D-Frag! (Blu-ray) (2014)

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General		Extras
Category	Anime	Audio Commentary-x 2 TV Spots-x 2 Trailer-and promotional videos x 6 More…-Textless Opening Song More…-Textless Closing Song Trailer-x 10 for other anime
Rating
Year Of Production	2014
Running Time	286:45 (Case: 300)
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	1,2,4	Directed By	Sugahara Shizutaka
Studio Distributor	Madman Entertainment	Starring	Konishi Katsuyuki Austin Tindle Hanazawa Kana Bryn Apprill Saito Chiwa Whitney Rodgers Takahashi Mikako Megan Shipman Koshimizu Ami Caitlin Glass Ito Shizuka Tia Ballard
Case	?
RPI	?	Music	Matsuda Akito

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0 English Audio Commentary Dolby TrueHD 2.0
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	1080p
Original Aspect Ratio	1.78:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

     Kenji Kazama (voiced by Konishi Katsuyuki / Austin Tindle) believes that he and his gang are the supreme delinquents within the Fujou Academy; that is until he unwillingly gets roped into the all-female Game Creation Club whose members, president Roka (Hanazawa Kana / Bryn Apprill), Chitose (Saito Chiwa / Whitney Rodgers), who is also school student president, Sakura (Takahashi Mikako / Megan Shipman) and teacher Minami (Koshimizu Ami / Caitlin Glass), are not above threats, intimidation, dirty tricks and physical torture to keep their club afloat because club numbers have dropped to a level where the club is about to be shut down; in addition the Game Creation Club has not actually created any new games! As a further threat, the Game Creation Club is a spinoff from the original Game Creation Club in the school headed by the busty Takao (Ito Shizuka / Tia Ballard), who is determined to shut Roka’s “false” club down although she has a thing for Kenji. Other rival clubs are also in the hunt. Kenji, who is too kind-hearted to be the delinquent he thinks he wants to be, has in fact walked into a simmering maelstrom where all is fair in love and gaming, where dirty tricks are the norm and rules are optional extras.

     D-Frag! is based on the manga by Haruno Tomoya that appeared in Comic Alive from February 2009. It is exuberant in tone, animation (where still frames and extreme colour changes occur as well as abrupt changes in character design) and audio, where there is lots of shouting. The series is amusing rather than laugh out loud funny and it includes in jokes about games and a number of recurring jokes, such as the card and board game Roka is creating called “Scramble for Porn Mags in Space” and the size of Takao’s breasts. Breast jokes can be in questionable taste, but while boobs are discussed no breasts are shown and the jokes are delivered in good humour and not at the expense of Takao. Indeed, most of the jokes in D-Frag! are predictable and the characters pretty one-dimensional, including “Miss Wonderful” Funabori (Toyosaki Aki / Felecia Augelle), the Game Creation Club girls who are the most deadly punks at the school, Kinji himself who spends all his time screaming, and his rival Shioh (Miyata Koki / Micah Solusod); it is noteworthy that the most interesting, normal and rounded character (pun intended) is Takao who does go through a character arc of sorts during the series.

     D-Frag! is nothing deep and meaningful but it is a lot of fun even if some of the situations and jokes get a bit repetitive. The anime of 12 episodes aired on Japanese TV between January and March 2014. D-Frag! – The Complete Collection contains all 12 episodes of the anime; episodes 1-9 are on disc1 while episodes 10-12 plus most of the extras are on disc 2.

Video

     D-Frag! is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1, the original broadcast ratio, in 1080p using the MPEG-4 AVC code.

     The colours are fairly non-descript except for occasional flashes of vibrant colour, black and white or still frames to emphasise an argument or game contest. The series also utilises colour changes, sometimes to black and white, while detail is generally fine and the lines firm. This is not the most expensive looking anime around but it is OK. Blacks are solid and shadow detail good.

     I did not notice any marks and artefacts.

     It is anime so lip synchronisation is approximate in either audio track.

     The English subtitles are in American English in a white font. They are easy to read and I did not notice any spelling or grammatical errors.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

     As is the case with many Funimation releases, audio is a choice of the original Japanese in Dolby TrueHD 2.0 while the English dub is TrueHD 5.1. I listened to a number of the episodes in each (the audio, and subtitles, can be changed on the fly with the remote which is a change from other Funimation releases).

     The Japanese is surround encoded so the rears featured music and some effects. The English 5.1 was not particularly enveloping with little in the rears and I did not really notice any subwoofer use in the episodes I watched. Indeed, the English is recorded at a slightly lower level. In both the dialogue was clear which is the important thing, and effects appropriate.

     The English voice cast were pretty good and although I still prefer to listen to the original Japanese this one is a more difficult choice than usual.

     The score by Matsuda Akito was effective.

     D-Frag! is not an action anime so either audio track is satisfactory.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Disc 1

Start-up Trailer

     A trailer for Baka & Test: Summon the Beasts (1:08) plays on start-up. It cannot be selected from the menu.

Commentary – Episode

     The Kazama gang, Austin Tindle, Ian Sinclair, J. Michael Tatum and Josh Grelle (the voices of Kenji, Nagayama, Ataru and Yokoshima) laugh, make funny voices and talk over each other about nothing in particular including animal poops, farts, lightning, using big words and being tasered, with almost no information about the series itself or their parts in it. Pretty inane.

Disc 2

Start-up Trailer

     A trailer for Hyperdimension Neptunia (1:31) plays on start-up. It cannot be selected from the menu.

Commentary – Episode 10

     US ADR director Jerry Jewell joins with Whitney Rodgers and Bryn Apprill (voices of Chitose and Roka). They still laugh but there is much less inane chatter as they do discuss plot points. Marginally more listenable.

Textless Opening Song “Stalemate” (1:32)

     The opening song without the credits.

Textless Closing Song “Minna no Namae wo Irete Kudasai” (1:32)

     The closing song without the credits.

Promotional Materials

     All the rest of the extras are trailers, TV spots or other promotions for the series. They are:

• Two TV Spots A bird? A plane? No, it’s a New Anime (0:17) and You Want to Join My Club, Don’t You (0:32)
• Promotional Video (1:52)
• The New DVD / BD Cheer (0:49)
• The New DVD / BD Cheer (Funabori Version) (0:17)
• A Commercial within a Commercial (0:17)
• Mobile Rally Commercial (0:17)
• US Trailer (1:33)

Trailers

     Trailers for PUCHIM@S (1:24), One Piece (1:08), .hack (1:00), School Rumble (0:32), Fairy Tail (1:07), Tokyo Ravens (1:19), Space Dandy (1:33) and Ben-To (1:02).

     Our local Blu-ray release of D-Frag! – The Complete Series is the same as the Region A US version down to the FBI piracy warning, although the US release includes DVDs of the series if that is of interest.

     There is nothing deep and meaningful about D-Frag! but it is a amusing, exuberant and twisted world where rules are meant to be broken and all is fair in love and gaming.

     The video and audio are appropriate. Except for a couple of commentaries the extras are all promotional stuff, the same as available in the US.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall