Dragonball GT Season 2   Starring (voice): Masako Nozawa, Takeshi Kusao, Yuko Minaguchi and Atsushi Kisaichi Distributor: Manga Entertainment RRP: £34.99 MANG6027 Certificate: PG Release Date: 17 March 2014

It seems to be the month for the conclusion of various anime series on DVD, so with little surprise we delve into the second and concluding half of Dragonball GT, which contains the remaining episodes thirty-five to sixty-four and the stand alone movie A Heroes Legacy. Not bad and it makes Dragonball one of the cheapest anime series to collect, per episode. The second half of the GT season is presented on a five disc DVD set.

When we left the gang, they were still getting through the Baby Saga, which concludes with episode forty. The remaining episodes cover two whole sagas, the Super Android 17 Saga (1997) and the Shadow Dragon Saga (1997), although there is a great deal of continuity between the sagas.

GT was the weakest of the Dragonball series, not least because it wasn’t based on the original material by Toriyama. As such the show not only divided fans, with some enjoying the signature, over long, fight sequences, whilst other failed to see much worth in the project. It is not surprising then that compared to the previous series, which ran to hundreds of episodes, GT was quietly closed down after only sixty-four, barely a burp in anime terms.

Little has changed in the way the story is told, whether Goku is facing off against a baby or an android, he always follows the same path of having to ramp up his powers in order to win, only to discover that his adversary has done exactly the same. That he wins is a foregone conclusion, which does remove a lot of the tension in the show, but then it exists to provide fun, whether this is in the form of highly extended fights or its unique form of humour. After a while it all gets a little samey, so it’s not surprising that the show was quietly retired.

You do get the free movie, which sits between episodes forty and forty-one and shows both contemporary characters and those from one hundred years hence. It’s a basic quest story, nice in its way, but nothing which really advances the overall plot.

The disc is presented with a restored print, but shows that there is only so much you can economically achieve with a show this old, so although it looks better than it has previously, it still shows minor errors. Audio is either an English 2.0 or 5.1 and a Japanese mono track any of them are fine, you get more separation with the 5.1, but overall this is not Shakespeare, so just turn the volume up.

Extras are fairly scant, but then they usually are on anime discs as the amount sold does not allow for spending vast sums of money on stuff which fans will watch once, so we get some trailers and the ability to watch each disc straight through.

Even fans of the show were disappointed with the GT series, but then if you’re a completest you might want to pick up the box set, given what you get, it a lot of bang for your buck.

6

Charles Packer