As a new reviewer for the site, I just wanted to quickly introduce myself to readers. My name is Jonathan R. Lack, and I’ve been writing film and TV reviews for eight years now, much of that time spent at Denver Post subsidiary YourHub.com where I publish most of my work. Anime isn’t an interest of that reader base, however, which is why I’m excited to write for The Fanboy Review and share my interest in anime with fellow ‘fanboys.’ Enjoy!
 

 
Has any anime ever been released so out of order in North America? Collecting the original Dragon Ball series has always been an exercise in frustration, going back to the jumbled release of the 2-disc ‘saga’ sets and culminating in the overdue but welcome blue-brick season set releases. The release of the films made just as little sense. When FUNimation began releasing the movies on DVD, we got uncut releases in the extremely strange order of film 3, Mystical Adventure, film 4, The Path to Power, and finally film 2, Sleeping Princess in Devil’s Castle, which was simultaneously released in a “Movie Box” alongside the other two. Meanwhile, movie 1, Curse of the Blood Rubies, had actually been released much earlier in an edited-and-dubbed only release as part of the material FUNimation (teaming up with various other companies) released in an earlier, failed attempt to bring Dragon Ball to young American audiences prior to their release of Dragon Ball Z. Rights issues related to this period in the franchise’s history meant an uncut release failed to see the light of day on DVD until just recently, just as the first thirteen TV episodes didn’t get an uncut release until the season sets. But the DVD is finally here, completing the long, complicated, and largely jumbled release of the series in North America. That alone may be cause for celebration. Continue reading →

I bet you are wondering why I’m reviewing Kai again…
 

 
I decided since I have both on hand to not leave our DVD only friends hanging without proper caps and a review.  When it is appropriate I’ll be using text from the Blu-ray, but anything that is different for the DVD version (packaging, video quality, audio, etc) will be freshly written.  And as a small note: Any grades I give here will be specific to what is expected or wanted from a DVD, so if a video or audio grade is higher here than it was in the Blu-ray review, it does not mean the DVD is superior. And if you want to read the Blu-ray review first: Dragon Ball Z Kai: Part One (Blu-ray), Early Review Continue reading →

After doing the review of Dragon Ball Z Kai on Blu-ray I decided to check the DVD.  Very quickly I noticed a difference in colors in the remastered Z footage.  When I showed some screen shots to a friend to find out about the Japanese Kai Blu-ray, he actually ran it over right then so I could take a screen shot for a comparison.
 
I’ll let the image and my notes on it speak for themselves.  Feel free to share.  I didn’t include the Japanese DVD because I don’t know anyone who has it.  Click on it for full size.
 

 
Each version has its own odd quirks and I’m quite sure arguments over which of the three has superior colors will go on for years.  It’d also be interesting to find out who tweaked each version and why any tweaks were made (did Funi tweak their versions or did Toei? If so, why the Blu-ray and not the DVD?)
 
After doing that image comparison, I decided to check the intro, which has entirely new animation. Each one is different in the intro also, but in different ways than in the episode itself, which suggests each intro was tweaked separately from the episode. (Click to see full size)
 

 
For the remastered footage you could argue any of them could be better based on how you feel about color in general, but for the brand new animation, the American Blu-ray clearly seems superior.
 
It’s worth mentioning that a slight difference in brightness between an American disk and a Japanese disk is normal. Japanese and American TVs have different black levels, so tweaking of the brightness is normally done to make them match when being viewed, but this doesn’t appear to be the tweaking that caused these differences (especially since there are three clearly different examples instead of two.)
 
Think I should update the first image with other DVD versions of Dragon Ball Z for comparisons sake?
 
 
Update- I chose to leave the original comparisons up as they are more relevant seeing as they all have the same and proper aspect ratio, but I’ve made an updated version that adds the Japanese DVD into the mix.
 
Thanks to Hujio from Kanzentai for the lossless captures of the proper frames.
 

 
The show content itself is interesting in that there is a slight addition of footage on the side and that (once again) the colors are different.
 
Although frankly the shot of the intro is a bit crazier
 

 
Yeah… it’s pretty terrible. It is definitely the worst of the four in this case. It definitely makes it appear that DVDs from Toei were a late addition to the plan for Kai in Japan, as no care seemed to have been taken with the encode at all.
 
If you’d like to read a review of the Blu-ray of Dragon Ball Z Kai, we actually have one (it is actually what ended up leading to this article.) Feel free to have a read: Dragon Ball Z Kai: Part One (Blu-ray), Early Review
 

 

 
In 1999, Pioneer began releasing the edited TV version of the first two dub seasons of Dragon Ball Z on DVD. In 2000, FUNimation began releasing their own uncut, bilingual DVDs of the series, starting with the third dub season. In 2005, after the rest of the series was finished, FUNimation began releasing bilingual, uncut versions of the episodes that were previously sub-licensed to Pioneer (now known as Geneon). But those releases were quietly canceled before even the first dub season was finished, leaving a gap of forty episodes that were never released in this format. However, in 2007, FUNimation re-started their Dragon Ball Z DVD releases in a “remastered” format that was cropped to widescreen, and fully released every episode this way from beginning to end in boxed sets. Thus, there has only been one consistent release of all 291 episodes of Dragon Ball Z in North America, but at the cost of roughly one-sixth of the footage from every frame of every episode. Continue reading →

It’s time to announce the winners of the Dragon Ball contest.
 

 
This was actually a really tough one, because quite a few of the entries were really good stories. I ended up picking two stories, and one amusing little aspect that has always made me smile myself.
 
First place is Joe Ricard.
 
Second place is Jack Bass.
 
Third place is Matt Fritz.
 
Here’s Joe’s entry:
 
If it can really be considered a “thing” then I’d say my favorite thing about Dragonball is sharing it with my nephew’s over the years.
Being an Uncle since I was six months old and having more neices and nephews come about over the years there always seems to be someone at just the right age to introduce to Goku and the gang.
When I was first getting into the series, I’d buy the VHS releases and bring them over to my sisters to watch with a nephew only a couple years younger than myself. When the “season sets” came about I bought the first one and would watch a few episodes every day with a nephew who would come to my house after school until his mother would pick him up after work. Finally I have a nephew who lives in Virginia and that I only see a couple of times a year. Everytime he visits, he checks my bookshelf to see how many new volumes of the manga I’ve gotten so that he can take them upstairs and read them before bed.
While the last nephew I mentioned is the only one with a continued interest in the series, I still enjoyed the time I spent with the others watching Goku and co. engaging in their crazy adventures and can’t wait for others to be old enough (not to mention when I have kids of my own) to introduce them to “Bloomers and the Monkey King”.
 
Here’s Jack’s:
 
Kame Sennin’s pafu pafu!
 
Makes me laugh so hard every single time! Bulma’s shoryuken follow up is just icing on the cake in that particular scene.
 
And Matt’s:
 
My favorite “thing” is by and large the VHS tapes of the first 13 episodes of Dragon Ball I received for Christmas when I was 10 years-old. I’ve watched those tapes at least a dozen times over the years, and now I hope to finally win (if not, buy) these episodes without all the edits and a Japanese track.
 
Now to go ahead and reveal all the prizes.
 
First place obviously gets the Dragonball set.
 
Second place will get to choose between the Bardock and Trunks’ singles, while Third will get the remaining single.
 
Got lots of great entries and I’ll post more up in a week or so.  And stay tuned, a few more DB related contests may be coming soon (and the next one, assuming it happens, is very likely to get far more entries than this one), and I may even end up awarding a few extra prizes for this one…
 

Just giving everyone an update.  There were far more entries than I expected and I’m still going through them ranking and re-ranking to find my personal favorites.
 
I hope to announce a winner on Friday (although it may be on Sunday at the latest.)
 
Just letting everyone know what was going on. (Just as an example, there are ten times as many entries as the last contest.)
 

Contest closed a few days ago. I will be going over all entries over the weekend and get in contact with the winners, and I’ll be sure to post the winners and some of my personal favorites.
 
And based on if I’m able to get out to where I need to be to make it happen, may be a special early review tomorrow for shonen fans.
 

Just thought I’d remind anyone who wanted to enter that our contest ends tomorrow night.
 

 
The main prize is Dragon Ball Season 1 on DVD, but there are a few other prizes that aren’t being revealed.
 
Contest article is here.
 

Time for another contest.
 
Only one prize I’m admitting to at the moment, but there’s a few more.
 
The prize is…
 

 
Season 1 of Dragon Ball on DVD.
 
This time around, the way to enter is…
 

Tell me your favorite ‘thing’ from Dragon Ball, DBZ, or DBGT…  and by thing, I mean anything.  Story, character, toy, game, a piece of art…  anything you can think of.

 
(It’ll help your entry out if you explain your choice.)
 
My favorite answer will get their choice of the announced prize, or a few other prizes.  First place gets their choice, then second place, and we keep going until no more prizes are left, same as last time.
 
Please send contest entries to contests@fanboyreview.net. Please only enter once. In your email include your answer and your name and address.  Contest ends at 11:59pm (Pacific) on September 15th, 2009 (that’s a Tuesday).
 
Didn’t win but still want the DVDs? Help support The Fanboy Review by buying from Amazon.
 

 
Fine Print- The Fanboy Review reserves the right to cancel the contest at any time for any reason. Contest is open to anyone in the multiverse, but will only be shipped within the continental United States and Canada (if you enter and win from elsewhere, you can still win, but you gotta pick a place within the shipping area, or pay for shipping costs). Fanboy Review staff is not eligible. Duplicate entries will be deleted. Winners names may or may not be posted on The Fanboy Review. Mailing addresses and other contact information provided will be used only to contact in regards to the contest and shipping any prizes. Information will not be given out, sold, or otherwise used in any malicious or annoying way. We reserve the right to add new rules as is needed, including while a contest is running. We aren’t responsible for any of the following happening due to the contest or the prize: death, injury, destruction, faith in humanity being lost, etc. We aren’t responsible if anything happens to the prize during shipping, or the prize is just bad. This contest is in no way related to Funimation Productions or any related company.
 
Dragon Ball – © 2005 BIRD STUDIO/SHUEISHA, TOEI ANIMATION. ©1987 TOEI ANIMATION CO., LTD. Licensed by FUNimation® Productions, Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Wow, it’s been a long trek to get this on DVD.  It’s kinda ironic that the last bit of all the original Dragon Ball/Z/GT related animations we finally get uncut are the first few episodes of the series (not including the 2008 special or Kai in that, purely all the originally released stuff.)
 

 
This is where the king of shonen anime started over twenty years ago.  How does it stand up to it’s bigger brother Dragon Ball Z?  Let’s take a look. Continue reading →