THE PULSE-POUNDING ACTION CONTINUES IN THIS THRILLING SECOND SEASON OF THE EYE-POPPING SCI-FI SERIES!
What They Say
Satellizer el Bridget and the most powerful Pandoras are summoned to a secret base in the wilds of Alaska—primed for the battle. But they quickly discover the true purpose for their presence: to assess the clandestine Chevalier organization to forge a new breed of soldier—E-Pandora! Rumors of the heinous experimentation haunt this project and only Satellizer and Kazuya can unravel the mystery before it’s too late.
The Review!
Audio:
The audio for this release is done in both English (Dolby TrueHD 5.1) and Japanese (Dolby True HD 2.0) for both the regular series and its special features. The sound is much cleaner in the Blu-ray than it was the DVD release. Voices are crisp and clear. They also were not overpowered by the soundtrack, which shows the creators for this Blu-ray understood the importance of making sure viewers can actually hear what the characters are saying. The opening and ending theme songs were also very nice. This series makes good use of audio to enhance its storytelling.
Video:
The 1080p High Definition 16:9 video quality is outstanding. The animation and artwork do not suffer at all during the playthrough, which is good because the art style for this series is one of my favorites. This series is one in which high-quality artwork is essential for the story presentation—being a story where the primary focus is high-octane action and busty beauties in various states of undress. Had this series not featured such nice production quality, it would be harder to justify buying.
Packaging:
Three super hot woman are featured on this cover. Elizabeth Mabley, Chiffon Fairchild, and Satellizer el Bridget are wearing their school uniforms in the middle of a snowy background. While I question their judgment in clothing, I cannot deny the striking image they present. The white background with hailing snow creates a contrast to the vibrant red and white colors of the characters, making them pop out of the cover. The pink background of the back cover once again features Satellizer on the right in a sexy pose. The left has the catchphrase and series description, along with several screenshots.
Menu:
The menu screen is a lot more dynamic than most menus, which often feature a static image of one or more of the characters, followed by a number of options. While the options you can select from are the same (play all, select episodes, extras, and options), the background shows clips from the series. The clips repeat themselves in a loop and are accompanied by a dark and ominous music that lends itself well to the violent nature of this anime.
Extras:
While season 1 of Freezing had some great extras like their OVAs, Freezing Vibration sadly does not have those. It does have some commentaries with Milly Power, Whitney Rogers, Caitlin Glass, and Austin Tindle. However, everything else about the extras is pretty standard.
Content: (Please note that this portion of the review may contain spoilers):
Freezing Vibration is a huge improvement from the first season. This isn’t because the animation and artwork are better. They are about the same. However, the main character, Kazuya, is a lot better as a character in this season than he is in the previous one.
This series has Satellizer, Kazuya, and the other top-ranking Pandoras traveling to the freezing tundra known as Alaska, where a new project to create super soldiers known as E-Pandora is underway. The girls are traveling there to test these new E-Pandoras. After all, in the fight for humanity’s survival, they are going to need all the help they can possibly get. However, while everything seems to be going well at first glance, there are a lot of rumors surrounding this project, and new information eventually comes to light that this project might be violating numerous laws set down by the Chevalier, which are like an elite group who controls much of the world’s government.
To fight against what is happening, Elizabeth Mabley decides to gather information on her own, but she is caught by Dr. Scarlett Ohara—the leading scientist in charge of the E-Pandora project—and subject to excruciating torture. This particular scene was actually pretty brutal. Elizabeth was tortured via electric shock like a criminal being given the death sentence. Very few things are more horrifying than watching a young woman be shocked by electricity so much that she pisses her pants, but that is what happened here. I’m not sure how I felt about this scene. I get that this is to showcase how dark and vile and far humans are willing to go to get what they want, but at the same time, it felt like this might have been put there for ryona fetish reasons.
While Elizabeth is being brutally tortured, Satellizer and Kazuya travel to her family’s estate in Europe. Their hope is that they can ask her father for help. Satellizer’s old man is apparently a very wealthy and influential member of society. They are hoping he can help them expose the corruption behind the E-Pandora project.
Sadly, they run into someone Satellizer never wanted to see again.
Her brother.
Satellizer’s younger brother is both the worst and best thing that happened in this anime. He is the worst because I hate him. Everything about him pisses me off. We learn that he is the reason Satellizer is such a broken character, why she cannot stand the touch of a man, and why she flew into berserker rages whenever someone did touch her. He physically and sexually abused her as a child. I really hate his guts. However, this is also why he is a good thing. That Satellizer’s younger brother invokes such emotions is proof that viewers come to care about Satellizer. She is more than just a two-dimensional character on a screen. She feels almost real. You have an affinity for her, want to protect her and see her succeed. This is something a lot of anime fail to accomplish. She’s not some cookie cutter archetype who can be replaced with another character.
This season has a lot of growing from Satellizer and even Kazuya. I feel like forcing Satellizer to confront her brother helped them grow, both closer and has characters. This, too, is something that doesn’t happen often in anime. A lot of character development often feels like one step forward and ten steps back. Characters are forced to confront something about themselves, overcome it, and then go back to square one, but these two appear to have actually progressed instead of regressed. I can appreciate that, especially on Kazuya’s side. I didn’t like him at all in season 1, but now I don’t actually mind him, though I still think he could stand to be more assertive.
In Summary:
Freezing Vibration is an anime filled with action, nudity, and fan service. While some of the fan service was awkward like watching Elizabeth Mabley pissing herself as she is tortured, the rest of it was pretty good. I can approve of a good bath scene.
Content Grade: A
Audio Grade: A
Video Grade: A
Packaging Grade: A
Menu Grade: A
Extras Grade: C
Released By: Funimation
Release Date: March 19th, 2019
MSRP: $29.98
Running Time: 300 minutes
Video Encoding: 1080p AVC
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 Widescreen
Review Equipment:
55″ Class AQUOS HD Series LED TV LC-55LE643U, GL Blu-ray player
