Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #19219 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-05-16
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Formats: Animated, Dubbed, PAL
• Original language: Japanese
• Subtitled in: English
• Dubbed in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 104 minutes

Synopsis
A secret society, the Secret Dragon, sits and waits for the time to take power with their giant robots. A teenager is captured by a government agency and finds out that he has a secret past which makes it extremely dangerous for him to be taken by the Secret Dragon. The result could mean the end of the World...

Customer Reviews

For Mecha fans only
Zeoraima was originally released between November 1988 and February 1990 as a 4 part OVA. Manga Entertainment released the series as two videos in 1997 with episodes 1 & 2 and episodes 3 & 4 being joined to create two 1 hour films. This DVD contains transfers of both of those videos on a single disc.

Zeoraima tells the story of a secret society called the Steel Dragons and their plans of world domination using 8 giant robots but the most powerful one - the 'Zeoraima' is missing. It's pilot is 14 year old Masato Akitsu , who thought he was normal until he realised that he had been genetically engineered to pilot the Zeoraima and only he can stop the Steel Dragons initiating Project Hades.

Despite it's short length Zeoraima fits a lot in without feeling like there's too much going on all the time. The plot whilst not terrible original does provide an entertaining and engaging story and manages to pull off some decent twists as well. The fighting scenes between the robots are dynamic and well choreographed.

The animation is above average but it does occasionally use some obvious resource saving sequences but some of the mecha designs are pretty cool and the characters are OK too. The colouring used suits the feel and atmosphere of the story very well. But what I do like about Zeoraima's animation is that it has that look and style that most mecha anime from the mid 80's to the mid 90's had, from Heavy Metal L-Gaim up to Evangelion, and I love that style.

The beauty of these older videos being transferred onto DVD is that they now tend to come with the original Japanese soundtrack, and whilst the dub track isn't too bad Zeoraima sounds much better in Japanese and I would recommend that you watch it this way.

Fans of mecha anime will enjoy Zeoraima, it's not amazing but it's a pretty enjoyable way to kill a couple of hours, but I feel people with just a casual interest in anime will find it pretty boring and average.

Not the best mecha anime
I got this DVD on rental, and I'm glad I did. The story isn't as deep as Patlabour and the mecha fight seens didn't leave me feeling as satisfied as Evangelion or any of the Gundam series have.

For all that this is a new release it is old or at least appears old (1970s, early 80s style and acting). I would say avoid this if you want a great mecha battles or a decent story.

I personally wouldn't pay £12 for this having seen it.