Heaven's Lost Property: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		1.5
Overall		3.5

Heaven's Lost Property: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie Review

He dreams of genie.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 17, 2011

Are there feminists in Japan? Does a culture which has so long valued submissive (even subservient) females have any room for a Women’s Liberation Movement? If so, there must certainly be an incipient protest evolving over such fare as Heaven’s Lost Property. The Women’s Lib Movement in the United States was still in its infancy when sitcoms like I Dream of Jeannie came along in the mid-sixties, so that when Barbara Eden repeatedly called Larry Hagman “master” in the series, it raised nary an eyebrow. It was only as feminists began to poke and prod the detritus of pop culture in later years that such ideas were held up to ridicule, supposedly prime examples of misplaced male hubris and sexual stereotyping, not just the result of lazy and formulaic sitcom writing. Of course it was okay for Jeannie to call Tony “master” but at the same time Jeannie’s navel couldn’t be shown to the innocent eyes of American audiences. Such were the silly contradictions of that era.

But here we are in the second decade of the 21st century, and, at least insofar as Heaven’s Lost Property goes, not much has changed. We still have a subservient female calling her man “master,” only now that we’re in a freer, more permissive time, showing a navel isn’t risqué, it’s actually passé. It’s not for nothing that the first episode of Heaven’s Lost Property contains a title including “full frontal” in its verbiage, for like several other anime of fairly recent vintage, Heaven’s Lost Property pushes the bounds of adolescent male hormonal fervor, attempting to create a popular entertainment that is both lascivious and at least relatively non-offensive. The show is deliberately provocative in a sort of buffoonish way, but it also maintains an arch, goofy humor which allows it to present undeniably sexist material in an almost blasé manner. Feminists may be up in arms, but chances are young males especially will find in Heaven’s Lost Property an animated version of some of their fondest fantasies.

Heaven’s Lost Property has some structural issues that are evident right off the bat in the first episode. We’re introduced first to Sugata, a high school kid with an overweening interest in science who is tracking a large black hole which is hovering in the atmosphere somewhere over the China Sea. Sugata is convinced this hole is the portal to (to quote an Oscar winning song from Disney’s Aladdin) a “Whole New World.” Sugata appears therefore to be our anchor for the series, since he directly addresses the audience in the opening sequence. Instead, we soon discover that the actual focus of the show is going to be on one of Sugata’s classmates, a withdrawn and angst ridden boy named Tomoki, who yearns for nothing more than a little peace and quiet. That of course means that Tomoki’s life is soon going to be upended into an unending series of turmoil and tribulation. Tomoki has been haunted by a recurring dream which has troubled him since his early childhood, where he sees an angelic female figure floating above him, just out of reach. This figure keeps asking to be rescued, claiming the sky has her in its grasp.

Tomoki regularly wakes from this dream in tears, and a female classmate Sohara decides that Sugata’s knowledge of arcane information may help to find out the meaning of the dream. Sugata instantly jumps to the conclusion that the dream and the black hole are linked, and tells Tomoki to wait under a gigantic 400 year old cherry tree outside of town that night when the hole is due to pass over. Both Sohara and Sugata’s plans to join Tomoki are thwarted for various reasons, and Tomoki soon finds himself underneath some sort of explosive force which is dropping huge amounts of explosive material earthward. Also dropping from the sky is a buxom, scantily clad female (is there any other kind in anime of this ilk?) with wings who turns out to be a “pet class angelroid” named Ikaros, one who immediately “imprints” on Tomoki and declares herself more or less Tomoki’s slave, with an I Dream of Jeannie-esque ability to grant any wish.

Heaven’s Lost Property walks a sort of oogling tightrope balanced precariously somewhere between ecchi and shonen. Tomoki is a typical hormone overrun adolescent male, and his realization that he basically has a willing and able female at his beck and call provides the series with an undeniable erotic charge that is only partially offset by Tomoki’s inherent nerdiness and inability to actually consummate the relationship. While there is a sort of smarmy aspect to quite a bit of this series, Heaven’s Lost Property manages to overcome some of that uncomfortable feeling simply be being so ridiculous so much of the time. Tomoki repeatedly says things off the cuff which Ikaros takes as being a wish, leading to calamitous results, which Tomoki must then struggle to put right again. (It never seems to dawn on Tomoki to simply wish for things to be back the way they were, he keeps begging Ikaros to cancel his last wish, which she is not “programmed” to do).

The major problem with Heaven’s Lost Property, though, is that it’s incredibly reminiscent of a number of other anime series where human males are visited by superpowered, usually hyper-sexualized, females. The series attempts to develop its own mythology, culled from the original manga, but it’s an uphill slog which the anime never really fully is able to exploit. Instead we’re left with some scattered laughs amidst quite a bit of gratuitous fan service. If that’s your cup of tea, Heaven’s Lost Property is probably going to be an agreeable enough time killer not to raise too many hackles.

Heaven's Lost Property: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Heaven's Lost Property is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of FUNimation Entertainment with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This series offers nothing new or innovative in terms of either character design or backgrounds, but it is unfailingly well animated and really pops extremely well on this Blu-ray. Part of this is due no doubt to the fact that the show likes bright colors, and those pop magnificently throughout each episode, with brilliant saturation and a really nice looking and well vared palette. Line detail is exceptional and the overall image is appealingly sharp and well detailed. As with a lot of these anime offerings, there are two distinct animation styles, one relatively more realistic, and the other more childlike, but both styles look equally sharp here and though the show itself may disappoint, the image quality is not likely to be among the complaints.

Heaven's Lost Property: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

As with most recent FUNimation anime offerings, Heaven's Lost Property features an English dub in Dolby TrueHD 5.1, as well as the original Japanese language track delivered via Dolby TrueHD 2.0. Both of these tracks sport excellent fidelity and good prioritization of voice, music and effects (and this series has an unusually wide variety of music, as a cursory glance over the many closing songs listed below in the Supplements section will prove). The Japanese voice cast is a little calmer than the English, as is usually the case with the FUNimation English dubs, but special kudos have to be given to Greg Ayres' English language Tomoki. Bringing just the right amoung of angst, frustration, slightly perturbed quality mixed in with a level of sexual inquisitiveness, this is one of the better casting decisions of late in the English language FUNimation universe. The 5.1 track does open things up rather nicely, with good use of surrounds in several key sequences where Ikaros flits about. Dynamic range is also excellent throughout the 5.1 track.

Heaven's Lost Property: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Textless Opening Song "Ring My Bell" (HD; 1:32)
• Textless Closing Song "Soba Ni Irareru Dake De" (HD; 1:39)
• Textless Closing Song "Misaki Meguri" (HD; 1:42)
• Textless Closing Song "Taiyou Ga Kureta Kisetsu" (HD; 1:34)
• Textless Closing Song "Senshi No Kyusoku" (HD; 1:33)
• Textless Closing Song "Yukei Yukei Kawaguchi Hiroshi" (HD; 1:36)
• Textless Closing Song "Natsuiro No Nanshii" (HD; 1:31)
• Textless Closing Song "Furimuku Na Kimi Wa Utsukishii" (HD; 1:32)
• Textless Closing Song "Wild Seven" (HD; 1:32)
• Textless Closing Song "Hatsukoi" (HD; 1:31)
• Textless Closing Song "Bokura No Daiarii" (HD; 1:31)
• Textless Closing Song "Champion" (HD; 1:32)
• Textless Closing Song "Akai Hana Shiroi Hana" (HD; 1:32)
• Textless Closing Song "Haru Ichiban" (HD; 1:30)
• Trailers for other FUNimation Releases

Heaven's Lost Property: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Heaven's Lost Property is never really bad, but it's also just kind of a middling series that manages to be at least slightly questionable at times in its pursuit of an ecchi lasciviousness. That tendency is balanced by the series' frequently quite funny sense of humor, and while you may have seen this set up before in any number of other animes, at least Heaven's Lost Property has really sharp looking animation and good sound design on its side. It's difficult to outright recommend something this mediocre, but if you're a fan of the series, you'll have no major complaints about this Blu-ray release.