Synopsis:

Back of the box spin: In a far distant future, a would-be master race seeks to dominate the galaxy. Against these merciless Afresians, mankind has just one hope: The mysterious female warrior known as Emeraldas. Driven by the tortured memory of her lost love. Emeraldas sails the Sea of Stars like a privateer of old, blasting the forces of tyranny into atoms with an amazing array of futuristic weapons. But when the devious commander Eldomain kidnaps a group of innocent civilians, Emeraldas is drawn into a deadly trap from which even she may not escape!

Audio/Video:

The audio for the feature is presented in English, French and in Japanese. The English is presented in 5.1 with the French and Japanese tracks in 2.0. The soundstage for the 5.1 was really nicely prepared and on the whole much nicer than the average 5.1 English dubs. The Japanese language track was nicely produced as well. It had a bit more punch than most 2.0 platforms and it even engaged the LFE for some pretty intense segments! I did not listen to the French track so I cannot provide any information on its performance. Suffice it to say, if it engages at all like the Japanese track, it will do just fine. Visually, the film's (actually two episodes) content is beautiful. The colors are bright and vibrant and the transfers showed very few flecks and scratches. It is presented in full frame and that is the only draw back on an otherwise very nicely produced video presentation.

Dubbing

The dubbing on Emeraldas was better than most but still missing the needed inflection to get the information onscreen across to the viewer. On the whole it's a fairly decent English Language performance but it still seems really wooden next to the fluidity of the images onscreen. The only other problem with the English track is that it does not correspond with the subtitles. Perhaps a lot of these phrases and words have no English counterpart, that could be one reason for the fuddle but, I can't for the life of me think why the Japanese language track isn't remastered in 5.1. It would really solve this issue altogether. In any event, the dubbing while not on par with the Japanese is acceptable.

Extras:

The extras on this disc as with most anime titles are spartan. The film's trailer along with 12 other ADV Films titles is presented as well as some decent menu screens and transitional screens from menu to selection. Other than that there are no extras.

Overall:

I never heard of Queen Emeraldas before I got this disc. I saw StarBlazers on the back of the package and bought it without question. Lejii, Matsumoto, who created StarBlazers also, created this film series. His trademark style is all over the film. This film ties in with the Captain Harlock series and is another triumph from an already well seasoned director/creator. The use of CGI in addition to traditional anime artwork is a match made in heaven. The textures are so rich and the colors literally jump off the screen. As this was an impulse purchase, I failed to see that it was only 60 minutes in length-two episodes! The price point is really steep for this title ($30) but hopefully, more episodes will follow with a more fan friendly price tag. Two episodes per disc are pretty silly to me when there's so much they could include. But that would probably require the studios to do more thinking than counting money. Anyway, this is definitely one for the collection. Highly Recommended