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PLEASE NOTE: Michael D's is currently in READ ONLY MODE. Anything submitted will simply not be written to the database.
Lots of stuff is still broken, but at least reviews can now be looked up and read.
Dragon Ball Z Uncut: Trunks Saga 4: Box Set (1991)

Dragon Ball Z Uncut: Trunks Saga 4: Box Set (1991)

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Released 11-Jun-2008

Cover Art

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Details At A Glance

General Extras
Category Anime None
Rating Rated PG
Year Of Production 1991
Running Time 800
RSDL / Flipper No/No
Multi Disc Set (6)
Cast & Crew
Start Up Menu
Region Coding 4 Directed By Daisuke Nishio
Studio
Distributor

Madman Entertainment
Starring None Given
Case ?
RPI $59.95 Music Bruce Faulconer
Shuki Levy
Kussa Mahchi


Video Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame Full Frame English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s)
English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s)
Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
16x9 Enhanced
Video Format 576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio 1.33:1 Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures No
Subtitles English Smoking No
Annoying Product Placement No
Action In or After Credits No

NOTE: The Profanity Filter is ON. Turn it off here.

Plot Synopsis

     The "forth season" of Dragon Ball Z covers two different sagas in the franchise. The first is a filler arc called the Garlic Jnr. Saga and the second is the Android Saga, which is really only a preface to the Cell Saga(s). Unlike the filler sagas in other shonen anime, Dragon Ball Z does something interesting with the less-than-dozen-episode filler arc bringing great-but-minor characters to the forefront, including Piccolo, Krillin and Gohan, none of whom are actually minor but are disempowered compared to Goku and Vegeta (at least for now) and thus rarely take part in major battles. With Goku and Vegeta both away from Earth, when villain Garlic Jnr. escapes from the Dead Zone (also the title of the non-canon film from which the character originates, and one of many Superman references) and brings with him a powerful demon virus to destroy the world, only the remaining Z fighters have the strength to defy him, battling for their lives to save the Earth.

     Although not adapted from the manga, these three main characters are all given both development and exploration not afforded to them otherwise - the short arc covering hapless Krillin's extremely attractive (and also incredibly stupid) girlfriend exemplifies his loneliness and his unfortunate position as disempowered in strength and looks; consider that despite being the most powerful and strongest human ever to be born, the fact that he is short and unattractive isolates him from other human beings. Meanwhile his considerably weaker strength compared to his nakama renders him sadly useless in the epic battles he's a part of and a frequent target for villains. Gohan struggles against his mother's desire for him to become a scholar, against his innate ability to become strong and protect the ones he loves, just as Piccolo struggles with his role in the unconventional family, in which racism and the sins of his past haunt him. This continues into the Android Saga, in which he trains with Goku and Gohan as a friend and member of their family.

     The animations and fights from the Garlic Jnr Saga are not great, and the Android Saga fares significantly better. Following his grim defeat during the Frieza Saga, the villain returns, reborn with cyborg parts under his father King Cooler, a sickening family unit bent on destruction following the Japanese loyalty ideology. But before they can murder the Z fighters and the remainder of Earth - helpless without Goku to protect them - a young man appears and effortlessly dispatches both. Enter Trunks, a young man from the future warning of an apocalypse brought by the sins of Goku's past, an old enemy from the original Dragon Ball now hell-bent on revenge. The series' ongoing fear of technology is ever prevalent, but more apparent is the fascination with family and the difficulty of non-traditional family roles, especially under the strange, and frequently criticised, honour-based society that consumes Japan. Trunks' father is elated, powerful prig Vegeta, whose defeat at the hands of Goku leaves him genocidal and aggressive, who responds badly to the discovery of his child, and worse to the threat of total destruction: instead of halting the possibility of annihilation before it begins, his lust to prove himself has him sacrificing safety, friends and family in the name of honour, for which he and thousands of innocents are punished.

     Consider this as to why Dragon Ball remains the most popular anime of all time, even against the more recent hits like disappointing One Piece and the unwatchable Bleach: rooted deeply within the series beyond the excellent fights and the fascinating characters are serious, smart ideas about the notion of family and power, and how the Japanese honour-based society poses a problem, and a threat, rather than a blessing. (One Piece in particular finds honour to be a positive thing, and feels all the more pathetic because of it, frequently confused as to its own underlying ideas as it apes Dragon Ball.) It's also tightly woven into a story that covers mythology from around the world, including closely adapting Superman and many of the better comic arcs (it's no accident how closely a bone-armoured Frieza resembles Superman enemy Doomsday, nor that Goku would be sent to Earth in a similar pod to Kal-el). Unfortunately not an entire story in itself, this forth season covers the prologue of a much longer, much better story, which goes on to cover the next few DVD sets and is excellent viewing. Unfortunately this set is let down somehow by being the censored version of the show, going against the advertised "uncut" claim. Several very violent, often gruesome scenes are edited down, and the show suffers for it; hopefully, with an eventual BD release, we will see the show in its original uncut format.

Don't wish to see plot synopses in the future? Change your configuration.

Transfer Quality

Video

     The video is presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio. It is 16x9 enhanced. As I discussed in the first Dragon Ball Z box review here, this aspect ratio is very controversial; to reiterate, the original anime was broadcast in 1.33:1, not widescreen. In creating this new version of the show for release, FUNimation went through a lengthy expensive remastering process in which the Japanese masters were converted to digital 1080p video and then cleaned up and cropped to create the transfer seen here, removing a part of the top and bottom and re-adding footage to the sides to create widescreen.

     As with the first set, this is a solid transfer and although there are still a lot of film artefacts in these releases there is very little grain and the colours themselves are bright and powerful. The widescreen looks very good on a HD set, giving the show a more cinematic feel (which is particularly nifty during the large-scale epic fight sequences), but occasionally it feels a bit off when it is clear that the cinematography is wrong for this aspect ratio, such as when the tops of heads are cut off. This is, fortunately, rare and overall I am satisfied with the look of this set. There are some other minor issues, such as small lines appearing briefly due to the process used to clean up the sets, but this is rare and isn't going to drag anyone out of the viewing experience.

     This is an unusual case, I feel, in that reaction to the set will ultimately come down to personal opinion rather than actual quality; although I am well aware that there are cleaner releases of the series available elsewhere, the set does look very good like this. Whether or not you will take to this is really personal preference and the FUNimation site has plenty of previews showing off the new footage vs. the old footage to help you make up your mind.

     The English subtitles are nearly flawless in this set thankfully, as the first season suffered greatly from poor translation and some parts of the second were also disappointing. Fortunately we get a great set of subtitles here, which accurately and dramatically cover the original Japanese for best effect.

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

Audio

     The audio is presented in English Dolby Digital 5.1 (FUNimation dubbing with Japanese music), English Dolby Digital 2.0 (FUNimation dubbing with FUNimation music), and Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0 (original Japanese soundtrack).

     Let's go over this bit by bit; to begin with, this is the very best English audio of the series that has been released. The 5.1 sound is very atmospheric, utilizing the full surround in the majority of scenes and then going crazy with the subwoofer during the fights and explosions (of which there are many). Fans who grew up with the original FUNimation dub will be pleased that all the original voice actors are here, and a lot of the dialogue has been redubbed to fit the newly uncensored cut of the show. The addition of the Japanese soundtrack gives the show a more pure form. The mix is very well done, with all the lines syncing and everything perfectly audible, though the actual translation suffers somewhat across the second and third seasons. Fans will likely find themselves switching to the Japanese track more and more often to see what the characters are actually saying.

     The second soundtrack is the original FUNimation dubbing, complete with the awful soundtrack with which the show was first broadcast in English. For completion sake it's nice to have it here and it's a pretty decent stereo mix, but it pales in both quality and depth to the new 5.1 soundtrack. Fans who listen to the 5.1 with the far superior Japanese music will never ever want to go back to this.

     Finally we have the Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack, which is again a vast improvement on the first set; there's more depth, detail and clarity here than there was in the first box, with the characters and battles much more audible. Although not as engaging or atmospheric as the English 5.1 (switching between the two will blow you away) this makes the show much more fun to watch for its original soundtrack, especially if you've already seen this saga before in English.

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

Extras

Animated Menus with Sound

     Music from the original FUNimation dub of the series plays behind a nice still shot of Trunks (the same as the DVD cover).

Textless Songs - Opening Song (1:50), Closing Song (1:39)

     The cleaned up, textless opening and closing credits for Dragon Ball Z look very nice and will give fans an unobstructed viewing. In 1.78:1.

Trailers

     Several Madman trailers round out the collection, presented in 1.33:1 with a very nice video and sound transfer. Although none of these appeal to me, they mostly retain the original Japanese music and style (except One Piece, which features the awful Funimation rap garbage). It's worth noting that many of these are just the openings for various anime shows which give the viewer absolutely no information about what lies within, making them borderline useless.

24-page booklet with episode summaries and character descriptions

     A full-colour booklet is contained within the DVD package; it's small, but a nice little summary of the episodes and major characters, as well as a small write up on the remastering.

R4 vs R1

NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.

     Aside from bonus trailers, the R1 and R4 versions of the set are identical. I am unable to find any PAL/NTSC comparisons for the set; usually, with animation, I'm prone to go with PAL as animation usually looks the best here, but the reviews say both look great. Buy whichever is cheapest.

Summary

     Dragon Ball Z: Season 4 continues the story into the next saga, through a filler arc that actually does something different unlike other anime filler arcs, and into the prologue of the much larger and more interesting Cell Saga.

     The video and audio are both controversial, due to the big changes made converting the original 1.33:1 to widescreen, and the quality of the different audio choices. It is an entirely personal preference as to how fans will feel about these.

     There are, again, pitifully few extras.

Ratings (out of 5)

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

© Ryan Aston (Bioshock)
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Review Equipment
DVDSony Playstation 3 (HDMI 1.3) with Upscaling, using Component output
DisplayPhilips 47PFL9732D 47-inch LCD . Calibrated with Digital Video Essentials (PAL). This display device is 16x9 capable. This display device has a maximum native resolution of 1080p.
Audio DecoderLogitech 5500 THX.
AmplificationLogitech 5500 THX
SpeakersLogitech 5500 THX

Other Reviews NONE