The first home-release volume of Kawamoris latest sci-fi classic, AKB0048, was unleashed upon Japan… well, it was last month at this point. I literally just got my shipping notice for volume 2 today, but my volume 1 was waiting upon the latest Precure movie and K-On! before shipping, meaning I only got ahold of it yesterday. Let me tell you, as sweet as K-On! is as a show, more than any other disk media release I own the LE would make a pretty great blunt weapon. It’s got some serious heft behind it, and you could do someone some serious damage with properly (or improperly) wielded.

Anyway, to steer back towards point, the first episode of AKB is presented on BD in it’s directors cut form!

Not that this proves all that terrible exciting. Whilst at first blush it looks like they’ve added four minutes to the episodes runtime, in reality that’s mostly because they’ve pushed back the end credits until after the episode itself has finished – the actual difference in the content part of the episode is closer to two minutes. They aren’t a particularly significant two minutes, either, unlike the additional footage from, say, SoraKakeGirl, which made that shows opener far more coherent that in was at broadcast.

The most curious edits for broadcast were probably the removal of the two cuts from the last two pictures above, being that they’re referenced in the shows OP and ED respectively. The first is part of an additional monologue from Nagisa between the concert and that first present-day scene at the school, whilst the second is from the end of an extended version of the scene where Yuka and Orine find Nagisa sleeping at the quarry. I suppose the intended poignancy of them starting the ED with a callback to that was completely lost since they cut it from the broadcast.

Also missing from broadcast: Nagisa trying to snog Orine
Otherwise, it’s mostly just footage of Nagisa sulking, and a brief discussion of the cutting social relevance of the lyrics to the song Aitakatta…

SYMBOLISM!

Actually, my favourite thing about the AKB0048 home release is absolutely amazing box copy…

In the era when the entertainment is prohibited, there was an idol group who send out the guerrilla lives, not looking back their danger. Yes, they are “AKB0048”. “AKB48” kept shining as a legendary idol, just before the earth downfalls. It’s a story of hyper galaxy idol group which inherits them by succeeding their name.

What is so hilarious about the this isn’t so much the text itself (which isn’t to say that it isn’t hilarious, mind you), but it’s omnipresence – it appears, in full, no less than nine times across the LE packaging!

The only extra of any real significance from the LE release, at least to those of us outside Japan for whom ticket redemption schemes are of little use, is the Augmented Reality card that ships with the release. Unfortunately, the corresponding software required to utilise it has been released for Android only, and since I don’t sport an Android device, I’ve got no idea what the thing actually does. Still, one side of it is decorated – I understand it was a random selection from nine different designs…

I got Mimori. Probably not the worst I could have gotten, but I’d totally trade for a Grumbley-chan.