The Daichis – Earth’s
Defense Family (Animé TV)
Picture: B-
Sound: B- Extras: C- Episodes: C
On the heals of the huge success of Pixar’s The
Incredibles (2004), Geneon has made The Daichis – Earth’s Defense Family
one of their first DVD releases in their new arrangement to release product
from the Bandai Visual catalog. To its
advantage, it is a good-looking, well-produced Animé that is a bit silly at
times, but is more ambitious than many of the shows of its ilk. Unfortunately, the way the Daichis become a
hero family is contrived and “dysfunctional heroes” is not quite accurate
enough to explain it.
Instead, after some odd surreal experience that I never
bought, they are suddenly heroes to be as if they just fell into it. They have as much character development as
the lesser characters in the original Speed Racer who are obviously
idiots. The Daichis are on the
borderline of that, so getting them into any adventures where any powerful
force would trust them to save the world to begin with is really stretching
it. With that said, the show is
watchable in spots. The first shows as
featured on this DVD are:
1) Earth’s
Final Day
2) The
Broken Family
3) Yellow
Card
4) Surprise!
The Daichi Family’s Weird
5) Special
Training! Sleepless Nights
Obviously, another single-entendre joke is how wacky this
family is, further stretching the credibility of the show, even as a
comedy. Maybe if The Beverly
Hillbillies were the family, this would be funnier, because they are more
developed as odd. This never works out
as the Sci-Fi/Adventure Animé equivalent of The Addams Family or The
Munsters. It is for ages beginning
at 13, but I wonder how many older persons would watch this regularly.
The 1.33 X 1 full frame image is one of the clearest we
have seen on an Animé series to date, offering better color than usual and does
not fake the out-of-focus look or softness that has become a cliché of the
genre. That makes it worth a look on
that level, though it is nothing groundbreaking. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo has Pro Logic surrounds in both its
English and Japanese versions, so the sound is not bad and makes sense for a
recent production. The only extras are
text-free opening credits, concept art gallery and previews for this and other
Geneon DVD titles. Though I was not a
fan, those who are will like this near-basic release.
- Nicholas Sheffo
