Kill la Kill: Volume 1 Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		4.0

Kill la Kill: Volume 1 Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 16, 2014

Considering what can appear to outsiders as an overly regimented society, Japanese schools are often depicted as downright centers of chaos in many shōnen anime. Chaos barely begins to describe the antics that are often on display in Kill la Kill, a manic but weirdly enjoyable outing from late 2013 and early 2014. Kill la Kill was something of a phenomenon even before it aired, since it bore the twin imprimaturs of writer Kazuki Nakashima and director Hiroyuki Imaishi, already critical and fan darlings for Gurren Lagann Vol. 1. Kill la Kill may not seem to have much on its mind other than (mindless?) comedy and completely out of control action sequences, but there are hints from the get go that there’s at least a little subtext to be found in the series, including a kind of Darwinian aspect where doing well in school can affect one’s (and one’s family’s) station in life. The main story of Kill la Kill follows a new transfer student named Ryuko Matoi, who has to deal not just with the rather peculiar power structure at the Honnouji Academy, but also with the fact that she’s somewhat desperate to track down the killer of her father, whom she is certain is at Honnouji Academy. Much like Gurren Lagaan exploited mecha tropes in unusual ways, Kill la Kill turns traditional shōnen formulations on their veritable heads, while also exploiting a kind of quasi- mecha element with the so-called Goku suits that students and faculty at Hoonouji Academy wear. (One assumes the Dragon Ball Z reference is entirely intentional.) A series about an outsider girl trying to matriculate into a closed school society while attempting to find her father’s killer would not necessarily translate in most people’s minds to something as bizarrely funny as Kill la Kill often is, but that’s part of the series’ admittedly frenetic charms.

The Goku uniforms (which function more or less exactly like mecha) are imbued with so-called Life Fibers that offer their wearers various powers, based on how many stars (as in shoulder epaulets) any given uniform has. Ryuko arrives at Honnouji Academy with a relic from her past, one half of a mutant pair of scissors her late father had created. It turns out the other half of the scissors were stolen by her father’s murderer, and so Ryuko has one important clue to divining the killer’s identity. However, after she arrives at Honnouji Academy and almost immediately runs afoul of the power strata there she at least discovers that her quasi-katana easily slices and dices the Life Fibers, giving her a fighting chance to climb up the social and academic ladder.

The initial main nemesis to Ryuko that Kill la Kill sets up is the imperious leader of Honnouji Academy’s student council, Satsuki Kiryuin, a girl who’s one year older than Ryuko and apparently of a more vaunted socioeconomic level. Somewhat like Ryuko, however, she also has a katana (a “real” one, this time) that is able to slice and dice through Life Fibers. Ryuko is initially unable to really battle Satsuki for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that Ryuko has yet to be assigned a Goku uniform, something that falls under Satsuki’s purview. Through a number of misadventures, Ryuko ends up discovering a discarded outfit which shows signs of sentience (hence the mecha angle), and soon enough Ryuko has donned the uniform, which she anoints with the name Senketsu.

Much of the first four episodes in this first volume of Kill la Kill are given over to expository elements, where things like the Goku uniforms and Ryuko’s own so-called Kamui outfit (which is different than standard Goku uniforms) are explained in quick but efficient detail. That tends to set aside the whole “who murdered my father?” element in the early going, but the series is so completely hyperbolic most of the time that few will care.

What fans may care about is Aniplex’s decision to release this series in pretty small increments and at a premium price, to boot. Volumes are filled with swag and other accoutrements (including a rather enjoyable soundtrack CD with this particular volume), but only getting four episodes on one Blu-ray disc in a box set may strike some as stingy, especially considering the somewhat high price (currently $39.98 at Rightstuf.com as this review is being written).

Kill la Kill: Volume 1 Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Kill la Kill Volume 1 is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Aniplex with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Kill la Kill was the first original anime by the production house Trigger, co-founded by Hiroyuki Imaishi after he left Gainax. To say that Kill la Kill's freewheeling animation style is a visual analog to the series' cartwheeling storytelling sense is perhaps even an understatement. This is a show where fairly traditional anime aesthetics can suddenly be supplanted by dreamlike scenes with a vague mist running through them, or even quasi-graphic elements that almost resemble abstract art (contrast screenshots 2, 4 and 5 for just a brief example of various stylistic gambits the show employs). The overall look of this transfer is a bit on the soft side, which I'm assuming is an intentional aesthetic decision on the part of the creative staff. Colors are incredibly bright, bold and often beautiful. Line detail is sharp and well defined as well. There's not a lot of depth to the image, giving a kind of flat ambience to much of the hyperbolic goings-on, but that perhaps only helps to make the action sequences play out like a comic book on speed.

Kill la Kill: Volume 1 Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

KIll la Kill Volume 1 features uncompressed LPCM 2.0 tracks in both the original Japanese as well as an English dub. This is a very noisy show a lot of the time, with everything from shouts, yelps, dialogue, sound effects and battle audio assaulting the listener in a ubiquitous fashion. Even relatively "quieter" dialogue sequences can often erupt into free for alls at the drop of a veritable hat. A surround track no doubt could have provided more breathing space for the audio, as well as more impressive separation, but despite the "busy-ness" of the sound mix, things are surprisingly well prioritized, with little if anything of importance getting lost in the shuffle. Fidelity is first rate and dynamic range is extremely wide.

Kill la Kill: Volume 1 Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Textless Opening (Episodes 2 & 3 Version) (1080p; 1:32)


• Textless Opening (1080p; 1:32)


• Textless Ending (1080p; 1:32)


• Web Version Previews:

  Episode 1 (15 sec) (1080p; 00:17)

  Episode 1 (30 sec) (1080p; 00:32)

  Episode 2 (1080p; 00:32)

  Episode 3 (1080p; 00:32)

  Episode 4 (1080p; 00:32)

  Episode 5 (1080p; 00:32)

Non Disc Supplements:

• Rearrange & Remix Soundtrack CD


• Double sided poster


• Postcard Set

Kill la Kill: Volume 1 Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

KIll la Kill is a frantic, delirious and even demented anime that comes out swinging and rarely lets up for its first four episodes. The fact that this first volume only includes four episodes may be the release's biggest hangup for some consumers, who will do the math, number the remaining episodes, and quickly come to the conclusion that a complete set is going to cost several hundred dollars. But for those with deep pockets, there's a lot to enjoy here, even if the series tends to browbeat its audience into submission. Recommended.