Series background:

Kousuke Ueki is your typical middle school student until he encounters an odd man named Mr. K one evening.  This unusual person, out of the blue, offers Ueki his choice of super-powers.  Out of all the myriad of abilities that are offered, the young man chooses (drum roll please....) the power to turn garbage into trees.  Not what I would have picked, but okay.  With this power Ueki has to battle the 99 other middle school kids who have also been given super-human abilities.  (And just about all of them are as odd as Ueki's.  One person has the ability to turn cloth into steel, but only while he's holding his breath.  Another can turn water into fire, but only if the water is in his mouth.)  The winner of this tournament will gain the talent of blank, and the 'sponsor' who granted the child the power he used to win will become the Celestial King.

Each battle between 'power users' will go on until one of them is knocked unconscious.  When that happens the fight is over and the person who was defeated loses their power.  That sounds fine, but there's a down side to this power to: if anyone uses it to harm someone who isn't in the tournament, they loose a 'talent'.  These talents can be anything.  Ueki loses the talent "to be liked by girls" at the beginning.  He only starts with 11 talents all together and when they all disappear, so does poor Ueki.

Helping Ueki in this trial is a fellow middle school student, Ai Mori.  Her favorite pastime is to 'meddle', so following Ueki around warning him to be on the lookout for other people with powers is just up her alley.  Later in the series, she gets a power of her own, but the person who gave it to her forgot to reveal just what her special ability is.  Also joining Ueki over the course of the early volumes include Rinko Jerrard, a power user who can change beads into bombs, and Tenko a large heavenly beast that takes a shine to Ueki.  Tenko can change into a fuzzy bracelet if he wants so that Ueki can wear him on his wrist.

This volume:

Ueki is getting ready for the second round as this disc opens.  He's been using Tenko to gain power stars.  He's up to eight stars, and would like to get to at least nine before he has to fight again.  The only problem is that Tenko can only grant so many stars.  If he helps Ueki gain one more, he'll die.  Thinking back on his life before he met Ueki and his friends, Tenko realizes that Ueki is a noble and fine person.  If he has to give up his life to help Ueki win, he's willing to do that.  Of course, he can't tell Ueki what would happen or else he'd refuse to power-up, so he doesn't.  But how will knowing that he caused a friend's death affect Ueki's fighting ability?

The second round begins in the next episode.  Five teams with five members each have made it to the finals.  In addition, two people, 'Robert Haydn' and Li Ho, decided not to recruit teams and they get a pass to the next level.  In this round the rules are a little different.  When someone is knocked out, they no longer loose their power.  It's only if the entire team is KO'ed that the power users will get in trouble.  Ueki's team gets paired against Team Guruno and all ten people are transported to an island.  There's a treasure hidden somewhere on it, and the first team to find it wins.

The battle to find the treasure isn't going to be easy however.  First, Ueki fights against Gitar, a guy who is invulnerable.  How can he possibly defeat someone who can shake off his most powerful attacks?  Next, Sano and Rinko are pitted against an unusual pair.  They have to defeat a team with the ability to change coloring book drawings into warp tunnels and the ability to turn a bad pun into a real object.  Together they are a very capable team.

The last pair in Guruno's team are seemingly unbeatable.  Guruno himself has the ability to change models into real objects.  He has little tanks and helicopters in a case, but his team-mate, Pastello, makes him even more powerful.  Pastello can change pictures into models, so Guruno has a nearly limitless supply of weapons.  Things are looking pretty grim, but when Pastello uses his ability to create a giant mecha robot, complete with working plasma cannon, it looks hopeless.

This is another fun volume.  The first episode was a little slow, but things picked up as soon as the next round began.  There's still a lot of humor in this show which adds to the enjoyment factor.  The part where Ueki's team discovered that there's a penalty for losing in the second round was great.  Written on their team marker, in small letters, was their penalty.  The other teams had "become bald at an early age" and "won't have a girl friend until you're 40" but Ueki's penalty was a simple "you'll die."  Ai loudly proclaimed that it wasn't fair, but to no avail.

Audio:
 
Viewers have the choice of either the original Japanese audio track or an English dub, both in stereo.  The English dub was a little heavy handed in the effects department.  In the very first episode they added some heavy echos to the voices in one scene which made it hard to understand what was being said.  It also sounded pretty stupid.  Because of that, I enjoyed the original language track a lot more.  Both audio options sounded good though, with nice range and clear dialog.  There wasn't any hiss of background noise.

Video:

The full frame picture looked very good.  The image is clean and clear, and the lines are tight.  This is a colorful show with a wide range of shades present.  The colors are strong and bright and add a lot to the show's look.  Digital defects are nearly absent, with only some very minor aliasing in the background.  Overall this is a very nice looking disc.

Extras:
 
There are no extras, only some Geneon previews.

Final Thoughts:

This was another fun volume.  While it isn't a great show, it is some fun mindless entertainment.  The action was pretty solid after the first episode and there seemed to be more humor in these episodes than was found in the previous ones.  If you're looking for some light, mindless entertainment, look no further.  Recommended.