Cheap Arjuna - Rebirth (Vol. 1) (DVD) (Shôji Kawamori) Price

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Customer Reviews of Arjuna - Rebirth (Vol. 1)

not perfect, but still enjoyable
i first encountered Arjuna on adultswim on demand. its the story of juna, who dies in a motorcycle crash, she is ressurected (how?) by a creepy glowing kid named Chris who tells her that she is the avatar of time who has to save the earth. I was entrigued as to how the avatar of time originated, but you never learn and this was dissapointing.this is a hate it or love it show and i will list the pros and cons followed by my overall review. <
> pros <
>- it makes you think <
>-nice if not different animation (think Fooly Cooly) <
>-good dubbing <
>-you feel for the characters, in fact most of the show doesnt focus on action <
> cons <
>-the other characters treat Juna like crap <
>-dissapointing ending <
>-there were a few plot holes <
> review <
>this is a completely different type of magical girl anime. its very thoughtfull, there are no cute bishoujo characters, in fact this is one of the anime out there that seems to realize that the fate of the world should not depend on the shoulders of an insecure li'l girl but that they should rest on that of someone who can handle it.the action is rather bland. the storys substance comes from the battle of emotions arjuna faces and the environmentalist thing goin on. i dont mind Arjunas internal emotional struggles but its the environmentalism that i didnt like.Its as if the show is trying to make you feel bad for eating meat or polluting or not caring for the Earth.C'mon, a highly developed culture cant/wont give up their lifestyle, it seemed that the show was even against laziness and tv (so Im lazy , is it a crime?). another thing i didnt like was that you never learned about the origins of the avatar of time, also the supporting cast seemed to hate and be dissapointed in juna when she screwd up and they never gave her instruction in the 1st place. on the positive, there is nice dubbing and animation and its just grippingly addictive for some reason. Arjuna is just so hard to stop seeing that it it outweighs thoe cons^^

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Uneven animation, mean-spirited ecological preaching
I thought the animation was rather poor. They relied too much on whiz-bang computer graphics, and so the cel-style animation of the characters is rather sub-par: it doesn't seem shaded properly. Many of the computer graphics are indeed excellent, but sometimes even they are lacking: one particular shot of "natural" forest featured trees that were spaced so regularly as to appear to be a Christmas tree farm. <
> <
>The characters of Takeo and Juna are pretty well done. Juna is a bit whiny, but she's going through a lot, and that's to be expected. As a matter of fact, this highlights one of my biggest complaints: her mentor, Chris, and his helper (whose name I don't recall) are hateful to her. They constantly berate her for her ignorance (though they don't actually explain much to her), are astonished when she does anything right, and are generally unhelpful and mean. <
> <
>The plot is pretty standard save-the-world fare, but in this case saving the world is literal: Juna is to save the _Earth_. S.E.E.D. doesn't seem concerned about the fate of the planet's inhabitants, as long as the natural ecosystem is intact. Juna is the new "Avatar of Time", which would literally imply that Time is a god, but the only god worshipped here is the Earth. Chris is willing to let her die in order to prepare her for saving the Earth. I got the impression he almost hoped she _would_ die so maybe the "Avatar of Time" would be reincarnated into someone less stupid. <
> <
>Oh, and nuclear power is always bad: better stick with nice, clean coal. Or better yet, stop using electricity altogether. Humans have a lot of nerve using air conditioning. <
>

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A GOOD START FOR NATURE GIRL
After reading less than stellar reviews about this dvd, the only reason I really picked it up was for the composer of the music, Yoko Kanno, the same genius behind the music of Cowboy Bebop. I figured she wouldn't lend her name to a project that was totally awful. I was pleasantly surprised, with some reservations, by Arjuna Volume 1.

Teenager Juna Ariyoshi and her boyfriend, Tokio, are riding his motorcycle to see a beautiful sunset when an accident kills Juna. While she is dead, a mysterious entity known as Chris offers her a deal. He promises to resurrect her in exchange for her becoming the Avatar of Time. You see, Earth has become infested with demons known as Raaja which in time will destroy our planet. It is Juna's task to purify the planet of these spirits in order to save mankind. She won't be alone. There is an organization named S.E.E.D dedicated to saving Earth who will back her up. She also has some weapons, such as a sacred bow, and a protecting spirit she can summon. She'll need him because the Raaja make Godzilla look like a midget. These first three episodes are mainly setup of the story with Arjuna's origin, her first battle, and her struggle to become the proctector of the earth. Struggle, because as is usual in these types of stories, Chris, supposedly her mentor, talks in riddles, and doesn't just come out and tell her everything. Add to this the fact that Tokio is at a loss as to what has happened to the person he loves.

I felt like the premise of exorcising spirits from the earth and the appearance of these wraithlike Raaja was very copycat-like of Final Fantasy:The Spirits Within. This wasn't helped by the fact that the Raaja are CG animated just like in FF. The CG of the monster looks very clumsy and out of place in the film.

There are some very beautiful scenes in these episodes. It had film quality animation except in the CG Raaja. The soundtrack, as expected, is great. Arjunas's costume takes a little to get used to, a little too Tinkerbell for me, but the series is very good about taking its time to develop her character. It does have a 5.1 Japanese along with
English sound. You can also isolate the score. You can also pick up all the volumes in one Arjuna complete collection set. Would've given it 4 stars except for the CG.