I can see why Funimation chose Aquarion to test the season box-set release instead of releasing it the traditional one volume at a time. Aquarion has names behind it that anime fans in the US recognize like Shoji Kawamori and Yoko Kanno, so Funimation can market the show. Who doesn’t like Yoko Kanno?

Though after watching the first volume, it’s pretty easy to see why Aquarion was chosen as a season-set guinea pig. The first five episodes are quite lame. I know I probably would not have bought volume two after seeing volume one.

Sure, most mecha shows are either super cheesy or are trying their hardest to prove mecha can be a serious business. Aquarion straddles the line quite deliberately in equal parts that it comes off as trying too hard without a clue. Eventually it sorts it self out enough to dump some interesting ideas about some shadow angel bad guys who harvest humans as food and that there are reincarnated heroes who are able to fight them.

I lay much of the blame of my initial harsh judgment of Aquarion to its character designs that seemed too goofy when laid against the backdrop of a serious story. My favorite lame design goes to Pierre, who wears a teal soccer uniform 24/7 and who has this special ability to kick ~wait for it~ flaming soccer balls.

The story development and introduction of these characters doesn’t help and probably adds to feeling of “whoa this is crap” for the first four or five episodes.

The biggest laugh comes from when the three individual craft merge to become the super giant robot Aquarion. Merging basically causes the three pilots to orgasm. It’s freaking hilarious in both languages. Maybe I’m just that immature, but it makes me giggle every single time, particularly when it’s three dudes and it’s in English where those lines are delivered with loving gusto.

I can forgive goofy crap pretty quickly, so I watched the rest. Really, you can’t be an anime fan for long if goofy, derivative, and pandering crap completely turns your stomach. That anime often does it so blatantly can make it awesome sometimes.

So yeah, Aquarion definitely gets better after the first dvd. The laughable stuff stays about the same, but as it progresses the battles get so much better. The season finale mech battle kicks ass.

There’s a lot of random things that made me lol beyond orgasmic pilots and a figure otaku who’s programmed his figures to talk to him. Like one of the battles takes place in Memphis. I can’t hear the name Memphis without thinking of Andy Kaufmann taunting people saying “Mehmphuss, Ten Uh See” like a total cartoon hick. Not that there was any reference to it at all. To me the battle in Memphis is the episode (ep7) where Aquarion turns for the better, because it was the first really good battle and I’m a sucker for story lines about overcoming fear, rejection, and self-exile.

I’ll get the second box set. It amused me enough to not feel like I was ripped-off, pretty environments, the CG work on the robots and the bad guy shadow angels looks good, and there’s a story somewhere in there, but I’m not holding my breath on that one. Plus, I’m sure I’m not the only one slightly motivated to buy this in order to support this release format. And FINALLY, the video quality seems better than previous Funi releases (about time they learned how to author dvds now that the format is reaching the latter phases of its life cycle).