Black Lagoon - Second Barrage

Label: MVM.
Release date: 8th September 2008
Certificate: tbc (There's no way this is getting less than a 15)
Running time: Approx 100 minutes
Video: 16.9 anamorphic.
Sound: English 2.0 Japanese 2.0.
Subtitles: English

Synopsis:

The Black Lagoon gang are back! A recent string of murders is the talk of the town. Not that murder is anything unusual, but the twin killers are targeting Hotel Moscow! The delicate balance of power held by the mafia leaders crumbles as the sickening slaughter escalates into a full-blown war of attrition. No quarter is given and none asked for, as Balalaika and her soldiers are forced to recall a time when their deadliest enemies were children.

Episode listing:

• Ep13: "The Vampire Twins Comen"
• Ep14: "Bloodsport Fairytale"
• Ep15: "Swan Song at Dawn"
• Ep16: "Greenback Jane"

Comments:

If there was ever an anime that was almost tailor made for the American audience then this is it. Being that it's not set in Japan, and only one of the main characters is Japanese or has even set foot in Japan, then there's absolutely no need to know anything about Japanese culture, customs or politics. What you do get instead is a series filled with action, violence, bad language, some more action and violence and a bit more bad language. There was a quote regarding the original GHOST IN THE SHELL movie, which stated that it was the kind of anime that James Cameron would make if Disney would let him. If that’s the case then this is probably the kind of anime Robert Rodriguez would make if Disney fancied having another go.

The first three episodes on this disc opening Black Lagoon’s second series form a single story arc, which may be this show’s most powerful and emotionally charged tale. This arc’s incredibly dark content touches on the results of systematic child abuse, psychotic preteen assassins and the gruesome circle of gleeful murder and cold-blooded revenge. Luckily the fourth and final episode is lighter in tone with a touch more humour to act as a counterpoint to the weight of the previous arc.

Now I'll say this up front; I’m generally not a fan of English language dubs preferring to stick with the original Japanese where possible. This show however is one instance where the dubbed version was so good that any preconceptions I may have had were just totally blown away. The scripting is well balanced and equally well paced and the voice acting top notch. The cast put in great performances all-round and are, except for a few dodgy faux European and Oriental accents, very believable.

Incidentally, when I mentioned before that there's a lot of bad language, I am not kidding. The final episode alone contains dozens of instances of the kind of profanity you would not be using in front of your grandmother, and one of those sneaks in before the starting titles have even finished. So if you're likely to be overheard by those of a delicate disposition, stick with the somewhat "less blue" Japanese audio with subtitles. It would seem that the ADR production company responsible for the dub realised that, as this show would never get anything lower than a 15 cert and there’s very little they could do with the dub track to nudge it up any higher, they may as let rip with the profanities and see how far they could push it.

The only thing that let the audio down was that, although there's a 5.1 mix production company listed in the end credits as having been involved with the English version, it's still only presented in 2.0 stereo. This is a real shame as most of the action sequences and (numerous) gunfights would have benefited greatly from the full surround sound treatment.

Visually the images are crisp and clear and presented in full 16.9 anamorphic. This is a definite plus for an anime where in several scenes you can both count a character’s teeth and read the engraving on the side of their pistol.

Extras:

Unfortunately this release is disappointingly lacking in this area. There's a clean (textless) version of the closing title sequence for episode 15 and a trailer for FLCL & Starship Operators and that's it.

Black Lagoon - The Second Barrage - Volume 1 is available from September 8 from all major retailers including Amazon and Play.

Review: Penfold