Hey, hey, hey! It’s time for the newest Rising Sun! And oh man, you should’ve been there for this one!

Many anime fans fondly remember Dragon Ball Z, the series that dominated ratings throughout the early 2000s, brought anime to the mainstream and pushed Funimation to the position of the biggest anime distributor in America. And it’s hardly a surprise that their release of the new movie, Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection ‘F’, has dominated the box office in America just as it had in Japan, and is now the ninth highest grossing anime film ever released in American theaters.

I actually had the pleasure of going to see this movie on one of the last screenings of the eight-day theatrical run, and going to see it in the theater enhances the experience. At 7:00, Funimation hosted a pre-show, including a recap of the Freeza saga of the television series, a quiz show with the actors and short previews of the live-action Attack on Titan, the Psycho-Pass film, and a new Ghost in the Shell movie.

At 7:15, the actual movie finally began. Opening with a glimpse of a flower garden with a giant tree in the middle, you get a glimpse of Freeza (Chris Ayres), hanging like a moth from one of the branches. It’s a very ironic, and somewhat appropriate depiction of Hell that series creator and writer Akira Toriyama has decided to show. It’s here that the plot becomes very clear, in the fifteen years since Freeza was defeated, his empire has begun to fall apart. When going to New Namek is no longer an option, the army’s new commander Sorbet (Jeremy Schwartz) reluctantly goes to Earth to gather the Dragon Balls and use their power to resurrect Freeza. Now that he’s back, he decides to train for the first time in his life so he can take his revenge against Goku (Sean Schemmel). After all, he did kill Majin Buu, and went toe-to-toe with a God of Destruction.

What follows is one of the most exciting beatdowns Dragon Ball Z has ever shown. Now that Freeza is back, Bulma (Monica Rail) and her old friend Jaco (Todd Haberkorn) alerts Teinshinhan (John Burgmeier), Krillin (Sonny Strait), Master Roshi (Mike McFarland), Gohan (Kyle Hebert) and Piccolo (Christopher Sabat) so they can battle the invading force. And man was that awesome! Seeing all these heroes get together to get a moment of glory in laying the smackdown on Freeza’s men is one of the most satisfying things long-time fans will see, and Jaco spices things up with his creative fighting tactics.

When that’s all said and done, Freeza enters the fray himself, and it’s here that Goku and Vegeta (Christopher Sabat) arrive to take over the fight. When I wrote my preview of the movie so long ago, I said that the fight choreography and how far Goku has advanced made the movie stand out. The full movie stood out, using all three of the combatants’ fatal flaws to advance the narrative and keep the audience on the edge of their seats, and giving out a plot twist worthy of Gen Urobuchi himself. With a satisfying conclusion (both in terms of character development and from a comedic standpoint), Resurrection ‘F’ nails it on narrative, taking what made Battle of Gods a great film and building upon it.

The animation and sound are spot on as well, with animation far better than what Dragon Ball Z had to offer on television. The usage of CGI allows for more complex scenes hand animation would never be able to do. The fight choreography also makes these battles exciting, fresh and very DBZ-like. The music is spot on as well. It makes things even more intense, fresh and original. The producers even got a metal band called Maximum the Hormone to perform a song for the movie, incidentally about Freeza. The idol group Momoiro Clover Z made their English debut to perform for the movie, and Funimation went so far as to show us the lyrics, making Resurrection ‘F’ a brilliant experience that shines through the night.

Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection ‘F’ will release on Blu-Ray and DVD on October 20th, and is definitely worth your $30 if you love action movies, or just plain love anime.