Magic Knights Rayearth Memorial Collection 2

By Kai Jääskeläinen     February 16, 2002
Release Date: May 20, 2001



The Review!
Content: Magic Knight Rayearth 2 continues where season 1 ended. The girls from another world try to return to their daily routines as schoolgirls but the death of Princess Emeraude still ravels their minds. Cephiro still lingers in their memories thus forcing Hikaru, Umi and Fuu to wish for their return to Cephiro. They find Cephiro is still in the same condition they left it, crumbling without a pillar.

Season 2 presents new worlds outside Cephiro which are quite weird. Autozam represents a technocratic nightmare like the one in 'Metropolis' and is the 'western world'. Fahren resembles none the less than China all the way to the yin and yang. Chizeta then is quite middle-eastern. So the alien worlds are quite stereotypical and it was quite funny when Fuu noticed that the amazingly chinese Fahren had all the same quite Japanese ninjas.

The most interesting new character is Lantis and its character just rubs its clampness to your face. It didn't bother me but if you have anything against a 3 metre high and incredibly anorectic pretty boy, be warned. The good second in the new characters section is Nova. She must be the ultimate of anime wicked ladies. She laughs, she cries and she fights! I won't spoil her origin though. Her every appearance is a highlight in the series and I honestly felt sympathy towards that poor little girl.

Some old characters return and some of them have now more screen time than in the first season. Ascot shows his teeth as well as Clef. La Farga and Caldina show a new side too. Ferio then is kept in the shadows! Outrage! The one character that didn't feel like a bozo in the first half of the first season is almost totally forgotten. His character development though is quite chewed and there's nothing more tell. Luckily the new characters fill those gaps.

The first three-quarters of the 1st season were quite boring and whole series seemed to start in the end of the first season. The 2nd season continues the pace seen in the end of the 1st season and is much more enjoyable than the 1st season. A bit of deja vu can be seen in the middle of the season but eventually the episodes just fly by. Rayearth is probably the best magic shoujo anime out there and I look forward to the OVAs if Manga video has the guts to release them. I'm hooked!

Video: The opening sequence issue that bugged the previous box is gone and it is now normal compared to any other solution. No more separate titles for openings. The picture is quite flawless: no pixellation, the source tape seemed to be in good shape and only few rainbows were found i.e. at least with my equipment. The picture isn't crystal clear but it's still good. The animation is what you'd expect from a TV anime. There are some dazzling sequences but the stills and the stock footages are still there. There was also supposed to be the entire population of Cephiro inside one castle and you see the first glimpse of only a fraction within the last 9 episodes. The Clamp character design is one of my favourite things in this show. This is candy for the eyes.

Audio: The Japanese soundtrack was 2 channel and so was my TV. No distortion or any other issues were found. The sound FX rocked and the music even more so. I just love every single piece of music in this series the opening song being the loveliest. I did not even check the English dub. I'll let someone else do that. The sound is good but not perfect.

Menus: The menus in the second box have also gone through some improvement. They're fast and quite flashy! Every disc has an individual menu and pretty animations along with music of the same topic as the picture in the menu. The menus work and everything is OK.

Packaging: This exceeds everything! The box itself is incredible. It's shiny cardboard, it's got a hinge in one of the bottom edges and it opens the box with style. The discs are easy to remove from the box. The keepcases are amaray-ish and the make was unknown. They still rock though. The inserts were odd. The chapter stop numbering in the insert was not similar with the disc. The covers are cool with pictures of the characters and the backs include a synopsis and episode names. The packaging is near perfection.

Extras: Not as much as with the previous box but quality exceeds volume. The alternative opening and ending, the mokona song and the Japanese TV spots were a blast and the storyboard rocked too. Some omake, galleries and info on the new characters. The commentary was the dub directors one and I thus passed it alongside with the outtakes. OK extras but something was missing.

Review Equipment
Philips 930 (modified) DVD player, Philips 21' PT442B TV, RGB Scart Euro connector