Anime Profile: Freedom

Like most sci-fi anime series, this one takes place in the future. Set approximately 300 years from now, we learn that teenagers are all pretty much the same. Sure, they might be living inside giant space colonies on the moon since the earth is supposedly uninhabitable, but like many a teenager, Takeru longs for more freedom than society allows. But since he doesn't know how to go about getting said freedom, he instead tries to soup up his car-like racing vehicle so that he can complete in tube races. His friends Kazuma and Bismark help him out in this task, but they can only do so much with the parts they've got.

Takeru knows his machine still needs more work to be as fast as he needs it, yet like most teenagers his actions are influenced more by emotion than logic, so when he's goaded by racing rival Taira, the two take off on an illegal street race... even though their bracelets warned them just before they launched that curfew was about to take effect. Takeru actually manages to do pretty well, until something breaks. Caught outside after curfew standing next to their burning vehicle, Takeru and his friends end up getting community service duty.

But, it's not all bad. During community service, they meet an old-timer that gives the gang a rocket engine to help soup up Takeru's vehicle. Oh yeah, and while Takeru's walking outside the domes in his spacesuit, tediously checking a long patch of cable to make sure everything as it should be, he witnesses something crash not too far from him. And yes, he goes to check it out... wouldn't you, after all? What he finds is some man-made electronic wreckage, and what looks to be a piece of paper. He stands, stunned, as he reads the single question written on it, and sees the picture on the opposite side. This question and photo will surely end up changing his, if not everyone's life.

This anime is kind of unique, see as how it is one of the first released on a DVD/HD-DVD hybrid disc. Since I don't have any high-definition DVD player yet, much less and HD-DVD specific one, I could only watch the standard DVD part. But the cool thing is, both the DVD and the HD-DVD parts are on the same side of the disc, so the other side gets to have a label and artwork... except they decided to forgo the artwork and instead cram a whole of text which pretty much summarized most of the episode.

The art and animation in the anime is also different than most. It's obviously done with computers, and sections (if not all of it) are done in 3-D, even though it retains the 2-D look. If you've ever seen the cartoon Futurama, then you'll know what I'm talking about. It's cel-shaded like a 2D animation, but the camera movements at times show that at least some of it was modeled in 3D. I think it's a good look, and is probably where animation is headed in the future.

What I don't like about this DVD release is that it contains only one episode, lasting no more than 24 minutes. With a list price of $39.99, and an Amazon price of $27.95 (at the time of this writing), that's one hell of a lot of money to put down for one volume of a six-volume series that provides less than a half hour of entertainment. Personally, there's no way I'd chuck out that much for this thing, but thankfully the good people at Bandai Visual provided me with a review copy. So yeah, I can tell you that I enjoyed this anime, it had a nice setup and I want to see what happens next... but unless you're rich with money to blow, just rent it.