Review of Naruto Unleashed: Series 2 Part 2 (3 Discs)

Introduction

Just when I had forgotten what had been happening in the world of Naruto, we finally get another instalment of ninja action. I wish they`d speed these things up a little, four boxsets a year instead of two. When you think about it, taking into account all the flashbacks and recaps, thirteen episodes really only contain around seven episodes worth of material. That isn`t to denigrate the quality of the show, as once again, pressing play on one of these discs is easy, pressing stop is another matter altogether. This is the fourth release, volume 2:2 of Naruto, and these three discs conclude the second series. I only received the check discs, but I assume that the final packaging will continue on from the previous sets, and have a couple of goodies inside. There sure aren`t any on the discs.

12 years previously, the Hidden Leaf village was plagued by the Nine-Tailed fox demon. The Fourth Hokage ninja sacrificed his life to defeat the menace, and sealed up the spirit in the body of a newborn child. That orphan grew up as Naruto Uzumaki, a mischievous prankster with great ambition. Not only does he want to be a ninja, but he also wants to be the strongest ninja of them all and be granted the title Hokage. He has more than a little competition, the Hidden Leaf village is a community of ninja, and Naruto had great difficulty just passing his entrance exams to qualify as a lowly Genin. Even when he did manage to get his certification, he was assigned to undergo training by the demanding Kakashi, partnered with his rival Sasuke and Sakura, the girl on whom he has a crush. What makes things difficult is that few see him as Naruto, instead of the dreadful fox demon that was sealed inside him.

The previous volume saw the Chunin exams proceed apace. After the written exam, the next challenge was to race across a forest to the next venue, a test of skill and survival. Events took a darker tone when a dangerous ninja named Orochimaru, with a specific interest in Sasuke began to interfere with the test. He wound up placing an ominous curse on Sasuke. Regardless of this, the test concluded well, too well in fact and it was decided to have an impromptu tournament to whittle down the field. As we begin this fourth volume, the one-on-one combat continues.

The final thirteen episodes of the second season are presented here across three discs.

Disc 1
40. Kakashi and Orochimaru Face-to-Face!
41. Kunoichi Rumble: The Rivals Get Serious!
42. The Ultimate Battle: Cha!
43. Killer Kunoichi and A Shaky Shikamaru
44. Akamaru Unleashed! Who`s Top Dog Now?

Disc 2
45. Surprise Attack! Naruto`s Secret Weapon!
46. Byakugan Battle: Hinata Grows Bold!
47. A Failure Stands Tall!
48. Gaara versus Rock Lee: The Power Of Youth Explodes!

Disc 3
49. Lee`s Hidden Strength: Forbidden Secret Jutsu!
50. The Fifth Gate: A Splendid Ninja Is Born
51. A Shadow In The Darkness: Danger Approaches Sasuke
52. Ebisu Returns: Naruto`s Toughest Training Yet!

Video

Naruto gets a 4:3 regular transfer that is clear and sharp throughout. There are some minor compression artefacts that are only really noticeable during freeze frame. As you would expect from such a long running animation, it`s best not to tire the animators out too early. Naruto is certainly less sophisticated than most anime released today, the character designs are simpler, and backgrounds not excessively defined. Yet in terms of quality, the animation is very effective, and certainly goes a step beyond older long running shows like Dragonball Z or Sailor Moon. Having said all that, the action quotient certainly goes up for season 2, and flashbacks, and freeze frames are fewer in number.

Audio

Manga Entertainment presents these episodes with their usual array of soundtrack options, DD 2.0, DD 5.1 and DTS English and Japanese. The surrounds do succeed in broadening the experience in terms of ambience and effects, but they are still upmixes of the original stereo, rather than newly created mixes for this disc. The theme tunes are excellent, and suit the story well, while the incidental music is a little more generic. I sampled the English dub and found it acceptable if unspectacular. It certainly isn`t the worst I have heard, but some of the actors don`t seem particularly suited to the characters.

Eek! Dubtitles yet again! Sometimes, as in Otogi Zoshi, you get lucky with dubtitles, the English language dub seems closely translated from the Japanese, and you don`t feel as if you are losing anything in the translation. If you are really lucky, the dubtitles while synchronised to the English dub, will also match the Japanese track.

That doesn`t happen with Naruto. Naruto`s dub is far enough removed from the Japanese track as to almost be a complete rewrite. You`ll have to put up with mistimed, absent or superfluous captions. It`ll be obvious for someone with no experience with Japanese that the translation is inexact (one word captions for spoken sentences), and that`s without mentioning the spelling mistakes and flubbed grammar.

Incidentally, there is a lot of Japanese text on screen, especially the dot matrix board that announces the names of the tournament combatants. None of this is translated, so even if you are watching the English version, you`re missing out on essential plot points. This is an intolerable situation, and one worth writing to your MP about, world peace be damned!

Features

Just the usual Manga trailers, and the same menus, again!

Conclusion

Let`s get this out of the way first. If you only watch Naruto in English, and have no intention of doing otherwise, then this set is for you. There is a slight problem with onscreen text going by uncaptioned, but this is a relatively small thing, and you should be able to draw much enjoyment from these discs. If on the other hand your language of choice is Japanese, then forget it. Import the uncut Viz release from Region 1 instead, which will have the correct translated subtitles. Let`s face it; if you don`t speak Japanese, then without the suitable subtitle track, this is half a release. It`s incomplete, and it shouldn`t be tolerated. Manga Entertainment have issued a press release assuring that subsequent releases of Naruto and the forthcoming Bleach boxsets will have translated subtitles, but the damage has been done.

That unpleasant business dealt with, I can tell you that this release of Naruto offers what you would expect from our dayglo orange Ninja, only more so. We`re well into the knock out tournament that will see the finalists for the Chunin exam chosen. It`s stunning to think that the Chunin exam began at the end of Season 1, the survival test took up most of the first half of the second season, yet even still, at the end of this second season, we`re still a month away from the finals (or six months until the next boxset release). What`s even more amazing is that while sticking with the Chunin exam storyline for over 26 episodes, it never grows old, and remains thoroughly addictive entertainment. Other, short run anime series are shows that can best be appreciated at a pace of one or two episodes at a time. Yet with Naruto, there seems nothing wrong with watching five or six episodes at one sitting. Some of it has to do with the number of flashbacks and pausing for commentary that occurs in the average episode, but more of it has to do with the writing style, which offers bite size bits of story that are easy to digest, along with copious bursts of action. Naruto is surprisingly easy to watch, which makes me wonder how anyone can tolerate watching it at one episode a week on television.

In these episodes that follow on from the forest test, there are still hints of a larger storyline, with Orochimaru popping up from time to time to machinate a bit. But the emphasis is really on the one-on-one battles between the students. The pre-fight posturing offers a lot of back-story into the characters, while the combat allows us to see their individual ninja styles. Some fights may last half an episode or so, the more interesting ones get stretched out a bit. The four most interesting confrontations begin with Sakura and Ino. This is perhaps the strongest character piece, as the two girls used to be best friends before falling out over Sasuke. The fight for them is more than just a Chunin exam, it`s an opportunity to settle old debts and clear the air between them. It`s always sad to see two friends fall out, and that makes this story more poignant. Sakura has come a long way from the shrinking violet of Season 1, and there is a novel use for that inner voice of hers.

Naruto, while succeeding against all the odds whenever faced with insurmountable obstacles, has never shown his stuff in an audience of his peers. Most of the Leaf Village Genin only recall Naruto the failure, Naruto the joke. Facing Kiba and his pet dog Akamaru, this is his chance to show how far he has grown as a ninja, although as usual he does resort to unorthodox techniques. Hinata is the timid girl who has always harboured a secret crush on Naruto, but facing off against her cousin Neji, it is finally her chance to come out of her shell, and in front of Naruto show what she is truly capable of. She has always been belittled and put down, and seeing her stand up to her cousin, considered the most talented student from the Hidden Leaf village is worth watching. It`s also where Naruto finally gets an inkling of how she feels about him.

The most impressive fight is that between Rock Lee, the bushy browed Bruce Lee wannabe, and Gaara, the moody kid from Sand Village. In the previous volume, Gaara had been revealed as a ruthless fighter with a hidden demon threatening to overwhelm him. Rock Lee on the other hand has no talent for Ninjutsu or Genjutsu; he has only his fists and his speed to rely on. It seems a tall order against a fighter who can manipulate sand to do his bidding, but when we learn of Rock Lee`s determination to succeed, and the faith his mentor has in him, anything seems possible.

Including the initial combats from the previous volume, there are ten fights in total, and Naruto`s animation really excels in showing 20 different combat styles, differing and explosive fights that keep the attention and never grow tiresome. There`s not a lot of story developed over the season when you pause and think about it, but the writing and pace keep everything moving in the right direction, and it feels as if there is more to it than there actually is. By the end of the second season, the Chunin preliminaries are over, and we have to wait for the final test. So do Naruto and the other combatants, who have a month to brush up on their techniques, as well as heal from the ordeals that they have just been through. The final episode is a welcome return of a comedy story, as Naruto resumes training. He has a new instructor to deal with, Ebisu, the expert Jounin that he demolished with his Harem no jutsu early on in the first season. He`s initially reluctant to learn from the guy, but as the episode ends, he`s on his way to learning new Chakra control skills, before being interrupted by a pervert on a giant frog…

And that`s the cliffhanger that will keep us salivating for the next six months or so. Naruto really found its feet in this second season, offering 26 episodes of entertainment. The pacing and the writing improved, and the cast of characters grew to fill out an interesting universe. It`s not the be all and end all of anime, but it`s easy to see just why it is so popular. It has a broad appeal to it that is quite charming, while the animation quality places it above the usual long running series. As for this particular release, it all boils down to how much you can tolerate dubtitles. I can`t!