Megazone 23 Vol 2

Rating:
Summary: MEGAZONE 23 PART II - FINALLY!!!
Review: I've been a fan of the Megazone 23 series since the mid-1980's, when I first saw a subbed copy of Part 1. As an oldschool anime fan, I think Megazone 23 is an absolute classic!

Now, over a decade after the first commercial release of Part 1 in the U.S., we FINALLY have Part 2 on dvd! While this volume is extremely different from Part 1, both in look and story, it holds up much better than the original. For those who are familiar with Part 1 but have never seen Part 2, I highly recommend it.

Now for a little history: Part 1 was to be re-written and re-ordered for an American release as Robotech The Movie. Though the project was completed and test-marketed, it was never officially released. Interestingly enough, some additional animation was completed for the Robotech movie at that time, as Harmony Gold felt the original open-ended conclusion of Part 1 wouldn't be sufficient. Whatsmore, there was an English dub of Part 2 (by the same cast used on Robotech), and my old vhs copy of Part 2 includes the ten minutes of additional animation that was used for Robotech The Movie. The reason I bring this up is that this additional animation is NOT included on this dvd, which is a little disappointing (I assume the current company doesn't own the rights to it).

In addition, while the subtitles and English dialogue this time around are much more true to the original Japanese version, the voice actors and script are not nearly as interesting or well executed as the earlier version. This is all water under the bridge, since the early version was never officially released, and you're unlikely to find it available anyway, so really I'm just venting about this!

Overall, I would give this anime a 5 out of 5, but the minor negatives mentioned above bring it down a star. This is one of my favorite animes of all time (and I've seen hundreds of them). If you've seen Part 1 and liked it, you HAVE TO SEE PART 2!!! If not, see Part 1 first... then see Part 2!!!