TSUBASA - RESERVOIR CHRONICLE: SEASON ONE

By: Iggy Michniacki on 12.1.2009

The Movie Itself:
With reviews for Sky Crawlers, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete, Witchblade: The Animated Series and now Tsubasa – Reservoir Chronicles: Season One, somebody might peg me as Project-Blu’s ‘anime guy.’ The honest truth is, I’m not. Even with high scores for two out of the four listed above, anime has just never fit me no matter how much of a nerd I may be. Friends have always tried to persuade me to give a few series a chance, cover art, synopsis paragraphs and relation to other media has always tried to pull me in as well. But the honest truth of the matter is I just can’t find the majority of it entertaining. I include this warning because there are many promising features to Tsubasa – Reservoir Chronicles: Season One, but I just couldn’t find it entertaining enough to keep me happy.

Syaoran, a friend of the princess, is on an archeological dig when he uncovers something amazing. Sakura, the princess, goes to discover his findings and ends up sprouting a set of glowing wings and vanishes through a wall leaving nothing but feathers. Syaoran discovers that the feathers piece together Sakura’s soul and must put the puzzle back together in order for Sakura to remain alive.

Upon their journey to help find the answers they encounter a banished ninja, Kurogane, and a wizard on the run, Fay D. Flourite. On the quest together, the four find many hardships through many different worlds in hope of regaining all the feathers. Each world (and episode) offering something different from ninja groups to kidnapping witches and not even every adventure offers the reward of a feather. As the series continues on, the four become closer and Sakura slowly regains her memories along with her life; helping more and more within the quests as they continue.

Offering what seems to be a variety of different genres rolled into one Tsubasa – Reservoir Chronicles: Season One is an anime of different sorts for sure. Anime fans are, will be and should be drawn to Tsubasa for its complexity and its characters but there was little draw for me.

Honesty is always the best policy so the truth is that my first attempt with episode one left me asleep, sprawled across the coach. Thanks to the fact that this isn’t just a hobby but a job it lead me to give it another shot as well as the other twenty-five episodes that followed. Pace might be my first issue, at least to start out the series. There are twenty-six episodes and around twenty different paces of said episodes. As much as the heroes of this series encountered a new adventure, the audience also saw a new consistency in action and plot.

The subject of change within a season can swing one of two ways; good or bad. Tsubasa visits many different worlds and explores many different ideas within the science-fiction, action and drama worlds. This can be pleasing to many but may leave some newcomers, such as myself, finding it hard to settle in and enjoy the ride.

As dissatisfying as I found the episodes to be, there were some strong positives within them, especially the characters. The range of the characters involved was enjoyable, and the fact that I didn’t feel like I’ve seen these characters in every other anime did help bring something to the table. Syaoran wasn’t over the top and characters with smaller roles help fill some voids and add a different taste to what our main heroes have to offer.

Returning to the subject of pace, Tsubasa seems to take off rather quickly only to be followed with episode after episode of buildup to reach a finale that explodes way too fast. The comparison to other series fits the bill as this seems to be a reoccurrence with anime series.

Tsubasa – Reservoir Chronicles: Season One isn’t for everybody, but being an anime, most of you should know this by now. It has plenty of positives to go with its negatives and anime fans, especially the younger ones, will find more enjoyable aspects of this series than they will find that are not enjoyable.
Rating: 4/10

The Presentation:
Tsubasa – Reservoir Chronicles: Season One comes to Blu-ray courtesy of FUNimation. This isn’t my first rodeo with FUNimation, and if they keep up the good work on the presentation it won’t be my last either.

The video is presented in full 1080p courtesy of a Mpeg-4 codec that delivers a nice picture. This isn’t reference material, and is just shy of the Witchblade release, but it still looks good. Colors would be one of the most noticeable things as they shine bright and true filling up the screen and adding to each scene. Character detail is as strong as it can get (due to limitations in the two-dimensional animation) and sees a nice benefit from this Blu-ray presentation. Depth looks good and adds a bit of dimension making this feel a bit more than two-dimensional. There are some issues with banding however, as fast moving sequences can have the occasional mishap. Also, background detail can vary in quality from episode to episode causing a bit of inconsistency within the entire season. Even with those negatives, the positives step in and deliver a strong looking Blu-ray.

The audio fairs very nicely as well, with a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 track that packs a punch. One huge problem; it’s an English punch that it is packing, as once again a Blu-ray is being released with the dubbed track featuring the lossless treatment. The original Japanese track (for the purists) is only presented in Dolby Digital 2.0. Oh well, once again as somebody who would rather here it ‘pure’ with subtitles will catch themselves checking out the dubbed track due to its vast superior quality.

All complaining aside, judging the TrueHD track on ability alone will get this Blu-ray very far as the English track is explosive, dynamic and complex. The audio flows through the speakers wonderfully, leaving very little issue and much enjoyment. The main problem, and possibly the only problem, is the volume of the dialogue compared to the rest of the track. Often dialogue can get washed out by music causing one to have the remote ready to adjust levels from scene to scene. Other than that, the audio is strong with all speakers working nicely and the subwoofer getting a fair amount of action as well.
Rating: 7/10 (video 7/10, audio 7/10)

The Extras:
For a full season of episodes I was expecting a full season worth of extras. Unfortunately, the extras don’t run that ‘full.’ There are a few extras, and the fans of the series should enjoy some of them but this is a rather underwhelming supplement package.

• Cast Auditions (English): The auditions include Syaoran, Sakura, Kurogane, Fai, Mokona, and Yuko.
• Faces in the Crowd: A guide to many of the characters seen throughout Tsubasa.
• Character Guide: Character “bios” for the main characters of Tsubasa.
• World Guide: Self explanatory… a guide of the world’s that are in Tsubasa.
• Textless Songs: The opening and closing songs played without the credits or subtitles.
• Trailers (HD): For quite a few animated features, such as Dragon Ball Z, Bamboo Blade, Sgt. Frog, Case Closed, Dragon Ball, Ah! My Goddess, One Piece, and Tsubasa.

Overall:
Anime always walks a very thin line when it comes to finding the right audience; more times than not I don’t fit in that group. However, anime fans should find themselves enjoying Tsubasa – Reservoir Chronicles: Season One even though I did not. FUNimation does another great job when it comes to Blu-ray presentation as both the video and the English dubbed track deliver a quality performance. Fans of the series shouldn’t have any issues with upgrading, those unfamiliar may want to see about renting before diving in.
Rating: 6/10