Rejected by the quasi-governmental organisation known as the Oceanographic Agency, Maia Mizuki instead finds herself working for NEREIS, an all female organisation which will do anything from retrieving cats to stopping criminals. With no memory of her past, her only clue being her grandfathers dying word "Daphne", Maia works her way up from having to do menial tasks to becoming a full agent of NEREIS, while all the time her past remains a mystery...

Daphne in the Brilliant Blue: Volume Five contains a further four episodes - seventeen to twenty - of this twenty-four episode series, so only one more disc to go, and to be honest I won’t be sorry to see the back of this show. What started as a strong premise, has reduced itself into the most vacuous fan service show I have seen this year. With a whole sunken world to explore, a history to discover and the overriding mystery of Maia’s origins, the writers have seen fit to turn their brains onto automatic, churning out shows with little or no merit.

It is no mystery that the names of the episodes relate to films, the question is that if they have sat through all these films how can they produce a show that ultimately turned out to be so bland. In Five Women and a Baby the girls... now don’t get ahead of me... find a baby. Time for a lot of chat and not much action. Shizuka’s Choice: Shizuka has to deal with an injured con artist and the calling of her heart. The Hunt for Green Yomogi No 1, and Maia has been kidnapped in a scheme to rob treasure from one of the sunken cities; the only thing of note was that she remembers that she has a brother. With the knowledge that her brother had buried something in Siberia. Once Upon a time in Siberia sees Maia desperately trying to prove his existence even though her own official records show no brother.

For a show that started so well, this revelation may be too little too late. The use of the Wang-Chang-Lee’ as the only credible enemy has shrunk the scope of the story to that of a soap opera, much to the detriment of the project. Yes there are still girls in skimpy outfits, but even that loses its interest after a while - and completely by episode ten. Only the last episodes will see if the writers can pull something spectacular to save this ailing show.

Once again the show's picture is clear and clean with audio options for English and Japanese stereo, plus subtitles. The disc contains only an art gallery as an extra.

5

Charles Packer