Search - Gestalt on DVD

Yet Another Incomplete OAV Series...

Carl Malmstrom | Monument, CO USA | 02/11/2001

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Companies like Media Blasters and ADV seem to have an odd talent for acquiring OAV (direct-to-video) series that never finished their run. "Ninja Cadets", "My Dear Marie", "Dragoon": the list is distressingly long and "Gestalt" only adds to it. To make matters more confusing, this is obviously a series that has its grounding in a video game that was never released in the US.The story is a bit confusing if harmless and unresolved. The characters obviously inhabit a world that was thought out pretty thoroughly by someone at some point, but we the American audience aren't given more than the basics of the world and its dynamics. Media Blasters could have done well to include a background information section on this DVD. It's a shame they didn't.The story itself is cute if somewhat odd. It begins with a priest leaving his order so he can go south to the closed, forbidden land of Gestalt (which is only referred to as "G" for reasons of superstition). Well, along the way he helps out a town and is given a mute slave girl as a gift (no, this is not going quite the way you think). He's attacked by the person that was sent to bring him back to the order, he lifts her curse of muteness, she defeats his would-be bounty hunter, they start to fall for each other, etc. You can kind of mentally fill in the blanks yourself for the next 45 minutes of screen time.From a technical aspect, the disc is perfectly fine. The CG work in the episodes comes out well in DVD format and the layout is nice, even if they extras are pretty much restricted to an art gallery.On the whole, it's a nice, light, if somewhat strange disc. It's a shame they don't take the story further, but I would assume that's the purpose of the Japanese video game. If you're looking for something light and more-or-less romantic, I guess you'd do okay by getting this, but I wouldn't recommend jumping to get it right away if you're looking for the next hit anime title."

I wanna see some more!

Tivor | Los Angeles, CA, USA | 09/02/2001

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is such a beautiful OVA series, and it's a shame that there are only 2 episodes. I admit, I purchased this DVD only because I thought the cover art was cool. I've never heard of it before, but there was just something in the art style which grabbed my attention. It was totally an impulse purchase, and, having watched it twice now, I do not regret one bit.The artwork and the character design is just as beautiful as the cover art, and they are very smoothly animated. It's a big-time eye-pleaser. And the dub is surprisingly quite tolerable, although I clearly prefer the original Japanese voices.But as for the storyline.... Well.... OK, I really like the story that's there. But it's just darn too SHORT!! I love Olivier's inner conflict of wanting to know the truth about the gods, and I like Ohri's character. They both have such great potentials, and it's such a shame that neither get very developed because of the time constraint (60 minutes). I so wish there were just a couple more OVA episodes to really dig into their characters and develop the plot more. I WANNA SEE SOME MORE!!! (I guess I'll have to track down the manga series, eh?)Still, I love this DVD because it just looks so darn beautiful. If anybody wants an eye-candy anime, I know this one's gonna be on my recommendation list."

I must be missing something

Tivor | 01/14/2001

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Okay, I have the distinct feeling that I was supposed to read something before I saw this anime because there seems to be so much more then I saw going on. The plot seems to be somewhat serious until the characters break out in weird laughter or gags out of nowhere, kind of like in tenchi, but unlike tenchi there really isn't anything funny about it. Also, for an hour of anime, I was definently left with the feeling that there was so much left, maybe because none of the characters reached their stated goals and yada yada. I'd suggest Gestalt be watched once future volumes are released... but I've yet to find out if there is anything else to it. So... if you're really dying to see a different anime and you want something that's going to leave you wondering and confused... go for it! But otherwise, save your money."

Yay, another OAV without prerequesite manga!

A. Arachne | Chicagoland, IL | 01/08/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I love the way the American translation companies think they can translate OAV series that don't cover a whole series without confusing and annoying many people.I, like many others, bought this anime because the box art was pretty. And while I admit that I was disappointed with the short length, I still enjoyed it. Its not so much that the plot is incomplete, as its just not fully introduced. What is covered by these two episodes is essentially the first two chapters in a seven volume series.After watching Gestalt, I did a little research on it. Sifting through massive amounts of Gestalt therapy pages (o_O talk about a pain in my bum), I was rewarded with information on the lovely manga that spawned this annoyingly short OAV. I found out it was based on a manga by the wonderful Kouga Yun, who, for some reason, has this problem which her long running series getting crammed into short OAV series (go watch Earthian and you'll know what I mean). I also discovered that there was no prayer (at least at that time- its not impossible now) of getting a translation of the manga over here- Gestalt, like Earthian, is a shonen-ai series.Now, I'm not going to say why it is, because that would be a huge major spoiler. But it annoyed me none the less. But what with Gravitation and FAKE being released over here, its actually not completely unlikely that we'll be seeing something of Kouga Yun's translated soon, Earthian at the very least.Eh, anyways, I don't think there's anything in here that would really offend anyone- the plot hasn't gone into shonen-ai territory yet, and I didn't notice anything else about it to be particularly "iffy"."