Prince of Darkness:
The feature continues to be a piece that doesn’t feel like it flows well and changes too much of what made the TV series interesting. When you take a show that is a mixture of light comedy and darker drama and go mostly for the drama, the tone changes drastically. Three years after the TV series, we’re introduced to the Nadesico again with Ruri as the sixteen-year-old captain of the ship and performing her duty. The movie actually opens with the image of the gravesite with Yurika and Akito’s images on it as prayers are being offered. From there, the movie goes off at a heightened pace of images and dialogue that quickly begin to lose meaning and form.
The other main change in the solar system is that there’s a general peace between the Earth and the Jovians. Boson jumping has become increasingly popular and that’s changed the way things have worked greatly. When you’re able to move about at will, the nature of society changes greatly. With the continual research and development of Boson jumping, the next phase of it has come in the form of the Hisago Plan. With these chulip jump points being arrayed around the solar system, it would free humanity even more. Of course, they also make a tasty target for the new insurgent group that’s risen to challenge the existing powers.
And much like in the original series, the government has a hard time doing much outside of bicker and accuses each other of things. Some of it is quite amusing though, when they’re able to use the accusation of the Jovian’s being a race of lizard people, how can you trust those leaders again. With the United Earth forces essentially unable to do anything and paralyzed, it’s little surprise that the Nadesico B gets itself back into the game with much of the original crew coming back to help out, including some mixed in Jovian’s to add some balance and humor.
From there… it’s just nonsensical to me. Just about every aspect of what I didn’t like from the TV series becomes prominent here, with a far too large cast sweeping in and out of the movie and making off hand comments. Characters that are barely on long enough for you to even try to remember their name never mind the relationships they had with other characters. Add in that the plot is pretty weak in itself and it’s just ninety minutes of flashy animation moving around.
Maybe this would have made more sense to me two years ago after the series ended and it was all the fresher in my mind. With the film starting off with the deaths of the leads and then seeing them back in other forms later, that took one of the few hooks into the show and tossed it aside. Granted, the film was released at a time when Ruri was all that was talked about in and outside of anime fandom in Japan with her face everywhere, harkening back to the time when it was “Noa ‘bloody’ Izumi” who was everywhere, but that doesn’t carry over to here for me. Ruri had some interesting moments in the series but not enough to carry the movie.
And it’s also the type of film where things happen that are easily explained away as yet another surprising revelation or off hand comment. Akito’s return as a visor wearing darkling who isn’t interested in anything is off-putting. There also appears to be something where more information was available to the Japanese fans of the show. Nowhere in the movie, at least to me, is it obvious that Akito and Yurkia were married for a year and a half during the three years that are skipped. Nor that Ruri lived with the two of them for a good part of that time, as well as just how Akito and Yurika supposedly met their end. Yet I was able to find it in a couple of reviews a few years ago of the movie during its theatrical release.
With all that’s going on here, I figured I’d at least get a decent SF anime movie with plenty of climactic battles. Those are indeed present here, but they feel so lifeless without the characters to really back them up. Having no feelings or caring for none of those in the show, the whole thing quickly folded on itself for me since there wasn’t anything to latch onto. This movie is definitely one for the fans and not the casual viewer. This is one of those rare movies where I can say that I feel like those people in the 80’s who would through whatever means end up with some anime movie that was poorly subtitled and only made a marginal amount of sense. I’m not saying this movie is poorly subtitled or scripted in any way, but it just feels like I’m missing so much of what’s needed that I’m unable to make any connection, instead I’m just seeing a dizzying array of images and useless dialogue going across the screen.
In Summary:
Martian Successor Nadesico was a difficult show to get through at times when I first saw it but my appreciation for it grew over the years with various re-releases. This return to it was one that I was more curious to see for the technical side more than the content itself, though I find my feelings cementing more on it now some nearly ten years since my last viewing. While my appreciation of the show overall has grown as my exposure to more shows and more history has occurred, the series suffers from a really bad ending. It’s a rare show that can go from a strong and engaging final episode to leaving me feeling like it’s an utter copout with only two minutes of story left. As a whole, Nadesico is a fun show that blends a lot of genres together well and works today even if it feels a bit quaint in comparison to what comes out today. This collection firmly serves as the definitive western release of it and is one that is very easy to recommend to people who want to sample one of the bigger titles of the mid nineties. Having pretty much everything produced for it outside of the manga here in one compact collection with as high a quality presentation as you can get will make this a must-own release for fans of it and a great way to see so much for a great price for newer fans willing to give it a chance.
Features:
Japanese PCM Language, English PCM Language, English Subtitles, Clean Opening, Clean Ending, TV Spots, Trailers, Interviews with Actors and Staff, “Welcome to Belle Equipe” featurette, “Nadesico Sorekara” special, and a music video
Content Grade: B
Audio Grade: B+
Video Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: B+
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: B
Released By: Nozomi Entertainment
Release Date: April 4th, 2017
MSRP: $64.98
Running Time: 740 Minutes
Video Encoding: 1080p AVC
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 (TV/OVA) / 1.78:1 (Film)
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.
Chris Beveridge
Chris has been writing about anime, manga, movies and comics for well on twenty years now. He began AnimeOnDVD.com back in 1998 and has covered nearly every anime release that’s come out in the US ever since.
He likes to write a lot, as you can see.
