Leviathan - The Last Defense: Complete Collection Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		2.0

Leviathan - The Last Defense: Complete Collection Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman January 20, 2015

Epic 3D may not have quite lived up to its title, but it offered a sumptuously animated tale that had ecological overtones as it depicted a war of sorts between anthropomorphized leaf people and a kind of villainous bug like species called the Boggans, a crew which was out to destroy everything lush, green and beautiful (why they were so obsessed was never really adequately explained, one of the film’s perceived pitfalls). Dial the animation level down a few notches—or perhaps more than just a few—and add a weird kind of quasi-My Little Pony aspect to the anthropomorphism and you might have at least a basic idea of some of the premise of Leviathan the Last Defense, a midlevel anime that is now seeing its second Blu-ray release on Sentai Filmworks, this time with a new English dub included. The fact that this anime rose to the level of a second release may come as something of a surprise, for it doesn’t really seem to have the frenetically rabid fan base that so many other anime do. There’s a kind of unambitious quality to much of Leviathan the Last Defense, a lackluster feeling that some may ascribe to the fact that the anime was evidently developed at least in part to help market a mobile game that was released in Japan. Multimedia tie ins are certainly nothing new, especially in the world of anime, but even the mobile game players might ultimately be less than inspired by Leviathan the Last Defense’s fairly languorous pace and at times lack of logic. The show follows the “adventures” (quotes absolutely necessary in this case) of three young magically imbued girls who can transform into dragon like creatures. At least two of them have a connection to a certain element, so that Leviathan can control water (albeit pretty fitfully at times) and Bahamut has power over fire. While third wheel Jörmungandr ostensibly has connections to Earth, she’s the most action oriented of the trio, tending to rely on her improbably huge axe to make whatever “magic” she’s interested in come to pass. Trailing along with this crew is a Tinkerbell-esque sprite named Syrup, who is desperately trying to get the girls to join a defense force she’s trying to raise to protect the sylvan paradise where the girls live, a place called Aquafall. Aquafall is under duress from a series of meteorite strikes which have unleashed some predators who come in the form of various insects. It’s even less “epic” than Epic, but for undemanding fans there’s a modicum of humor (sometimes pretty forced) and a genial enough presentation that at least doesn’t rankle even if also doesn’t create a whale of a lot of interest.

Leviathan the Last Defense is rather oddly structured, as if the creative staff had developed the mobile app, got some kind of deal for so many episodes of an anime, and then at that point figured out how to fill them. This odd pacing and story unfolding is first on display with what is supposedly the very setup of the series—the sort of quasi-ecological disaster facing Aquafall. After all, Syrup spends quite a bit of her screen time in the first several episodes giving lip service to the defensive forces she’s trying to accrue, and yet the anime does little else with this aspect other than give it lip service. In fact the opening several episodes play almost like “slice of life” vignettes, albeit with occasional fantasy elements like the huge mud swamp Bahamut gets stuck in, which turns out to be a sentient being.

There is therefore very little sense of urgency running through this series almost from the get go, where even the first incursions of the smaller bugs (there are much bigger ones to follow) are played mostly for laughs, with a small, kind of semi-robotic winged beast repeatedly bonking into the heads of the girls (who have not yet officially met). Even once the threat is begun to be made more of a primary focus, Leviathan: The Last Defense tends to fritter away any given episode with completely (or at least mostly) tangential information having to do with one or more of the main trio. That means that the series never capitalizes on any exploitation of the idea that these three girls are "action heroines," instead leaving them to deal with mishaps having to do with their special dragon powers.

Since I’m not familiar with the original mobile game app, I can only surmise from evidence found within the anime rendering that Leviathan: The Last Defense is geared toward younger viewers. It has the same kind of non threatening ambience that the old Dragon Tales show used to have on PBS, where the kids would encounter strange beings, get into some sort of small scale (no pun intended) trouble, get supernatural help from their Dragon buddies, and then return to their regularly scheduled lives. The perplexing lack of a really consistent through arc in Leviathan: The Last Defense is what tends to hobble this series, so that even in the wrap up to this set of episodes, there’s no feeling of catharsis, simply of another big bug being eradicated with a kind of magical can of Raid.

Leviathan - The Last Defense: Complete Collection Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Leviathan: The Last Defense is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Sentai Filmworks with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This is another anime that combines appealing traditional animation techniques along with CGI, typically used for the invading bugs and "special effects" like portals opening or a kind of blotchy attack orb that confronts the girls. This is a very colorful anime whose bright and vivid palette pops very nicely in high definition. There is once again the use of boosted brightness and a kind of white overlay wash to delineate certain scenes (and characters like Syrup sometimes tend to be presented with an even brighter ambience). Sharpness and clarity are just slightly variable (contrast screenshot 9 with screenshot 12), but overall this is a solid looking presentation with crisp, well defined line detail and a stable image.

Leviathan - The Last Defense: Complete Collection Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Leviathan: The Last Defense is trumpeting the new English dub, which is certainly serviceable enough, but which may lead some audiophiles to ask why the mix wasn't upgraded to a surround iteration, especially given the fact that the series utilizes so many booming sound effects in its battle sequences. Instead, both the original Japanese track as well as the English dub are presented in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. The stereo imaging is actually quite wide and nicely detailed, but there's little doubt that the anime's action elements would have been better served by a 5.1 mix. That said, fidelity is fine and there are no problems to mention. I found some elements in the English track not especially well prioritized in terms of dialogue or narration sometimes getting slightly buried in the onslaught of effects.

Leviathan - The Last Defense: Complete Collection Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Clean Opening Animation (1080p; 1:21)


• Clean Closing Animations (1080p; 1:22 and 1:22)

Leviathan - The Last Defense: Complete Collection Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Leviathan: The Last Defense is an agreeable enough anime, but it's awfully unambitious and often seems to be just whiling away the time until the next episode comes along, when it ends up doing much the same thing. Those with younger kids (especially girls) may find that the kids love this undemanding fare (there is some very minor but largely unobjectionable fan service here that certainly never rises to anything approaching the shocking). For those who are fans of the series, technical merits here are generally strong, and this release includes an advertised new English dub.