[Digital] Air Master Episodes #01-04

[Chris Beveridge]

Review by Chris Beveridge

Mania Grade: B
* Age Rating: 13 and Up
* Released By: FUNimation Entertainment, Ltd.
* Running time: 100
* Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
* Disc Resolution: 480i/p
* Disc Encoding: MPEG-2
* Series: Air Master

In Summary:

Derided by a lot of people for its designs, Air Master is a surprisingly fluid piece of work at times that's part of the re-energized fighting genre that's been worked over by having more prominent female characters taking on the roles and going toe to toe with the men. These four episodes provided some really fun fight sequences that were creatively done as well as introducing an interesting and diverse crowd of secondary characters and fighters for Maki to deal with. Though it’s been four years since I first saw these episodes, coming back to them proved a lot of fun and has me back in the right mindset and eagerly looking forward to working through the familiar to get to the new.

[ooga]

I still have the 3 single discs that Toei released here. I remember liking what I saw even with the questionable character designs and the goofy script, so I should probably watch the episodes on line. I just have to remind myself to skip a certain episode about getting a guy pregnant. It's pretty damn creepy to put it mildly!

If Funi were to dub these episodes and put them out in a collection I'd probably pick them up. Even with the bad taste Toei left in my mouth with the awful job they did releasing (or more appropriately not releasing) this show in R1 the first time around.

[sir_integra]

Originally Posted by ooga

I still have the 3 single discs that Toei released here.

So do I. I love this series. I'd like it to be available on dvd again also, bit I think the chances are very slim.

[ooga]

Originally Posted by sir_integra

I'd like it to be available on dvd again also, bit I think the chances are very slim.

I would've said the same thing a week ago. But now that DiscoTek has licensed FOTNS TV I'm thinking anything is possible in R1.
The fact that Toei is allowing Funi to stream these episodes on their portal makes me cautiously optimistic. Why waste the bandwidth otherwise? Hopefully they were burnt enough on their first attempt releasing this show to offer Funi "reasonable" terms/fees. If they don't attempt to gouge Funi with their licensing fees this show can likely turn a modest profit.

[Otakufan]

I still have the first episode from the original Toei demonstration disc that TRSI sent me back in the day.

As I recollect, I was quite impressed with the mid-air battle scenes and the English dub. It was the only one of the Toei releases' at the time that caught my eye. Too bad, they weren't able to complete it.

I'd definitely pick it up if they ever re-release it here.

J. A.

[Chris Beveridge]

Air Master is a huge guilty pleasure show. After finishing off Slam Dunk, I figured I owed it to myself to give this a whirl in streaming format as well.