21 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Black Rose is nothing like a Red Rose, January 29, 2005
This review is from: Revolutionary Girl Utena - The Black Rose Saga DVD Collection (DVD)
I was forced to watch the incredibly "pretty" Red Rose Saga of Utena. Berserk being my favorite anime, everytime a rose came up on the screen I wanted to throw something at the TV (which happened at least once every two or three minutes). However, I'd like to note that the first Juri battle is worth anyone's twenty minutes, despite that it's in the Red Rose Saga.
Then I got to the Black Rose Saga. In the first episodes a girl basically has a mental breakdown in an elevator and is stabbed in the heart with a black rose. The Black Rose Saga is DARK. This is when the creators of Utena finally start with all the deeper philosophical, symbolic, and psychological aspects that make Utena such an amazing anime. It goes from happy flowers flying through the air and petty high school crushes to incest, questioning one's sexuality, becoming an adult, and more obvious symbolism. The last episodes were so dark and depressing that I almost wanted to stop. If you like anime on any level, Revolutionary Girl Utena is MUST.
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13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The second season of the greatest anime of all time., May 17, 2003
This review is from: Revolutionary Girl Utena - The Black Rose Saga DVD Collection (DVD)
The release of the second arc/season of Utena is a big deal-a very big deal for us in the states. The Black Rose arc is far from being the best Utena series, but is still better than most series. It's fighting sequences are better than that of the first season, but it dosen't focus on character relationships the way the 1st does, but gives us a good insight on the secondary characters of the show, such as:: Kanae, Kozue, Shiori, Tswuabuki, Wakaba & her Onion Price, and Keiko. It also introduces us to the so called "villians" of Utena, Mikage and Mamiya. The relationship between the two has scared some off from this series but please, there aren't any real fruity scenes between the two. It never goes farther than Mikage kissing Mamiya's fingers- so if you're homophobic, you'll still enjoy this series. Mikage is a very interesting character with a dark past that will give this series quite a shocking season finale. Don't pass up the series that shocked Japan and is flying off the US racks.
Contains episodes 14-26
***Aside from the Black Rose, this also contains the first two episodes of the highly anticipated 3rd Saga- Akio.***
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
This is the second DVD set released for Revolutionary Girl Utena, July 2, 2008
This review is from: Revolutionary Girl Utena - The Black Rose Saga DVD Collection (DVD)
This DVD set includes four discs, which covers episodes fourteen through twenty-six of Revolutionary Girl Utena. Unlike the first DVD set, these discs actually have chapter marks on them. I really appreciated this, as it made it easier to skip over the opening and closing credits when I wanted to move on to the next episode.
As an extra, all four DVDs have an Art Gallery, which consists of stills from the episodes, as well as some production art. However, the images flash by so quickly that it's hard to pause on a particular image that you want to take a closer look at.
All four DVDs include an interview with Kunihiko Ikuhara, the director for Revolutionary Girl Utena. He was interviewed at the Big Apple Anime Festival in 2001, and the interview was split between the four discs. His audio is left in Japanese, and English subtitles run on the bottom of the screen. Each disc also contains an interview with one of the English voice actors. Each disc also has a "Revolutionary Girl Utena Storyline" option in the Special Features menu. The first disc recaps what happens in the thirteen episodes on the first DVD box set, and the other discs recap what happened on the prior disc.
The first two discs have text-only biographies for a couple of entities involved with the show, while the second two discs have a song from the series (with the Japanese lyrics running on the bottom of the screen). However, one of the songs only has an instrumental audio track; the audio fro the lyrics wasn't included. Unless you know Japanese, then this song feature is rather useless.
The special features, while they aren't necessarily great, are better than the special features that appeared on the Revolutionary Girl Utena Rose Collection DVD box set.
As far as the actual episodes, the storyline becomes much darker as the series unfolds on this set. Near the end, though, so many concepts get thrown out to the viewer, that it just washes over you and you're left with a lot of questions.
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