Defective or Disappointing UK Anime Discs

Not sure if it's a packaging defect, but purchased a copy of Bebop Part 2 Blu-Ray from HMV yesterday and on opening it there looks to be brown lines and dots on the cardboard case. Most notably on the second B in Bebop and on the orange line at the bottom. Is this the design? Very strange as the back is perfect and was factory sealed.

Picture here:
http://i58.tinypic.com/wlvia1.jpg
 
That's reassuring, I don't mind if it's intentional. I was having strange theories like someone threw coffee across a room and a stream landed on the set before being shrink-wrapped.
 
Emulsion said:
Not got it myself but according to Just Passing Through review of Garden of Words Blu-ray, it's missing a signs only track.

From the review.. "There is no signs only track on this disc, and there are a fair few moments of plot specific on screen text that need translating, including the film’s title."
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Yup, no signs-only track. Also, there's a point at which on-screen text is translated for a split second, between two lines of dialogue. You'd need to pause the video in order to read it. Not a deal breaker but yet another example of the sort of sloppy subtitling that's all too common with anime Blu-rays.
 
Okay, its not UK but I do have a question .. the Funimation release of My Bride Is A Mermaid, is that super faulty? cause the one I have has subtitles out of sync... It also looks terrible, not sure if its the ratio of an older show being on my large TV or what but it's all very distracting and can screw up the comedy.
 
I have watched the Funimation release and it was mostly fine. There's one issue with it which is that they couldn't get a textless version of the end credits and so, rather than risk exposing their viewers to Japanese text, they decided to crop/zoom the textless parts of the ending themselves. The results are hideous.

I didn't notice any problems with subtitles, though. Is it every disc in your set?

(While I'm here, thank you to everyone for the reports! I silently add them to the top post but rarely take the time to thank people.)

R
 
Rui said:
I have watched the Funimation release and it was mostly fine. There's one issue with it which is that they couldn't get a textless version of the end credits and so, rather than risk exposing their viewers to Japanese text, they decided to crop/zoom the textless parts of the ending themselves. The results are hideous.

I didn't notice any problems with subtitles, though. Is it every disc in your set?

(While I'm here, thank you to everyone for the reports! I silently add them to the top post but rarely take the time to thank people.)

R
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Wait is that why the end credits apart from the 1st episode all look so bad, thought it was odd they were so super grainy and pixelated
 
Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic (Season 1 Part 1) - Blu-ray (and presumably DVD)

- The physical package for both Blu-ray and DVD has the title spine on the wrong way round like the older Kaze releases (facepalm). This is because it's the same design as the French release with French audio also available.
- No subtitle lyrics for Opening and Endings (like every Kaze release except for license rescues)
- Subtitles flash too quickly for single word or short sentence translation.
- There's a signs-only track but only applied to episode titles.
- In the Japanese Audio viewing, subtitles flash too quickly when dialogue and episode title translation clashes at the same time as pointed out on Episode 11 and 12.
- Audio and Subtitles are locked away, though J. Canth via MyReviewer has clarified the Blu-ray release can change audio during playback.
- Clunky Main Menu interface (as evidently seen in the UK Anime Network video).
- Textless Opening is based on Episode 1 and not the alternate version used for the rest of the half season set (as mentioned from UKAN video above).
- Textless Songs have player locked romanji subtitles "rendering them less than textless".

Most of the information is found from MyReviewer.
 
I was waiting for the list of defects with Magi to show up... I'm glad I didn't give them another chance and pre-order.
It's quite disappointing considering that the German releases seem to have gotten a major improvement this year.
Oh well, waiting for an Aniplex BD - failing that there's always other methods.
 
NormanicGrav said:
Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic (Season 1 Part 1) - Blu-ray (and presumably DVD)

- Subtitles flash too quickly for single word or short sentence translation.
Click to expand...
I'm trying to get my head around what this means. How long subtitles remain on screen after a character finishes speaking is something I've never thought about nor noticed.

There's always the dub, I suppose... (yeah, I really wanted this one to not be gimped).
 
Since Girls und Panzer has a confirmed BD release, I'd better list all the faults in it (since they'll be using sentai's BD master) and what will slip into the DVD release (since Australian distributors seem to like using the BD masters to create a PAL DVD master).

-Locked subtitles
-One line of subtitles is mistimed during the tank cleaning scene in episode 2 (the line is 'I'm soaked')
-There are two instances at around 00.25 and 23.39 in episode 11 where the audio speeds up briefly (only in the Japanese audio track, and the first instance is easy to miss)

The first two are (as far as I know) only present on the BD, but considering how certain BD only errors have slipped onto the DVD version over here the third is likely to be present in the DVD release.
 
Hanabee have their own in-house facilities now so, if they are using the masters and not the finished discs, it is possible for them to make adjustments.

It also doesn't follow that the DVD will have the same flaws since I don't believe you can simply say "turn this BD master into a DVD one" and have an exact copy.
 
Shiroi Hane said:
Hanabee have their own in-house facilities now so, if they are using the masters and not the finished discs, it is possible for them to make adjustments.
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Hanabee shared stock with sentai, so they won't have any masters to make adjustments (and MVM wouldn't want to pay to get corrected masters made since it's a cost that would cancel the BD release as the audio issues would require obtaining the Japanese HD audio track for episode 11 which would be costly if what Manga have said about the costs of accessing HD audio masters).

Edit: also GuP was released before Hanabee started their own in-house authoring facilities (that includes the OVA as that was shared stock as well).
 
Emulsion said:
Anyone know of any threads like this one, but gives info on US releases?
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Don't think one has been created but I wouldn't mind if this thread merged both versions.

There's also this forum that has some issues with certain titles.
 
demonix said:
Hanabee shared stock with sentai, so they won't have any masters to make adjustments (and MVM wouldn't want to pay to get corrected masters made since it's a cost that would cancel the BD release as the audio issues would require obtaining the Japanese HD audio track for episode 11 which would be costly if what Manga have said about the costs of accessing HD audio masters).

Edit: also GuP was released before Hanabee started their own in-house authoring facilities (that includes the OVA as that was shared stock as well).
Click to expand...
Huh? Hanabee's release date for Girls und Panzer is today.
 
Shiroi Hane said:
demonix said:
Hanabee shared stock with sentai, so they won't have any masters to make adjustments (and MVM wouldn't want to pay to get corrected masters made since it's a cost that would cancel the BD release as the audio issues would require obtaining the Japanese HD audio track for episode 11 which would be costly if what Manga have said about the costs of accessing HD audio masters).

Edit: also GuP was released before Hanabee started their own in-house authoring facilities (that includes the OVA as that was shared stock as well).
Click to expand...
Huh? Hanabee's release date for Girls und Panzer is today.
Click to expand...
Then why does the US release boot to the Hanabee logo when run in a zone B player unless they're still sharing stock (the same goes for the OVA collection).
 
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