- Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
- Video Codec: AVC/MPEG-4
- Resolution: 1080p/24 (23.976Hz)
- Audio Codec: Japanese & English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz/24-bit)
- Subtitles: English
- Subtitles Color: Yellow/White
- Region: A (Region-Locked)
- Rating: TV-14 (VD)
- Discs: 2 (2 x Blu-ray)
- Digital Copies: N/A
- Run Time: 325 Mins.
- Studio: Sentai Filmworks
- Blu-ray Release Date: February 26, 2013
- List Price: $69.98
Overall
[Rating:4/5]
The Series
[Rating:4/5]
Video Quality
[Rating:4/5]
Audio Quality
[Rating:4/5]
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:1.5/5]
The Series
[Rating:4/5]
It seems a rather odd choice to base a series on a Pachinko game and, to be honest, I didn’t have high hopes for this series having that knowledge. That said, Battle Girls: Time Paradox (戦国乙女～桃色パラドックス) turns out to be a far better series than I assumed it would be. Filled with humor and a mixture of fan service, yuri, fantasy, and action, the characters are all interesting and the animation attractive. The story follows the bumbling young sixteen year old Hide “Hideyoshi” Yoshino. Going about her life, carefree and interested in nothing more than her cellphone, after school free time, and junk food, Hideyoshi is on the verge of failing her next history exam, which leads her to the local shrine to offer up prayer in hopes that it will help her succeed. Little does she know that it will be a fateful choice, as she stumbles upon a stranger who resembles her teacher engulfed in a bright blue light that whisks her away into a strange past. She awakes to find that she is in Japan’s Sengoku (Warring States) period – but an odd, alternate version of it, where the world is filled with only beautiful women. Hideyoshi has become a retainer for the powerful Lord Oda Nobunaga and must help her and her faithful retainer, Akechi Mitsuhide, find the mythical Crimson Armor that will help Nobunaga unite the nation. But it won’t be easy! For starters, Hideyoshi has no clue what she’s doing, she doesn’t know how to live in this era, and there are others determined to keep the armor out of Nobunaga’s hands.
The series has an easy pace, lots of action, and lots of silly humor that makes it irresistible. Oh, did I forget to mention the horny talking dog, Shiro, who is the only male in the world and only talks to Hideyoshi? Over the course of the thirteen episodes, the quest for the Crimson Armor, which could easily have deteriorated into one repetitive battle after the next actually serves to move the characters forward without the viewer even realizing it. Nobunaga, for instance, slowly becomes less focused on conquering, and more focused on teamwork and the lighter side of life. Mitsuhide is a classic tsundere character who eventually warms up to Hideyoshi in a surprising plot twist, but also has her own yuri subplot involving Nobunaga. The character designs are all quite elaborate and, as you can see from the screen captures here, rather skimpy and well endowed, outside of Hideyoshi, who is more cutesy than anatomically well-endowed. Whatever the case may be, they’ve done well to make a lot of something out of what is basically a gambling machine game.
Video Quality
[Rating:4/5]
The digital animation for Battle Girls: Time Paradox arrives with an AVC/MPEG-4 1080p encodement on Blu-ray. While it looks reasonably good, it isn’t perfect. There is some softness and I do believe I detected the slightest hint of ringing at times around some of the line art. Colors are sufficiently vibrant and video noise and color banding are not issues.
Audio Quality
[Rating:4/5]
The original Japanese-language soundtrack is included in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz/24-bit) as well as an English dub in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz/24-bit). Both versions offer clear dialogue, a reasonable amount of dynamics, good stereo separation and a punchy midrange.
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:1.5/5]
There are no real extras included here, only clean opening and closing animations, Sentai Filmworks Blu-ray trailers and English disc credits.
The Definitive Word
Overall:
[Rating:4/5]
I liked this series a lot more than I thought I would, probably a lot more than I should have. I assumed that it would just be another basic fan service warrior girl series. While there are elements of that there, it’s more than that. Its humor and sincerity keeps it on a different level and the fan service is kept to a bare minimum, no pun intended.