Legend of the Galactic Price-tag

Legend of the Galactic Heroes (aka Ginga Eiyuu Densetsu) is one of “THOSE” animes. You know the type--those super famous, super long, classics that can never catch a break in English speaking territories. The kind of content that only dedicated fans can bring out illicitly because no company can afford the license thanks to its pedigree, nor would any company be willing to try because none have the cojones to touch a 150+ episode series that’s 30+ years old. So Sentai Filmworks’ acquisition of LotGH in 2015 was a pretty big surprise. Sentai releasing older series isn’t really too out of character for them--I mean they’re no discotek, but their Casshan release was great, and back-in-the-day as ADV Films they regularly did classics such as Gatchaman and Aura Battler Dunbine. But even knowing that this was still unbelievable, a legendarily unobtainable series can soon be obtained--but at a price the Monkey Paw demanded.

The 3 long years of radio silence was bad enough, but when news finally came in 2018 that’s when it really hit the fan. Legend of the Galactic Heroes would only be getting the royal treatment; a luxurious limited edition set that would cost $800 (plus shipping and handling). There will be no standard edition, there will be no cheaper DVD versions coming later, and there will be no other prints made. Only 1000 sets are being sold, so only 1000 people will be able to obtain the legendarily unobtainable. Those are some tough breaks. No real sane person would honestly buy this, only the most desperate super fan would sink so low--so naturally I bought one. ba-dum-tss

Why would I do such a thing, you may ask. Well, part of the reason is I’m one of “THOSE” people. You know the ones--the dastardly type that has bought some Aniplex of America releases (not a lot of them though!) and *gasp* may even import the occasional blu-ray from Japan. Jokes aside though, I quite enjoy my hobbies, so I don’t mind spending on them. A lot of my Gundam collection is in fact overpriced Japanese BDs that I really cherish for the gorgeous cover artwork that the US releases never get. I always felt like I’m willing to pay a premium price if the product I am paying for is premium--but to be fair, that’s just me, other people may call the whole thing a scam. I know a lot of people hate limited high price releases, and honestly, I can’t stand that only a chosen few can ever own LotGH now. If not for the fact that I had recently obtained my tax rebate before this pre-order window I would have easily missed the chance to become one of those chosen (this is the other reason why I ended up buying it).

Honestly while this set should be a major showpiece of my collection I felt a lot of remorse over it in the coming months; as this was easily one of my most conflicted purchases I have ever made in my life. This blu-ray box set has haunted me. After all, this is probably the most money I spent on something that wasn’t a car or an electronic like a new television. $800 is a lot; depending on where you live, you could probably pay a month’s worth of rent with this kind of dough. Even someone like me felt pretty pressured over paying this much for a hobby. Then there’s Sentai botching the first shipments royally. The set I’m showing here is actually my second one--the original set arrived damaged and I had to send it back. Regularly I’m not too picky about these things but goddamn for the price I paid it needs to be as close to perfect as possible.

From what I could tell, the number plate in my original set came loose during the shipping process and scratched the crap out of everything inside. I saw quite a few others with similar issues on forums over the following days. What I find hilarious is that when I got my replacement set they GLUED the new number plate in place and no matter how hard you tug it’s not coming out. Looks like they learned that one the hard way! Sadly I lost my original number thanks to this. I luckily did have the foresight to at least take a photo of it in case something like that happened though; number 131 out of 1000. Now I’m number 626 out of 1000 (gah). C’est la vie, at least my set isn’t broken anymore. If there's anyone out there that returned their set and suddenly became 131: you’re welcome.

So only now am I starting to really feel comfortable with this set and I just recently added it to my collection display. It sat in its shipping box on my desk for weeks as I felt uneasy about it. I’m starting to finally come to terms with this huge, expensive thing I now own--and let me tell you, if I ever move this is getting a crap load of bubble wrap considering the shipping woes Sentai gave me with the first set. Over all, this has been one stranger chapters of my collection though.

Please enjoy the following photos I took of this legendarily rare box set.

Complete set with one of the 4 blu-ray cases laid open.

Inside fold-out art for the blu-ray case.

Included book.

Most of the book is filled up with basic episode recaps. Somewhat disappointing,
there's tiny screenshots and almost no art whatsoever in it.
Listing all the classic music pieces used in each episode is a very nice touch, however. 

Commemorative coins of best boys Yang Wen-li and Reinhard von Lohengramm.

One of the two 3D lithographs included. Said 3D effect is actually pretty nice under
the right kind of lighting. 

Happy Dragon Quest XI Day!!!

I'm actually really impressed with the Gamestop pre-order pins. Usually the bonuses Gamestop gives are pretty crummy. lol

Happy Dragon Quest XI Eve

Tomorrow marks the release of Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age for the North American and European markets. To help celebrate this launch I decided I should write a little something Dragon Quest related on my blog. It’s no secret to those that know me that I am a huge fan of the franchise, and that Dragon Quest XI is easily one of my most anticipated game releases in years—after all we have not had a chance to sit down with a new entry in this franchise since Dragon Quest IX back in 2010. That eight year wait was thoroughly killing me inside but I persevered and made it this far! So let’s talk some Dragon Quest.

Now Dragon Quest is an monumental franchise that helped to establish not just role-playing games in Japan but around the whole world. The original release was a game that many thought simply could not be done, as at the time role-playing games were only ever released for a very dedicated niche PC market. Taking an RPG from a computer with complex command prompts and a full keyboard and mouse interface and converting it for a video game console with a controller that just had an A and B button, start and select, and a directional-pad was thought to be ludicrous, but then came Dragon Quest.

The early NES (or Famicom if that’s more your style) Dragon Quest games are far from perfect in their game design, but they mark the first real RPG video game experience a casual audience could enjoy, and soon other RPGs would follow in their footsteps and the genre became a mainstay for gaming everywhere and not just stuck on the PC. A large part of this had to do with a strong marketing push, using popular magazine publications to essentially hold the hands of the newly introduced whom had no idea how to navigate an RPG; very much akin to the role Nintendo Power would play for us in America during the late-80's and early 90's. It’s because of this (among other reasons) that the series has always had a very strong media presence in its home country and Dragon Quest enjoys dipping its fingers into everything from comics, to toys, to cartoons. Which leads us to what I really wanted to talk about today, the 1996 animated film: Dragon Quest Saga: The Emblem of Roto.

Emblem of Roto started life as a manga created by Chiaki Kawamata, Junji Koyanagi, and Kamui Fujiwara in 1991 running for 21 volumes until its completion in 1997. It is among the many, many, many other Dragon Quest manga out there. It’s not a very well known manga series in English speaking circles and unlike Dai no Daibouken it isn’t fully translated into English either. I first encountered Emblem of Roto a little over a decade ago when I was in my Dragon Quest frenzy stage and could not get enough of the series (I still can’t, really!). Back then I would buy up anything on eBay even remotely close to Dragon Quest and ended up owning a lot of Dragon Quest related crap. In my huge pile of Dragon Quest books in Japanese that I can’t even read laid a couple manga volumes and even an art book for this series. I remember flipping through these pages and being fascinated by it, hoping to one day find some stuff for Emblem of Roto in English. That turned out to be very hard to do.

I really love the art work for Emblem of Roto too, if I can just talk about that for a minute. It has a very 90’s-esque anime style to it that I am quite fond of, but also has a hint of Akira Toriyama’s unique style mixed in too. Series that have had Toriyama as lead artist always have a very fascinating art evolution to me as he developed a super distinct and identifiable style of his own over his 15 years as a manga artist in Shonen Jump writing Dr Slump and Dragon Ball. So when I see how anime studios and other artists have to take that style of his and adapt as well as change it for works like Beet the Vandel Buster, Blue Dragon, and Emblem of Roto, it’s always fun. Where does Toriyama begin and these many other artists end, so to say.

Getting back on track, however, it wasn't until recently I learned of this Emblem of Roto movie, and it wasn't until a few days ago that I actually got around to watching it! Imagine my surprise that there was a movie adaptation all this time and that somebody actually went and fansubbed it to boot! However, adaptation may be a pretty forgiving word, as far as I can tell skimming the few scans that exist online, and flipping through the volumes I have, this film more or less does its own thing and only takes the characters very loosely from the manga. So then just what is this movie even about? We should probably be getting to the meat and potatoes by this point now after all.

Well the gist of its short 45 minute run time is that Arus, our protagonist, happens to be the village crybaby. The boy is known for being a coward and doesn't seem to get along with the other kids his age nor able to stand up for himself. The other kids bully him, and he doesn't seem to have friends. Arus is terrible at fighting and can’t keep up with the others training his swordsmanship or his magic. The elders of the village all seem quite worried over how weak and sensitive he is, especially in this uncertain time with monsters roaming everywhere outside the village.

After some mischief with the town bully, Kira, Arus is dared into adventuring into the forest at night to prove his manhood. The two boys, Arus and Kira, stumble their way through the monster populated forest trying to find an old shrine, that the village used to worship at but can no longer go to because of the monsters. The shrine is the only location that the lily of the valley blooms in. First boy to bring back one of these lilies as proof that they entered the shrine is the winner. Arus fumbles around like a klutz and just when he’s about to break down and cry he ends up falling into a den where fairies live. The fairies are initially terrified that a human has invaded their home but soon turn amazed that Arus can actually understand their sacred language and decide to instead ask him for help. Arus agrees to help them kill a monstrous flower that started to bloom near the shrine. The flower gives off deadly poison that is killing all living things plant and animal alike near it. However the flower slumbers at night giving Arus an easy chance to cut it down before the sun rises thus becoming a hero.

After heading back home to procure a sword and chomping the flower down just in time before sunrise Arus explores the shrine only to find that the monster is not dead—in fact its roots have taken over the entire shrine acting as creepy tentacle like tendons that capture everything that moves within. After some temple running (literately) and dodging the deadly roots in a chase scene, it’s round 2 of fighting, and this time Arus is able to muster all his strength and kills the evil plant for good—even saving Kira in the process whom was captured by the tentacle roots earlier in the film. It’s then in the heart of the shrine that Arus learns of his origins as a descendant of the legendary hero Roto (or Erdirk) and the two boys go home as friends as the credits roll.

The movie is a pretty straight forward affair, given its shorter run time that is to be expected—but you’d assume it would move pretty briskly like most 45 minute anime films do, however, it’s actually somewhat slow at the beginning. The movie really takes its time to establish Arus as a weak and bullied kid before finally having the “call to action” occur at about 20 minutes in—almost half way through. Once the movie does start going though it’s quite fun and chock-full of some really impressive animated sequences that I did not expect for such a humble and overlooked kid’s film. This was never brought to blu-ray, hell it was never even brought to DVD. The copy I was watching is an old VHS recording. So it’s somewhat heart breaking in the end seeing how gorgeous this little feature ended up being.

It’s all the little things that make Emblem of Roto a wonderful looking film. I love the gorgeous hand painted backgrounds with birds and other animals always flying around. There’s constant movement in this film actually. The way the wind blows during scenes outside in nature; how clothes move; how there’s always something moving in the background—it’s fantastic. I love that the character designs are super flexible and move smoothly, and that characters have fully developed faces that show lots of emotions. I love that Arus’ sword is almost twice the size of his body. That was something I especially loved actually. Arus is just a kid after all, and the way the animators handled him sheathing and unsheathing this unwieldy adult sized sword just made for some fantastic little animated moments. The whole thing is over in less than an hour, and all these small things really add up to make the short run time go by even faster. Honestly the animation alone can really sell a movie like this.

And just like that Emblem of Roto was over before I know it. It is kind of fitting in a way when I think about it. Emblem of Roto is probably not gonna get any more attention in English speaking circles any time soon. It’s very easy to overlook and though dedicated as the English DQ fan community is, there probably isn’t enough interest in a lot of these multimedia tie-ins to get translated. Hell, thanks to the MMO nature of Dragon Quest X we’re back to not even having every mainline Dragon Quest game released outside of Japan again—so we don’t even have all the games released any more, I'd say the chances that an older manga getting released are even slimmer. But what we do have of Emblem of Roto in English is fun, easy to watch, and great to boot. I really recommend checking it out for yourself if any of my rambling sounded interesting to you. And I hope tomorrow’s release of Dragon Quest XI will be a great day for all of you.