Patlabor: The Mobile Police: Volume 2
Central Park Media
Cast:
Extras: Featurette, Interview Art Gallery, Character Bios
Rating:
Central Park Media is continuing their line-up with another release of the anime TV series ’Patlabor.’ ’Volume 2’ contains the series’ episodes 6 through 10.
Each one of the 25-minute episodes features four chapter stops, as well as a fifth for the preview on the next episode. You can decide to play all 5 episodes on the disc in consecutive order, or select them individually through the Scene Selections.
The episodes are presented in their original fullscreen aspect ratio on this DVD. The transfer is clean and stable and free of blemishes or speckles. Colors are well reproduced and very powerful, although red tones do show a slight oversaturation at times. Edges are sharp and well delineated, but no distracting edge-enhancement has been applied. The compression has also been handled well and the presentation is free of pixelation or other compression artifacts.
’Patlabor’ comes with Dolby Digital Stereo tracks in English and Japanese with optional English subtitles. The audio is also clean and free of defects and even the English dub is quite workable.
The DVD also contains a number of extras, such as the entertaining 7-mintue ’Behind The Scenes’ featurette that is informative and refreshingly enough, doesn’t take itself too seriously. Also included is additional information about the series’ principal characters.
A text interview with the series’ screenwriter Michiko Yokote is also included on the disc as well as a self-running sketch and image gallery that runs for 3-minutes.
The DVD is rounded out by credits and a promo spot for the Big Apple Anime Fest, which has evidently been added at the last minute, as the text in the menu entry doesn’t quite match the other menu entries…
Overall, ’Patlabor’ is a solid release. It’s a fun series and the DVD allows you to watch in the best possible quality. Image and sound are of top quality and the extras add some additional value to this release.