The video on the first two discs is incredible. No macroblocking or colour fades. In fact the colours are bold even in the night time scenes. Very well done. The third disc is also very high quality but appears to have been captured from a digital TV source. This is the only disc where the commercial break bumpers have been left in and there's some sort of message scrolling across the top of the screen at the start of the show.

Great stereo seperation and clean sound at a good level. No hums, hisses, or clicks here.

Great stereo seperation and clean sound at a good level. No hums, hisses, or clicks here.

The visuals in this are a great blend of classic Miyazaki stuff and the modern Animated Superman Adventures from here in North America. The whole thing has a western (not the old west... I mean western civilization) feel to it while still obviously being anime. Check out the screen shots to see what I mean. The story is a great adventure that takes the time to develop all of the characters and introduces the whole cast at a leisurly pace. Disc two... on episode 15, near the end of the episode, my copy jumped past the last three or four minutes. I was able to rewind to just before the skip happened. I don't know if this defect is present in the full run or not but I didn't miss too much... it amounts to a minor irritation. Disc three has a similar part where an episode jumps past about twenty minutes to the next episode. When I checked out the same scene on my computer, it just froze. All of the animation after this glitch is still present, it just takes a little persistance to see everything which can be irritating. In spite of the glitches on the second and third discs I still quite enjoyed watching this series. Don't be fooled by all the pictures of airships though... they only feature in a few scenes here and there throughout the series.