Anime

Dragon Ball: Mystical Adventure Review

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The third Dragon Ball movie is an odd one as it doesn’t feature any new characters at all but instead takes a good chunk of them from the Red Ribbon Army and 22nd Tenkaichi Tournament arcs and mushes them together, then throws in a new location for a bit of set dressing, plus Chiaotzu is some sort of Emperor now for some reason. The weird thing is that I find it really works, this is far and away my favourite of the four original Dragon Ball films, but then again I love the RRA and 22nd TB arcs, so maybe it’s not that big a shock. Well, either way, let’s take a look!

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Dragon Ball: Revenge of King Piccolo (Wii) Review

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The only other game I own that’s based on the original Dragon Ball series, “Revenge of King Piccolo” is essentially a Wii version of the previous game, Advanced Adventure, only focused solely on the Red Ribbon and Demon King Piccolo arcs with less modes and playable characters, BUT all in 3D, so… hooray, I guess. I brought it hoping it would be a modernised take on the GBA game but instead found a pretty safe, generic game instead. How does it hold up in 2023? Well, funnily enough, it’s much the same in that it’s a safe, generic action platformer. Let’s take a deeper look anyway… well, as deep as such a shallow game can go anyway!

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Dragon Ball: Sleeping Princess in Devil’s Castle Review

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Dragon Ball’s second theatrical feature sort of picks up from where the last one left off, in that the previous film adapted the first 13 or so episodes of the show / story arc of the manga and this one riffs on the next one, where Goku meets Krillin and they train under Master Roshi… well, then it sort of stops to tell a mostly original story, though adding in a few missed beats from the previous film and of course favourite side-character Lunch, who gets a much different introduction here! Let’s take a look…

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Dragon Ball: Advanced Adventure (GBA) Review

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I finally figured out how to get through my colossal Dragon Ball game backlog on this site: attach a game review with each movie / TV special review! Amazingly given how many films and specials the combined series has this was only JUST enough. That being said, let’s get the two Dragon Ball games I own out the way before sadly starting the Z games while still reviewing original Dragon Ball films, that’s just how much more popular the Z brand is,  and we do that with Dragon Ball: Advanced Adventure (which I could’ve sworn was called “Advance Adventure”, but I guess I was misremembering…) I remember just being happy to see a game based on the original series at the time but as it turned out it was far deeper and more addictive than I had anticipated. Let’s see if it still holds up!

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Dragon Ball: Curse of the Blood Rubies Review

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Before we get to the final chunk of original Dragon Ball episodes I thought I’d better cover the four Dragon Ball movies first, as they all feature Goku as a kid, rather than the taller late teen we see in the final story arc, and they generally adapt the stories we’ve already covered via the main series, just with new antagonists and such. “Curse of the Blood Rubies” (known simply as “The Legend of Shenlong” in Japan) adapts the very first story arc of the series but takes out Pilaf and his gang and inserts a new threat in King Gurumes and his men. How much does this change the story? Not as much as it only being 40 minutes does… Still, let’s take a look at the first of many, many Dragon Ball-related 40-odd minute films and specials!

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Mobile Suit Gundam SEED C.E. 73: Stargazer Review

David Hogan2 Comments

After a brief break to cover the recently-aired shows we have one last visit to the Cosmic Era of Gundam to go before moving on to our next older anime review chunk and it’s Stargazer, the three 15-minute episode OVA series, or ONA I should say, it was an early example of Original Net Animations! This is my first time watching the “series” as it wasn’t released on DVD here with the rest of SEED so its inclusion with the rest of the SEED Destiny box is my first chance to sit down with it. Turns out it’s pretty good, for a 45 minute story anyway. Let’s take a look!

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One Piece – Wano Arc (Episodes 1045 – 1067) Review

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It’s time for the penultimate One Piece Wano Arc review, as I know the series likes to streeeetch things out but what’s left should fit into one single chunk of episodes, so I’m happy to proclaim this as the second to last. With one or two smaller exceptions this chunk ties up the big fights that aren’t Luffy vs. Kaidou, including some very flashy fight sequences, though as per usual watching it one episode a week made the fights feel like they went on forever… Let’s take a look!

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Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury – Season 2 Review

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I know I said the next Gundam review would be me finishing off my coverage of the Cosmic Era shows, but I do try and get reviews for the seasonal shows out as close as I can to when they aired, so you’ll have to bear-with! That being said I’m always happy to talk more about The Witch from Mercury as although parts of the ending definitely felt rushed the second half / season of the show was once again great, full of fun twists and turns and great visuals and music. Let’s take a closer look!

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Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Swordsmith Village Arc Review

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Ufotable are back for another chunk of Demon Slayer adaptation, but I have to say that this time round I wasn’t as invested. Don’t get me wrong, the animation is still often jaw-dropping but the plot felt so samey to what’s come before that I honestly found myself less and less interested as it went along. How less interested? Let’s take a look!

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Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny HD Overall Review

David Hogan6 Comments

It’s time once again to do an overall look at a Gundam show for the sake of consistency and now it’s SEED Destiny’s turn, a rare sequel to an alternate universe series. While some will tell you the series is the worst Gundam show ever or something along those lines (they clearly haven’t watched Victory Gundam all the way the through like I did a few years ago…) and while the show isn’t without its problems, especially with its central protagonist, it’s far from bad, just not particularly stand out and feels like it’s on a holding pattern. Interested? Don’t want to read my four previous episode batch reviews? Well, read on!

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