8.5 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
The Dark Tournament has come down to a final grudge match and Yusuke's full wrath is unleashed as a friend's blood stains the arena floor. But there will be no time for rest or recovery as kidnapping follows victory and further intrigue threatens the boundary between worlds. A tunnel is being carved, and when completed it will lay waste to the World of the Living. There are seven who seek an age of destruction and chaos, and hero must battle fallen hero.
Starring: Nozomu Sasaki, Shigeru Chiba, Megumi Ogata, Shigeru Nakahara, Nobuyuki HiyamaAnime | 100% |
Foreign | 96% |
Action | 38% |
Comic book | 33% |
Comedy | 21% |
Martial arts | 18% |
Supernatural | 12% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.33:1
English: Dolby TrueHD 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
Japanese: Dolby TrueHD 2.0
English
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Three-disc set (3 BDs)
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A, B (locked)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 3.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 1.0 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Yu Yu Hakusho is one of those series which starts with an incredibly intriguing premise but then tends to discard the most interesting elements of that premise to toe a fairly standard line. Season One had a fascinating enough start, with Yu Yu Hakusho’s hero, Yusuke Urameshi, getting killed right off the bat and then having the predicament of first getting acclimated to his new “spirit body,” and then against several seemingly insurmountable odds, reuniting with his actual physical body when he was given a chance to be resurrected as a Spirit Detective. Unfortunately that first season then devolved, if slightly at times, into a typical battle fest more reminiscent of Yu-Gi-Oh or Dragon Ball Z than of X Files, a live action series this anime might have resembled had it stuck more to the supernatural and metaphysical aspects of what Yusuke is going through. That predilection toward the tried and true continued in Season Two, which saw the series become even more obsessed with tournament battles and various head to head matches between Yusuke and his allies and any number of supposedly nefarious enemies. This Third Season at least takes a temporary breather from the Demon World tournament and starts to explore a storyline that is more reminiscent of X Files, as Yusuke is kidnapped and one of his nemeses, a former Spirit Detective named Shinobu Sensui, who is seeking to open a portal to a netherworld where all sorts of nasty demons and dark forces dwell. After over a season of nothing but one tournament battle after another, Season Three of Yu Yu Hakusho manages to inject a little unpredictability into the series, with a new sense of dread and threat to Mankind helping to broaden the series’ scope and make it more than just one seemingly endless battle. While the battle element is certainly still part and parcel of Yu Yu Hakusho’s approach, and certainly part of this season as well, opening the show up beyond the bounds of one tournament allows for some interesting new developments and helps rid this show of some of its stale, formula driven plot mechanics.
As with the first two seasons of Yu Yu Hakusho, the third season blasts onto Blu-ray with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.33:1. This is definitely "old school" animation, and as such it has a more painterly, less stylized, look that may or may not appeal to individual viewers. But as with the first two seasons, the third season of Yu Yu Hakusho looks great most of the time, with brilliantly saturated colors that pop very nicely throughout all of the episodes. Line detail is generally excellent. As was the case with the second season (but oddly not so much with the first season), there are a couple of frame to frame alignment issues which create momentary placement shifts in individual episodes. There are also a few very minor blemishes, but overall Yu Yu Hakusho looks fantastic, especially considering its age, and this Blu-ray increases the sharpness and especially the color saturation substantially, making the series even more visually vivid.
Once again following in the footsteps of the first two seasons, Yu Yu Hakusho is presented with two excellent lossless audio options, the original Japanese language track presented in a Dolby TrueHD 2.0 track and a very good English dub presented via Dolby TrueHD 5.1. While I usually opt for original language tracks, I've been enjoying the kind of goofy ambience of the English dubs in Yu Yu Hakusho and did so again for this third season. As with the previous seasons, fidelity is top notch, with some good discrete channelization in several key sequences throughout the season, especially with regard to sound effects. The series excels at excellent LFE, and the enjoyable score is also very well presented. There's not much dynamic range to speak of, since this series is "turned up to 11" most of the time, but the sonic activity is clear and precise and very well presented on both of these Dolby TrueHD tracks.
Getting through the second season of Yu Yu Hakusho was frankly a bit of a chore, especially since the series seemed to have more or less completely squandered its rather promising premise in favor of one Yu-Gi-Oh or Dragon Bal l Z battle after another. While there's still some of that element in this third season, this is a marked step in the right direction. Sensui is a really interesting villain, and getting out of the tournament gives the show a new sense of energy and direction. That shark that is so easily jumped in television may be lurking just off screen, but for now Yusuke and his friends (and enemies) are successfully avoiding it. Recommended.
幽☆遊☆白書 / Yū Yū Hakusho / Anime Classics
1992-1993
1992-1993
Anime Classics
1993
1993
1993-1994
Anime Classics
1994-1995
1994-1995
2018
鋼の錬金術師 FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST
2009
ソウルイーター
2008-2009
Anime Classics / フルメタル·パニック!
2002
1993
2010
2005
1989-1996
2009
Episodes 168-195
2008
1994
2003-2004
2009-2010
Classics
2003
1992
Classics / フリクリ
2000-2001
2010
2010
1995
Anime Classics
2002