Originally airing in 2001, Dendoh is one of the first series done by Sunrise in digital paint. As such, it has a bright, vivid colour palette, extensive use of well-blended CG, and extremely fluid animation. The HK release is a DVD rip, and I was going to give it a four, but the set suffers from overcompression - the 39 episode breakdown over four discs is 9/10/10/9+Extras. As such, scenes with extensive detail and lots of sparks, explosions, etc. suffer from blocking up, especially on the fourth disc. For the most part, this will look great on TVs. There are no watermarks anywhere on the video.

This is a standard stereo track. I noticed one or two dropouts, mostly on disc four. Everything was nice and clear, and the music didn't overpower the dialogue. It all sounded fine on my TV.

This is a standard stereo track. I noticed one or two dropouts, mostly on disc four. Everything was nice and clear, and the music didn't overpower the dialogue. It all sounded fine on my TV.

Packaging - 3/5 MI's Dendoh release comes in a blue digipack with different images behind each of the plastic pieces. Each disc has a different image screen on it, highlighting one of the characters. It looks OK, but the AV box+double amrays looks a lot nicer (some nice red foil on the logo). Also, I got a cheap pressing, and one of my discs came really scratched up and flawed (as in wouldn't mount on any of my four DVD players), and had to rip a friend's AV set to watch disc three. Menus - 4/5 The menus are nice and simple. There's no music, but just a list of episodes, broken up by threes, and a subtitle menu. Once you select a group of episodes, you're taken to a chapter menu for those three eps. Also present on disc four is the play extras option. Chapters - 5/5 Chapter stops are OP, Part A, Part B, ED, Preview. Can't complain here. Extras - 4/5 The extras for this release are: Clean OP1, Clean ED, Clean Launch and Data Weapon Footage, Clean OP2, Funding Trailer. Breaking these down, the Clean OP/ED are self-explanatory. The launch footage is nice to have, as the voiceovers are all in Engrish with Japanese subs at the bottom. The clean version doesn't have these, and the video quality is a little better as well. The funding trailer is VERY cool, and clocks in at about two minutes. It's done with traditional cel animation instead of CG, and some of the designs are quite different. Overall, the extras deserve a five. However, it's impossible to watch them on fast forward (handy when the launch footage clocks in around five minutes and is rather dull after having seen it as stock in four straight episodes). They *are* chapter stopped, though, where the commas break them up in the list above. Content - 4/5 Hokuto Kusanagi just moved to Hoshimi with his family. While walking his dog, Jupiter (Cupid in the subs), he meets Ginga Izumo, a brash boy of the same age. It is at this time that the mechanical empire of Garfa attacks Japan, and everybody can probably guess where things go from here - chosen by the robot as pilots, secret organisation, alien family background, evil machines want to destroy all humans, yadda yadda. As far as robot shows go, there's nothing particularly *new* about the plot. That said, the execution is so jawdroppingly incredible that you just don't care. The characters are all well developed and fleshed out, the situations presented as the kids have to keep their identities secret all entertaining, and the general lack of filler (just one recap episode!) keeps everything moving at a brisk enough pace that there's no time to get bogged down. And then there's the robot action. Wow. While the actual designs for the Dendoh and Ogre robots are unappealing to the eye at first glance, they grow on the viewer quickly. Additionally, the director is notorious for his love of making toy-riffic robots, and doesn't fail to provide absolutely cool accessories into the plot: Dendoh can perform advanced moves (read: arsekicking martial arts) via the GEAR commander, a small device that looks like a Game Boy crossed with an iPod. Additionally, the kids have to track down six data weapons which attach to Dendoh and allow it to perform even more advanced attacks (as well as take on physical animal-esque forms). The animation is top notch, as should be expected from a Sunrise robot show. The CG is smooth, and is well integrated. It's somehow appropriate that a show about data weapons and a machine empire is animated with digital paint and 3DCG. Just be aware that this comes at the price of about 1,5-2 minutes of stock footage in most episodes. Personally, I find the Dendoh stock footage cool enough not to care, but this may grate on some viewers. Then there's the score. All of the music (especially the BGM) is incredibly catchy, and does a superb job of presenting the tension of the moment, the thrill of a launch, and the impending doom of an attack. Overall: I watched all of Dendoh in less than a month, and mostly on weekends in marathon viewings of four to seven episodes at a time. As I stated above, there's little groundbreaking about the plot (mind you, GaoGaiGar was the same way), but Fukuda is a good enough director not to let that get in the way of presenting one of the best robot shows of the late 90's/early 00's. I've heard Dendoh described as being the Superman to offset Big O's Batman, and the description is accurate. A grand, uplifting, and powerful tribute to the great days of robots, GEAR Fighter Dendoh is a 70's robot show done with modern animation and budgets. There is no reason for this show *not* to be licensed and airing on US television. Go buy this set NOW.