Story
High Noon contains the best and most emotional episodes in the Trigun series. Everything is finally revealed and wrapped up including Wolfwood's past, the final confrontation between Vash and the remaining Gung Ho Guns, and Vash's final meeting with Legato Bluesummers and Knives. The most ironic aspect of the episodes contained on this DVD is that the final episode, "Under the Sky so Blue", reveals the entire past of Vash the Stampede and his last battle with Knives. Just watching this one episode will allow you to understand the entire series without having to watch any previous ones. Perhaps this was done purposely by Nightow-san, however all of the episodes on this disc are amazing.

Packaging
The cover is the first time that Vash the Stampede is in no way featured. Rather, an image of Knives holding up his gun is displayed, in the exact same fashion as volume 1's art of Vash holding up his gun. The artwork is amazing and this is a great image to use for the cover. The back cover shows Vash pointing his gun up with a silhouette of Wolfwood kneeling in a church. The final image is of Knives smiling, holding both of the six-shooters, preparing to create the angel arms. A soliloquy and summary of the episodes is pasted as well.

The extras within the DVD casing are a chapter menu and a feedback slip.

Menu
The menu begins with a spinning image flying at you from a distance. When finally (which is only about a second) the image reaches the front, it is revealed that the image is of a newspaper where the options have been cleverly made into headlines. The cover art of Knives is used as the headline image. Accompanying the newspaper is a musical score fitting to the menu's genre. From the menus I have so far seen on anime DVDs, Trigun's menus have by far been the greatest and most original (8-30-01). 

English
With the strong emotional scenes in the episodes of this volume, Pioneer failed to truly capture them with the dubbing job they did. Wolfwood's monologue about his past is far below how the Japanese version was done, the drama and emotion meant for the scene was lost despite the well-done acting of the VA. 

Moving on, the VA chosen to portray Chapel the Evergreens has the same tone and emotion as the original VA, making this character perfect in the English version.

Though I try not to spoil events in a series, not discussing the death of Wolfwood would be an insult to the series. His final monologue wasn't too bad but lacked the seriousness the character was trying to display when realizing the mistakes he has made in his life. At times, he seemed to even sound like a whining baby crying to his mother; not the final image you want for such a great character. Again, the drama and emotion for such an intense scene was lost.

The VA chosen for the adult version of Knives was completely off character. He sounded far too normal and not sadistic enough. He sounded far too much like Vash without the goofiness. Though they are brothers doesn't mean their voices have to be similar.

The final and most powerful Gung Ho Guns, Midvalley the Hornfreak, was done rather well, as much of a surprise as that may be. I was expecting them to try to "daddio"  the character since he is a saxophone player and meant to come off as a sauve guy. However, they left the character's persona as serious, but did include a few minor instances where he acts cool. However, these instances do not ruin the serious attitude of the character.

A true disappointment was the dubbing done to Vash's final confrontation with Legato Bluesummers. This was mainly due to the VA chosen to portray Legato. The scene falls far below the drama, emotion, and seriousness of the Japanese version. I felt as if I wanted to gag after hearing Legato's British voice attempting to convince Vash to kill him. If (what am I saying?) When you buy this DVD (O_O) I recommend only watching the Japanese version of this scene, even if you watch the English version of everything else.

Japanese
I couldn't believe how well done the episodes were in their original Japanese versions. The past and death monologues of Wolfwood are simply breathtaking in emotion and perfection as well as Legato and Vash's final confrontation. The depression that Vash undergoes after this confrontation was created in such a way that you can almost feel what Vash is experiencing. These four episodes are just perfect and amazing, nothing else can describe them.

Extras
The extras for this DVD were pretty nice. The first is the "Japanese LD Covers" which totaled 13 images of the covers used for the LD releases of Trigun in Japan. Some of these images were used as the cover art for the American release. All the artwork was done by Yasuhiro Nightow. The following extra is "DVD Credits" which is just as informative and just as boring as ever. Next up is "Vash and Knives"; 19 images of the character designs for both characters and their weapons. The final extras on this DVD are the "non-credit opening" and "non-credit closing". The best part about the extras is that the greatest musical score from the series (in my opinion at least) was used. 

Final Thoughts
I was blown away by how great this DVD was. Absolutely everything you would want to see on an anime series is contained in this volume (Minus nudity or anything like that, you know that's what you were thinking ^_^). Even if you have never seen any of the previous volumes, even if you know nothing about the Trigun series, even if you don't have any money or a DVD player, you need to get this volume. The episodes contained are the epidemy of how wonderfully magnificent the Trigun series is. Later minna!

© Eric.