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Review

by Maral Agnerian, May 2nd 2002

Arc the Lad

DVD 2 - Fireball

Synopsis:
Arc the Lad DVD 2 - Fireball
When the bounty on Pandit is lifted, Elk is sure it's a trap, and he and Shu hatch a scheme to find out who's after Lieza by using her as bait. What they don't know is that the Mayor's about to launch his evil plot, and that the mysterious Arc is after the Mayor and his cronies. Elk finally confronts his nemesis Arc, only to chase him over the ocean and into disaster.
Review:
Things start to get moving in the second volume of Arc the Lad, as the Mayor's evil plans begin to be revealed. His motives, however, are still a mystery, as is the link between him and White House, and why he wants Lieza. Adding to the interest, we finally meet Arc and his crew (which, of course, includes a 4-year-old...are they standard issue or something), and Elk reveals an important part of his past, including the source of his powers and his ties to White House. Lieza begins to manifest strange powers of her own, but their meaning and source remains a mystery.

The pacing has picked up a bit, with somewhat less of the slow and disjointed feel of the first few episodes. It's still not action-packed, but there's plenty of plot development and excitement, what with the Mayor's plot and Elk's confrontation with Ark. I would have liked to see more development of Shu--apart from that one scene on the first disc, there's been no hint of his private life or past. Elk gets plenty of development, which is nice, but Lieza is such a stereotypical sweet good-girl that she tends to grate sometimes.

The art and animation are pretty much the same as in the first volume--i.e. nice and clean but with somewhat muddy colours. The music is still awful, as are the menus and total lack of extras, but the dub is still fairly good.

So far my original estimation of this series still holds--fairly interesting, but could have been more so if handled differently. If the first disc really grabbed you, then by all means pick this one up, but otherwise I'd pass it up for something else.
Grade:
Production Info:

+ Plot picks up; Elk's past revealed
− Still not really engaging; lame music; no extras
Director: Itsuro Kawasaki
Screenplay: Akemi Omode
Character Design: Yoko Kikuchi
Art director: Toshihisa Koyama
Animation director:
Yoko Kikuchi
Yoshiaki Tsubata
Mecha design: Kenji Teraoka
Executive producer:
Yukio Nagasaki
Ryuzo Shirakawa
Producer: Hideo Katsumata

Full encyclopedia details about
Arc the Lad (TV)

Release information about
Arc the Lad - Fireball (DVD 2)
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