Review for Romeo X Juliet: Volume 2

Introduction

Romeo X Juliet turned out to be quite the pleasant surprise last month, when the first volume came to UK shores. The Gonzo adaptation of the Shakespeare play takes an infinite number of liberties with the plot and the characters, but stays true and honest to the fundamental themes of the play. It's an all-new story, but charmingly familiar with it. It's also one of those rare Gonzo animations where the story receives just as much attention as the usual eye-candy, if not more. To top it all off, Funimation give the show one of the best English dubs that I have heard in years. This is truly the consummate anime package, and I have been anticipating this second volume with unseemly avarice, yet masochistically putting off watching it as long as possible to get those anime taste buds salivating profusely.


Romeo X Juliet is set in a fantasy realm of indeterminate time period, where Neo Verona is the centre of a vast continent, floating high in the sky, and where noblemen travel in style atop Pegasus like dragonhorses. It was 14 years previously that the Capulet family, rulers of Neo Verona were brutally slain by the Montagues, who usurped their throne and began a reign of tyranny. Only one heir to the Capulet name survived that night, a young girl named Juliet, and now as she nears her sixteenth birthday, she hides among the citizens of Neo Verona, disguised as a boy, protected by the surviving retainers of the Capulet family. And while Prince Montague's grip on the city ever tightens, his son Romeo is about to come of age. These two young hearts are set on a tragic collision course.

In Regions 1 and 4, Funimation and Madman released Romeo X Juliet in 2 two-disc sets. MVM have opted for four single volumes, released at a disc a month. This second release bears the legacy of the US and Australian discs. It's subtitled Romeo Disc 2, and next month we'll get Juliet Disc 1. This disc has the next six episodes. When we left the story, Benvolio and his family had just been banished by Montague from the city, and were being pursued by assassins. Juliet's group had heard rumours of this and went to rescue a potential future ally, but the battle quickly turned against them.


7. Warmth ~Just for Now~
Rescue comes in the form of a mysterious dragonhorse rider, who obviously knows who Juliet is, but only lets slip his name, Tybalt, before vanishing. Having rescued Benvolio, and more importantly his father, the former Mayor of Neo Verona, attention now turns to turning him to their cause. After all, the ex-Mayor is one of the few people who know the truth about the Capulets, while the rest of the city has been fed years of false propaganda about their tyrannical ways. Meanwhile, the Midsummer Day Flower Festival is impending, the one day each year that the doors to the inner city are opened, the common folk can mingle with the nobility, and true love is confessed with a bunch of flowers. Odin's friend Emilia wants him to accompany her, as her beau has let her down, so Juliet reluctantly dons the disguise. Hermione wants to use the celebration to mark her engagement to Romeo, but Romeo's thoughts turn to irises once more, and he wanders into the city hoping to run into Juliet.

8. Naivety ~What Justice Is~
Juliet is testing herself even more now, dealing with her confusion with sword training. There's more of a reason too, as she finally decides to take up her father's sword and assume his legacy. This heralds the reappearance of Tybalt, who is chasing his own vengeance, and wants to measure just how ready Juliet is to take on her father's mantle. His test is a brutal one though. Romeo on the other hand is facing brutality of his own, brutality from his father who is quickly tiring of his waywardness, brutality towards Hermione when he tells her that he loves another, and brutality from Benvolio, who gets in touch with Romeo, wishing to tell him the truth about his father. But most brutal of all is when Romeo sees Juliet in Tybalt's embrace…


9. Rise to Action ~Hesitation Quelled~
Events are moving on apace for the Capulet sympathisers. With Juliet taking up her father's sword, that's just the call to arms that they needed, and soon they are gathering at a secret location and formulating their plans. They even have support from one of the nobles, Camillo, a good friend of Juliet's sponsor Conrad, and one of the few Capulet sympathisers to survive the purge of the nobility. He assures them that there are still many nobles who privately think that the Montagues are a bad idea. The Montagues have their own problems. Romeo's still tormented about what he saw, while the strange dead leaves in the castle pond have an odd effect on his father, sending the prince racing out of the castle. It's just the opportunity that Juliet and her men have been waiting for, but they have a traitor in their midst.

10. Tears ~To Have Met You~
Juliet manages to escape the mayhem, with the aid of Tybalt who shows a canny knack for timing. Following the disaster, Juliet is dispirited, broken, and distraught, and while Tybalt finds a place for her to lie low, she takes to wandering the streets. It's just the opportunity that Montague needs to break the back of the rebellion, and urges the nobles to invest even more funds into finding the final Capulet. But there is a surprising voice of dissent in the council chambers. Meanwhile, Juliet somehow finds her way to the nunnery where Lady Portia, Romeo's mother now lives in seclusion.


11. The Vows ~The Blessing of the Morning Sun~
What are two young lovers to do against a world of adversity? Try to find another world of course, which is exactly what Romeo and Juliet do when they leave the city atop Romeo's trusty dragonhorse Cielo, and search for an idyll to live their new lives together. It isn't easy of course, with what looks like a forest refuge turning out to be anything but. Yet when you find an abandoned church in a field of irises, what else are you to do?

12. Solace ~To Stay This Way~
It's a short honeymoon. Their new happy home is made uneasy by Juliet's conscience, and exploring their surroundings leads to an ominous discovery of giant dead tree roots. An enigmatic old man implies that these roots have something to do with the very existence of the world itself, and the fact that they are dead and dying is worrying indeed. But back in Neo Verona, the prince has two problems instead of one. His desire to find the missing Capulet girl is as heated as ever, but now his son is missing as well. Search parties are sent out, but little do they know that when they find one, they'll find the other as well.

Picture

Romeo X Juliet gets a 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer, which as usual is an NTSC-PAL standards conversion, with all the associated issues. In addition to that, with 6 episodes, plus extras on one disc, compression artefacts were a tad more noticeable, particularly around scenes with busy motion, cloudy or foggy scenes, or fade outs and fade ins. It isn't all that pleasant when noticed, but thankfully it can be ignored. Otherwise the image is clear and vivid enough, although there is an overall softness to it, which I believe is intentional. The animation is astounding, approaching theatrical quality in terms of detail and vibrancy. There are very few static scenes here, the camera is used effectively and the fantasy world of Neo Verona is brought to striking life, with Gonzo's usual efficacy when it comes to combining 3D CG and traditional 2D animation. Value for money has to be balanced with quality transfers, and the trend in recent years has been towards value for money, hence the high episode count per disc. This series may have been better served across 6 discs, but of late, Funimation have been bringing out their series on Blu-ray as well. Upscales they may be, but it may be worth seeing how Romeo X Juliet looks in higher definition, and Romeo X Juliet was animated in native HD by Gonzo.

Sound

You have a choice between DD 2.0 Japanese, and DD 5.1 English along with optional translated subtitles and a signs only track. I first opted for the Japanese track, and as usual found it to be more than acceptable. Admittedly the stereo is a disappointment; for a show this extravagant there really ought to be a surround track worthy of the name. Especially when you consider the music. The themes are a suitable moving ballad opener, and something more rocky for the end credits, but the incidental music is stupendous, given the full orchestra, and really feeling like a proper Hollywood picture of yesteryear, full of rousing themes and gentle melodies. There's more than a bit of action as well that really could be elaborated on.


However, this is one of those rare anime where the English dub actually sounds better than the original Japanese, at least to my ears. I was interested to see which way they would go with this, and thankfully they've avoided the temptation to go for the full Shakespearean dialogue. There are hints of it in the more formal dialect of the nobles, and you will find more than a few Shakespearean quotes as well. More importantly, other than a few incidental characters, the cast really excel, as if they realise that they have to up their games to live up to something really special. On more than one occasion I noticed characters that actually felt performed better in English, the playwright Willy is a case in point. In the Japanese version he's a rather camp and effeminate stereotype, but in the English dub he develops a wicked way with the language, and a delightfully sardonic attitude. Maybe it's just that Shakespeare is best served in English…

Extras

You have a nice, easily navigable menu and your usual jacket picture, but for some bizarre reason, the episode titles differ from menu to actual programme, and even from programme caption to subtitle translation (although I think Nativity instead of Naivety is just a bad typo). Otherwise this disc is extras free.

Conclusion

I opined in the review for the first volume that Romeo X Juliet would shape up to be one of the anime series of the year, and this second volume does nothing to refute that. Although I must admit that the accelerator does come off that breakneck pace of the opening six episodes, and this volume does slow down a bit, especially towards the second half of the disc. It's necessary though, to offer some much needed character moments, and give us a pause to reflect on what has come before, although Romeo X Juliet doesn't resort to something as crude as a recap episode.


This disc is really split into three sections, and I must note that for the first half of the series packaged as the Romeo collection, the focus at this point is much more on Juliet. We begin with Juliet coming face to face with more of Montague's brutality, especially when she winds up rescuing Neo Verona's ex-mayor, who Montague is trying to have assassinated. We also meet the mysterious Tybalt at this point, a dark knight on his own mission of vengeance against the Montagues, who's been watching Juliet's progress with cynical world-weariness. He's ready to test her when she declares her determination to depose Montague and restore her family name. It's just the thing that her retainers have been waiting for, and they rally to her call, but she herself is more half-hearted about it. It's as if her identity as a Capulet is warring with her developing feelings for Romeo, and her throwing herself into the battle is a reflection of her own inner turmoil.


Such motives inevitably lead to disaster, although the disaster that occurs isn't directly her fault. Her retainers' over-eagerness is probably to blame, their enthusiasm at seeing their princess leading from the front probably blinds them to obvious treacheries, and so it is that the rebellion is betrayed before it can even get started. Juliet of course blames herself, and takes the defeat badly. Running away together with Romeo is almost a rescue from her dire circumstances. It's here that the pace of the disc slows down, and so it should. Finally the star-crossed lovers are free to be together, to escape, to find a new life, to forget all their cares and worries. It's important to take the time to develop the relationship, and you certainly won't begrudge the time devoted to the couple drifting lazily downstream, in a boat made for lying together gazing dreamily into one another's eyes. Besides, there's always a nervous edge to their adventure, nobles unprotected, venturing into the real world, fleeing from their pasts, their families, their obligations. As you would expect, there's no happily ever after for them, as brutal reality soon catches up.


While the focus of these episodes is more on Juliet, there's plenty of Romeo as well. His story is less prominent mostly because of his position. He doesn't have the weight of the world on his shoulders as Juliet does. Pampered son of the prince, he can afford to be single minded in his pursuit of Juliet, and really his tale develops more slowly. Best friend Benvolio gone, he now has the Prince's man Mercutio trying to insinuate himself into his life as a replacement friend. He's fairly cold and honest to his betrothed Hermione when he tells her he loves another, but surely he's saving up trouble for later on down the line with her, as she remains hopelessly devoted to him. He tries standing up to his father when it comes to the pursuit of the Capulets, but against the forceful personality of the prince, he doesn't stand a chance. Again, it's really only in the final third of the disc that we begin to see some of Romeo's potential strengths as a character, as he has to break free of the apron strings binding him to the nobility.


My one complaint in the previous volume was the under-development of the Prince, Leontes Montague. This volume begins to remedy that, offering some insight into the sort of man who would slaughter a family just for power. The fact that Romeo's mother, Lady Portia must have been in love with him at some point is a sign that his personality wasn't always thus. The more hints that are dropped about Escalus, the tree at the heart of Neo Verona, the more dimension it adds to Montague, indicating that there is much more motivation to his actions than simple maliciousness. One or two moments of reflection from him during this volume also add to that enigma, and I'm looking forward to seeing how this aspect of the story pans out.


The first half of Romeo X Juliet has been a corker. It may be an unusual anime twist on a classic story, but that classic storytelling still shines through despite the fantasy veneer. It's simple, elegant, and enthralling, and this volume, like the first, is highly recommended. I hope that the high standards carry through to the second half.