Peacemaker

Publisher
ADV
Country of origin
Japan
Format
Series
Running time
24 episodes/ 25 minutes
Year
2003

Peacemaker Volume 3: Gunning for Trouble

By noghri
27th Mar 06

Peacemaker volume 3: Gunning for Trouble

Here is the third volume of Peacemaker titled Gunning for Trouble.

First off What ADV says

Strange winds are blowing through Kyoto. A boisterous man sporting a gun, a cowboy hat, and a vocabulary full of foreign phrases breezes into town. Meanwhile, rumours are afoot about a fallen lord, a powerful mystic and their chaotic game that could threaten the capital. But trouble also comes in other guises. Seeing Tetsu falling farther into depression, Yamanami and Keisuke take it upon themselves to give the boy a vacation-and an education-that the young boy will not soon forget!

Review

After the promise of the last volume and the increase in pace I really was looking forward to this volume. By now the opening theme "You Gonna Feel" by HAV has grown on me and is a welcome tune and it really gets my attention focused for the beginning of the show. While mentioning the themes for the show I need to make a mention for the ending theme "Hey Jimmy" also by HAV, this tune took a lot more time to grow on me but the style is quite similar to that of the opening and it is a nice way to round off the episodes.

This DVD like the others before it holds four episodes following the life of Tetsunosuke Ichimura a fifteen-year-old new recruit of the Shinsengumi, he works as a page for one of the three vice commanders of the organisation. So did this volume live up to my heightened expectations? In short the answer is a whole hearted yes!

The pacing has picked up a little yet again and the story appears to have really got into the swing of things. The characters appear to have all been introduced and the only new faces worth mentioning will be in my episode content it will be much easier that way. The artwork and soundtrack are still as good as ever and the character development is coming along nicely, while watching this volume something did occur to me, although the story is based around Tetsu he really isn’t a star as such, at least not yet anyway. The mains character group is made up of about six Shinsengumi and a few other characters like Saya.

Episode Content (may well contain spoilers)

Episode 9: Dragon

In the very beginning of the episode we see a flashback of Suzu's past. The Shinsengumi killed Suzu’s brother and Yoshida took Suzu in as his page. Hijikata sent Tatsunosuke and Tetsunosuke to Hyogo to pick up a parcel for him, on their way to the Yodo River, Tetsunosuke saw Suzu and started chasing after him. They're finally able to find their way to Yodo river and met up with the worried sick Tatsunosuke. After crossing the river, Tetsunosuke met a mysterious person who sang a strange song (US national anthem) in a strange language (English), the same strange language that his father spoke. Tetsunosuke ran after this person, but he wasn't the only one. Four Roshis were after this person and took Tetsunosuke hostage. The mysterious person not only carries a katana, but also carries a pistol. After the Roshis ran away, Tetsunosuke wanted to ask this person some questions, but he doesn't want to reveal his secret. He saw Tatsunosuke who came after Tetsunosuke, and he muttered, "Peacemaker" and led them to see the ship he's stationed on. He told Tetsunosuke about the Navy and travelling around the world. Tetsunosuke was astonished by his stories, but Tatsunosuke seemed very suspicious of this person. They eventually picked up Hijikata's parcel at the harbour.

Episode 10: Hidden

This is the same time line as episode 9, so Tetsunosuke and Tatsunosuke are still out on the errand for Hijikata. Yamanami watches Hijikata as he trains himself. Yamanami apologizes to Hijikata for opposing him all the time and wanted to be demoted to an accountant. Even though he held the highest martial arts rank, he said that after the incident with Serizawa Kamo (He was the Chief of the Shinsengumi until he was targeted to be assassinated. Read the history section for more details), his sword became rusted. Hijikata argued that him, Soji, and Kondo all had a part in the incident and their sword didn't become rusted. It is because Yamanami didn't want to do it in the first place; Hijikata forces him to draw his sword and insists that he can kill again. Yamanami became angry and threw his sword down, he opposes the way Hijikata run things, and anything that gets in the way gets killed. He doesn't want to be manipulated by Hijikata anymore. The scene flashes back to the night they assassinated Kamo, even at that time Yamanami questioned the decision to kill Kamo. Hijikata's reasoning's as black and white as ever, you use a person when the person is useful, if the person gets in the way and you kill him. Tetsunosuke and Tatsunosuke came back from their errand and brought back Hijikata's parcel. Tetsunosuke wanted to know what's in the box but Hijikata wouldn't tell him. Later Soji walked into the room and found out that Hijikata's making medicine for fatigue since he uses to be a medicine Peddler. The mysterious person who raised the dead in episode 4 is named Furube. He apparently serves a master but in reality is manipulating him. He summoned a Hikagami and sent him to the Shijyo River. Back at the Shinsengumi Headquarters, while Soji tried Hijikata's medicine, a soldier reported that Roshis attacked one of the Shinsengumi squads by the Shijyo River. Hijikata and Soji went to investigate. Yamanami went with Saitou. Hijikata and Soji fell into the magic of Furube and couldn't move as the Hikagami attacked them. Saitou detected that Furube was controlling the Hikagami and attacked him instead. Furube retreated with the Hikagami. Saitou guess that Furube is a master of Mikkyou techniques, which are esoteric Buddhist spiritual teachings. So the Hikagami is not a ghost, but a man. Furube took control of the weakest part in his mind after confusing him. Yamanami said that if that should happen to him, Hijikata would need to kill him without hesitation.

Episode 11: Older Brother

Saitou was doing a reading of Tetsu but it was trick of Shinpachi, Sanosuke, and Keisuke to see whom Tetsu liked. Saitoh read that Tetsu can't get this person off his mind from the past and is still alive today. Yamanami invited Tetsunosuke to Shimabara so he could have fun and forget about what Saitoh said. To Tetsu surprise he found Saya there who worked as a servant.

Episode 12: A Look

Tetsunosuke found out that Saya is working as a serving girl for Akesato at Shimabara; she is embarrassed and ran away. But Tetsunosuke caught her and told her that he missed her. Keisuke arranged a room for them to talk in. Meanwhile, Suzu is also in the same place requesting Akesato, but since she's with Yamanami she asked him to come back another time. But apparently he had an appointment with her in place of his sensei, Yoshida, so he decided to wait. While waiting he ran in the Tetsunosuke who was playing blindfolded tag with Saya, and invited Suzu to play too. In the other room, Yamanami and Akesato are talking about Saya and Tetsunosuke. Akesato revealed that Hana and Saya would turn 16 next year and then they too will become like her. Tatsunosuke finally made it to Shimabara and he ran right past Yoshida. Meanwhile, Tetsunosuke and Saya are playing cards and Suzu is with them too. Tetsunosuke and Suzu finally learned each other's names and that they're both pages, but they couldn't reveal whom they're serving. Later Tetsunosuke asked him about his sensei's personality and what he looks like, the description are he's got long hair, wears black kimono, handsome with a tough look, and realized that their masters are both similar, until the part where Suzu said that he looks up to Yoshida. After some discussion, Suzu said to Tetsunosuke that it doesn't seem like Hijikata's using him as a servant, it's more like he's taking care of him. In Yamanami's room, three Roshi wanted Akesato to accompany them and started to make a scene, but Yamanami and Keisuke stopped them. Meanwhile, Tatsunosuke finally found Tetsunosuke and is glad that he didn't really get to do anything. Yoshida, with a terrifying look, emerged from behind the door and told Suzu to get away from Tetsunosuke.

Thoughts

As you can tell there is a lot more action in these episodes, I had to include quite a bit more details because brief descriptions just didn’t make a lot of sense and seemed all over the place. The two brothers are away from the temple compound for quite a bit of the time in this volume, this results in a somewhat disjointed story, but it is done well enough not to be an issue.

The action in the storyline is much wider including most of the characters instead of the key few in the previous volume. And while still slow going we are finally getting to grips with the basis of the main plot.

The background music sounds great in this volume and in particular you’ll want to listen to the strings in the background of episode 9 and the Middle Eastern flute music of episode 10. Both of these pieces of music are exceptionally very well done. The music all transferred over great and I didn’t hear any drops in sound quality.

As far as the voice acting goes both tracks sounded great but in this case I’m going to go with the dub track as my favourite. The performances just reached me a bit more and sounded a bit more realistic. The performers really went all out with this volume and I really enjoyed listening to them especially David Born as Sakamoto and Jessica Boone as Hotaru. I thought it was kind of interesting though to learn that David Born has been with ADV for 4-5 years and yet I’ve never heard him perform before or at least I’ve never noticed him in the credits before. I honestly thought that he was just a very talented rookie when I first heard him. Maybe the style he employs in this series is different to his normal performances or maybe I am just a bit clueless.

Extras on this DVD feature clean opening and closing animations and there is another short character montage for Soji Okita on this volume which was very cool to watch as it sheds some light about who he is as a person and what some of his inner motivation is and also there is a commentary track which is absolutely hilarious, this commentary is hosted by David Born and Vic Mignogna.

Overall

Well at the halfway point of the series what are my thoughts? Well I like it, the story still promises to be a real gem. With the addition of Ryoma the gun toting cowboy wannabe samurai who ends up befriending the Tetsu is set to add some fun to the show but it's his sense of style combining the east and west that makes him stand out more and draw attention away from the main characters. With the hint of him possessing knowledge of the Ichimura brothers parents and their pasts brings him straight to the forefront. It is also interesting to see how his arrival has altered the feel of the show somewhat and moved more of the focus from Tetsu to Tatsu. Though the action sequences are short, the mixture of them plus the further development in characters and their relationships make the third volume of this series seem very different from the first two volumes of the show.

Overall this is a hit in my book and I cannot wait to see how it all turns out in the next volume of Peacemaker.

R2 DVD Notes

Features: * Japanese 2.0 Language * English 5.1 Language * English Subtitles * Clean opening and closing animation * Production sketches * Character Collection 2 * Voice actor commentary

Release information: ADV/ Available Now

Notes: Audio: The audio was extremely impressive, all sound effects and music sounded extremely clear and crisp. No audio dropouts or "noise" could be heard, and a major plus is the 5.1 support. I must also say that all the sound effects were done amazingly well, all extremely realistic and life like just like the first two volumes. This volume also includes an audio commentry by the voice actors. Menus: An extremely creative and unique menu style, beautiful to say the least but still is easy on the eyes. Its design consists of a blood stain across forground of the menu, with rose pedals floating down the screen and some eye catching battle scenes behind it creates a feeling of excitement and anticipation for an amazing anime. I would also like to say that the background music is catchy and brings everything together, definitely a job done well by ADV. Extras: A nice amount of extras, one of the most notable and unique things was the production sketches as with the previous volumes. We are shown the making of all the characters, this definitely gives a perspective of the anime from a creators stand point, you definitely feel what the creators were going for, with each individual character. The sketches consist of scenery, battle scenes, characters, poses, different facial expressions, outfits, and while looking at this you see how creative and unique the drawing styles and artistry is in Peacemaker. Another interesting part of the extras is the original Japanese DVD spots. ADV also gives you some previews of other animes and there is also a clean opening and a clean ending. Packaging: The artwork and even the logo are the same as the first Japanese release, the cover features an amazing close up of Tetsu's master Toshizo Hijikata looking forlorn. This is in contrast to the pure white background and really adds to the quality of artwork. The back cover continues to the white feel but is a bit darker and has a group of frames from the anime along the top. There's a couple paragraphs of a basic summary and a list of the discs extras. The rest is filled out by the thick section of production credits and the technical information. The cover is also reversible with that side providing the Japanese cover art that has Keisuke Yamanami and an attractive young blonde woman named Akesato who appears to be blushing. This artwork is also the front of the included booklet. The booklet folds out into several pages and has quite a bit of information, from text interviews with the staff, two side stories and a few full colour character design sketches.

-- noghri 27th Mar 06

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