"Mars is now almost entirely covered in water. Humanity exists in large city-ships that float through the open seas. But life is hard for those who live on Mars - the economy is in bad shape, work is scarce, and food is expensive and highly prized. Gram and his friends try to do the best they can, but the work keeps drying up.
Some have taken to a life of piracy to combat the corruption in the government; one such group is the pirates of the feared Ship of Aurora. And the Earth government, which rules Mars, has dispatched a new team of military pilots to combat them. In their specialized mecha called Round Bucklers, they must make the seas of Mars safe for humanity.
Caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, Gram finds himself on the run with the most notorious pirates on Mars. But here's the thing- he's starting to like them!

Rather than flesh out the scenario early on, the series seems to be willing to let the audience fill in many of the blanks as to how Mars became a water world and colonized by mankind. Whatever the case, the primary factions shown in the first five episodes were the local Mars government, the ruling Earthers, and the pirates like those on the Aurora (who are tied to a rebel leader of sorts but this relationship isn't completely explained by the end of the DVD). The lead protagonist is Gram, a man in his early twenties who scrapes by on whatever work he can get. His problem is that he gets pissed off easily and those around him aren't as willing to forgive his sins when there are dozens who'll replace him at the drop of a hat. He acts as guardian to a couple of kids and after turning down a creepy guy wanting to break into Gram's last place of employment, finds his charge more than willing to take the job. Needless to say, this leads Gram into a life of crime with circumstances putting him at the helm of a powerful mechanized robot (Round Buckler) and working for the most notorious pirates on Mars in their submarine. As time progresses, he finds out the government propaganda about the pirates to be as accurate as it was about the bright future of Mars so he joins them in their quest to plunder for the masses.

On the other side of the coin is the governmental forces that seek to prevent the pirates from stealing everything not nailed down. One of the troops is a life long friend of Gram and upon seeing him listed as one of the criminals in a warehouse burglary, she takes it personally and tries to apprehend him now that she's assigned to Mars. On the face of it, he's just another thug in her eyes since the supplies the pirates have stolen are desperately needed on the watery world of Mars (water is often considered a virtual universal solvent and the main supply stolen was tons of desiccant needed to prevent the moisture from eating away at the infrastructure of the floating city it was stolen from). Neither side is pure and noble, making their actions all the more interesting as the characters live their lives, fight their battles, and engage in a series of battles for what they believe in."

With only one more volume to go, you know that the storylines are going to be wrapping up soon. This means, in essence, that Mars Daybreak V5 has to start the process and it does so, although in a bit of a haphazard manner. Using the book stolen from the Mars Library city-ship, the crew has now pinpointed the exact location of the holographic location of the treasure. Kubernes continues to follow them, even providing assistance in hopes of moving the process along a bit. Gram runs into an old friend, greatly lifting his spirits and the cast makes a few changes in terms of position with the departure of a friend recently. The Earth forces continue to pursue the ship and after a few more battles, they all arrive at the cave they've been looking for. Exactly what happens next is largely left up to the final volume of the series but these four episodes were a bit weaker than average, leaving me to rate the DVD as a Rent It. I understand that tying up loose threads and setting up the finale is difficult and I still suspect that as a single boxed set the title will be well worth a higher rating, but as difficult as it was, I felt obligated to rate the volume on its own merits, thus proving my point that watching and reviewing multiple volumes at the same time can be tricky.

Picture: Mars Daybreak V5 was presented in the original 1.33:1 ratio full frame color it was shot in by director Kunihiro Mori for release on Japanese broadcast television. The colors were properly muted for the undersea action, the depressed areas properly dirty as if to convey the underlying economic times, and the elite offices of the provisional government and other factions looked pristine (trying to subtlety push the notion that the upper levels of society have it much better than the rest of us). The animation was the current combination of traditional anime and CGI with decent, if unremarkable, results. The character and setting designs were nicely handled; looking a bit different than the usual offerings you'll see in shows by other companies (this was another collaboration between Emotion and Bones as distributed domestically by Bandai). There were no compression artifacts and I don't think anime fans will be unhappy with the majority of the visuals here.

Sound: The audio was presented with the usual choice of the original 2.0 Dolby Digital Japanese stereo track or the newly made 2.0 Dolby Digital stereo English dub. I liked the vocals of the dub better this time even if a couple of background characters didn't seem to fit all that well. In terms of the sound effects and music, both seemed about equal to me with limited separation between the tracks and a dynamic range less pleasing than some of the other modern releases I've listened to lately. In all though, it was well enough handled that no one should complain too loudly (as some extremists tend to do).

Extras: The only extras on the DVD were a set of trailers.

Final Thoughts: Mars Daybreak V5 helped forward the plot and provide a reasonable background from which the series can conclude next time but it seemed like the pacing was off more often than not, which hampered the replay value and made it seem almost like it was designed to make the ending volume better rather than offer any real delights itself. To be frank about it, the series has an interesting premise and some of the characters, while very similar to those from other shows, still had enough unique mannerisms to sell as originals. The manner in which the plot was paced seemed haphazard at times too but even using ideas and similar mech designs as seen elsewhere couldn't stop me from watching. If a boxed set is eventually released of the series, I hope some care is put into adding some unique extras (or lowering the price down a lot) but overall, it was well worth a look and I hope the payout of the ending volume is worth the wait. Give it a look if you like anime, adventure, piracy, and science fiction.

If you enjoy anime, take a look at some of the recommendations by DVD Talk's twisted cast of reviewers in their Best Of Anime 2003, Best Of Anime 2004, and Best of Anime 2005 articles or their regular column Anime Talk.