s-CRY-ed

Publisher
Beez
Country of origin
Japan
Format
Series
Running time
26 episodes
Year
2001

s-Cry-ed Volume 5

By Joseph (Joe) Wood
21st Dec 05

The Lost Ground and its inhabitants have proved that they are a force to be reckoned with over the last four volumes of s-Cry-ed. The penultimate volume of the series certainly doesn’t hold back the punches as it begins to lead us into the series’ last few episodes.

Five more episodes on this disc. In episode eighteen, Kanami leaves the small village in search of her Kazu-Kun, and Ryûhô decides to follow her in order to protect her, meanwhile Tachibana and Mimori encounter the “refined” (or “optimised”) Biff. Kazuma makes his choice over what to do next after talking it over with Cougar. Episode nineteen sees the small mountain village left under Scheris’ protection is attacked (again) by Kigetsuki and the Tokonatsu sisters. Ryûhô hurries back to the village yet he is unable to do anything whilst the villagers are used as hostages when from out of the blue Kazuma appears. In the remaining three episodes, Kanami kidnapped by Mujô who uses her power in order to infuriate Kazuma and Ryûhô into opening a door to the other side, here Mujô’s powers grow even stronger and he begins to change the face of the city at his own will. Kazuma and Ryûhô join forces and head for the city in order to confront Mujô and rescue Kanami. Once inside what was once HOLY HQ the two split, Kazuma faces Biff yet again, and Ryûhô must face his former commander Martin Jigmar.

Finally, the series begins to let us into the secrets that some of the characters have known for ages. These revelations though might not be quite what you were expecting. Also, in this volume, most of the characters that were separated come together, Mimori and Tachibana are saved by Ryûhô, Kazuma also comes back to Kanami who is with Ryûhô and Straight Cougar lays his hand on the table and we learn what the cards he’s been playing so close to his chest really are. Yet the joining of all these characters so fast does seem slightly forced, especially Kazuma and Ryûhô.

The secondary characters take a back seat as the plot starts to open up, which is a shame, as the characterization is one of the series’ strong points. Tachibana is left behind in the village, as he wants to help the people their…yet he’s known them less than a day and they suddenly seemed to have started liking Alters. This feels like a rather poor excuse so the writers can remove one of the weaker characters from the final leg of the series.

Still despite the problems with the series trying to fit the entire plot in these five episodes, so that they can focus on the final episodes, volume five is a worthy addition to a excellent series, and volume six looks set to be even better.

R2 DVD Notes

Features: English/French/Japanese Audio, English/French/Netherlands Subtitles, Beez Trailers, Beez Catelouge (leaflet, Japanese TV Adverts, Charcter Profiles,Clean Opening animation episodes 18-22, Character Openings

Release information: Publisher: Beez Released: January 16th 2006 Classification: PG Running Time: 100m

Notes: A shame that their aren't any more of the audio dramas on this disc. The character openings are montages of one particular character, but some may contain spoilers.

-- Joseph (Joe) Wood 21st Dec 05