Anime Synopsis:

Ryu must undertake the ultimate journey of self-discovery and learn to control the force threatening to consume him. But with his confidence waning, will he have what it take to confront Akuma – the vicious master of the Dark Hadou himself? Find out as allies old and new join forces against a sinister new threat in the pulse-pounding sequel to the phenomenally popular Street fighter IIV series.

DVD EXTRAS:

• All Regions
• Color, Animated, Dolby, HiFi Sound, Surround Sound, Digital Sound
• Making of
• Interviews
• Full-screen format

KNOWN DVD SECRET(S): Go to Special Features, then click on weblinks, and then click on the manga symbol to see the original Japanese trailer of the Street Fighter Alpha OVA.

DVD REVIEW:

First, let me get this out of the way:  I am a true SF2 fan.  Boku wa Street Fighter II dai fan desu!  Ok, now that out of the way, I can go on with this interview.

People who will love this anime are those anime fans who grew up going to the arcades and wasting their money on Street Fighter II, the guys who spent their money buying every Capcom Street Fighter video game for their console and those who love Street Fighter in general.  The majority of anime fans who are not familiar with the game will not like the storyline at all.  There are many characters and those who will really know about them are the fans and people who played this game.  Notice on the DVD box, the majority of the ones who gave the rave reviews are gaming magazines and a comic book magazine.  Even way back then, these magazines were raving for Street Fighter II.  I watched the first movie, I loved it.  Watched SF2V and loved it.  Now Alpha (or Zero as it's called in Japan) is out and I love it.

This is just a very good bonus for Capcom fans.  For those who beat the game and wanted more from the ending.  This movie is like that.  I even enjoyed this movie better than the SONY version.  This movie just rocks!  Well, actually it was two OAV's made into a movie for the US release.

As for special features, the 25 minutes interviews with the Japanese cast was cool.  Especially to see Sho Kosugi's son, Kane doing the voice of Ryu (Kane was black ranger for the Kaku Rangers in Japan and been on several dramas.  He's also the son of Sho Kosugi in a lot of the 80's Ninja movies).  Watching these interviews was a blast and also to see the making of the anime was pretty cool.  Love that music.  If there was one thing that I didn't like is that they didn't make the Japanese track in digital 5.1, only the English dubbed version (bah!).  Special features include the typical trailers for Manga Ent. and for the series.  But with all these goodies, that's way more than what most anime DVD's have.

Again, fans will love this anime.  It's not a perfect anime but it's two hours of enjoyment.  Again, most anime fans will not like this unless they are hardcore fans of the SF2 or Alpha video games.

THE MOVIE: B+
THE DVD EXTRAS: A- (for an anime DVD)
THE DVD OVERALL: A-

Check out other cool DVD reviews on this movie by clicking here: 1, 2, 3, 4