Gungrave: Collector's Edition Review

Cold Cobra

Cold Cobra

I'm entirely trustworthy...
AUKN Staff
What to you get when you take a full-on action heavy PS2 game called “Gungrave” and adapt it into an anime? If you said “a mafia thriller centred on the relationship between two characters and what tears them apart” then you’ll be oddly correct, at least for half the series anyway…

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🐍❄️ covered what I would say (albeit with less words, congratulations for that), more or less. Mostly less~
Your username is a missed opportunity, by the way: there's Solid Snake, Liquid, Solidus, etc. Cold Snake might be a tad... obvious, but would you consider Liquid Nitrogen Snake? Or at least replace Aizen with a snake? Thank you in advance.

Gungrave is another of those oddities from the 2000s when Madhouse were going all-in on seinenish cartoons Nippon unlikely care for; competing with Gonzo in an epic battle towards bankruptcy. 'Twas an example of why I fell in love with anime... until CG and isekai broke mein heart into pieces. But I digress: 'tis not every day you get a game adaptation that - much like meeeeee - has little interest in the whole game tingymajig, complete with an original backstory more akin to The Godfather than shooting zombie monsters arcade(y). On a semi-related note, I do believe I once typed "Michael Corleone, eat yer heart out: Harry MacDowell's where it's at." Or something.

That ep2-14/7? portion was the gangster equivalent to Berserk's 'Golden Age'. Throwaway ep1 set afterwards 'n all. Am looking forward to rewatching.... well, as much as someone dead inside can look forward to watching an old fav cartoon. The boss battle murderation between that and the finale - which returns to mini-gangster golden age form, as the two reunite for one last hurrah, that I recall, 2eps or otherwise - is largely gone from my brain, bar Bunji being cool in his showdown. High point of the series was the elevator ep/car ride--ep14? "BRANDOOON!" is etched into my brain as result.

ACDStorm said:
Is this any different from the old Funimation release?
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Nein, 'tis identical: including the amaray case artwork and disc art for good measure. The recent Witchblade release was the same--neu box, same olde interior. Nice to own 'HD' CEs, all the same. Also a tad... unfuni.

I had held some misguided hope for Gungrave that there was some other mythical, actually HD source as the Funi release had it listed as '1080i', with nary a 'P' in sight, unlike MVM. But alas: 1080i must've been code for DVD upscale, before Funi reasoned it simpler just to put 1080p on the box as most anime fans are blind as 🦇s and happy with anything.

Recently, I belatedly acquired @MVM's Welcome to the NHK DVD release, and that used Aussie discs with a higher res, higher quality transfer vs Funi. But with Gungrave + blu, I imagine it was animated at 480p and sold so badly in Japan that's all she wrote as higher quality goes. 'Tis saddening...

PS: The Geneon R1 box is a Trigun guy work of art, and actually befitting of the 'art box' description. Pity MVM couldn't or wouldn't repurpose.
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Aion said:
🐍❄️ covered what I would say (albeit with less words, congratulations for that), more or less. Mostly less~
Your username is a missed opportunity, by the way: there's Solid Snake, Liquid, Solidus... Cold Snake might be a tad... obvious, but would you consider Liquid Nitrogen Snake? Or at least replace Aizen with a snake? Thank you in advance.
Click to expand...
It is funny that this old username of mine did indeed start as me and my friends creating Foxhound code names when the original MGS came out and for whatever reason it's followed my online identity for the past 26 or so years, so a bit late to change it now. Will consider badly photoshopping a snake head onto Aizen's body at some point...

Otherwise, nice write up :)
 
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