Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		3.5

Majestic Prince: Collection 1 Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman August 4, 2014

It’s been a long and winding road since the days of properties like Gigantor and Mazinger Z, but as some wise man once stated, “The more things change, the more they remain the same.” Despite the inherent illogic of that formulation, there’s probably no greater proof than Majestic Prince, yet another mecha outing that traffics in many of the same ideas and even plot points as robot- centric anime of yore. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, of course, and Majestic Prince manages to establish a certain comfort level almost immediately simply because longtime anime fans are going to at least sense the basic outlines of the plot and characters without having to worry about figuring out distractions like confusing acronyms and complex terminologies (not that Majestic Prince shies away from these genre conventions). Majestic Prince struggles mightily to move this popular idiom into the 21st century (though ironically the show’s “future”—2010—is obviously already past), but despite a bit of post-modern irony courtesy of a hapless team that can’t ever seem to get its act together, the show feels resolutely old school. That may actually be part and parcel of Majestic Prince’s intent, though, for the series often feels like it’s trying to conjure up memories of mecha glories from years past. Once again Earth is under assault by a horde of alien attackers, though in this case it’s revealed that the interstellar interlopers, a race called the Wulgaru, are actually far outnumbered by Earth defense forces. That seeming inferiority is counterbalanced by the fact that the Wulgaru possess, well, alien technology that allows them to conquer without needing to outnumber their foes. A ragtag group of kids who are part of a top secret experiment known as the MJP Project are recruited to be the front line of defense, and a particular cadre in MJP, the wonderfully named Team Rabbits, is the focus of Majestic Prince. The “team” part of Team Rabbits is at least questionable, for a lot of the series’ humor stems from the members’ inability to work together. In fact, one of Majestic Prince’s freshest takes on mecha is that it’s just ludicrously funny a lot of the time, offering a nice balance to the action elements that reminded me (despite the obvious differences) of properties like Patlabor The Mobile Police.

Majestic Prince seems to be trundling down a fairly straightforward action path as it opens, with a well done sequence showing an interstellar enclave known as Undina Base being invaded by the Wulgaru. That in turn ramps up the involvement of the so-called MJP Project, genetically modified humans who are supposedly able to better exist in the “wilds” of outer space. This subset of Mankind includes several groups of kids that a bit later become the focal “teams” that are selected to fight the Wulgaru. But here Majestic Prince starts to cartwheel off into pure comedic territory, with Team Rabbits revealed to be an almost hopelessly incompetent group of supposed fighters. So — guess who gets to take on the Wulgaru, who are rapidly approaching Earth itself?

Still, Majestic Prince retreats into more formulaic action material as main character Izuru Hitachi begins to realize his lifelong dream of being a hero when he pretty much singlehandedly is able to keep the Wulgaru from destroying Undina Base, where not every human has been evacuated successfully. This would seem to suggest that Izuru might be set apart from the bulk of Team Rabbits as the one character who’s actually able to accomplish something without fouling everything up, but this actually turns out not to be the case. However, Izuru’s efforts make Team Rabbits a bit of a media sensation back home, despite the internal strife roiling their private relationships.

This first set of episodes slowly starts detailing various “special powers” the the motley Team Rabbits members possess. Kind of like a mecha version of The Fantastic Four, each individual on Team Rabbits has a specialized ability, ranging from analytical prowess to things like sensory enhancements. Majestic Prince starts to unspool some backstory as well, starting to hint that there may be some conspiratorial elements to the MJP Project. (It should be noted that Majestic Prince does indeed have an unruly amount of acronyms and terminology floating about, but while it’s initially a bit of a slog to understand everything, within a few episodes the gist of all the fast flowing verbiage becomes pretty clear.)

While there’s an undeniably hackneyed aspect to Majestic Prince, especially in the first handful or so of episodes, things begin hinting at a few interesting variances from accepted canon once all the characters are firmly in place and the training regimen has been detailed. The Wulgaru turn out to have a kind of shocking connection to humanity, and there’s even an alien who comes over to “the light side” (so to speak) to help Mankind. Unfortunately even this element tends to play it “tried and true”, so It probably won’t come as a huge surprise to find out that this female alien may have a hidden connection to Izuru. Despite this almost slavish devotion to (sub)genre conventions, Majestic Prince actually manages to work up a fair degree of interest by the midway point of the entire series that this first volume provides.

Majestic Prince: Collection 1 Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Majestic Prince is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Sentai Filmworks with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This series may be "old hat" in terms of subject matter and plot points, but it has a very engaging animation style, one which pops very well in high definition. Both computer animated and traditionally animated elements are blended pretty seamlessly here, with the CGI offering some cool quasi-3D aspects. Colors are very bright and bold, with blues, purples and reds especially impressive throughout these first 12 episodes. Line detail is similarly very sharp and consistent. Occasionally, the show looks just a bit soft (especially with regard to some of the CGI elements), but overall this is a very nicely animated piece that provides a lot of visual interest, and one whose high definition presentation is quite vivid and enjoyable.

Majestic Prince: Collection 1 Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

For a show that's built rather substantially on mecha action, it may come as something of a disappointment to some audiophiles that only DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mixes are available (in the original Japanese and a newer English dub). While these tracks are obviously missing the complete immersive powers and potent low end that surround mixes would have provided, what's here is actually surprisingly visceral quite a bit of the time. Sound effects are neatly deployed to the sides at times, and dialogue is always cleanly presented, even in sonically busy sequences.

Majestic Prince: Collection 1 Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Other than trailers for other Sentai Filmworks releases and a page of disc credits, this Blu-ray set offers no supplements, or at least anything that I score as supplements.

Majestic Prince: Collection 1 Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Majestic Prince is one of those series whose ultimate achievement is probably going to be written in the second half of the series, one that's due from Sentai Filmworks in September. What that means is that those who sample the series courtesy of this first volume are going to have to decide if the frankly fairly cliché ridden opening set of episodes provide enough interest to warrant continuing on in the hopes that something truly unexpected will happen. To be fair, there are glimmers of interest already starting to spark by the end of this first volume, so hope may indeed be well placed. One way or the other, Majestic Prince, while certainly reminiscent of any number of prior mecha outings, is at least buoyed by some really effective animation. Even if your mind isn't fully engaged in the series, there's always a lot for your eye to enjoy. With caveats noted, Majestic Prince comes Recommended.