DVD Review: Girls Und Panzer – The Complete OVA Collection

If you thought the madness of girls in tanks was over, well you were wrong as the OVA Collection for Girls Und Panzer will soon be available within the UK, but what exactly do you get within this DVD Release by MVM Entertainment? Find out in our DVD Review of Girls Und Panzer – The Complete OVA Collection.

Synopsis:

The girls from Oarai are back, and whether they’re shopping for swimsuits, camping out or doing the Ankou Dance, they bring their own special brand of Tankery to the task at hand. There’s also a tour of the Oarai school ship, a look at what REALLY happened while Yukari and Erwin were out doing reconnaissance, and a team talent contest that’s not to be missed!

Our View:

When it comes to OVA Collections I usually assume a collection of episodes that deviate from the main storyline, such as the Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood OVA Collection; however with this Girls Und Panzer OVA collection we find ourselves experiencing a selection of stand-a-lone events that tie into the TV Series to provide some closure to a highly entertaining series.

In total six individual styled episodes are included with the collection, with each one easily being tied to episodes (and events) which took place in the TV Series. For instance the fifth OVA episode (entitled Snow War) sees Yukari and Erwin scout the surrounding area to see where the Pravda High School tanks are located, this OVA episode is actually an ‘alternate’ point of view of the events that happened in Episode 9 and 10 of the TV Series. That’s not the only episode which ties into place either, as the fourth OVA episode, which is only 4 minutes long, sees the entire tankery club perform the Anglerfish dance around Orai, a punishment task which was originally handed out in one of the earlier episodes for not winning the match.

While some OVA episodes intertwine with events from the TV Series, other episodes tend to have a stand-a-lone story, such as going shopping, camping or hosting a banquet party, and that’s what makes this OVA Collection quite unique as it sees the girls in regular activities, something which wasn’t shown in the TV Series. From my perspective though the most important episode in this collection is the third OVA episode, an episode which provides a highly detailed and informative answer as to why Schools are on ships. If you wondered why then this will be a very enlightening episode (unless you spoiled it by google searching), either way there is still a few laughs to be had.

It’s quite interesting how each OVA episode has a relatively stand-a-lone story, but at the same time can easily be tied to events of the TV Series, however there are a few issues. First of all unless you’ve seen the TV Series there is no way of understanding what’s going off, secondly each episode is around 15 minutes in length, with the exception of the fourth OVA episode which is only 4 minutes long. Disappointingly that run-time even includes the opening and closing animation sequences, so even though you are getting some new Girls Und Panzer styled action there isn’t much of it.

Extras:

Continuing the trend set by the TV Series Collection released earlier in the year this OVA Set features the usual selection of bonus content, such as text less songs and trailers, however it surprisingly also contains some exclusive English content in the form of an alternate take.

Impersonation (Take 2) is an alternate take on a scene from the Banquet War episode, whereby Duck Team members preform impersonations of other characters. In this alternate take the ‘real’ voice actor for that character is used as opposed to someone trying to impersonate it. For instance Akebi Sasaki impersonates Momo Kawashima but instead of Akebi’s voice actor (Carli Mosier) doing the impersonation it’s actually Momo’s voice actor (Kendall McClellan). It’s quite an interesting extra feature (as it’s an English exclusive) but if you are not familiar with the English voices then (amusingly) they all sound the same.

As usual the text less opening and closing songs are included, both of which are the same ones used in the TV Series, so there really isn’t anything new here. Finally to round out the list of extra features we have a selection of trailers, which include Little Busters, Say “I love you”, AKB0048 and Accel World. Some of these titles have not been released within the UK, but Accel World is getting a UK Release onto Blu-ray and DVD during June, so at least now you’ll know what to expect from the series.

Specs:

Media: DVD 5
Region: 2
Running Time: 1:21:22
Video: MPEG-2
Audio: Dolby Digital 2.0 224kbps (English & Japanese)
Subtitles: English (Yellow)
Resolution: 720 x 576 (576i)
Aspect Ratio: 16:9 Widescreen
Frame Rate: 25 fps

Overall:

The tankery class of Oarai Girls Academy return in full force with this short OVA Collection, a collection of six episodes that sees the girls engage in various different activities with each episode featuring a different storyline. Each episode features a different main topic, such as going camping, shopping or exploring the ship, however underneath this ‘single-episode-story’ the events can be related to the TV Series and thus provides some closure for questions left unanswered.

While it does provide some closure to events within the TV Series fans of the ‘Tank Warfare’ maybe disappointed, as throughout the entire collection there is no tank battles – instead its comical banters, discussions and a party to end it all. I’m not saying that the episode content is boring, far from it, but if you are expecting some comical girl banter mixed with tanks then sadly you’ll be out of luck.This could be only one of few disappointments with this OVA release, because you expect tanks and get nothing, however there is a few other issues and most of these are on a personal preference level. For me I though the episodes were too short (especially the fourth OVA) and some of these events could have easily been included into the main series, that being said what is left over is highly entertaining for fans of Girls Und Panzer.

In terms of the quality then it’s another ‘top quality’ release by MVM Entertainment, as it features easily accessible menus, changeable audio options and a variety of additional content to maul over after the episodes have ended. Speaking of audio options the original cast (for both English & Japanese versions) returned for the OVA episodes, so whichever audio version you are used to you’ll be able to enjoy without the need of getting ‘readjusted’ the different voices.

Overall Girls Und Panzer OVA Collection is exactly what it says on the case, it’s an entire collection o of episodes that further explore the world of Girls Und Panzer, but more importantly bring closure to a series that end rather abruptly, even if it is a bit short in length. Basically If you own the TV Series collection then getting this set (especially on Blu-ray) comes recommended, otherwise you’ll be missing out on the complete Girls Und Panzer experience, however as a stand-a-lone release it’s not that great.

Score:

Girls Und Panzer – The Complete OVA Collection will be available on DVD from the 16th June 2014 and on Blu-ray from the 30th June 2014.