Level E: Complete Series Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		3.0

Level E: Complete Series Blu-ray Movie Review

Maybe Level C+ is a fairer assessment.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 3, 2012

There are those who love to wile away the hours trekking from YouTube video to YouTube video courtesy of the site’s “Recommended” listings on the right side of any given page, listings which present a sort of virtual world assemblage of six degrees of separation. It’s fun to, say, start with Debbie Reynolds singing an hilariously unfolksy version of “If I Had a Hammer” and end up with a decidedly unsuitable for work collection of movie insults a mere five or six clicks later. While I would never claim to be immune from such online pleasures, I often find myself entranced by a somewhat (emphasis on somewhat) more literary habit, almost hypnotized in a strange way by Wikipedia articles, clicking on random hyperlinks in any given article to arrive at a new, unexpected destination. Wikipedia’s so-called “anime portal” is an especially fertile ground for amusement, as many of the anime articles seem to have been written by authors with an at best rudimentary command of English, or perhaps by those who utilized Google Translate or Babelfish without any editing. But occasionally Wikipedia offers up little nuggets of wisdom that are incredibly concise and often laugh out funny in their own regard, and such an item graces Wikipedia’s article on the anime series Level E, an article I stumbled onto some time ago (I believe when I was researching background information on Yu Yu Hakusho, another anime culled from the same manga writer who created Level E), but which provided me with such a gut busting guffaw I’ve never forgotten it. Buried in the article is a brief recap of the anime episodes, and therein the first episode is summed up this way: An alien invites himself into Tsutsui’s apartment, and hilarity ensues. This is such a droll utilization of the trope “and hilarity ensues” that I couldn’t help but giggle helplessly when I read it, as it also aptly sums up the rather cliché ridden ambience of this series (I’m hoping whoever contributed to this article did so with his or her irony delivered with firm intentionality). Level E is often goofily amiable in its own way, and it’s certainly an incredibly colorful outing from a purely visual standpoint, but it’s also weirdly inconsistent in tone and for such a short form series (only thirteen episodes) also maddeningly unable to sustain story arcs for more than a couple of episodes at a time.

There’s an intentionally arch quality to a lot of Level E, as evidenced by its use of “all knowing” news reporters, as well as an omniscient narrator who pops up from time to time, most of whom sound incredibly pretentious and just as often clueless. As is summed up so succinctly in the Wikipedia recap, Level E does in fact deal with a mysterious, golden tressed alien named Prince Baka (no “artist formerly known as”, unfortunately) who is already ensconced in Yukitaka Tsutsui’s apartment when the young man shows up in his new town to play high school baseball on an athletic scholarship. The first couple of episodes of Level E deal with the Odd Couple pairing of the Prince and Tsutsui. Tsutsui is kind hearted but obviously upset by this stranger just taking over his living quarters. Prince Baka on the other hand claims to be suffering from amnesia but also manages to reclaim a valuable item that had been taken from his crashed spaceship by some local researchers, an item Baka uses to ultimately convince Tsutsui that he is in fact an alien and not just some raving lunatic who’s wandered in off the street. This very arc points out one of Level E’s inconsistencies, for Tsutsui has already come to the conclusion that Baka is indeed an alien, after the flowing haired stranger is injured in an accident and then heals himself miraculously before Tsutsui’s eyes, with a billowing light show that seems to magically suture up Baka’s wounds with nary a scar.

Playing into the “hilarity” revolving around the adventures of Baka and Tsutsui is a typical and expected romantic angle between Tsutsui and his pretty next door neighbor, Miho Edogawa. In another trite development, Miho’s father turns out to be the lead investigating scientist who’s looking into not just Baka’s crash landed craft, but the suspicion that Earth has been populated by all sorts of aliens for some time. While these angles are certainly nothing new, the good news is that as with so much else about Level E, the series never really pauses long enough to dwell on any of them to make them ultimately that objectionable.

The best aspect of Level E is its just flat out silliness, especially when toward the middle of these episodes something completely lunatic like Baka turning five helpless humans into Power Rangers occurs (the series doesn’t actually call them Power Rangers, no doubt aware of copyright issues, but for all intents and purposes, that’s exactly what they are). In moments like these, Level E seems to be trying at least to make some cogent commentary about pop culture, ostensibly from an “outsider”’s perspective. In that regard, it probably actually falls flat, but there’s such a manic intensity to the proceedings that it’s hard not to laugh at times. Whether or not that boils down to laughing at something rather than with it will probably depend on any individual viewer’s tolerance for supposedly “crazy shenanigans” and, well, hilarity ensuing.

Level E: Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Level E is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of FUNimation Entertainment with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This is an often eye popping high definition presentation that benefits both from really excellent character design as well as some well modulated CGI in terms of some of the science fiction aspects of the series. Colors are bold and bright and exceptionally vivid, beautifully saturated and well gradated through a very widely disparate palette. There are some very well done effects here, especially with regard to some of Prince Baka's alien technology. Line detail is very crisp and stable and overall this is a fantastic looking anime, whatever one may think about the actual story and characters.

Level E: Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

At least as impressive (if not actually more so) is Level E's fantastically rendered Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mix (in English). (There's a Dolby TrueHD 2.0 mix in the original Japanese which sounds just great, but which does not have the incredible low end or obviously surround activity of the 5.1 mix). From virtually the first moment, when what is assumed to be a meteor crashes into our planet and the left channel virtually erupts in low frequency awesomeness, listeners will be aware they're in for a major treat with regard to Level E's sound design. Over and over again, there's some really startling low end in virtually every episode, and even less "showy" aspects, including some of the dialogue scenes, offer widely splayed sound design that really opens up this series and provides a lot to enjoy from a purely sonic perspective. Fidelity is top notch and dynamic range is incredibly wide.

Level E: Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Episode 7 Commentary features Terri Doty, Cris George, Caitlin Glass, Leah Clark and Apphia Yu. This is another frankly obnoxiously noisy and chatty commentary, especially in the early going, though things finally calm down, relatively speaking, and occasional nuggets of information get passed along. FUNimation really needs to corral the participants of these commentaries and have a moderator who can keep things on track. Even getting the participants to stop talking all at the same time would be a major step in the right direction. While it's inarguably fun for fans to get to know the voice talent and crew associated with any given anime production, someone needs to realize that this isn't a house party—it's a commentary.


• Episode 13 Commentary features Vic Mignogna and Micah Solusod. This is a much better commentary even though it's just as joking as the Episode 7 Commentary. What sets this apart is that it only has two participants, and they let each other speak (what a concept!). There's some interesting information about voice acting in this as well as reactions to the series as a whole.


• Textless Opening Song "Cold Finger Girl" (HD; 1:32)


• Textless Closing Song "Yume – Mugen No Kanata" (HD; 1:32)


• Level E: Interview with a Prince (HD; 12:47) is a faux live action interview with Vic Mignogna.


• U.S. Trailer (HD; 1:02)

Level E: Complete Series Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Level E tends to wear out its welcome fairly quickly, but in dribs and drabs it's actually a fitfully entertaining and even amusing outing. The series tends to tread (and retread) too often over already seen material, especially with regard to the relationship between Baka and Tsutsui, an element that becomes positively tiring after just a couple of episodes, despite some occasionally distracting sideshows erupting into the carnival like ambience of the show. The series does have a really enjoyable visual style and the audio on this Blu-ray is impeccable. If you're not too demanding and just want an amiable enough time killer, Level E will probably fill the bill well enough until something better comes along to really provide some ensuing hilarity.