Customer Reviews

Kimba Boxed Set

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

To Amazon Customers,
One of the most wonderful and uniquely styled Japanese anime programs that aired in Japan during 1965 and later aired in syndication during Saturday mornings in the U.S. in 1966, returns to American audiences on DVD. That program is 'Kimba' which was produced by the legendary Japanese animator "Osamu Tezuka". Originally produced in Japan as the 'Jungle Emperor', this animated program was licensed and later aired in the U.S. So popular was this series that other "Osamu Tezuka" animations were released in the U.S. "Osamu Tezuka" has been credited for pioneering and creating the demand for Japanese Anime programs in the United States and in other countries.

Kimba is the story of a baby white lion born in captivity that escapes back to his homeland after the ship he was aboard sinks into the sea. The program depicts the life of this baby white lion growing up in the African forest learning the history of how his father was the king of this wild frontier. Kimba soon discovers that he is part of a long line of kings and begins his journey to regain his families' standing as king of the African forest.

The story and theme music became so popular that after the proliferation of Japanese anime in the U.S. and worldwide, additional programs were created. Kimba and its predecessor programs have been translated into some 8 languages and have appeared in several animation festivals in Europe and Australia.

The American release of this Japanese animated program included the widely popular theme music produced by "Isao Tomita", "Bill Giant", "Bernie Baum" and "Florence Kaye". This American release of this popular animation would not be complete without the voices of "Billie Lou Watt", "Cliff Owens", "Gilbert Mack" and "Hal Studer".

Although controversy rose after the release of another African lion based animated motion picture in 1994 by a major American studio, Kimba has survived and remains as the premiere animation program enjoyed by children and adults throughout the world.

There is no question that if you enjoy Saturday morning animated programs from the 60's and 70's, then you should purchase Kimba on DVD. This animated program has truly stood the test of time. The wonderful characters, colorful animated settings and the memorable music will have you and your family watching these DVDs over and over again. I strongly encourage you to buy Kimba on DVD for you and or your family. Kimba on DVD brings out the best in Saturday morning entertainment.

Kimba is a great Saturday morning anime cartoon from the 70's. Miles ahead of mindless Sponge-Bob and Rugrats, it's still as fun for today's kids as it was 30+ years ago.

The DVD is of mediocre quality. This is not a "remastered" version. Picture and sound are not the greatest, but probably no worse than watching Kimba on a 1970's UHF cartoon channel.
I get a loud, annoying feedback screetch/buzz on the menu screen, but thankfully, the feedback goes away once I hit play and begin viewing the programs themselves.

A nice buy for those with a nostalgia for early Anime and fond memories of the original heroic white lion.

For a child born in the 60s this was deep stuff. Remember there was no 24-hour Disney channel, cartoon channel, Nickelodeon, or Discovery Kids, etc. I still remember Snowene's face appearing in the stars as the orphaned Kimba struggled to swim to shore. The song still brings tears to my eyes. Today's kids may not find it it has the bells and whistles of the crap they're used to, but classic anime fans will find the storylines and characters comforting.

I absolutely love Kimba and this boxed set is great, exactly as it was in my (australian) childhood...my only complaint is that we don't get every episode of Kimba...please release the other half of this boxed set...

Being Australian, I had to buy (another) DVD player, one that was multi-zoned...but when I heard and saw my first love, after all these years...aaawwwwww.....

I absolutely adored Kimba when I was seven years old. And when I grew up and Disney's The Lion King came along, I was certainly aware of some of the similarities in the story.

But the themes are very different in the two stories.

The Lion King presents a conservative view of society. The models for Simba's world are the hereditary monarchy and the circle of life, meaning the animals at the top of the food chain eat the lower animals. There are also bad animal castes: the hyenas in the Lion King are uniformly evil. And Simba seems to have no original ideas - he's out to save his own ass to become king, to reproduce to keep the dynasty going.

The Kimba of the original series was a visionary and a radical utopian. Kimba set up schools for animals, promoted vegetarianism - to hell with the "circle of life" - and sought to bring about an understanding between humans and animals.

Simba was a British monarch - Kimba was Gandhi.

Rhino seriously dropped the ball on this set. They did nothing to restore the shows to the way they should look. They just found old faded films from the 60s, and used these to master the DVDs. Then they threw in some blue tint to make up for the fading, but this made the pictures dark and very difficult to make out at times. You will not see the masterful and joyous use of color that went into these shows originally. And Rhino absolutely murdered the sound of the famous theme song.

The bonus features on disc 4 are a mixed bag. It's nice to hear Fred Ladd, the man in charge of bringing Kimba to America, reminisce about the show. And you get to read the original, first draft of Tezuka's plan for the show. But in his commentary, Fred Patten gets the sequence of events wrong on more than one occasion, which means that his theories of cause and effect are wrong.

But the bottom line is that the technical quality of this set is disastrously bad. Go for the new Kimba Ultra Edition box set instead.

Although the series itself was an impressive effort and the folks at Right Stuf International have a great catalog, it seems that no effort was made to present Kimba in its best possible light. Tons of scratches, uneven luminance and color shifts. I work in post production and these things can be fixed! I'm not saying you should not buy it, the series is definitely five star but the DVD quality brings it to a three. Too bad.

I see what other reviewers mean about the picture quality, but the show is so good I still give it 5 stars. I was born the year the show was made, and watched it in the afternoons in the late 60's early 70's and was crushed when my local station stopped airing it. Through he magic of the internet I tracked it down againa nd have been having a great time watching Kimba with my kids, who dont believe there was a time before VCR"s and DVD's wer einvented, when we had to watch Kimba whenever he happened to be on! The artwork and cinematography are wonderful, as is the voice acting. The stories are exciting and the messages are great for kids. I can't say enough good things about it.

Kimba is simply my favorite TV show of all time. I know so many people who said it awakened in them a deep love for animals. For me, it was so great to see such deep truths shown on TV: that love never dies, and the need for a real understanding between people and animals if they're going to survive. Ecology, metaphysics, and love, all in a kids' cartoon along with silly jokes and a catchy theme song!

But this set only has the first half of the series! When will we get Kimba Box Set #2?

Actually, I'm I big fan of Fred Ladd's dubbing team for Tezuka's series from this period (Gigantor and Astro Boy), so I'm not so upset at the lack of a Japanese track on this. In Ladd's interview to the Gigantor DVD set he talks about the fact that the episodes were mildly recut, so having English and Japanese as an option would not be possible, because they would not stay in synch.
I do wish more of an effort to find the English language version's negative had been made. These are merely serviceable DVDs --- not quite as awful as dvdreview.com's review indicates (the 1st episode starts out horribly, so perhaps the reviewer didn't keep watching to see the mild improvement!).
I think fans can proceed with caution as to the video quality, but ultimately live with it. Hopefully, as with Gigantor, a second volume will follow.