Thanks to FalsePrime from animesuki, here are the picture drama impressions
Alright, Box Set II arrived and I have watched the entirety of the Picture Drama and it has some serious good points and some bad, I will just do a bullet point review for those interested.
First off the art work is beautiful, they took the time to make it fit 16x9 and they did an amazing job, it doesn't look stretched or anything, just gorgeous. Relena has never looked better then she does in this.
2. They use music from Wing TV music, and while it came with Wing TV the series, the fact it is an Endless Watlz production left me wondering which they would go with. It was amazing choice, they do an amazing job using icon tracks from the show, and almost all of them fit.
3. The most important thing, it's siginifcantly better then the Novels. Granted the content isn't new, but they do three things to improve what has been a train wreck thus far.
3.1 - First and most importantly ALL backstory and flash backs have been completely cut. This is all Mars century, the cast, the story and the suits.
3.2 - The keep the pace going, something Sumizawa has zero ability to do. The length is pretty much exactly 1 Wing Episode long (another great thing, they even do the mid episode cut with the characters flashing, and include the track that accompanies it) so it doesn't over stay it's welcome and allows the the story to go from point a ->b and maintain flow.
3.3 The soundtrack and introductions. The music is nearly perfectly timed, with each having a unique piece of music fitting the character or the suit.
4. It's definitly set up to have a follow up, it only goes to about the halfway point of where we are. In fact the ending is right after Heero and Relena talk over the comms while Heero is in Snow White.
5. There are a few new added pieces of art, but they are very minor, the most noticable is a new side shot of Epyon from it's side as well as it launching from a hanger. To go along with this though, they did added very small animations, like beam effects actually glowing and having Energy look as if it's emminating from the weapon.
6. Heero and Relena's VA's. I along with a few others aren't exactly up on the Heero/Relena angle that gets pushed, but now more then ever it really felt like the two really felt like the got their characters and made the scene between them work. The back and forth just felt right.
Lastly for positives, the characters never felt like clones when watching it. The main two featured are Fenrir (Duo Jr.) and Duo Sr. They had their own unique feel and Duo does 100% come across as Duo, the VA combined with how the scenes made him feel like himself and not someone going by the name.
Down points? There are some I have to admit.
Most of the art is recyclyed. Also while they do add some nice effects and the music do alot to hide it, you can feel that they where limited in what they could show simply because there has been so little art to come out of Novel series.
Another thing that was a double edged sword was it really excelles where the Novel fails, Pacing, feel, mood, but it also is let down by the fact they had 20 minutes to work with and it leaves things cloudy and you really needing more to get into it.
Side notes.
I didn't notice it until I had it in Full HD and infront of me but some small details.
First - Snow White's Head Jewel and Goate are Violet and NOT red. Also Snow White's eyes are not Wing Green, but Blue/Turquoise. Also they give a pretty good discription of Snow White's buster rifle, and even the way they carry on, it makes it really stand out how you don't want to fuck with this machine.
Last - The ending is Sleeping Beauty and the Prince Charming capsules floating next to each other (another Relena/Heero shout out), it's kinda animated with several of each floating around.
The worst part of this is none of it is physical. I had hoped that the book would contain physical picutres of the Drama, but that isn't the case. You get some bio's on OZ suits and pilots. There is one interesting picture from Okawara of a beta version of Epyon that is quite different then the finished product.
The only Frozen Teardrop art that comes with the set is in fact that Relena/Heero picture that annoyed fans.
http://i.imgur.com/xOfLifM.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/WBQOpbN.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/viNUqqD.jpg
