Search - Viewtiful Joe, Vol. 1 on DVD

Great anime, too bad they didn't get someone else to localiz

Dark Helmet | Seattle, WA | 04/17/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Picked up the first Viewtiful Joe DVD recently, so here's my review.

The show: I've only seen the episodes that are on the DVD, so I'm not sure how this shapes up later, but... As you may or may not know, there's a VJ anime which has been dubbed for the US market. It follows the plot of the game more or less, with some changes that you may or may not like due to the fact that Capcom for some reason let 4Kids and Geneon do the localization. First of all, the voices have all changed, and Joe's at least not for the better IMHO. He sounds like a permeanently congested surfer dude. Most of the rest of the characters sound at least reasonably like their game counterparts, save Gran Bruce who now has the stereotypical Aussie accent instead of sounding like a pirate. Some of the names have been changed around, such as the Six Machine becoming Machine Six, and Six Maijin becoming Robo-Six. Sprocket also gained a tie to cover her, her... uhh... chest, and the scenes where she pulls at the zipper on her shirt were all cut, along with VJ's middle finger being edited out in the transformation scenes. Now, if he were flipping the bird I could understand, but the pose has him with his thumb, middle, and pinkie finger raised. Not the same thing, IMHO. I think that the anime itself is rather good, so I give that an A-, but the localization gets a D. Capcom should have had someone else do it, and had them keep the voice actors from the game.

The DVD: Man they're not giving it away. The first DVD only has three episodes on it, and set me back $17.99 + tax. That means to buy all the discs for the first season alone (24 episodes) would set you back $144. Ouch. The on disc extras are limited to the FOX Kids commercial for the cartoon, and a still picture character guide that mostly tells you the same stuff that the game does. It's rather lame IMHO. It does come with a mini poster with an ad for the next volume on the back, a lenticular card (the ones that shift back and forth between two different images depending on the angle), and some stickers that are probably not outdoor safe.

In closing, I love VJ, and the original anime is great, but I can't really recommend this DVD. The localization isn't that great, and it's too expensive for what you get. It should either be cheaper or have more episodes on it. Neat pack ins don't make up for it."