Witchblade (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray) Unboxing [NSFW]

Witchblade (ウィッチブレイド) is a 2006 television anime series based on the American comic book series of the same name written by Brian Haberlin and Christina Z from Top Cow Productions. The series was adapted by studio Gonzo and the staff credits include director Yoshimitsu Ohashi, series composition writer Yasuko Kobayashi, character designer Makoto Uno, and music composer Masanori Takumi. The series first aired in Japan on April 2006.

Note: This post also contains images from the box art and booklet that are not suitable for work.

Background:

“To kill, to live, to love, to die. The destiny of the Witchblade continues.

Sought by the greed of Men since the dawn of humankind, but only bestowed upon the woman whose fate it forever scars – The Witchblade. Is it the Righteous Sword of God, or the Hand of the Devil Himself? Now a new bearer has been chosen and she must discover the answers for herself. As she stands on the brink of destiny, she is forced to seek the balance between ecstasy and ruin…

Masane Amaha is a woman on the fringe of society, bouncing rootless from town to town with no memory of the past and no clue as to what the future holds. But upon her arrival back in Tokyo, chance and circumstance conspire to unleash the fury of the Witchblade. The ancient weapon stirs. Conscripted into the service of the Doji Group and hunted down by the emissaries of the NSWF, Masane will find herself an unwilling ground zero for the swelling chaos fast approaching.”

Plot Synopsis via MVM Entertainment, March 2023.

When I first heard of Witchblade the anime, I was thinking of the usual ecchi mid-00s fantasy anime aimed for a mature audience. In reality upon learning more about the show itself, it caught me by surprise that it was a loose adaptation of a comic book series which in itself also spawned The Darkness, which I’m very familiar with thanks to its video game adaptations that were both very good. So learning this had increased my intrigue to check out this 2006 adaptation by studio Gonzo, though it was a challenge as the UK only had access to it via DVD whilst Funimation in North America made it available for streaming and on Blu-ray.

As mentioned, Witchblade was licensed by Funimation for North American audiences in 2006 and was released first on DVD before eventually receiving a Blu-ray version a few years later, which is another one of Funimation’s in-house upscales i.e. a Standard Definition Remaster of sorts. This was normal practice by Funimation whenever HD materials didn’t exist at the time and they wanted to push more shows onto the Blu-ray format as the market grew.

MVM Entertainment in the United Kingdom released Witchblade many years back when they were putting out single volumes and also thick box sets for their DVD titles. The series had remained in print for at least a decade, until eventually the DVDs went out of print. Then MVM announced they had picked up a select number of Gonzo shows they previously released and will be releasing them on the Blu-ray format, which included Witchblade. With the Funimation catalogue slowly going out of print (with some returning under the Crunchyroll branding), it’s good timing for the series to remain in print here in the UK.

Collector’s Edition Contents:

What I like about MVM Entertainment’s collector’s editions for Witchblade and a few other Gonzo shows is that they were using the assets from Funimation’s original Blu-ray releases for these new editions, which is rather nostalgic in a way.

This release is presented with a rigid box containing an Amaray case to house the Blu-ray discs, in addition to 4 art cards and a 24-page booklet. The booklet includes interviews and character designs which I believe are the same content included in the older Funimation releases.

The artwork is free of any BBFC content but the back cover does contain information about the series and disc extras, because as mentioned this is identical to the old Funimation Blu-ray artwork. The collector’s edition Blu-ray has 1000 units printed for an SRP of £59.99, and is also available as a standard edition Blu-ray, which was released a few months after.

The series has been available for a while and I purchased my copy during a Deal of the Week offer over on MVM’s retail store Anime-on-Line for £19.99.

Physical Contents:

• Rigid Box with Amaray packaging and semi-clean artwork
• Info for specification and BBFC description on back cover
• 24-page Booklet
• 4 Art Cards

On-Disc Contents:

Distributor: MVM Entertainment
Released: 13th March 2023

The collector’s edition release for Witchblade contains all 24 episodes across three Blu-ray discs, with the encode & authoring done by Funimation via their release in 2009. The audio options are Japanese with English subtitles and the Funimation English dub.

The white subtitles are unlockable during playback, and the regions are restricted to Blu-ray players set to B.

Blu-ray Specs:

Languages	English, Japanese
Audio	English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0
Video	1080p High Definition Upscaled format 16:9 aspect ratio
Region	B
Subtitles	English
Locked Subtitles	No
Discs	3 BD-50s

Blu-ray On-Disc Extra Features:

Disc 3:

• Japanese Cast Interviews
• The Witchblade Forged:
  • Part I
  • Part II
  • Part III
• Inside Top Cow
• Textless Songs:
  • Textless Opening “XTC”
  • Textless Opening “Dear Bob”
  • Textless Closing “Ashitano-Te”
  • Textless Closing “KUTSUHIMO”
• Japanese TV Spots
• Promotional Video

Unboxing Photos:

Final Notes:

Witchblade is available to purchase on Blu-ray by MVM Entertainment in the UK & Ireland. The collector’s edition Blu-ray release can be bought through Amazon UK, AllTheAnime Store, and Anime-on-Line Store.

For the standard edition, it is also available across different retailers including Amazon UK, AllTheAnime Store, and Anime-on-Line.

(Disclaimer: Amazon links are also included when available. They are affiliated so if you decide to order them, I’ll earn a small percentage if they ship which will help me with any hauls or small bills.)