Unlike most people, I didn’t get Harry Potter or The Bourne Ultimatum from this week’s releases. Instead, I have the slightly more obscure, Freedom 3, the third episode of the anime series.
Imagine being on Netflix’s one-disc-at-a-time plan (which I am), but that it’s complicated by a months-long wait between the discs in your queue. And you’re using this method to get through all those subtitled Hiro Nakamura episodes on the disc set of Heroes (a problem I solved by purchasing the box set).
Following the Freedom series is not exactly like that, but it’s darn close. Each episode is pretty short at around 30 minutes, and then you have to wait a couple of months for the next one.
At my house, we didn’t realize that the series was growing on us until we popped in the third episode. Being the internet savvy dude that I am, I already knew what was in store, but it was fun to see it for myself — in HD.
This story picks up with Takeru narrowly escaping the Colony’s policing robots and getting Alan’s help to secure a rocket that just might make it to Earth.
There’s a lot more action in this episode than last time, which makes for a more eventful audio experience. The sound specs on this disc are just like those on the previous installments: Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 Surround, and Japanese PCM 2.0. It’s all in Japanese, with English subtitles (thus my Heroes reference).
The HDi features consists of picture-in-picture (PiP) view of the storyboards and CG renderings, and a couple of videos to download. One is a trailer for the next episode, and another is a commercial shown on Japanese television for the Freedom 3 disc. This is pretty much the same that happened on the last episode. Unlike most PiP implementations, the PiP in Freedom can be moved around and resized, and you can also control its transparency. I wish it was this way on all movies.
The picture quality of this 1080p VC-1 encoding is very clean. Afterall, this is essentially a computer-driven animation effort, so there’s no reason for any significant image flaws. It’s in a 1.78:1 aspect ratio, which means no black bars on the top and bottom, for those of you who are bothered by them.
Like the two that preceded it, this disc comes in the TWIN dual-layer format, where both the HD DVD and DVD versions of the movie are stored on the same side. Unlike traditional combo discs, you don’t have to flip a TWIN disc over to switch formats.
Many people complain about the relative high price of these episodes, especially since they’re only 30 minutes long. I can’t blame them, but it’s easy to solve this problem by just renting the movies. Some people have undoubtedly heard that this series is tied to the Nissin Cup Noodles product. I can assure you that the product placement is barely noticeable. In this episode, it was actually a little humorous to finally see how the noodles would get worked in.
I really like this series, and I’m already hungry for the next episode. I’m sure it’ll make for a great box set when all six are finally released, but for now, we just have to be content with watching the eposides come out one at a time, every couple of months.
Freedom 1 is available at several outlets, and Freedom 2 is available at a few less, and it seems like you can only get Freedom 3 at www.dot-anime.us. It’s not on Netflix yet either, nor did I see it at Blockbuster. Keep looking, it might yet show up there.
