Trigun Vol. #6 (of 8)

By: Dani Moure
Review Date: Monday, April 24, 2006
Release Date: Monday, April 10, 2006



What They Say
With the seeds of love, came the seeds of death...

A glimpse into the past reveals the history of the world, and perhaps its future. August is gone, and with it went the man in red. Wolfwood, returns to aid in his resurrection, but can Vash rediscover his purpose? Revenge does not satisfy hate, but can love of life really defeat death? Only Vash has a chance to find the answer!

Episodes Comprise:
17. Rem Saverem
18. Goodbye For Now
19. Hang Fire

The Review!
After a sixth month delay between volumes, Trigun enters its final arc with a change of pace...

Audio:
I listened to the English language track for my main review, and noticed no dropouts, distortions or other technical problems with the disc; it's a pretty standard stereo mix. The dub is really good, accurate to the literal translation but sounding very natural and never stifled. All the key performers, in particular the actors for Vash and Wolfwood, put in great performances

I spot-checked the Japanese track, having heard it all the way through before, and noticed no issues in the areas I checked.

Video:
Video is the main area where this series takes a bit of a knock. It looks a little washed out at times, though that is in part due to the animation style and colours used. I noticed no compression artefacts or aliasing during regular playback, which is good. Unfortunately, this transfer suffers heavily in the form of cross colouration and rainbowing, along black lines and in character's hair in particular. It's a little unfortunate and can be a bit distracting at times, though it's not terrible and didn't ruin my enjoyment of the show.

Subtitles are in a yellow font which is easily readable, and I noticed no spelling or grammatical errors in them. As this is an older series (in terms of its original DVD release), the ending song is hard-subbed.

Packaging:
No packaging was included as this was a check disc.

Menu:
The menus are simple but functional, and essentially the same as the last disc, so I'm not going to try and find something better to say. It starts with a brief introduction sequence continuing to the main opening menu, which has a central image of Vash again with a flame burning behind him. The show's logo is at the top, with episode choices and the set-up and extras menus at the bottom. A piece of background music plays over the main menu, and sound effects of bullets being fired are used on menu transitions. The sub-menus are static and silent with a bit of character artwork beside the selections. Access times are fast, as you'd expect with a set of simplistic menus.


Extras:
Extras on this disc are minimal, but that's to be expected. First up is the Japanese home video cover art for the series' domestic release, followed by the Trigun trailer again.

Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
With the last couple of volumes, Trigun has really shifted focus to a much darker storyline that you can just tell is ready to bring plenty of death and destruction. We get to see a few dark moments from the past here, but with seven episodes remaining by the end of this disc, it looks like things are going to get worse " much worse " before they get any better for our group.

The events of the last disc were a pretty pivotal turning point for the series, as Legato unleashed the power of Vash's "angel arm", and he blue multiple holes in the fifth moon and caused a fairly hefty chunk of destruction. With that done, the first episode here picks up a bit of backstory, introducing us to the character of Rem that we've heard Vash mention with some fondness before. She was a part of "Project Seeds", which was the humans' project to find a new planet to settle on following their ravaging of the Earth. Rem was a part of the team that was controlling the spaceship that was leading several others, carrying thousands of cryogenically frozen people to start a new life when they found somewhere to settle. She was also the woman that taught Vash and his brother, Knives, everything they knew.

Both Vash and his brother were extremely fond of Rem, but were reviled by most of the rest of the crew because they were different (many of the others would call them "monsters"). Vash was always the kinder, caring one, and seemed to get an ever so slight bit more attention from Rem. Knives on the other hand had something of a dark streak that seemed to manifest itself more and more as he grew jealous of Vash's relationship with Rem, and indeed as he started to form his own ideas of the world.

What he instigated back at that time was pretty hideous, and not only lead to a lot of death, but was also the catalyst for the two brothers beginning to absolutely hate each other. We really see a lot of Knives' hatred of the world and the humans that seem to despise him grow as this episode continues on, and in a way it's quite tragic but shows how different two beings can be, since both he and Vash had almost exactly the same amount of attention and the same teachings and yet turned out so different. There is a great scene with a spider catching a butterfly in its cobweb, which just shows the two boys' different reactions and just highlights the gaping difference in their personalities perfectly.

When we return to the present day, time has skipped forward a couple of years, as we join Wolfwood on a search for Vash the Stampede, whose been missing ever since the incident with the fifth moon. He arrives in a town that's being traumatised by bounty hunters, the leader of whom claims to be Vash himself. A girl called Lina causes a bit of trouble with the leader, and a man called Eriks who has been living with her and her grandmother for some time, does his best to fight for her when the bounty hunters arrive to settle the score with her. He goes out of the tavern and begs and pleads for the bounty hunters to leave, going so far as to strip and bark like a dog revealing all the scars that cover his body. This man, Eriks, is actually the real Vash, and he and Wolfwood are back as a team to try and save the town.

There's a really interesting dynamic in this episode, from Vash's complete change and him settling down to a more subdued life (which is just the kind of life you'd expect him to love and enjoy with his personality), to Wolfwood's appearance tracking him down and some of the more intriguing comments that he makes regarding Knives and some things he's been getting up to recently (such as devastating an entire town). It's definitely a bit more of a "standard" Trigun episode in a sense, given its feel, but it also works with these little additions that do make a difference to how it plays out, and it's also gives us a couple of nice scenes with the enemies to hint at more evil lurking in the background.

Given that Vash and Wolfwood are now back together, there are only two ladies who need to return to reunite the whole gang, and sure enough Meryl and Millie make a comeback here. News of Vash's resurgence reaches their insurance firm, and so they're immediately reassigned to track him down again. It's great that we get to see the pair out of the usual trouble a bit and in their regular lives; while they haven't really changed much it gives us a quick reminder of how fondly they thought of their time with Vash even with all the trouble it caused them. With Meryl in particular, we all know she has feelings for Vash and it's great to see her show it even though she'd never admit it!

True to form, tracking down Vash proves difficult as he's a bit tied up in some family dispute in another town, something that all of the characters end up getting inadvertently involved in. Again, this episode is what you've probably come to expect, but with the change in tone and atmosphere in the show, knowing what evil is lurking in the background, it takes on a much sinister and darker edge. There's a closing shot of an enemy at the end which sums it up perfectly as he's been manipulating things and looks ready to come to the fore. We all know Knives and Legato are both lurking in the background, and seeing them make their moves looks sure to be a fantastic ride.

In Summary:
This disc is pretty standard Trigun fare in terms of story, and to a degree it feels like a lot of setup as the final movements are being made as all the good guys come back together and the bad guys prepare for the final showdown. Nevertheless, with the great episode from the past that shows different sides to the characters of Vash and Knives, and shows the motivations behind them, as well as the dark tone that forebodes everything at the moment, it's a very enjoyable set of episodes. For those collecting the whole thing, this is a no-brainer, but for everyone else the darker nature the series is taking on is proving to really elevate the series. Recommended.

Features
Japanese Language (2.0),English Language (2.0),English Subtitles,Trigun Trailer,Japanese Cover Art

Review Equipment
Philips 28" Pure Flat Widescreen TV, Philips DVP5100 free DVD player, JVC gold-plated RGB SCART cable, standard stereo sound.