Anime box-sets for 2009: Part Nine

Witchblade: Box Set

Label: MVM
Certificate: 15
Discs: 6. (24 episodes)
Running time: 785 mins approx
Video: 16.9 anamorphic
Sound: English 5.1, Japanese 2.0
Subtitles: English.
Release date: 9th November 2009
RRP: £49.99 – AmazonPlay

Brief synopsis:
Throughout time the awesome power of the Witchblade – a sentient weapon of immense destructive potential – has been sought by those who would use it to satisfy their own lust for power. For reasons known only to itself, the Witchblade can only be wielded by women and even then only a select few chosen by the blade itself are ever deemed worthy of it’s power. But with the great power granted by the Witchblade also comes a heavy burden and those who wield it find their fates permanently intertwined with that of the world’s most powerful weapon, and it’s a burden that will eventually lead to their demise.

After a catastrophic earthquake six years ago almost removed Japan from the face of the earth, a young mother and her newborn child were found barely alive in then midst of the destruction. With no memory of anything before the earthquake Amaha Masane and her young daughter Rihoko have survived ever since living on the edges of society, living on the run from the Child Welfare Ministry who wish to separate mother and child by taking Rihoko into care. When finally caught by the Child Welfare Ministry, Rihoko is taken away and Masane is put behind bars. In her attempt to escape and reunite with her daughter Masane unwittingly unleashes the power of the Witchblade. Getting her daughter back soon becomes the least of her worries as various clandestine agencies as well as influential corporations want it for their bio-weapons divisions and will stop at nothing to get their hands on it

Comments:
So what happens when you take a great American comic book series like Witchblade and let the Japanese have their way with it? Well what you get in this case is essentially what Japanese animation is most comfortable with: Tits, skimpy battle outfits, plenty of “Monsters of the week” – some of them quite silly monsters at that – more tits, lots of action and a semblance of a plot somewhere in the middle of it all. There’s several liberties been taken with the Witchblade mythos so if you’re expecting the various media to tie up nicely then you’re going to be sorely disappointed. This does seem to be one of the rare cases of inversions where, instead of the US “re-imagining” a popular Japanese series such as Astroboy, Speed Racer or Dragonball-Z, and missing the mark just a smidge (you can read that bit as “completely stuffing it up” if you like) this time it feels like the Japanese writers have been given a pile of Witchblade comics to flick through but no-one’s translated more than the basics for them. It’s probably safer to think of the whole thing much like the various versions of Battlestar Galactica, i.e., the whole thing’s all strangely similar but with nothing set in stone.

That said the plot’s pretty much what you’d expect: Heroine has Witchblade, various evil/greedy people/organisations want the Witchblade, violence ensues when they don’t see eye to eye. But then considering the basic premise and subject source material, where else were they going to go with it? They tried to add a decent plot, mainly to do with either corrupt and immoral organisations trying to turn the Witchblade into a bio-weapons to be implanted into genetically engineered human soldiers or our heroine trying to be a good mother whilst turning into the most destructive force on the planet every other day, and for the most part they pulled it off. It’s not Shakespeare by any means, and it’s hard to do “dark and moody” when one of your main characters is a six-year-old kid, but on the whole it’s still fairly decent. You know right from the get-go it’s not going to end well for the wielder of the Witchblade, but then, when does it ever?

The animation’s well handled, but it is from animation production company GONZO so that’s to be expected. They’ve refrained from going overboard with the CGI which is a plus and the production values remain well above average throughout though apparently GONZO ended up animating many of the action sequences twice. This was because a number of the “battle outfits” were considered to be too revealing so they had to have two versions, one involving some rather skimpy outfits that were still fit for TV broadcast and another version, with ever skimpier outfits, for the DVD release. Many of the monster designs come from the “suspension of disbelief” school of thought and the majority have definite, and somewhat unsubtle, sexual overtones to them. Let’s put it this way; most of the “monsters” are male, most of the victims are female and the warriors are all big-breasted Amazonians. The writers seem to have somewhat of a one-track mind thing going on here and could probably do with getting out and meeting real women a bit more.

Vocally the original Japanese version is impressive. Noto Mamiko, who’s usually know for playing young boys or gentle & softly spoken girls, is cast against type as heroine Ahama Masane and surprises by carrying it off well. Fan favourites Mizuki Nana and Itou Shizuka also do wonderful jobs. The English language dub version tries it’s best, pulling in many of Funimation’s rising stars of dubbing such as Jamie Marchi and Colleen Clinkenbeard (and Carrie Savage does what she does best; playing an often-annoying prepubescent know-it-all girlie) though it never quite manages to match up to the original

Extras:
Video tour of Top Cow Studios with Founder/Illustrator, Marc Silvestri; “How to make a comic book” mini feature; Interview With Japanese voice actor Noto (Ahama Masane) Mamiko; Promo video, Textless Opening and Closing animation and a number of trailers

Witchblade: Box Set will be available from most high streets and online retailers from 9th November 2009. You can find clips and trailers for this series on Funimation’s website here.