working on the character designs while White Fox will be producing the animation for it. Check out the key visual to the right.

The Japanese cast includes Yuki Kaji as Tetsunosuke Ichimura, Takahiro Sakurai as Susumu Yamazaki, Yumiko Kobayashi as Young Tetsunosuke Ichimura, Jouji Nakata as Toshizo Hijikata, Mitsuki Saiga as Souji Okita, Kappei Yamaguchi as Shinpachi Nagakura, Kenji Nomura as Sanosuke Harada, Kousuke Toriumi as Heisuke Todo, Takashi Matsuyama as Hajime Saitou, Masami Iwasaki as Kai Shimada, Takaya Hashi as Isami Kondou, Mikako Takahashi as Saya, and Shinnosuke Tachibana as Suzu Yamatoya.

The previous TV series that was produced was for the prequel series so it certainly makes sense with the sequel manga still ongoing to delve more into that since Nanae Chrono has kept on chugging at this since 2002. The original manga series was serialized in Monthly Shonen Gangan between 1999 and 2001, producing five volumes, while the current series kicked off in Monthly Comic Blade in 2001 and has produced eight volumes so far with the eighth out today revealing this new adaptation.

ADV Films originally dubbed and released the first TV series and Funimation picked up the distribution rights to it after ADV Films shuttered their doors. Check out the trailer below for that series.

Plot concept: Three months have passed since the Ikedaya Incident that crushed the anti-shogunate rebellion–and propelled the Shinsengumi, Kyoto’s now-official police, into history as Kyoto’s premium peacekeeping force. But there is no rest for the peaceful: An unexpected threat to the Shinsengumi arises, and it’s going to take more than mere swords to defeat this new terror on the horizon.

Peacemaker Kurogane Movie 1 Japanese Packaging

[Source: Peacemaker Kurogane]

With a heavy background growing up in the 80’s watching sitcoms, that’s something that I’ve carried through the years. I’m drawn to the shorter form of comedy like this, the different ways they can be filmed, the evolution of the format over the years, and so forth. One of the more prolific sitcom creators of the past decade+ is Chuck Lorre, who brought out Two and a Half Men, Mom, and the Big Bang Theory along with a few others. While Mom never clicked for me I enjoyed the others as the team Lorre worked with knew how to cast and work that dynamic well over the years.

So I was delight in how Netflix is continuing to target older audiences (older than me, such as my mother) because for me it brings back stars I grew up with in leading roles when they usually get supporting or bit roles. Lorre’s latest is a new series on Netflix with The Kominsky Method. I’ve long enjoyed Michael Douglas since Romancing the Stone and was thrilled that he had a role in Ant-Man. Similarly, I’ve enjoyed Alan Arkin a great deal in so many supporting roles over the years and the inclusion of Nancy Travis hits a sweet spot. With Lorre and his team writing all the episodes, the eight-episode series deals with a lot of things that people have to deal with in terms of loss of spouse after decades, the loss of friends, and the struggle of being brittle in a world that’s evolving faster and faster. It’s not a perfect show but it’s a show that really lets its characters have natural flaws, amplified by the sitcom model, and really connects well. It’s an easy to burn through show that delivers.

This week also saw me polishing off the last couple of episodes of Altered Carbon, leaving me more excited for what’s to come. There’s a lot of neat stuff to explore in it when it comes to future-tech/social issues and that’s an area that science fiction has long explored well. This goes big toward the end and I really like how it wrapped things up while setting up for changes to come with the second season as Anthony Mackie takes over as the lead.

Beyond that, this past week was a bad week for TV for the most part thanks to Thankgiving. A lot of shows go off the air since people are traveling but we at least had new episodes of Legends of Tomorrow with a really fun kaiju work involving one of the creators of Godzilla, as well as more Arrow and Walking Dead. But mostly the week was just lots of holiday prep and running aorund.

© 2018 Kafka Asagiri / Chunghwa 35 / KADOKAWA / Bungo Stray Dogs DA Production Committee

The film project for this franchise with Bungo Stray Dogs: Dead Apple came out back on March 3rd, 2018 and now the home video side has been set for it. The release has gotten a last-minute bump from November 28th, 2018 to December 5th, 2018 and now we have the fully updated packaging for it as well. The DVD is priced at 8,800 yen and the Blu-ray at 9,800 yen. It’s coming with a deluxe booklet with story and interview material while the on-disc extra so far is just the trailer for the film.

The series comes from the manga that began in 2012 in the Young Ace magazine from writer Kafka Asagiri and artist Harukawa35.

The TV series adaptation was produced by Bones with Takuya Igarashi directing based on the screenplay by Yoji Enokido. Nobuhiro Arai served as both character designer and chief animation director.

The Japanese cast includes Yūto Uemura as Atsushi Nakajima, Mamoru Miyano as Osamu Dazai, Kensho Ono as Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Kishō Taniyama as Chūya Nakahara, Sumire Morohoshi as Kyōka Izumi, Yoshimasa Hosoya as Doppo Kunikida, Hiroshi Kamiya as Ranpo Edogawa, Toshiyuki Toyonaga as Junichirō Tanizaki, Hiroyuki Kagura as Kenji Miyazawa, Yu Shimamura as Akiko Yosano, Chiaki Omigawa as Naomi Tanizaki, Rikiya Koyama as Yukichi Fukuzawa, Mitsuru Miyamoto as Ougai Mori, Sora Amamiya as Elise, Junichi Suwabe as Sakunosuke Oda, Jun Fukuyama as Ango Sakaguchi, and Akira Ishida as Fyodor D.

Plot Concept: Nakajima Atsushi was kicked out of his orphanage, and now he has no place to go and no food. While he is standing by a river, on the brink of starvation, he rescues a man whimsically attempting suicide. That man is Dazai Osamu, and he and his partner Kunikida are members of a very special detective agency. They have supernatural powers and deal with cases that are too dangerous for the police or the military. They’re tracking down a tiger that has appeared in the area recently, around the time Atsushi came to the area. The tiger seems to have a connection to Atsushi, and by the time the case is solved, it is clear that Atsushi

Bungo Stray Dogs Dead Apple Japanese Packaging

Bungo Stray Dogs Dead Apple Japanese Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 12 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 11 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 10 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 9 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 8 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 7 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 6 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 5 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 4 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 3 Cover

Bungo Stray Dogs Japanese Volume 2 Cover

[Source:  Bungo Stray Dogs]

A new week of movies and lots of time to catch up on things – which doesn’t always happen since there’s so much binge-worthy material out there that draws me in. You’d think the two-hour experience would be the draw for a film but I keep finding myself wanting to be pulled into an eight to ten-hour drama so that I can immerse myself in that more than anything else.

One film that I did take in is something that I haven’t actually finished. I’m a big fan of the Coen Brothers and their approach to the change in filmmaking as studios become even more franchise-driven had them work their Western anthology film The Ballad of Buster Scruggs with the Netflix approach. I’ve watched just over half of the installments so far and am definitely enjoying them, though the first really is unlike the rest. The stories aren’t fantastic or anything but I really enjoy the cast and the kind of slow but contained approach to it all. Of course, there’s just so much to enjoy with the scenery from the on-location pieces that it’s enjoyed simply for that.

Another Netflix film I check out is the very fun little French piece from Fred Cavaye with Nothing to Hide, which was released in 2017 as Le Jeu in France. The cast is fantastic with a nice international approach beyond French actors with some from Canada and Argentina and it delves into the kind of “black box” lives that people lead with their phones being a secret place until a blow-up happens. With a group getting together for a dinner and a game being played with all their phones as a lunar eclipse happens, there’s just revelation after revelation happening and it builds wonderfully.

While I didn’t make it to the theater I did have some background films to watch during the week while writing. This week saw me watching The Fate of the Furious for some fast action fun while I also managed to check out Happy Feet for the first time, something I avoided during that time when my kids were watching it non-stop over and over. We recently got into both The Martian and Ant-Man and the Wasp but I also got to have some silly fun with the Melissa McCarthy Spy film.

Cheap pickups this week has me starting to catch up on some summer films I missed, such as getting the iTunes editions of Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again and The Spy Who Dumped Me to check out. The Black Friday weekend also drew me into some really cheap Blu-ray pickups, in the $5 range or less, with Ready Player One and Murder on the Orient Express alongside the silly stupid comedy Why Him? that I enjoy and I finally nabbed Justice League for $6. And even that felt like I was paying too much.

The winter 2017 anime series BanG Dream is having its home video releases handled by Overlap and the show previously saw a standard-ish seven volume release that had an OVA produced for it. The complete set is coming a year after the last of the singles finished and we now have a nicely expansive look at the packaging as a whole for it. It’s got a planned November 28th, 2018 debut where it’ll have the thirteen episode run plus the OVA priced at 15,000 yen.

The thirteen episode series previously saw a seven-volume release with a lot of extras where the Blu-ray’s are priced at 7,000 yen each. No DVDs are being produced for this release. Check out the breakdown and artwork below!

The project was directed by Atsushi Ootsuki based on the series composition from Yuniko Ayana. Natsuko Nita adapted the original character designs done by Hitowa Issen and Xebec handled the animation production.

The Japanese cast includes Aimi (Aimi Terakawa) as Kasumi Toyama, Ayasa Itou as Arisa Ichigaya, Rimi Nishimoto as Rimi Ushigome, Sae Oozuka as Tae Hanazono and Ayaka Ohashi as Saaya Yamabuki.

Plot concept: The story follows Kasumi Toyama (played by Poppin’ Party’s lead singer, Aimi) when her life changes on the day she finds a star-shaped guitar. Determined to form an all-girl band, her search leads her to four like-minded souls: Saya, Arisa, Rimi, and Tae (all brought to life by the members of Poppin’ Party).

BanG Dream Complete Japanese Box Set Packaging

BanG Dream Complete Japanese Box Set

Bang Dream Japanese Volume 7 Cover

Bang Dream Japanese Volume 6 Cover

Bang Dream Japanese Volume 5 Cover

Bang Dream Japanese Volume 4 Cover

Bang Dream Japanese Volume 3 Cover

Bang Dream Japanese Volume 2 Cover

BanG Dream Japanese Volume 1 Cover

Bang Dream Japanese Box Set Side 2

Bang Dream Japanese Box Set Side A

[Source: BanG Dream!]

This past week of anime has gotten a lot of simulcasts fully past the halfway mark and we’re now starting to see some closing arcs getting ready – such as the ReRideD show having wrapped up itself as an anomaly.

We’ve been mostly working through the home video releases that we had gotten in from the week prior – a set a day keeps the doctor away! – and didn’t have any new arrivals land, which was a welcome reprieve to make a dent in things. There’s some really good stuff that’s out recently and continuing to come out and that’s making it very easy to make recommendations for people – especially since we’re getting such a good mix of new and old titles.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at some shows menus that we have reviews coming up for in the next week:

 

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Next #anime up for review is from @sentaifilmworks

A post shared by Chris Beveridge (@cjbeveridge) on Nov 19, 2018 at 3:36am PST

 

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Next #anime up for review is #bravewitches from @funimation

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Next #anime up for review is #blendsanime from @aniplexusa

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Next #anime up for review is #takunomi from @sentaifilmworks

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Next #anime up for review is #negima from @sentaifilmworks

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