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With the second DVD in the Captain
Herlock – Outside legend released we now have the opportunity to
dive into more of the Herlock outside legend story. To refresh the
readers’ memory, Herlock is based on the work of famed anime
director Leiji Matsumoto (Star Blazers, Original Comic Space
Pirate Captain Herlock). Script work by Sadayuki Muarai (Perfect
Blue, Millennium Actress).
The first episode of this disc
starts off where the last episode of the previous disc ended. The
Space Sheriffs Office is closing in on the Sol System to stop the
Fata Morgana and to bring order back to the galaxy. With the Sol
Fleet and their forces failing to the greatest weapon Noo has in
it’s arsenal, fear. The Space Sheriffs
forces approach and land a successful attack, only to discover
that the Fata Morgana with the help of
the Noo maybe too powerful to stop.
Like the Sol fleet before them, the Space Sheriffs fleet
falls victim to the
Noo, they begin attacking on another,
destroying ships and murdering one another in a paranoid belief
that they are protecting themselves from their fellow crew mates.
The second DVD in the Outside Legend
saga “The Legend Returns” contains three episodes.
5. Battlefield – The
tombstone planet
6. A Gentle smile on the
skull of memory
7. The moon waits in the
promise land
Battlefield – The tombstone planet –
The Space Sheriff’s fleet arrives in Sol to stop the Fata
Morgana and restore order to the
galaxy. However, the deceased crew of the Fata
Morgana using Noo
greatest weapon, the fleet of the Space Sheriff quickly falls prey
to the Noo, and turns on one another.
Will Herlock be able to stop the
Noo before chaos reigns supreme on the
galaxy.
A Gentle smile on the skull of
memory - The Noo
attempt to affect Herlock’s crew, to
make them fall prey to fear. Will Herlock
and his crew be the next victims of the Noo,
are they strong enough to resist?
The moon waits in the promise land –
The moon is still in it’s orbit around
the earth, even after Noo has attacked
it. How can that be? What of the Arcadia, the ship
seemingly with a mind of its own, has
set a course to find one of her missing crew man.
Even within the second disk the
story still seems to be off to a rush start. However, some more
time has been allocated for character development and the
opportunity to delve more into certain characters pasts in order
to gain a better perspective of who they are and what lead them to
become who they are. Still there hasn’t been much time for
development of the main characters of the story, with the series
moving on, I don’t feel there will be time to go back and
reintroduce Herlock, who he is and why he became the man he
became, this is partially due to the long following of the Herlock
series. However, still being new to the universe, it would have
been appreciated if there was a slower start to the series or
allowing some time to give more detail to the characters and how
they evolved. They do a brief background of who Herlock is where
he’s from and why he’s in space, but this is not enough. Some of
these issues could have been resolved with a few features on the
DVD.
Sadly the features included with the
DVD don’t seem to be getting much better as time goes on, the
features offered are Bilingual 5.1 Audio (English and Japanese).
Also, 2 streams of English Subtitles: Dialog and signs or signs
only. One the biggest disappointments of this DVD would have to be
the lack of any bonus features. The only available features were,
previews for upcoming Geneon releases and the original Japanese
opening. If any additional feature such as original or conceptual
art work definitely would have added to the disc. Maybe even with
a time line that explains Captain Herlock universe. Character
biography’s giving additional information to the characters that
make up this universe.
With the second disk now
available and still no sign of special features that would help to
make this a definite buy, the story seems to be evolving nicely
and at an increasing pace. With the battle between Herlock and Noo
approaching, I can’t wait to see what events will unfold. Still,
with the lack of any form of special features with the disc, I
would have to say based on the anime itself it’s a must for those
who are fans of Matsumoto’s work. However, for those who aren’t
really fans of the earlier style of animation then this one might
be a good one to rent or at least borrow a copy from someone.
Hopefully in the next release we will see additional features. |
Version 2.0
