Gantz Volume 1
 As you pass by the scene of a recent car wreck, police officers, firefighters, and paramedics milling about, you tell yourself not to look but… you just gotta. A morbid curiosity grips you, maybe you'll see something horrific, you might see something cool or instead something that will turn your stomach. Whatever the thoughts fly through your head it's almost certain that you'll try to get a glimpse, it's just human nature. High school student Kei Kurono learns that himself. His life is like any others, he attends school, visualizes all the females in the class naked, gets laughed at by the class for being sexually aroused, buy some porn on the way home, and then wait for the subway,
just another normal day. One moment thinking normal boring thoughts and then he's wondering if he's going to witness the gory death of the drunkard who just fell on the tracks. But Kei's day turns for the worst, he's recognized by a childhood friend, Masaru Kato, who just jumped down to the tracks to save the unconscious drunk, now he's expected to help in the rescue. To make a long story short, Kei and Masaru save the intoxicated bum and then die a needlessly gruesome death, but instead of showing up at the pearly gates of Heaven or the fiery depths of Hell, they wind up in the middle an apartment that's filled with other recently deceased and a mysterious black orb. A few minutes after they arrive the orb begins to sing a ridiculously cheerful song, offers the group of dead-but-not-dead strange weapons, and then orders them to go dispatch a weird alien with an affinity for green onions.
Seems like Gantz is a weird and complicated series, but that's not all, Gantz is one of those shows that contains all the elements that make parents believe that all anime are pornographic gore-fests. Nudity, violence, sexual tension, gore, fanservice, delivered through kick-ass animation. And if that didn't encourage you to run right out and buy this DVD, there's more good news, Gantz, which is based on the manga of the same name by Hiroya Oku, was animated by GONZO, the same production company responsible for the Full Metal Panic and Hellsing animations.
But with all the positive aspects an awesome series has, there are bound to be a few downsides and Gantz isn't an exception. Surprisingly, the problems so far aren't with the series itself, but actually with choices made by the US licensor ADV. Consumers have long complained about the high prices of anime DVDs and ADV seemed to attempt to fix that problem by releasing Gantz with an MSRP of $17.98, but the low price actually serves more of a cosmetic purpose seeing as how the DVD only has two episodes. This will be the trend for the subsequent volumes of Gantz which at 26 episodes will be released on 13 volumes at a laughable price of about $9 per episode as opposed to the $6-$8 per episode for discs with 3-4 episodes that retail around $24.99.
Extras are also scarce on Gantz volume one. The included extras are an interview with series director Ichiro Itano, the usual previews, and clean opening and closing animations. Since people are going to be forking out about $9 per episode ADV really owes viewers a bit more than what is on the DVD. Commentary like with the Neon Genesis Evangelion Platinum release, popups like with the Excel Saga DVDs, interviews with the US cast and staff, production sketches, more previews, and even a booklet with info on the series are all additions that could be made to this series a better value to customers.
A saving point of the first volume of Gantz, besides the violence, gore, nudity, action, and sweet animation, is the music. The theme song, Super Shooter by Rip Slyme, rocks with it's fusion of Japanese and English lyrics, the song Last Kiss by Bonnie Pink is sweet melody that carries viewers through the end credits, and the creative musical soundtrack heard throughout the series is by Natsuki Sogawa.
Another interesting aspect of Gantz is it's cast for the English dub. Chris Ayres as Kei Kurono, Illich Guardiola as Masaru Kato, and Shannon Emerick as Kei Kishimoto have previously played supporting roles in other English dubs. The choice of using actors that have less recognizable roles is refreshing and helps reduce the distraction of remembering other characters a voice may be associated with.
Obviously, the hard part of making a decision whether to buy Gantz volume 1 is its price to episode ratio, if possible, it may be more economic to rent the series. While it's hard to base an entire series off of two episodes, Gantz appears to be a sound and worthwhile series to look forward to.
| Aproximately 50 Minutes. |
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TV
MA
VSL |
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