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4.0 out of 5 stars
Not the Best of the Series, July 28, 2004
This review is from: Nadia, The Secret of Blue Water - Nadia in Love (Vol. 9) (DVD)
Nadia is my favorite anime series, but this volume has a few weak episodes. Of the four episodes on this disc, 2 are weak and 2 are great. The first one is the final episode of the African adventure. The African adventure is a substory that doesn't add much to the overall plot of the series. In other words, it's a forgetable episode. The next episode is a song episode. Each character gets a song and the songs are played over a montage of scenes from previous episodes. I imagine this episode was made to cut down on production costs. Again, it's a forgetable episode.
The third episode , however, is a key episode in the series. In this episode, Nadia learns who she really is. This discovery is key in underdanding the superb ending of this series. In the forth episode, we see the heroic return of a lost character who was thought to be dead. This episode explodes with action and suspense.
Even though two of the episodes are weak, I recommend that fans of the series pick it up. You'll need this one to understand the last episode of the series which, in my opinion, has one of the best endings in all of anime.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Nadia Finally Finds Her Homeland, September 14, 2007
This review is from: Nadia, The Secret of Blue Water - Nadia in Love (Vol. 9) (DVD)
The highlight of the 9th volume of Nadia lies with the last two episodes where Nadia finds her own home of Tartessos in Africa. And the reunion of the Nautilus crew that were believed to be dead. Episode 34 is much more like showcase of theme songs of each characters though the music itself is nice. If you are bored with Lincoln island episodes and African village episodes the patience is now rewarded with last grandios episodes.
Verdict: Nadia and its series is back to the right course.
Rating: 78 out of 100
Recommended for: Nadia series, Evangelion series and Nausicaa fans.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Slow but worthy climb back into excellence for the series., August 28, 2002
This review is from: Nadia, The Secret of Blue Water - Nadia in Love (Vol. 9) (DVD)
Finally, after an onslaught of mediocre to hideous filler episodes, NADIA--THE SECRET OF BLUE WATER manages to recover tremendously. However, the transformation occurs only on the last two episodes of this volume, the penultimate of the series. That's all you need to watch on this volume, because the first two episodes here are skippable in every way.
The first episode which opens the disc, the last of the African arc, in particular, is absolutely atrocious--in fact it gets my prize for being the worst episode in the entire show. After sitting through it, I wondered why the writers even bothered taking our heroes to Africa at all, because it comes across as a totally senseless, not to mention beyond stupid, distraction from the main plot. I already spoke about it on my review for Volume 8, so I won't recap my comments here, but I can advise you that Episode 33 (and its predecessor) is badly out of context with the show and should be avoided at all costs.
The subsequent episode is really little more than just an excuse to make the characters break into song and to recycle clips from the show over each number. Here Jean sings a mindnumbingly simple ditty where he confesses his love for Nadia--and informs her how her misbehavior is affecting him! I like the songs, and I do give the folks at Monster Island credit for getting the dub cast to sing them (Meg Bauman's Nadia has an especially lovely singing voice), but on the whole this episode, again, is little more than just a pointless sidestory. The concept that Jean gets Nadia to reevaluate her behavior is a good one, but it's ineptly executed and serves no real purpose.
Only after all this does NADIA really returns to its roots of appeal. The artwork resumes the rich, crisp quality of the first twenty-two episodes, and the characters return to what they all had developed toward in those same episodes. After our heroes disappear into some sort of whirlpool and descend into Nadia's long forgotten homeland of Tartessos, the artwork becomes black & white for about 75% of the episode. Only the blue light of Nadia's shimmering jewel, occasional red wavelengths, and a painting of Noah's Ark are in color in contrast to the darker images. This style continues as Jean and company explore the ruins of the kingdom and Nadia confesses her darkest secrets -- about her homeland, identity, burden, responsibility, destiny... and ultimately, her self-loathing.
The combination of an interesting artistic style, poignant scripting, and tugging at all the right heart strings, makes Episode 35 rank as arguably one of the very best of the show. Which is not to say that there aren't any minor shortcomings. There are times when some of the "secrets" Nadia reveals about her homeland come across as somewhat rushed; due to shoehorning all those bad episodes into the show, however, this is unavoidable. Also, when Jean and company sing "Happy birthday" to Nadia on the Japanese language track, the song is song in ENGLISH("Engrish"?)! On the dub, they instead sing something along the lines of, "It's your birthday today, may all your wishes come true." One gets the impression that the dubbing team concocted this to avoid the issue of legal rights.
I'm not going to reveal anymore about this volume, for doing so would be the equivalent of giving more spoilers. The only sad factor is that there's only one more volume to go after this, but in the meantime, avoid the horrid first two episodes of this penultimate volume and start watching from where the good kicks in. You won't be disappointed.
Oh, and there is another cool extra: a text interview with Nathan Parsons, who voices Jean, which is not as interesting as the Meg Bauman interview, but still good and informative.
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