Review for Eureka Seven AO: Part 1

Introduction

Releasing a sequel to a show that isn’t readily available isn’t the best way to advertise its merits, and this is the second time that Manga Entertainment have done this with this particular franchise. Fortunately, this isn’t always the case, as prior to the release of Last Exile: Fam The Silver Wing, Manga rescued the original Last Exile series and gave that a release too. Picking up lapsed ADV and Geneon licenses is somewhat easier than Bandai properties, and the original Eureka 7 was released in the US by Bandai, and in the UK by Beez. When Manga Entertainment released the spin-off movie on DVD and Blu-ray, back in 2011, the original series was still available from Beez, in Anime Legends form, allowing the unwitting viewer of the movie to actually catch up and understand half the things it was referring to, even though the movie was ostensibly a standalone retelling, not a sequel. But in August of that year, the Sony DADC facility was torched in the riots, and with it went most of Beez’ stock. Now that Manga Entertainment are releasing Eureka Seven AO, a bonafide sequel to that first series, you can’t get that first series for love or money. Funimation had a similar problem in the US (minus riots), as Bandai’s stock had mostly sold out by the time they got round to releasing AO a few months ago.


It’s only last month that Funimation finally announced that they had license rescued the original Eureka Seven, and given the pace at which they release these things, you may have watched and totally forgotten the sequel by the time the original is back on shop shelves, and you’d be forgiven for expecting a similar delay in the UK. Once again, I must add the disclaimer that I have never actually seen the original Eureka Seven. Whiny teens piloting giant robots just isn’t my bag, Evangelion notwithstanding, and when it’s giant robots on hoverboards, surfing through the sky, my suspension of disbelief is a little lacking. Still, I’m always up for a new anime, and hopefully the sequel won’t need the intimate knowledge of the original that the movie demanded. Incidentally, while Manga had initially announced an HD outing for this title, that plan has fallen by the wayside, and Eureka Seven AO comes to the UK on DVD only (Apparently the US Blu-rays are coded Region AB).


It’s the near future in the independent nation of Okinawa. But on one of the islands, a young boy named Ao has a difficult upbringing, living with his adoptive grandfather, ever since his mother left when he was still a child. The islanders never trusted his mother, the woman who fell from the sky, and brought calamity with her, and that mistrust has transferred to Ao as well. Of course some of that is transference, as Okinawa hasn’t had an easy road to independence, and life isn’t easy in a region still jostled over by the local powers, particularly Japan and China. Part of that jostling is for military control as well, particularly the possession of an IFO known as the Mark 1. Japan has it, and they need certain components from Okinawa to complete it.


All hell breaks loose when a Scub Coral, a massive toxic outgrowth appears suddenly, heralding with it the arrival of a G-Monster, a destructive alien form of the sort that brought calamity ten years previously. Ao and his friend Naru get caught up in the middle of the mayhem, and circumstances place Ao at the helm of the Mark 1 IFO, which just happens to be the giant transforming, sky-surfing robot, Nirvash. Nirvash is actually Ao’s legacy, left to him by his mother, and at its controls he has the power to fight the G-Monsters, and protect Naru. But the local militaries aren’t keen on giving up their special robot, and an International G-Monster fighting team, Generation Bleu take an interest in Ao as well. Maybe at the helm of Nirvash, Ao will discover what happened to his mother...


The first twelve episodes of Eureka Seven AO are presented across two discs by Manga Entertainment.

Disc 1
1. Deep Blue
2. AO’s Cavern
3. Secret Operation
4. Plant Coral
5. Generation Bleu
6. Noblesse Oblige
7. Bye Bye Angel

Disc 2
8. Blue Thunder
9. Enemy Below
10. The Pied Piper of Hamlin
11. Mirror of the World
12. Heaven and Earth

Picture

Eureka Seven AO gets a 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer on these discs, which courtesy of Madman Entertainment in Australia get the native PAL treatment, along with 4% speedup. It’s a pretty nice transfer, clear and sharp throughout, with few visible signs of compression, and only a tiny bit of shimmer on fine detail at the limits of the DVD format. It’s a good thing too, as Studio Bones have made a vibrant animation, rich in both character and background detail, with some really fluid action sequences and a grand scope. It also up-scales pretty well with just a smidge of edge enhancement. There are issues with the size of the on screen text captions that appear, announcing each location in this world spanning story. The English text is a little small, and due to some poor subtitle placement, is often obscured if you are watching in Japanese with subs. This is definitely one show that needs a Blu-ray release to do it justice, and I hope that Manga choose to revisit it in the future, as they did with Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood.

Sound

You have the choice between DD 5.1 English and DD 2.0 Japanese, with optional translated subtitles and a signs only track. I went with the original Japanese audio, which has some really strong voice actor performances to it. The action comes across well enough through a stereo set-up, particularly with a little Prologic applied, but Eureka Seven AO really does impress when it comes to the show’s music, both the theme songs and the incidental tunes. It really delivers something beyond the usual action anime clichés, and it’s certainly a selling point of this show. I gave the dub a brief try, and it seemed to work well enough for the purpose (although I doubt I could bear the pronunciation of Ao as ‘Ow’ for long), and the 5.1 upmix certainly gives the action sequences a little more oomph. I did notice the telltales of pitch correction though.

Extras

The discs present their content with static menus, and have jacket pictures to look at when at rest in compatible players.

The sole extra feature on disc 1 is the audio commentary for episode 5. It features voice actors Chuck Huber (Christophe Blanc), Sainty Reed (Fleur Blanc), and Jad Saxton (Elena Peoples). I’ve often picked nits at Funimation commentaries for being a general waste of twenty minutes, inconsequential blathering with nothing pertinent or interesting to be heard, just mutual back-slapping and name checking. This commentary transcends all that to present 20 minutes of sheer inanity. This is the worst Funimation commentary I have yet heard.


The commentary for episode 10 on disc 2 makes up for it to a degree. It’s split into two parts, the first with ADR director Zach Bolton and voice of Georg, Tyson Rinehart, in a fairly jovial and inoffensive chat. Part two sees Zach Bolton joined by John Swasey, the voice of Ivica, and that is a much more measured and informative conversation.

Inside the Booth: Eureka Seven AO lasts 13 minutes, and is a useful little featurette that takes us through the dubbing process for the show, with the aid of voice actor Brandon Potter (Gazelle), and ADR director Zach Bolton.

There are 3 minutes of original commercials for the show here. You get four of the textless opening sequences, and 3 of the textless closings. Finally there is the English language trailer.

Conclusion

I’d forgotten how good sci-fi from Studio Bones is; after all we get to see such shows so rarely in the UK. It isn’t just the Fullmetal Alchemist franchise. There are shows like Wolf’s Rain, Kurau Phantom Memory, Rahxephon, and Darker Than Black, all of which attest to when it comes to storytelling chops and character development, Studio Bones always stand out from the crowd. They always imprint their distinct style on a show, always create something memorable. Eureka Seven AO is no exception, and having watched the first half makes me want to watch the original Eureka Seven series as well, sky surfing giant robots included.


Thankfully, you don’t need too much familiarity with Eureka Seven to enjoy its sequel, after all, it is set in another reality altogether. Not having seen the original, I don’t know how many of the themes carry over, or how much it has in common, although from what I recall of the feature film, there are certain points of commonality. It’s set in a world not too dissimilar to our own, but a world that has been afflicted by sudden extra-dimensional alien invasion throughout history, in the form of outbreaks of Scub Coral that appear in a burst of fantastic light. This also heralds the arrival of G-Monsters, or Secrets, varied giant monsters who head relentlessly towards the Scub Coral, and if the two should meet, a devastating fusion explosion results. Governments and the militaries of the world do their best to prevent this, but it is the extra-national group, Generation Bleu, with the access to the IFO technology based on the original Nirvash that has the best success rate. But the politics of this world are complex, and there’s something of a technological arms race going on, as well a race to exploit the benefits that Scub Coral and Secrets bring with it, the Trapars that power anti-gravity technology. There is a fair bit of technobabble that comes flying out of the screen, but it is pretty easy to keep up.


In this world lives Ao Fukai, a young boy who has always felt like an outsider looking in. That’s no surprise as at the start of the show he lives in the nation of Okinawa, one of those prideful independent countries looking to get rich off the Scub Coral and trapar boom, but also having suffered in the past because of it. 10 years previously an outbreak ended badly, and no family was left untouched on the island where Ao lives with his adoptive grandfather. But when Ao’s mother just arrived, falling from the sky, which was suspicious enough, and then vanished through more suspicious means on the day of the incident, it’s no wonder that the islanders blame Ao by association.


The Nirvash giant robot has been contested by the local powers as a source for the IFO technology that Generation Bleu use to fight the Secrets, but the fact of the matter is that Ao’s mother left it as a legacy for her son. Now, when another Scub Burst occurs, and a Secret attacks the island, the Nirvash falls into Ao’s possession, and he instinctively knows how to pilot it. He winds up saving the island, but the islanders are far from grateful, especially as his hair suddenly turns blue, marking out his strange origins even more. He winds up working with Generation Bleu, who at least value his talents, but they have their own agenda to follow, and there is always a sense of the outsider about Ao.


At least among the people of Generation Bleu, he finds some friends, especially the other IFO pilots of his team, Pied Piper, but the more he fights against the Secrets, the more the mysteries surrounding the Scub Bursts and his own origins deepen, particularly when another blue-haired stranger appears with a more destructive agenda. Truth has a mission to reveal the truth of the world, regardless of how much death and destruction that entails, but when he targets one of Ao’s few islander friends, Naru, it becomes a lot more personal for Ao. Naru was one of the few survivors of the incident 10 years previously, and her health has been compromised ever since, but when Truth appears and apparently heals her, she makes a choice to join him that makes little sense to Ao.


There is an element of a Scub Burst of the week to Eureka Seven AO, but it mixes up its stories with such elegance that it doesn’t really matter. It keeps on unveiling its narrative and putting in intriguing plot developments and revelations that make you just want to watch another episode. One of Ao’s co-pilots, Elena Peoples seems to be just your average otaku girl, but as the story progresses, her character becomes more enigmatic and complex, and it seems as if she’ll be the biggest mystery in the show. But that’s until the conclusion of this half of the series, which ends on a painfully tantalising note when a character from Ao’s past reappears.


Studio Bones does really good storytelling. There isn’t an overdose of fan service, they don’t need to resort to character clichés, but you wind up hooked to each episode, you wind up wanting to watch more, and that’s getting the basics right. Part 2 of Eureka Seven AO couldn’t come soon enough, but once again, this is a series that really should have had the Blu-ray treatment in the UK.