Tokusatsu Blu-rays from Discotek!

[Benjamin Haines]

Unbelievable! I've already watched three of those series (all but Winspector) but I definitely will get all of these at some point. I have Discotek's releases of Space Sheriff Gavan, Megabeast Investigator Juspion and Legend of Dinosaurs & Monster Birds but I haven't yet gotten Kamen Rider Black, Kamen Rider Black RX, Space Sheriff Sharivan or Mobile Cop Jiban.

Discotek, I support you! I can't afford to immediately buy each of your tokusatsu releases but I do intend to collect them all eventually and I hope you keep releasing them! I'll try to collect at least one more before this year is over!

Kamen Rider V3 and Android Kikaida are two of the best tokusatsu series that I've seen. The episode files that I have were ripped from the super-expensive DVDs that JN Productions released in the 2000s. They had really well-done English subtitles, and in V3's case they were done by August Ragone, so I'm not exactly thrilled about what Discotek is calling "newly polished subtitles" for V3 and "upgraded subs" for Kikaida. Speaking of which, are they really going with the alternate spelling of Kikaider in the subtitles for this release? That's going to take some getting used to. I guess they'll also be spelling Hakaida as Hakaider, like Media Blasters did with their release of the 1995 movie.

[lhb412]

^ Discotek always goes through the old subs to see if corrections and revisions should be done. They also go above and beyond with the formatting for titles, songs, signage, etc. On Twitter the subtitle editor specified that he's going through the V3 subs to make sure the translation (special terms, nicknames and whatnot) will be consistent from Shout's subs for the original Rider into the subs for V3! Isn't that insane?!

When Generation Kikaida went out of business I almost pulled the trigger on V3 and Kikaider...but in the pit of my stomach I suspected Discotek would snatch them up. Revisions are one thing, but translating a long series from scratch at the level of quality Discotek maintains is a serious workload (remember how they contacted a fansubbing group to use and revise their scripts for Juspion), so the hard work for the subs and the extras would essentially be in the can for these - plus they're popular, well known shows! It just made sense.

[lhb412]

Really loving Jiban! Love the feel of this series. You know, it looks pretty great despite being SD. All of these '80s shows are a bit on the grainy side (16mm?), so there's not that much of a visual difference, and the transfer seems a lot better than Juspion (the previous SD on Blu-ray release).

[lhb412]

Kamen Rider V3 and Electric Dragon 80,000v drop on November 26 and are now avaliable for preorder! I think I'll save 'em for Christmas presents!

[lhb412]

[quote="lhb412"]Kamen Rider V3 and Electric Dragon 80,000v drop on November 26 and are now avaliable for preorder! I think I'll save 'em for Christmas presents![/quote]

... and both are indeed under the Christmas tree right now! BTW, apparently Electric Dragon does indeed carry the 'Toku Time' branding, for anyone collecting the whole set. Next tokusatsu release is Winspector in February. Next round of Discotek announcements will probably be in January or maybe February.

[lhb412]

If you'd rather order direct from the source; Media OCD, the company that actually produces most of the actual Discotek discs, now has an online store and will be carrying new Discotek titles, starting with the preorders of their next wave of releases:

https://www.mediaocd.com/category/all-products

(The subtext of this post is that everyone misses Rightstuf and hates that Crunchyroll absorbed it)

[lhb412]

New Toku Time announcements! Coming soon:

Kamen Rider X
Kikaider: The Ultimate Human Machine (aka Kikaider Reboot)
Special Investigation Robo Janperson

... also, Kitamura's live action Lupin III movie.

[Benjamin Haines]

Hell yeah! I'm glad that Discotek is going for so many Metal Hero and Showa-era Kamen Rider shows.

[lhb412]

^ Some interesting info on the stream: since they've raided so much obscure material in the anime space already and certain things are currently off-limits or prohibitively expensive (btw, Toho's paused licensing their anime since acquiring GKIDS) they're intentionally diversifying with tokusatsu, American cartoons, and Japanese live action films - with special mention on how the toku titles have been selling well!

They're also releasing Happiness of the Katakuris, a Takashi Miike flick that had already been released by another label and once I saw that I figured this might be a new common thing for the label: Discotek 'license rescuing' cult Japanese films once they're OOP from other labels, which is something they've always done with anime.

[lhb412]

Kikaider and Janperson (with vastly improved cover art) drop on May 27!

https://www.mediaocd.com/category/discotek

[lhb412]

All of Discotek's May 27th releases (remember: they drop a batch of new titles all at once every two months) are already instock over a month early at Media OCD's store. You can get Kikaider and Janperson five weeks early!

My preorders (along with Winspector) have already shipped!

[lhb412]

July 29th brings us Kamen Rider X and (the previously unannounced!) Super Rescue Solbrain!

[Benjamin Haines]

Fantastic! Discotek will end up releasing every Metal Hero series at this rate!

[lhb412]

Man, I'm really booking it through Janperson. The three separate villain groups really keep it fresh.

Have I mentioned on this board that it seems the Media OCD warehouse is, by pure coincidence, really close to where I live? Not exactly sure where, but we've got tons of nondescript warehouse space around.