Review - Daphne in the Brilliant Blue Vol. 2 - Reunion
Reviewed by Richard Brownell on 9.6.2007.
Score: 7/10
At the end of the first volume of Daphne and the Brilliant Blue, we had just acquired Gloria in the Nereids group. So we had all but one of the scantily clad ladies in the opening credits. And that's just one too few. So to begin volume two, the group finds themselves trying to recruit that last girl.
To be precise, the girl they are after is named Yu. She was formerly a member of Nereids, but after racking up tons of damage in a chase of some small-time criminals she had to spend a while in jail. Now she's out, so Rena tries to get her license reissued since she can't work at Nereids without it. Unfortunately, the police chief refuses which is bad news because Yu is known for having a horrible temper, bad enough to put a human-sized hole in the wall.
So who gets sent to tail her? Who better the new inexperienced girl, Maia? She doesn't get beaten to a pulp of course. On the contrary, Yu is the fifth person in the opening so in the end she is back with Nereids. She's the hand-to-hand fighter of the bunch. She's only the only one with a weird almost Akira Toriyama scrunched face with weird hair. As with the rest, she has a tremendous body which is not well covered in daily life and pretty much not covered at all while she is fighting where she pretty much just wears a series of strings tied around her body.
The remaining three episodes continue the mostly episodic storytelling of the show, except now we have the full crew. Episode six finally reunites Maia with her friend who actually made it into the Ocean Agency. And through an unfortunate turn of events, she even has to help her, thus proving that perhaps Maia is really made out for Nereids.
The most interesting episode is probably episode seven where it turns out the branch manager talks the talk to his daughter at home, despite that he's a slobbering wuss at work. When his daughter says she's going to visit his workplace, he has to make deals with the girls to get them to pretend to be incompetent and that he does all the heroics. Of course, you know that can't go as planned.
This volume ends with Maia once again being put in a precarious position by the rest of the team. It's basically her job to always be in the most danger. But that's part of what makes the show entertaining. Occasionally, the girls are in some nice fan service poses, but often times their attitudes or bizarre outfits do little to help make Daphne a guy's guy show like that. The second volume definitely didn't go downhill from the first and now that the full team is together, it's beginning to catch its stride.
Special Features
DVD Special Features
· Bilingual Audio (English 2.0/Japanese 2.0)
· English Subtitles (Dialogue & Screen Text)
DVD Extra
· Creditless Ending
