Ben-To: Complete Series

A mock-serious action anime in which supermarkets serve as battlefields (tagline: “victory tastes delicious”), this series centers on teen video game nerd Yo Sato, who is on a limited high-school dining budget. Sato discovers that the markdown prepared-food section in grocery stores is a scene of regular combat, as hungry bento brawlers beat each other senseless to buy bento-box meals at 50 percent off. Inducted by a sexy but fearsome high-school classmate into the "Half-Priced Food Lovers Club," Sato learns to unleash his inner warrior so he can eat prize bento cheap. While there is sublime absurdity in the mythologizing of store clerks, shopping baskets, and bargain-hunting-gone-bloodsport, the one-joke premise eventually grows stale and Ben-To falls back on old anime school-comedy standards: namely nudity, lesbian erotica, and humiliation, although some of the friendship material here is actually rather touching (as is a paean to the obsolete Sega Saturn video game console). Presenting all 12 episodes from 2011 in a dual-language Blu-ray/DVD Combo set, rated TV-14, extras include a featurette with a live-action bento brawl staged by the American voice actors. Recommended, overall. (C. Cassady)