Sakura Wars TV Complete Collection Anime DVD Review

As the series sets to bring their main storyline to conclusion with Aoi Satan while also showing that the cast has grown over the course of things and are now a functional team, the final batch of episodes hits its stride well enough. The main storyline rumbles along with Aoi Satan and his crew continuing their search for the fifth and final stone so that they can raise Edo Castle and begin their ascent to real power in this world. Aoi Satan moves somewhat to the background during the initial stages of this, letting Crimson Miroku instead take the lead along with the little boy in the frontal assault on the Flower Troop’s home base and theater. Their attack is fairly devastating and it forces everyone to go on the run as the complex is evacuated.

So now without a home and holed up at one of the research stations instead, the team starts to falter as revelations start coming up about who Aoi Satan really is. That particular revelation is most devastating to Kohran since she had such faith in him and his designs that it shakes her to the core, something which causes the team to start fraying as the battles get more intense. While the Troop tries to regain their balance, Aoi Satan sets his plans in motion to devastate the bulk of Tokyo via his Wakiji while he unearths the final hidden Tenkai Stone – and a bloody massive stone seal at that.

Both the main plot and the character growth plots converge as the battle for the ruins of Tokyo comes into play. The main storyline plot of Aoi Satan continues to be mildly interesting but it’s standard villain fare, and what little motivation the character had is basically tossed aside at the end to simply have him look cool. But it’s hard to sympathize with a villain whose prey gets away because they’re running from him and he’s simply walking. Villains would win more if they put some effort into things.

The Flower Troop team itself is given a push to become something more than they have been, partially due to the Commander and Vice-Commander disappearing from the scene as it gets more heated. Each has their own reasons for doing so, and it forces Ohgami to become the real leader of the team and set his plans into motion to deal with Aoi Satan. And while the team does fight together effectively, there isn’t the kind of oomph and rush to it that you’d expect, mostly because outside of Iris and Kohran, pretty much all of the characters are the same as they were in the beginning. And while I may be misinterpreting the character, I continue to find Sumire completely unlikable in this version.

There’s some sense of closure at the end of all of this, which is a plus, though it’s another show the feels like it’s closing the first book of many instead of a single volume. The wrap-up is just a bit too fast and too easy to really give a feel for how things are after all that’s gone on, as well as any real sense of comradeship from the team though it’s supposed to be hinted at through some of the kids that walk by. The ending isn’t exactly unsatisfying, but it fits the nature of the series, which is damning it faint praise really.

In Summary:
While over the years I’ve enjoyed numerous aspects of the Sakura Wars franchise overall, this particular venue didn’t manage to win me over all that much the first time around. Revisiting now well over a decade after its first release I’m still of the same mind – and I don’t think it’s aged all that well either both in story and the quality of the source material. Between feeling like the same kind of episodes were repeated several times and the added feeling of “been there and done that” due to the previous two OVA series, it took some effort to get into the shows groove. And even once there, we didn’t last long before it went off the tracks again. Add in my complete lack of interest in the games that supposedly truly flesh out the characters, and the series becomes fairly mediocre overall. There were some good moments, but they were far outweighed by what seemed like déjà vu.

Features:
Japanese 2.0 Language, English 5.1 Language, English Subtitles, Cleaning Opening and Closing Animation

Content Grade: C
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: C
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B-
Extras Grade: B-

Released By: Sentai Filmworks
Release Date: April 5th, 2016
MSRP: $29.99
Running Time: 625 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1

Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.