Soul Eater: Part One

Label:

Manga Entertainment

Certificate:

15

Format:

DVD

Discs:

2. (13 episodes: 1-13)

Running time:

325 mins approx

Subtitles:

English

Video:

16.9 anamorphic

Sound:

English 5.1, Japanese 2.0

Release date:

28th June 2010

RRP:

£24.99 - Amazon - Play

Soul Eater: Part Two

Label:

Manga Entertainment

Certificate:

15

Format:

DVD

Discs:

2. (13 episodes: 14-26)

Running time:

325 mins approx

Subtitles:

English

Video:

16.9 anamorphic

Sound:

English 5.1, Japanese 2.0

Release date:

26th July 2010

RRP:

£24.99 - Amazon - Play

 

Brief synopsis:

Deep in the heart of the Nevada desert lies Death City, home of the Death Weapon Meister Academy – or DWMA for short – where humans who can morph their bodies into deadly weapons and Meisters who can wield these weapons are trained. Run by Death himself, the DWMA instructs both Weapons and Meisters in everything they need to combat both Witches and those who would become Kishins – evil humans who have gained great power by consuming the souls of the innocent.

Teenage bookworm Maka Albarn is one such trainee Meister who, along with her weapon partner Soul “Eater” Evans, plans to defeat ninety nine evil humans and one Witch in order for Soul to become the coolest of weapons and one worthy of being the personal weapon of Death himself; a true Death Scythe. Also aiming to turn his weapon partner into a Death Scythe is Black Star – last living survivor of a clan of legendary ninjas whose weapon partner Tsubaki is descended from a family of powerful demon weapons.

Swiftly joined by Death The Kid, the son of Death himself, and his pair of weapons, the Thompson Sisters, Maka’s circle of friends soon find themselves up against not just Demons, Witches and wannabe Kishins but also some of the deadliest enemies known – or unknown – to mankind.

Comments:

Imagine if you will a strange merging of the twisted mind of Tim “Beetlejuice” Burton, the even more twisted melon of Roman “Lenore” Dirge and the somewhat suspect noggin of David “Twin Peaks” Lynch – a psyche so twisted it must resemble a strand of DNA by now - and you’re seeing a hint of what makes up Studio Bones new action comedy anime, Soul Eater. Full of dark humour, action, gore - well as much as a 15 cert can get away with – and a storyline that looks fairly simple at first glance but hints heavily that it’ll be getting deeper and deeper as this series progresses into it’s stride. If there’s a shounen series out there that has a serious chance to challenge the likes of Bleach and Naruto for their Shounen crowns then this surely has to be that series.

The animation, like the storyline, appears at first glance to be fairly simple but there’s a surprising complexity under the surface. It takes a lot of effort to make animation look as stylishly simple as this and it’s something that Studio Bones have excelled with here. On the whole it’s all very smooth and vibrant with bold usage of colour. The 3D CGI integrates especially well, particularly when used as backgrounds. The camera rarely stays still and the ever-changing camera angles really enhance the action sequences, of which there are many. If there was ever an anime that just cried out for a Blu-ray release then this is it.

US distributor and dub creator Funimation must have a lot of confidence in the appeal of this show as they’ve put an impressive amount of work into the English language dub. In fact this is easily one of their best – and probably most expensive – dubs ever seen… or more accurately... heard as it sounds like they’ve pulled in pretty much all of rising stars of the voice acting world, as well as number of more experienced talent to keep everything on track. To be honest, and this isn’t something you’ll hear from me very often, while the original Japanese version of this show is very impressive the English language version of this show is arguably the superior of the two.

If that wasn’t enough, it’s not just the voice acting that’s a treat for the ears as the soundtrack is as impressive as it is eclectic. Moving easily from jazz to hip-hop, bouncing through rock, metal and punk before sliding between pop and classical. Along the way this show touches upon pretty much every genre under the sun more than once.

In total this series runs to the grand sum of fifty one episodes and rather than releasing a whole slew of DVD singles with only three or four episodes per disc, Manga Entertainment are rather sensibly releasing this show as four DVD twin-packs of six or seven episodes per disc. Plus, as a number of Internet retailers are offering quite substantial discounts of about £10 off of each twin-pack, which makes this series a great value for money purchase.

Extras:

Soul Eater: Part One – “Soul Eater Late Show” plus Textless opening and ending version one animation
Soul Eater: Part Two- “Soul Eater Late Show” plus Textless opening and ending version two animation and commentary for episode 23.

Soul Eater: Part One is available to buy from today while Soul Eater: Part Two will be released on the 26th July. A trailer for this series can be found here at Manga Entertainment’s official website.