Kaleido Star: New Wings Vol. #1
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January 19, 2006
by: Vincent Del Vecchio
"Kaleido Star gets my highest possible recommendation. This is a show that dreams are made of."
Review Hardware Used: Samsung HL-R5067W 50 Inch DLP HD-Ready Widescreen Projection TV, Denon 2910 DVD Player with Monster Video HDMI Cable (Player set to 480p), Yamaha RX-V596 DD/DTS 5.1 Surround Sound Receiver, Klipsch Quintet 5.1 Speaker System w/ matching KSW-12 (400 watt) subwoofer, Monster Audio cable all around.
Disc Description
It’s a blast from the past as the Fool reveals Sora’s journey to becoming a Kaliedo Star. But Sora’s glory is short lived as two new rivals appear at Kaleido Stage and steal the spotlight from Sora. As her stage time is usurped by the dashing Leon Oswald, an Asian beauty named May Wong appears and proclaims herself the next Layla Hamilton. She is certain to win a leading role, and if she’s lucky, Leon’s attention. But they are not the only unexpected newcomers to Kaleido Stage. One little runaway will find herself in some very hot water thanks to Sora’s never-ending eagerness to help!
All your old friends are back along with some gorgeous adversaries who you’ll love to despise. So, kick back, relax, and get ready for the amazing debut of Kaleido Star – Season Two!
Disc Features
”Day With a Kaleido Star” with Serena Varghese (Rosetta)
Production Sketches
Clean Opening Animation
Clean Closing Animation
ADV Previews
Disc Review
Content: (May include spoilers)
It has been about 14 months since I’ve written a review and about 19 months since I first reviewed the first volume of the first season of Kaleido Star. In fact, the first review I’ve ever written for Anime Advanced was Kaleido Star Vol. #1: Welcome To The Kaleido Stage. So I suppose you can consider this my coming out of retirement review. And now, on with the show!
Kaleido Star: New Wings Volume 1: Eclipse of the Star picks up basically right after the first season ends. The first two episodes on this disc are basically back-story episodes. They provide a summary of what happened in the first season and what has led up to this point in time. This is a good way to refresh a viewer’s memory since it has been about a year since the last volume of the first season was released. Unfortunately, this means that only three of the five episodes on this disc are new content. This isn’t much of a negative really, so don’t let it persuade you otherwise when making the decision to jump into or back into the show.
Sora and Layla have performed the “Legendary Great Maneuver” and all is well. Or is it? Unfortunately, not everything at Kaleido Stage is going according to plan. Attendance at shows is down, profit is plunging, and with Layla Hamilton injured and moving on to pursue other things, the draw to the Kaleido Stage has pretty much hit it’s peak and has come crashing down to abysmal levels. Unfortunately for Sora, the fans just do not see her as a big a draw as Layla was and have lost interest. So in order to combat the decrease in ticket sales, Kaleido Stage owner Kalos has decided to bring in Leon Oswald; a performer who’s skills are so incredible that he makes everything he does look like child’s play. That’s all good and well right? Wrong. Leon’s attitude and his reason for being there don’t exactly match Sora’s views and the two come to blows almost immediately.
During the first show, Leon has the main part and Sora is cast alongside Leon as his co-star. This is all fine and well until Sora decides to spice things up a little; which she is known for doing every now and then. When Leon notices that Sora has stolen even a moment of stage time from him, he just ups and gets ready to leave in the middle of the show. After a little convincing, he decides to stay but it is all on his own terms. Here we see that Leon, at least for now, has Kaleido Stage in the palm of his hand and is basically calling the shots. He’s the type of character you love to hate and it is with good reason. His stark contrast to Sora really comes out almost the moment we meet him and he is literally a bastard. He’s the type of man that cares only about himself. He wants to look good and will spare no expense at making Sora look bad if he can achieve that goal.
A bit further into this volume we’re introduced to yet another nemesis for Sora in the form of May Wong. Things just aren’t looking up for our leading lady at all as May Wong constantly berates Sora left, right, up, down, and side to side. She is in poor Sora’s face about every little thing. Not wanting to believe that Sora has any shred of talent, she has poised herself to become her replacement and will try to achieve that goal at all costs. While Hillary Haag plays May Wong with incredible enthusiasm, and the Japanese voice actress does as well, May Wong is that character that gets on everyone’s nerves. It makes you wonder how anyone can put up with her constant babbling and putting down of everyone else. As sweet and as forgiving as Sora is, it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if in one of the upcoming volumes, she just turns right around and gives May Wong a hard slap across the face. What makes it all the worse is that Kalos seems to not care one bit. Maybe he has this grand scheme, that in the end this will all make Sora the greatest performer that has ever graced the stage, but it is almost painful to watch Leon and May Wong literally double team her.
The final episode on this disc sees Sora and May compete against each other for the co-starring role of Mina Murray in Dracula. Once again we see Sora’s total commitment to improving her skills. While Sora’s motivation to improve comes from wanting to put on the best show for the audience, it seems that the only reason May Wong wishes to improve is to humiliate Sora. This right here, once again, gives the viewer enough reason to see May Wong as only a self-centered young woman out for Sora’s blood, so to speak. Although these scenes might give the viewer that impression, there are a few parts where we see that May Wong may have some other reason for this; which we probably won’t learn until much later in the season.
Video:
Whilst animation quality is a main consideration that people use to gauge a show’s worth, Kaleido Star is all about the story. That’s not to say that the animation isn’t gorgeous because it is downright beautiful. Every action scene is portrayed with the utmost quality and you would be hard pressed to find anything wrong with either the animation quality or video quality.
On our setup, the video aspect of this disc is outright top notch. There is no aliasing, no tearing, and colors are vibrant and stand out perfectly. Hats off to Gonzo for the production value put into the animation and hats off to ADV for providing a release that just looks amazing.
Audio:
For the initial viewing, we watched the show in its original Japanese language track. The stereo mix was done very well with a good use of the two speakers. Directionality was fluid and overall, the Japanese language track sounded very good.
Afterwards, we went back and watched the show with the English language 5.1 track. The 5.1 audio definitely made a big difference. The directionality of all 5 speakers was excellent. ADV Films shows us why their 5.1 English tracks are not just gimmicks, the voices filled up the front soundstage nicely while the ambient effects and music took hold of the left, right, and surround speakers and provided us with a nice feeling of immersion. This is top notch audio work here folks and hands down outstanding.
Menus:
ADV continues to bring us DVD menus that are both easy to use and eye pleasing. This volume of Kaleido Star is no exception. A beautiful blue background with an animated Kaleido Stage inspired middle section highlights the menu while extensions careen off of it to provide easy selection to each of the 5 episodes and the disc extras.
There is no “Play All Episodes” option but selecting the first episode on the disc allowed us to watch the five episodes from beginning to end with no interruptions. This is a quality menu that is easy to use and stands out nicely as a pretty piece. The music is mysterious and plays nicely to the magical high flying circus theme of the show. What more can you ask for?
Extras:
There are a few standard extras in this volume of Kaleido Star. We get clean opening and clean closing animations as well as production sketches, DVD credits, and trailers for upcoming ADV releases.
In a nice twist for the show’s extras section, we get to spend a few minutes with Serena Varghese, the voice of Rosetta. This is basically a short extra where we see what her day is like from when she wakes up, goes to school, and finally to work to voice roles at ADV. This will prove to be a nice little something for fans of English dubs.
Dialogue:
Subtitle display looked excellent. Timing was good and easy to read. Font color and size were also good and it wasn’t a chore to follow along with the subtitles for this show at all. The Japanese cast does a very good job here with only a few voices that grate the eardrums but overall it is a quality effort.
The English dub has quickly become one of my favorite in an anime series thus far. The entire ADV voice cast with the exception of maybe one or two of the minor single line characters are all done with great enthusiasm and sound great. Cynthia Martinez continues her spot on performance of Sora. Luci Christian once again returns as Sarah to provide her wide vocal range for that character’s lines. Jay Hickman once again returns to voice the Fool; who continues his top of the line performance as the slightly perverted, fortune telling spirit of the stage. Kira Vincent-Davis and Nancy Novotny return as Anna and Mia to help Sora in strong form. Hilary Haag voices May Wong; Sora’s competition this time around and Mike MacRae pulls of a convincing accent as the cold-hearted super stage performer Leon Oswald.
The Bottom Line:
Picking up immediately after the end of the first season, sans the two flashback episodes, which are actually a welcome addition; Kaleido Star: New Wings immediately throws you back into the action of the Kaleido Stage. The introduction of two new nemesis type characters for Sora to interact with is a welcome addition. Although some may think that May Wong is rather annoying, she is played very well and seems to have something that may be driving her to act the way she does. In contrast, Leon Oswald is your perfect complete bastard character. He is cold-hearted and has an ego a mile wide. I respect his character because I’ve seen performers who have become big stars grow egos such as this so I know where they are trying to go with his “I’m bigger, better, and more popular than you will ever be” attitude. In a different light, some viewers will just come to despise one or both of Sora’s competitors this time around. They are both more annoying than Yuri ever was.
Yet whilst I write this, I can’t help to think that this is the reason this show is as good as it is. No matter what happens to bring Sora down, she always stands back up; ready to fight, ready to move on, and ready to make her dreams and the audiences’ dreams come true. It is that determination that makes Kaleido Star the amazing series it has become. It has truly been too long since the first season ended and I’m glad that wait is finally over.
In ending, I must say that this volume has woken a sleeping love in me for this series and has only made it stronger. Kaleido Star continues to be the best it can be in the universe that its creators have brought to life.
Kaleido Star gets my highest possible recommendation. This is a show that dreams are made of.
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Content |
Although the first two episodes are "resfresh your mind" episodes, the last three continue Kaleido Star's amazing trend. |
9.8 |
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Video |
One word describes the video & animation quality and that is: Incredible. The only thing stopping it from getting a perfect score is the lack of anamorphic widescreen. |
9.8 |
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Audio |
Great audio quality from both language tracks. There aren't jets and giant explosions but the 5.1 makes best of what is offered. |
9.0 |
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Menus
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Easy to navigate, simple to understand, and very fast loading times. Round it out with the appropriate music and you get something beautiful. |
9.1 |
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Extras
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There could be more but the quality of a show isn't rated by the amount of extras it has. For what it has, it is done well and is satisfactory. |
8.5 |
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Dialog
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In Japanese or in English, prepare yourself for unsurpassed voice acting. Emotions run high in this volume and the voice actors on both tracks nailed their performances home flawlessly. |
9.6 |
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Verdict
The second season of Kaleido Star is finally here and with it brings back all the beauty, all the mystery, all the amazing stunts, and all the emotion of the first season. If I could only say one thing here, it is this: "Get this show as soon as possible!"
I am proud to give it AMN's highest honor: The Platinum Disc Award.
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9.7
[not an average]
+ Beautiful everything!
+ Great voice acting on both language tracks!
+ The wait for the second season is finally over!
- Some of the new characters are VERY annoying.
- Not enough Fool perversion?
- The wait until mid-March for volume 2.
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