FLCL: Progressive and Alternative Blu-ray review

Feb 04, 2020- Permalink

Warner Bros Home Entertainment has now released a Blu-ray combo pack of Adult Swim’s cult anime shows FLCL: Progressive and Alternative. FLCL: Progressive is the sequel to 2001’s FLCL (フリクリ). That series followed a young teen named Naota who encounters an alien Galactic Space Police investigator named Haruko when she runs him over with her Vespa and then hits him in the head with her vintage Rickenbacker guitar. But hey, she was looking for Atomsk, the most powerful space pirate and you gotta do what you gotta do. Especially when the Fraternity is battling the Medical Mechanica. If you’re following along, then this show’s for you. Please note that while Warner Bros provided us with a copy of the series to review, the opinions below are my own.

In FLCL: Progessive, we know follow a 14-year-old teen Hidomi and her classmate, Ide, as the power struggle between the Medical Mechanica and the Fraternity continues. Our alien investigator, Haruko, has now taken on the form of Hidomi’s teacher and she’s joined by another alien, Jinyu. From there, FLCL: Alternative centres on 17-year-old Kana and her friends. Once again Haruko returns to try and save the planet from the Medical Mechanica.

Having not seen the original FLCL, I can’t tell you how these follow-ups compare story-wise, but if you’re aware of the shows and are looking to add them to your collection, I can tell you the technical specifications of the 2 disc set. The AVC-encoded 1080p video presentation is presented in the original airing’s 16:9 aspect ratio. The video is crisp and the details of the line animation are very sharp. The colour palette is muted and there appears to be no digital noise or compression issues. On the audio side, your ears are presented with an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack. Subtitles are available in English SDH. The 12 episodes are presented on two Blu-ray discs and there is an included digital copy code. There’s a nice selection of extras, including a making-of featurette that interviews cast and crew, a look at the new production team behind the sequels, a segment on the Japanese band The Pillows that provide much of the soundtrack and a featurette on the English voice actors and their work to dub the series with energy.

If you’re a fan of the FLCL series and want to complete your collection, then the video, audio and extras of the FLCL: Progressive and Alternative combo pack will be a nice addition to your home entertainment library.