The Great Yokai War: Guardians arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of SRS Cinema in a limited edition release, although was later given a standard release. Anyway, the disc offers a high-definition experience of Takashi Miike's fantasy sequel. This Blu-ray edition features the film in its original Japanese language with English subtitles, and includes a handful of extras and collectible physical items. These are based around the stellar Bob Eggleton artwork seen on the Blu-ray cover. That said, for fans who want a more "traditional" cover, it does feature the option to switch the cover around to one that more closely matches the standard edition.
As for the quality on this Blu-ray, it's got good video presentation combined with a good audio presentation, if one can overlook the lack of a surround track. The extras though, while numerous, are a slight miss though.
| Video: |
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The video quality on this Blu-ray is impressive, though not without some minor flaws. There are some compression artifacts, such as pixelation during foggy night scenes, that are noticeable. That said, the image remains sharp overall. Colors are also quite vibrant on this release although they are occasionally oversaturated, which causes slight detail loss in faces, but the visual presentation is still solid.
The Great Yokai War: Guardians is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1.
| Audio: |
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Presented in 2.0 stereo with its original Japanese audio track, the audio is clean and well-balanced, with clear dialogue and effective music placement. Ambient effects offer a decent sense of space, and it's overall a good stereo presentation. The lack of a 5.1 surround mix is disappointing, though, especially since that option is available on Japanese releases. While the stereo track performs well, audiophiles may find it underwhelming given something better does exist on other releases.
The audio track is accompanied by removable English subtitles, which translate both the dialogue and any on-screen text.
| Extras: |
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This limited edition release offers a variety of extras, but really lacks some compelling content here. Not only that but the presentation quality of almost all of these features, save the movie's original trailer, also feels low. This is surprising as the video track for the main feature is relatively stellar on this release.
First up, we have a making of feature. This is a 13 minute video that features burned in English subtitles. Sadly, the short is more about the movie itself, i.e. promoting it, than about the making of the production. Granted, there is some reflection by the cast, but it's very light on insight as a whole.
Next up we have the "About Yokai" feature. This is more aptly titled "Eugene's Thoughts On The Yokai Film Series and Daimajin Movie Trilogy" on the SRS website, though. To frame it up, this feature is recorded vertically using a cell phone and features Eugene Alejandro talking about the Daiei films from the 1960's that precursor the modern revival. For whatever reason, the video is flipped horizontally, so all on screen text is backwards. I'm sure it was filmed that way, but why didn't SRS flip it if so? Anyway, the feature doesn't really introduce who Alejandro is. Searching online, I can see some movie reviews he has done and that he is a frequent contributor to SRS releases, but not much else. As a whole, this feature just feels odd especially due to the video quality being so very low. SRS would have benefitted had they just run clips from the movies being talked about and kept the audio.
Moving on, trailer enthusiasts will find no shortage here, perhaps to a fault. In addition to the main feature's trailer, there's a "Kaiju Trailers" section containing 19 more trailers. These are mostly for low-budget titles, though a few notable ones like The Whale God are included. Subtitles are inconsistent, and most trailers seem created by SRS rather than original ones. Add to that five autoplaying trailers when the disc starts, and the total hits 25... an overwhelming number.
In terms of additional bonus material off the disc, since this is the limited edition version with only 2,000 units out there, it also features a few physical supplements. This includes a postcard, a bookmark and a folded poster. All of these showcase the artwork created by Bob Eggleton for this release, which is seen on the cover as well.
One technical note: on some players, the menu screen exhibits a distracting shaking effect. This didn't occur on all devices, as I tested it on a few, so it may be hardware-specific.
| Overview: |
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While The Great Yokai War: Guardians receives a strong HD presentation with generally sharp visuals and a good audio track, the extras leave something to be desired. Video and sound are certainly serviceable, with only minor caveats like oversaturation and the lack of a surround mix. Overall, though, a good way to experience the film.
For those deciding between the limited and standard editions, the standard might be the better value. It's around $5 cheaper, and the only difference in on-disc content is a brief video in the limited edition ("Eugene's Thoughts on the Yokai Film Series and Daimajin Trilogy") swapped for a slideshow in the standard. However, collectors and fans of Bob Eggleton's artwork may still prefer the limited edition, which comes with a postcard, bookmark and folded poster featuring his design that's not found on the standard edition. |
![Blu-ray: The Great Yokai War: Guardians (SRS Cinema) [Limited Edition]](../images/blu-ray/great_yokai_war_guardians_limited_srs_cinema24/cover_tn.jpg)
