Just a place to post my ramblings about what I watched/read. My two cents - Strongly recommended
- Recommended
- Not recommended
- Strongly not recommended
Written by: SatĆ Ami, Ćnishi Takahito, Toyoda Momoka
Studio: Kinema Citrus Co., Ltd.
Original run: July 5, 2023 â September 20, 2023
Episodes: 12
WARNINGS: Thereâs bullying and abuse in quite large amount.
The plot in short: In an alternative version of the TaishĆ era in which magic and spirits called Grotesqueries (ç°ćœą, IgyĆ), are real Saimori Miyo, who was born without supernatural talent, is abused and forced into an existence of servitude by her family and, especially, by her stepmother and stepsister. The family then decides to have her marry KudĆ Kiyoka, rumored to be a cruel and abusive man. Her husband to be, however, proves to be a good person and they slowly start to fall in love.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Commercials mostly. They showed the anime had a really pretty graphic and the plot seemed mysterious and dramatic enough to interest me.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
The anime series covers only the first 2 volumes of the light novel series. Things are cut or simplified so to fit them into the new media but, whatâs more, while the series gives a sense of conclusion to the romance, the plot regarding the mystery concerning the Grotesqueries and other things are left completely unfinished. So if you were here for that, prepare yourself to feel disappointed.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âAnata no Soba ni.â (èČŽæčăźćŽă«ă âBy Your Side.â) by Riria and as ending âVita Philosophicaâ (ă°ăżă»ăăŁăăœăăŁă«) by ItĆ KashitarĆ. The opening is very pretty, from the sweet music to the beautiful images which match well enough with the music. I liked how young Miyo went to old Miyo but found particularly cute to see the two cherry petal overlapping as to symbolize Miyo and Kiyokaâs love. The ending is equally pretty, although it has a rougher edge and the images are deliberately moving in a stilled way. Neither is so impressive youâll be amazed but both are really pleasant to watch and cute.
The plot: The plot of the romance overlap with mysteries regarding the Grotesqueries, Miyoâs motherâs family and Miyoâs lack of power and the plotting of people seeking power. While the ideas are all interesting⊠in the end the anime focuses mostly on the romance, maybe because since it wasnât going to cover all the volumes, it just couldnât focus on the rest. The romance plot is very cute and sweet so if youâre into love stories you might totally enjoy it.
The characters: Theyâre cute, pretty and you might like them but they felt very one-dimensional to me. Theyâre either very, very nice or theyâre very, very bad.
The visual: Oh, I love it. Everything is so pretty and detailed. And those beautiful kimono the characters use⊠oh, thatâs the best part, really.
The musical background: The music is very nice and sweet. Evan Call made lovely compositions for this anime. They can be relaxing and giving a good atmosphere.
Overall: The fact that the characters are so one dimensional and the mystery plots are a bit neglected due to the story stopping earlier on are two important downsides⊠but the love story is so lovely and cute itâs still a very sweet series to watch.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
Miyo and Kiyoka are a couple overwhelmingly cute, with Miyo not properly appreciating herself (she goes so far as to think she has no right to be happy because she has no supernatural abilities) and Kiyoka trying to act cold but then slowly warming up and becoming protective and Miyo also slowly gaining confidence.
And other characters came out as cute and lovable.
The problem comes with the characters who arenât meant to be lovable. Theyâre just represented as so evil and disgusting itâs like watching âCinderellaâ and having to deal with the stepmother and stepsisters but without the fun parts of the Disney movie (well, the story has quite a lot in common with Cinderella, to be honest). The bad people is just bad, overwhelmingly so (I mean, not only her family abused her but they even threatened to kill her if she werenât to turn down Kiyokaâs proposition!), and this generates such a sharp contrast with how instead the nice people is just SO VERY NICE the story really feel split into good characters and evil characters, which ends up making characters look too fictional. In truth the good characters are a bit more than just good as theyâre more developed than the evil ones, so itâs possible that the evil ones came out as just evil because there was no time to develop them but it still feels like the story is presenting an overly simple good vs bad view of people, fitting for a child story more than this genre of story.
Long story short, I think developing more the antagonists would have benefitted the story.
The whole supernatural abilities with the Grotesqueries and the bad guy in the shadow part of the plot is also way too neglected, which is a pity because itâs actually interesting but⊠it feels really sidelined to the love story. It still exists and you can still enjoy it but⊠itâs just too little.
So to sum it up this is a cute, cute, cute love story one can definitely enjoy, but it would have benefitted from having the other parts of the story developed more. Still, I think itâs pretty and enjoyable enough so itâs nice to watch it.
And now letâs end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching: Eyes off you
Two cents of ramblings on: âYami no Matsueiâ (Anime)...
...and why I recommend it.
GENERAL DATA
Title: Yami no Matsuei (éăźæ«èŁ âDescendants of Darknessâ)
Media: Anime television series
Adaptation of: Yami no Matsuei (éăźæ«èŁ âDescendants of Darknessâ) ShĆjo manga by Matsushita YĆko
Genre: Dark fantasy, mystery, supernatural
Directed by: Tokira Hiroko
Written by: Amiya Masaharu, Horii Akiko
Studio: J.C. Staff
Original run: October 2, 2000 â December 18, 2000
Episodes: 13
WARNINGS: There are gruesome murder, paedophilia, rape, human experimentation, demonic possession, humans turning into monsters, suicideâŠ
The plot in short: In the world of the dead, Meifu, the JĆ«Ć-chĆ takes care to judge the sins of the deceased. A sub section of this institution is the shĆkan-ka (summoning division), specialized in dealing with troubles in regards to the dead and whose employers are called shinigami. Among them thereâs Tsuzuki Asato, in charge of the KyĆ«shĆ« area who, along with his new partner, Kurosaki Hisoka, is called to investigate on some mysterious deaths happening in that area and that are all connected with surgeon Muraki Kazutaka.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Surprisingly enough, in a time in which everyone was watching the anime, I started with the manga instead, and since I loved it, I decided to watch the anime as well.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Most of the background of the story is a fantasy version of Japanese myths and beliefs so itâs probably funnier/easier to watch it if youâre aware of whatâs the Meifu, whoâs Enma, what are the Shinigami and Shikigami, onmyĆdĆ, how Tsuzukiâs shikigami match the ones of Abe no Seimei and so on. You can still enjoy it though, taking those ideas just as a fantasy concept but you might go into overload at how many are introduced.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âEDENâ by To destination and as ending âLOVE MEâ by The Hong Kong Knife.
I love, love, love âEDENâ. The music is beautiful and the imagery is symbolic and well fitting the slow melody. I think itâs a bit of an odd choice to always open it with a voice giving ALWAYS the same explanation of whatâs Meifu and so on but whatever, since not everyone might be familiar with those concepts it might help. âLOVE MEâ is not bad though not something I would call my fave, as it plays we see illustration for the manga which are clearly beautiful but, overall, this montage doesnât tell me much.
The plot: Since itâs solely 13 episodes, the anime decided to focus solely on 4 manga arcs which were, at the time, the most meaningful in the story. Even if the series ends with an open ending, the result is still a coherent enough story that focuses mostly on the main characters but manages to give them story arcs so that you can appreciate their evolution.
The characters: Due to the many arcs cut, some side characters were left out or received little developments. The main one though are well enough developed and interesting to watch as they go through their arcs. Itâs easy to end up loving them.
The visual: In the manga the character design changed often as the authorâs style evolved a lot, the anime went for one that made the characters slender but still pretty. The charactersâ faces are expressive and there are some nice shoots. I like how, although colours arenât generally bright, the eyes of the characters and magic effects always seem to be brighter.
Byakko for example, despite technically being just white with some black stripes, seems to shine.
Suzaku too...
The scenery isnât impressive but accurate enough...
...and when it involves Sakura it can get very pretty.
The musical background:I love it! There is music which is extremely sweet and some which is pretty evocative. I especially love âTozasareta Kokoroâ and âKaeru Bashoâ but also the version of âAkuma no Trillâ (or, if you prefer, âIl trillo del diavoloâ by Giuseppe Tartini) used is awesome or the song âAmethyst Remembranceâ, oh, theyâre really too many, really, kudos to SaitĆ Tsuneyoshi for creating them.
Overall: Itâs a good series, that despite cutting so many parts of the manga manages to still stand up alone and deliver a story, something that canât be always said for more recent works that cut a lot and end up losing the story they were meant to tell.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
So⊠two more words about the opening which I really love. I said the imagery is symbolic, but you donât get how much until you watch the whole series and realize ITâS ALL IN THE OPENING. Basically the opening tells you all thatâs going to happen and you donât even realize until you donât watch the series and connect all the dots. Itâs AWESOME.
Going on with the story. As I said this story is born as a ShĆjo. The three main characters all had, at some point, a female love interest or so it seems. The anime instead preferred to be more ShĆnen ai, focusing on and empathizing on the male relations, mostly cutting out the females one so that, back in 2000, this anime was considered a ShĆnen ai one and fans would get furious is someone were to suggest the characters had female love interests.
Itâs not a praise or a complain, itâs just a choice⊠and in insight not even a bad one as, even in the original story, the male relations were more interesting than the ones the male characters had with the females they met.
On the downside sometimes this ended up tying characters to the stereotypes of the ShĆnen ai more than they were. For example Tsuzuki in the manga can be pretty feral and strong (with a punch he breaks bulletproof glass)⊠but in the anime heâs more ukefied, his strength lying in his Shikigami more than in himself. They also remark his cute/puppy/childish side even more as well as his propensity to cry. Still Tsuzuki remains a wonderful character and one of the most beloved, if not the most beloved.
On the other side Muraki comes out as even more of a pervert and sadistic (and thatâs saying A LOT as Muraki is pretty terrible in the manga too), obsessed with Tsuzuki, with having his attention and his body and jealous of Hisoka.
I said they had cut arcs from the manga⊠but to make up for it they had, in some points expanded the ones they decided to use and, since the manga at the time was ongoing and hadnât developed yet the relation between Saiki and Muraki, they gave Muraki a reason to hate Saiki so that the story would feel solid.
The emotions of the characters are well developed, the evolution of the relationship between Tsuzuki and Hisoka is very good⊠but also very good is how the respective traumas are handled.
The themes of the story are intriguing.
They play on the idea of immortality, if itâs a good or a terrible things...
Tatsumi: Itâs like a small ship sailing off into the sunset. The cherry trees bloom here all year long. What a relazing place...
Tsuzuki: You think so. I think itâs because we know blossoms die so soon that theyâre beautiful.
... if itâs right or wrong to sacrifice others to survive...
Tsuzuki: What are you doing?
Young Tsuzuki: Caring for the roses. The best way to make pretty roses is to cut off the extra buds. Itâs something all gardeners do.
Tsuzuki: But donât you feel sorry for the buds? Theyâre trying their best to become flowers, too.
Young Tsuzuki: You have no right to speak that way. Asato. You are a murderer! Like these roses, you have survived nipping peopleâs lives in the buds!!
Tsuzuki: No, I just...
Young Tsuzuki: Then how do you explain whatâs behind you?
Tsuzuki: No, I didnât want to kill them!!
... the fact that the characters are rejected from society because theyâre perceived as monsters...
Tsuzuki: Hey, Hisoka. Muraki said Iâm not human. Then, what AM I?
Hisoka: Tsuzuki...
Tsuzuki: If Iâm not a human, then I... What AM I, anyway?
Hisoka: What do you mean?
Tsuzuki: Now I remember, when I was a kid, everyone bullied me. I was different... different from everyone... They accused me of being a monster.
How they can find a place to call home where theyâre accepted...
Hisoka: ...is this Tsuzukiâs past? Discrimination, persecution, loneliness... and hatred of his own existence...
Tsuzuki: I knew just what it was that made me different...
Hisoka: They treated you so horribly...
Tsuzuki: But... I wanted to be with them... I wanted to be a human!!
Hisoka: You ARE a human! I guarantee it!
Tsuzuki: Hisoka...
Hisoka: You've always been a human! So donât cry anymore!
...and...
Hisoka: Up until now... Tsuzuki has rescued me other and over... When I was unable to trust and open myself up to others even after death... he gently held me in his warm arms. He always watched over me with a smile!! Now that Tsuzuki... is in trouble... I want to rescue him!! This time... I WANT TO BE THE ONE TO CONFORT HIM!!!
...and...
Hisoka: The first time I found a place to call âhomeâ... Watari-san... Tatsumi-san... the members of the shĆkan-ka... You are all family to me... And it was Tsuzuki who lead me to accept all of you... Because he was near, I had a place with everyone else. I fight... to rescue Tsuzuki!
... the inescapability of fate...
Muraki: Tsuzuki-san... Even if you kill me you will not be freed from your deep sadness. Those born in the chaos of darkness are doomed to wander eternally through the darkness. There is no escape. Neither for me, nor for you. For we are both descendants of darkness!!
... suicidal thoughts and what helps you to cling to life...
Hisoka: Tsuzuki! Letâs go! Tsuzuki...
Tsuzuki: Let me die, Hisoka. Iâve already lived more than my share... I... Iâm just tired. I canât exist anymore. So, godb... Hisoka?
Hisoka: THEN STAY AT LEAST FOR MY SAKE!! I donât want to be alone anymore!! Where I belong... is by your side!! I... I need you!!
Tsuzuki: Can I... stay with you?
I love the way they handled Hisokaâs problems at connecting with people due to his sad past and his empathy (since he can perceive other peopleâs feelings he has been labeled as a monster by his family and kept imprisoned by them) but also how they handled Tsuzukiâs sense of guilt and fear of being a monster due to the unnatural colour of his eyes.
The series make a good work at capturing the contrast between the two, so that were Hisoka is withdrawn, standoffish and finds hard to make friends, Tsuzuki is extrovert and friendly and extremely caring and warm⊠but also where Hisoka manages to stay psychologically strong despite being weak physically, itâs were Tsuzuki instead break despite being on the outward extremely strong (only magically in the anime, although in the manga he was also strong physically).
And then thereâs Muraki, the bad guy you love to hate.
Muraki is a sadistic killer who rapes a teenager and then kills him slowly, after making him live in pain for three years, murders left and right, manipulates young women and even turn one of them into a monster, obsesses and sexually harass Tsuzuki and might have raped him as well.
But Muraki is a surgeon whoâs supposed to save people and also depicted as charming and looking like an angel, heâs basically all white with white hair and silver eyes and white clothes, and all this contrast with Tsuzuki, whoâs a Shinigami and therefore supposed to kill people and dresses all in black, with dark brown hair and unnaturally purple eyes (which are associated with demons) but whoâs also genuinely a good person, who wants to help others and is tormented due to the nature of his work.
The visual plays a lot on those two, on how theyâre basically yin and yang and itâs great.
And Muraki and Tsuzuki arenât the only two on which the anime plays on contrast, thereâs also Hijiri and Hisoka, Hijiri being open about his feelings while Hisoka guarding them or Hisoka and Tsubaki, Hisoka hating Muraki for what he has done to him while Tsubaki canât help but love him despite how he used her.
Should I also mention how the mystery and the drama in the story are excellent but the funny moments too are overall very nice?
And yeah, I said there are gruesome murders but the anime, differently from other animes, present them in a tasteful manner, the gory scenes are implied not shown for the sake to gross us out. You get the horror of the deaths⊠but you donât get the stomach turning visual.
And what about the use of the music? The music is beautiful and itâs really well used to underline the mood of each scene. Here too they did a great work.
Really, itâs an old anime and not as good as the manga (despite the manga being still unfinished) but itâs still a good transposition of the manga and a story that can stand on its own.
If you can stomach what a horrible person Muraki is I wholeheartedly recommend it.
And now letâs end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching: Possession
Two cents of ramblings on: âUmineko no naku koro niâ (Anime)...
...and why I STRONGLY DONâT recommend it (read the novel or the manga instead, they're AWESOME!).
GENERAL DATA
Title: Umineko no Naku Koro ni (ăăżăăăźăȘăé ă«âWhen the seagulls cryâ)
Media: Anime television series
Adaptation of: Umineko no Naku Koro ni (ăăżăăăźăȘăé ă« âWhen the seagulls cryâ) shĆnen dĆjin soft visual novel by Ryukishi07 and 07th expansion.
WARNINGS: There are gruesome murders, psychological and physical torture, nakedness, abuse.
The plot in short: On October 4, 1986 for the annual family conference, the Ushiromiya family gather on Rokkenjima island, a small island owned by the family head, KinzĆ, who also reside there and whose health is declining. Among the family members thereâs Ushiromiya Battler, one of KinzĆâs nephews, who comes back after a 6 years absence. A storm traps the family, the servants and the family doctor on the island, while a letter from the Golden Witch, Beatrice, challenges them to solve the epitaph so as to find KinzĆâs secret stash of gold or die according to the epitaph.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
As I watched âHigurashi no naku koro niâ and âHigurashi no naku koro ni Kaiâ I thought I might enjoy this series as well.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
This story is filled with murders which are gruesome in nature and depiction (and Iâll show some images of them). The TV version censors them by blurring/covering the scenes but the dvd version shows them in all their gory nature. You might not feel like stomaching them. The anime also covers only the first part of the story. A second anime covering âUmineko no naku koro ni Chiruâ was never realized so the only way to see the end of the story is to either read the Visual Novel or read the excellent manga transposition. This series is also split in 4 arcs, each of them proposing a different version of what happened on Rokkenjima on those fateful days. Also I reference âHigurashi no naku koro niâ and mention âGolden Kamuyâ.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âKatayoku no Toriâ (ççżŒăźéł„ âOne-Winged Birdâ) by Shikata Akiko and as ending âLa Divina Tragedia: Makyokuâ (la divina tragediaïœéæČïœ âThe Divine Tragedy: Diabolic Songâ) by Jimang from Sound Horizon.
I love the opening, the mixing of Italian text and Japanese one, Shikata Akikoâs voice so perfect as she sings this. Although the opening is the same through all the episodes, the visual changes 4 times, so that in a way the 4 arcs all have visually different openings, though sometimes the differences arenât that radical. Although the visual might remember the opening of a visual novel (but this series had birth as a visual novel so itâs fitting) the images often well match with the rhythm and the words of the song, creating an iconic opening many love. The ending also has a beautiful music, through the visual, after a quick panning of a long chessboard, is mostly of scenery which donât really match the song in any way. The only noteworthy bit is the one at the end that shows two empty chairs, then Battler and Beatrice on them, then they disappear from them. Still, the most of the anime viewers who also know the Visual Novel and the manga, agree that the opening and the ending are one of the few great things of the anime.
The plot: Now the plot of âUmineko no naku koro niâ is intriguing, deep, mysterious, elaborate, psychologically and socially well studied, in short, AMAZING! Too bad the anime cuts it so much itâs barely understandable. It feels more like watching a messed up summary, the changes affecting the mystery parts so that the solution of some mysteries becomes impossible.
The characters: Although this story has a VERY LARGE cast (Just the Ushiromiya family counts 12 members plus there are 5 servants and a guest, the doctor, for a total of 18, plus thereâs Beatrice and all her magical underlings and letâs not forget Ange, Bern and Lambda... yeah, as I said a VERY LARGE cast) the characters are well studied from a psychological point of view, theyâre deep and intriguing and well characterized⊠or better, they are as such in the visual novel and the manga. The many cuts of the anime, the poor adaptation of scenes made by cutting dialogues or changing them or changing expressions or not showing them or generally making a mess of things made pretty hard to get to know most of them and will mislead you on who they are or how their character is. In short, a mess.
The visual: Letâs start with the âupâ side. The anime improved Ryukishi07âs art so the character design is kind of better than his own. Not great, Iâm not even sure Iâll call it good but⊠itâs better. And thatâs the only nice thing I can say because, for everything else, the visual is poor. Scenery, shots, charactersâ expressions, charactersâ position, quality of the graphic⊠You name it itâs a mess that drags in even in some illustrations for the anime and in the dvd version. Even the Pachinko game is better than this mess.
The musical background: Actually this one is one of the few very good things. The people working on it where mostly the same of the ones making the music for the visual novel so they keep the same atmosphere and, hey, the visual novel had beautiful music so this works for the anime too. This is a BGM you can enjoy to listen.
Overall: Someone might remember I had no flattering words for the âGolden Kamuyâ anime adaptation. Well, the âGolden Kamuyâ anime adaptation is a masterpiece compared to âUmineko no naku koro niâ because, even though they share many flaws, at least the visual is, despite not being great, way better and thereâs not all this interest in showing breasts and backsides in place of what we need to see.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
I started my âUmineko no naku no koro niâ experience with this anime and, after finishing it, I didnât want to hear anything else about it. It wasnât like âGolden Kamuyâ, a poor adaptation but that still was good enough it encouraged me to read the manga. It just discouraged me from having anything to do with the story. If it wasnât for a friend who insisted and persuaded me to give the visual novel a chance, assuring me it was good and the anime messed up, I would have never known how AWESOME the source material was.
This adaptation lacks direction, itâs as if Studio Deen picked up hoping it would sell as âHigurashi no naku koro niâ did but then they felt confuse by how the story was different and had no idea how to process it.
They put hardly any effort in the visual.
Thereâs a senseless abuse of creepy/deformed faces (mostly with Maria)...
...but, apart from this, compared to the visual novel where the characters have an EXTREMELY LARGE range of expressions, here they have a rather poor one, often not even showing them. The scenery is not so great and all the anime seems to love showing are gruesome scenes,
creepy faces and⊠giggling breasts and waving backsides or characters in inappropriate poses (when George cries over his motherâs body, the scene seems to focus more on how he rubs his face in his motherâs breasts than on his grief),
the changes of scenes are poor and, often abrupt. Some shots are simply horrid, the proportions of the characters messed up...
...some movements are so weird they seemed comical when they arenât meant to...
and the shoots are often bad, cutting heads...
... or being rather weird...
...or focusing on breasts and backsides (sometimes placing the characters in uncomfortable poses to have a better shoot at their backside) instead than on what characters are doing or on their expression in a way thatâs not even sexy in such circumstances.
Characters often donât react appropriately (When George is griefstriken and supposedly unable to support himself Battler and Jessica hold him as if he were a sack of potatoes, apart from NanjĆ no one seems to care Jessica is coughing her lugs out...)
The cuts from a scene to the other are a mess because, often, too abrupt, with charactersâ dialogues ending up being mistaken for the continuation of the previous scene.
They had no interest in having us solve the epitaph, which gets barely any attention⊠which okay, I can partly understand but stillâŠ
They actually had no interest in us solving the mystery either. Ryukishi07 said he would work with Studio Deen but somehow communication should have been lacking because the anime adapted some scenes in such a way that the intended solution becomes impossible (NanjĆ taking care of Kanonâs wound in front of everyone so that they would see thereâs no wound, Natsuhi also being shoot in front of everyone so for Beatrice itâs impossible to hide the letter Natsuhi had with herself...).
They hardly made an effort to characterize the characters. Where they were complicate people now theyâre AT BEST given a character trait and thatâs it. Sometimes not even that and they just loom in the background (episode 1 even forget to show NanjĆâs name).
This comes especially bad in regard to Beatrice and to the one character whoâs the true identity of Beatrice, but also in regard to Battler and Angeâs feelings.
Weâre talking of main characters here, not of side characters, those at least should have been well cared for.
They cut a lot, indiscriminately, but then they were totally capable to waste time for things that werenât needed like random shots of the weather worsening, or of the clock when they could have just showed it in the background behind the characters.
Now, credits when itâs due, the visual novel is a massive work.
It was impossible to transpose its first 4 arcs in 26 episodes, 26 episodes are barely enough for 2 arcs, not 4. So if it was just the cutting⊠I guess I wouldnât be so negative.
But here itâs more than just cutting, here itâs lack of care.
Iâve seen fans animating the final sequence of the dialogue between Battler and Beatrice way better than the anime did. Iâve seen the Pachinko game make the characters way more expressive than the anime did, with the tiny bit they animated with jerky animation being way better transposition than the anime one.
I donât know why things went so bad with the anime, why they missed the good spots of this AWESOME story (the charactersâ dept, the social themes, the mystery) to focus just on gory scenes (which are drawn in that sort of ugly way that doesnât impress you, more like disgust you not for the gory scene but for the animation), breasts and backsides and creepy, almost insane faces as if they came to believe this was what made âHigurashi no naku koro niâ good and, in order to make this series good as well, they would need to recycle those plot elements and nothing more. Because yeah, they had âHigurashi no naku koro niâ in mind as we have extra scenes showing Maria watching some random scenes from the âHigurashi no naku koro niâ anime.
To sum it all⊠read the visual novel or the AMAZING, AWESOME manga adaptation which, in the âUmineko no naku koro ni Chiruâ part contains improved scenes but watch the anime solely after them⊠if you really have to watch it, because boys⊠itâs ugly and messy and misleading and really, it would seriously need a remake but I doubt theyâll even make one since the fact this mess was a commercial flop apparently discouraged Japanese producers who missed the fact that if the anime was a flop it was solely because the anime was poorly done, not because the story was lacking.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching: Dolls of Rokkenjima 2.0
The plot in short: Despite the directorâs wishes, Brain Surgeon Dr. Kenzo Tenma, believing âall lives are equalâ operates Johan Liebert, who was admitted earlier in the hospital, instead of the mayor, who arrived later, and saves Johanâs life. Little he knows Johan, despite being a kid, is a dangerous killer, who resumes murdering as soon as heâs better. Tenma ends up being suspected for Johanâs crime and has to escape. He then starts hunting for Johan.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
âMonsterâ is the sort of classic manga/anime one has to see and I waited even too long in watching it so, as soon as I had some free time, I decided digging into it.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
I mentioned âThe Fugitiveâ an American movie directed by Andrew Davis dated 1993
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âGrainâ by Haishima Kuniaki and, as ending,
- for episode 1 to 32 âFor the Love of Lifeâ by David Sylvian.
- for episodes 33 to 74 "Make it Home" by Ingrid Fujiko Hemming.
Iâve mixed feelings for the opening. âGrainâ is an instrumental music but that gives a fitting atmosphere. The visual however seems more fitting for the second part of the series, as it kind of spoiled it. I mean, after the title we see a wasteland and then Tenma into the city with the look heâll had later in the story, when heâll be a fugitive without even Dieter with him, his shoulders hunched over as he keeps away from people or escapes. So itâs not like itâs bad, but when I watched it with the first episodes, it just felt spoilerish and gave me the wrong vibe.
The two ending basically shows images from the story âThe monster with no nameâ, a tale told in the story. The idea is interesting because at first you donât understand what theyâre showing, especially considering they donât show the whole tale but just a bit of it, but then you notice that, after a while, they change and show the next part of the tale, and then the next, and then the next, and you start getting curious with the story thatâs being shown⊠then you get familiar with the tale and figure out what youâre seeing and itâs intelligent and interesting. So, while at first they might not make much of an impression, as the anime progress, you start watching them with interest.
The plot: âMonsterâ was inspired by âThe Fugitiveâ but itâs much more than just Tenma escaping and trying to prove heâs innocent and chasing the real culprit. The story digs into complicate themes like âif all the lives really are equalâ, whatâs the sense of self and identity, social relations and how they affect people, trauma and how it destroy them, what makes happiness, if people want to die or not, the fact that different choices can bring to different results and so on and itâs all so damn good. I love how also some themes are delivered by paralleling the stories of the characters with the tales of child books. Really, this is a great and complicate story.
The characters: The characters are amazing. Theyâre different and well constructed, realistic and intriguing. They make you feel for them or they make you hate them but theyâll hardly leave you indifferent. With some you can empathize really hard, with some is more difficult and Johan is an enigma we try hard to unravel and weâre probably not fully meant to but still itâs all so good and even minor characters feel so real so yeah, itâs great.
The visual: âMonsterâ isnât something that makes me think âoh this is so prettyâ but this doesnât mean the visual doesnât have its charm. The character design for each character is very different and well constructed. Theyâre often not meant to be pretty but to feel real, to feel like the tons of people you meet everyday, not like the bishĆnen/bishĆjo of manga tales. The colours arenât bright but they fit the mood of the story. Thereâs still a care for the scenery, a realism to it so, although itâs not pretty, itâs good. The characters come out as expressive and nuanced so yeah, itâs a good work.
The musical background: Haishima Kuniaki gave this series a rather fitting BGM, which can very well get you unsettled when the story needs you to be. It might not be something youâll want to listen on a happy day, but it fits very well the mood of the story.
Overall: Itâs a great and complicate story that will make you ponder a lot about many things. Yes, it takes time to watch it all because itâs 74 episodes and many of us have gotten used to series of 12 episodes but that time is well spent. Without rushing this series will lead you through its plot and its themes, offering you emotions and points to ponder in an amazing travel through plenty of important topics so really, spare some time to try it out.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
Thereâs so, so much to love about âMonsterâ.
I love, love, love the way this story digs into the psychology of the characters, how it focuses on their ideas but also on their growth, how it forces them to face âthe other side of the coinâ, challenging their beliefs and their determination to pursue them.
Letâs pick Tenma, for example. He tries to stick to a noble idea âall lives are equalâ and then⊠he sees this ideal challenged when he discovered not only that he has saved a serial killer who also killed people he knew merely because he overheard him saying they were better off dead. Tenmaâs travel through the whole story is amazing, how he decides he has to correct his mistake of saving Johan by killing him yet how he canât make himself do it because he still values human lives, how he stop himself from helping whoever he meets, how he blames himself when he believes he killed Roberto in self defense, his fear, his determination, everything is good, relatable, solid, down to how he ultimately manages not to kill anyone and even decides to save Johanâs life.
But Lungeâs travel too is interesting. This man, persuaded heâs always right and that, therefore Tenma has to be the culprit and that heâll arrest him and have him executed, comes to realize he was wrong and, ultimately, although he knows Johanâs role in the mess, makes it so that Tenma will have a chance to save him.
Or what about Eva? At the start sheâs a terrible person, then she sinks into despair and further ruins herself and worsen her character⊠but then, thanks to her meeting with Martin and his efforts to save her, she manages to pull herself out of her misery, both her anger at Tenma and her grief for Martin, drop drinking and start a new life as interior decorator.
And what about Doctor Gillen, who first has a low opinion of Tenma, due to having been envious of him in his university years and believing Tenma caught him as he cheated during the final exams and looked down at him, things he hated... so he wants to hand off Tenma to the police, but then discovers that Johan is real and therefore Tenma is innocent and tries to help him.
Or Verdemann, the lawyer whoâs plagued by the idea his father was a spy and therefore he canât trust people⊠but by starting to work to help Tenma learns more about his deceased father and manages to reconcile with him.
Or Grimmer, a former subject at 511 Kinderheim, whoâs a really nice man but, due to what he went through at 511 Kinderheim, has troubles connecting with his emotions⊠who in his death finally manages to connect and express with his own pain for losing his son.
And then thereâs Johan, whoâs an enigma, characters constantly theorizing on him and on what turned him into a monster and theyâre all on something but no one seems to even grasp the full truth because a person is just that complicate.
But this is just the tip of the iceberg in a story who has plenty of interesting characters.
Also, the adaptation does itâs best to be faithful to the manga Urasawa Naoki demanding everything in the manga was adapted and giving directives during its making.
âMonsterâ is an amazing story on trying to discover what turns people the way they are, on what saves them or sinks them and on how humans are actually so very complicate that often itâs not possible to find those answers because although everything contributes into turning us âUSâ itâs actually quite difficult for us to find the exact point in which a path derailed in a way or another.
Long story short, itâs for adults and itâs not what I would call a series for someone who just want to pass a fun time without thinking at deep stuff but I TOTALLY RECOMMEND IT as itâs deep and intriguing and make you ponder and itâs mysterious and well constructed. Yeah, itâs long but just watch it, you wonât regret it.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Running Up That Hill PT. 2 - Johan Liebert & Anna Liebert
Adaptation of: BungĆ STRAY DOGS (æè±ȘăčăăŹă€ăăă°ăč âLiterary master stray dogsâ) Seinen manga written by Asagiri Kafka
Genre: Action, mystery, supernatural
Directed by: Igarashi Takuya
Written by: Enokido YĆji
Studio: Bones
Original run: 7 April 2016 - 23 June 2016
Episodes: 12
WARNINGS: Thereâs death, mafia (or should I say Yakuza?), human objectification, suicide attempts, murders, terrorist attacks.
The plot in short: Nakajima Atsushi, a teen driven out from an orphanage, rescues Dazai Osamu from drowning. Due to this meeting he learns he has a supernatural ability which transform him into a berserker white tiger in the moonlight. This lead him to join the Armed Detective Agency, an Agency of supernaturally gifted people and to fight other groups of supernaturally gifted men.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Back then I saw the promotional video and it seemed interesting so I decided to try it out.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
You might enjoy more the series if youâve some knowledge of Japanese literature as each character is named after a famous writer and their supernatural abilities are named after their works or something that happened in them (hence the âBungĆâ in the title) because characters and abilities are actually inspired by writers and their works.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âTrash Candyâ by Granrodeo and as ending âNamae wo Yobu yoâ (ććăćŒă¶ă âI'll call your nameâ) by Luck Life. I loved both. The opening well work to introduce both the Armed Detective Agency members and the Port Mafia members with some very smart shoots and a good dose of dynamism. The ending also has some clever shoots but focuses mostly on Atsushi, Dazai and Akutagawa, playing on the contrast between Atsushi and Akutagawa and their relation with Dazai, assigning to Atsushi an azure colour while Akutagawa has red. It also plays a lot with the theme of books as it starts with Atsushi reading a book and then we will have various shoots in which we see a book or pages floating in the air. Overall both are very good.
The plot: âBungĆ Stray Dogsâ is a still ongoing manga, so the series focuses mostly on introducing the main characters and the setting in a series of episodic plots which results in covering the first 4 volumes of the manga⊠and it does its work well as you easily get how that world work and start to know and like the characters. The mood well alternate from amusing to dramatic to action filled so this is also something worth praising in this series.
The characters: We get to know around 20 characters in 12 episodes, some well enough to find them worth of our love, some instead are just introduced, but theyâre all recognizable enough and feel interesting and make us want to know more about them.
The visual: The visual is good, the backgrounds are detailed and well cared for, thereâs a good use of lights to create atmosphere, the animation is fluid, the effects when the characters use their special abilities are good. This series as an interesting quirk of using boxes that feel like pages in which one would write a novel to deliver information, writing them as if someone was just typing them inside the boxes. As they donât fill them with too much info they arenât annoying. The colouring isnât bright unless someone is using a special ability, which draws even more attention on it. The character design makes each character very recognizable. Overall itâs all good.
The musical background: Iwasaki Taku created an interesting BGM for the series, but, as far as Iâm involved, itâs nothing I really came to love or be impressed with, although it had some good moments.
Overall: Itâs an interesting start for a series thatâs clearly meant to continue. I think you enjoy it even more if you can get the references between the charactersâ name and abilities and the writers and their works but, even if you donât, itâs still a good work that will intrigue you ad make you long for more
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
Personally I loved Atsushiâs struggle to find a place to belong and his own self worth. Heâs a kind and naĂŻve soul but one who can be very capable when put to pressure but, due to his unlucky upbringing, he holds no love for himself and heâs sure he has no worth. Despite this heâs a surprisingly nice person. When we meet him, even though he was starving and homeless, he saved Dazai from drowning. Later, he threw himself on a bomb to protect the others. Then despite being scared and warned of the danger Akutagawa presented, he faced him to protect the Tanizaki siblings. Then, even though he was told not to, he fought Akutagawa again to try to save KyĆka, whom he perceived as similar to himself as she canât control well her own ability and would like to die so as not to be used as a killer anymore. And when Atsushi decides to give his all he can be a surprisingly good fighter, heâs not skilled just because he uses the power of the tiger but also because he uses his brain when fighting. Long story short, although Atsushi seems weak, he has a great inner strength he uses to help others and is overall awesome.
And of course I love how KyĆka too gains a sense of self worth through her connection to Atsushi and stop wishing for her own death but tries to find a way to live.
Dazai is also an amazing character. Heâs amazingly capable, mysterious, funny, suicidal, intelligent, dark, merciless and kind at the same time, his personality having so many facets, so heâs pretty similar to a diamond in a way. Heâs complicate and intriguing and make you want to know more about him, a lot more.
Akutagawa is also an interesting character, with so much rage inside him that hides how filled with pain he is, how desperate he is to prove himself to Dazai to the point heâs beyond jealous of Atsushi and fixates on Dazai failing to realize around him thereâs people who cares for him like Higuchi. He clearly need to be explored more, as we only seem to graze his own surface but he sure feels interesting.
Special mention for Mori Ćgai, the leader of the Port Mafia, who in the last episode seemed a harmless guy searching for little Elise, and even manages to pass for a good person when he advises Atsushi during his fight with Lucy.
Mori Ćgai: No, boy. Your enemy lies that way. I wouldnât advise running away in this particular case. Er, that is, if you trust the words of your local neighborhood physician. If you were to believe her words, youâll forget everything once you leave through that door. Youâll remember neither the enemyâs subterfuge, nor your colleagues in danger. And the enemy will continue to press her attack. Iâll teach you something of use. In game theory the optimal strategy is to launch a total counteroffensive on an enemy who has attacked you. Crush the enemy.
Nakajima Atsushi: But how?
Mori Ćgai: An arrogant enemy who feels invincible is the most vulnerable opponent of all. And did I hear right, that the ones beyond that door are the very ones who desperately tried to save you when you were taken?
Sure, differently from Atsushi, we could clearly tell he was suspicious as hell when interacting with him and then thereâs the fact he scared Lucy to death with just a look, but he still came out as interesting and he even advises Atsushi short after his fight has ended.
Mori Ćgai: Boy⊠A logical, optimal solution exists in any wartime situation, no matter how difficult the challenge. You must not forget that, especially in times of confusion when you might feel inclined to recklessness.
âŠand it seems a good advice but⊠if we scratch at the surface a logical, optimal solution is a cold matter that doesnât keep into consideration emotions or human lives, which fits with how he is the Port Mafia leader and previously, when he âmotivatedâ Atsushi to fight, he actually manipulated him into doing so.
So yeah, heâs an interesting guy. Well, actually everyone is interesting and I could talk about all of them a lot but I think itâll be better if Iâll let you discover them.
Overall âBungĆ Stray Dogsâ is definitely a series worth watching that will give you fun, drama and lot of action as well as a dip into literature. It work well if you want to get into the manga or can be just enjoyed as a stand alone or, maybe, you can move to the next series as this one is just the first series and there are 2 more series (a 4th is also planned), an OAV and a movie. So if youâre just an anime person and not into manga you still have a lot to watch.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching: One Way Or Another
Two cents of ramblings on: âYĆjo Senki - The Saga of Tanya the Evilâ (âThe Military Chronicles of a Little Girl - The Saga of Tanya the Evilâ) (Anime version)
GENERAL DATA
Title: YĆjo Senki - The Saga of Tanya the Evil (ćčŒć„łæŠèš The Saga of Tanya the Evil âThe Military Chronicles of a Little Girl - The Saga of Tanya the Evilâ)
Media: Anime television series
Inspired by: YĆjo Senki (ćčŒć„łæŠèš âThe Military Chronicles of a Little Girlâ) Seinen light novel series written by Carlo Zen and illustrated by Shinobu Shinotsuki
Genre: Fantasy, Isekai, Military
Directed by: Uemura Yutaka
Written by: Ihara Kenta
Studio: NUT
Original run: January 6, 2017 â March 31, 2017
Episodes: 12
WARNING: ADULT SERIES.
The plot in short: In a parallel universe, a little girl, Tanya Degurechaff, is a mage fighting in a war for what looks like a parallel WW1 German Empire. But the truth is sheâs nothing else but the reincarnation of an atheist salary man, who, one moment before dying, was confronted by an entity which claims to be God and rejected him, labeling him âBeing Xâ and that reincarnation is nothing else but God/Being Xâs attempt to force Tanya to finally have faith in him as the salary man said people would have faith only if they were weak and in dire straits. Still Tanya refuses to believe and declares a personal war to âBeing Xâ, doing all she can to survive as, if she were to die this time, there would be no reincarnation.
Holy shit I thought about this a little but never could actually verbalize it. Anton Sioux literally tries to kill a 9-year-old girl multiple times. Like, this isnât even a matter of âsheâs a soldier on the other sideâ he personally has a grudge against a fkn 9 year old and regularly tries to kill her. Granted, Tanyaâs not really 9 but nobody in the show knows this.
And holy shit how did I not realize that, at least in the anime, every single time the Empire goes to war itâs someone else having attacked them first. Legedonia violates their border in Norden. The Republic violates their border in the Rhine. Dacia violates their border in that timelineâs equivalent of Transylvania. The Rusy Federation violates⊠well all of their eastern borders really. The Empire is, and has always been, whack-a-mole-ing smaller powers who keep coming to fist fight it, lose and call them evil for it. (In the LN Iâm pretty sure much of the areas of the Empire are occupied territory, suggesting the Empire fought wars against all of them before the 1920s, but meh who cares)
...the anime does a really good job at making you question the framing.
Everyone babbles about the empire being evil but... they were the ones invading it in the first place.
Rerugen complains about Tanya being a monster but... they turned a 9 years old little girl into a soldier and sent her on dangerous missions in the frontlines. In her first mission they ordered her to delay a company while she was ALONE as reinforcement will arrive in 10 minutes. She asks to leave the battleground and they tell her ânopeâ stay there and fight.
And even with Anson the anime remarks all this.
Anson could have remained outside of the battle that ultimately killed him, instead heâs so moved by vengeance he doesnât even contact his family and is so determined to join the fight they believe he could barge into it alone. Heâs so taken by the idea of killing Tany that heâs willing to make himself self explode to do so which mirrors how Tanya faked self destruction to actually escape alive from their first meeting. He instead doesnât care about surviving, he just wants to destroy her. Heâs a fanatic on a personal crusade against her, paving the way for how his daughter will act in an even worse way under the cover of pretty and high moralistic words.
This series is really great at this, at making you think at those sort of things, forcing you not just to listen and swallow accusations but at THINK if those charges are legittimate, if the person shouting them is really speaking from a higher moral ground or not.
The plot in short: The Gold Saints who died in order to destroy the Wall of Grief are revived in Asgard. In an attempt to discover why it happened they end up involved in a battle against a foe threatening Asgard.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Itâs âSaint Seiyaâ! Itâs the Gold Saints! I love them! I could I not stumble into it?
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Iâll reference âSaint Seiyaâ manga and anime version and the second âSaint Seiyaâ movie, âSaint Seiya - Kami-gami no Atsuki Tatakaiâ (èé棫æçą ç„ă ăźç±ăæŠă âSaint Seiya: The Heated Battle of the Godsâ).
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âSoldier Dreamâ by ROOT FIVE and, as ending, âYakusoku no Ashita eâ (çŽæăźææ„ăž âTo the promised tomorrowâ) by ROOT FIVE. Now⊠âSoldier dreamâ, sung by Kageyama Hironobu, was the old âSaint Seiyaâ opening used for the Asgard saga⊠which okay, is iconic and awesome but⊠I wish the anime has just gotten his own opening. The visual is not bad⊠but itâs nothing special either and it spoilers the series a lot. It immediately implies Aiolia is the main character/hero of the series, that he gets a âlove interestâ and that his main opponent will be Gullinbursti FrĂłdi, that Hylda is not well, that Miro and Camus fight, and that the Gold Saints, despite having died in order to destroy the Wall of Grief, are somehow revived in Asgard, that Saga, Dohko and Mu will do the Athena exclamation, that Athena will give her blood to turn the gold cloths into god cloths complete with visual of them, that thereâs Yggdrasil and letâs not forget Andreasâ scar. Really, all we miss is a shot of whoâs behind all this. Thereâs plenty of shoots of the Gold Saint. Well, at least the Gold Saint arenât depicted as thin as the Bronze Saint while being in Asgard⊠The ending song is pretty nice. Visually it doesnât show much, just the Fire Clock of the sanctuary, the gold cloths and then the Gold Saints standing in front a giant Athena but I like the touch of having one of the flames on the Fire Clock to extinguish in each episode until all are extinguished and the series has ended. Itâs worth to say in the last episode they replace the panning on the gold cloths with scenes from the series⊠which okay, makes sense but itâs not great.
The plot: Credits when itâs due âSaint Seiyaâ never had this complicate of a plot, itâs just battle after battle racing against time because Athena got herself in troubles but here they tried to toss in also mystery and other stuff and⊠and they made a mess, thereâs plenty of plot holes. However, whatâs really good is instead that they tried to close the Gold Saintsâ character arcs in a satisfactory manner and they nailed this one correctly.
The characters: Well, letâs see. The Gold Saints are definitely mostly well developed in this one, they all get a role, something to do and a good characterization. I loved them.
Lyfia⊠is not that impressive as a character, but she works. The God Warriors⊠they tried to give them some character and dept but they are a lot less impressive than the old God Warriors of the anime. Still, they arenât bad. Andreas has no character and the real bad guy behind all this is⊠just evil and thatâs all he is. Freya and Hylda? Oh yes, I caught a glimpse of them. They donât do much beyond being in the background occasionally.
The visual: I love the shining colors used for the cloths and the attacks, the dynamism, the fact the Saints here donât seem about to drop dead of starvation (yes, decades have passed and here I am, still hung up on how âSaint Seiyaâ made the Saints progressively thinner). The animation quality isnât always great but itâs still nice and, although the background arenât extremely detailed, theyâre still well cared for.
The musical background: âSaint Seiyaâ BGM has a history of being good (Yokoyama Seiji made really epic music!). This might be not as epic as the previous BGM for the Asgard saga but itâs still a pretty good one so kudos to Mizutani Hiromi.
Overall: Itâs a âSaint Seiyaâ spinoff about the Gold Saints. To enjoy it, itâs required to know âSaint Seiyaâ and it has all the sins and all the virtues of a âSaint Seiyaâ story, meaning youâll love it if you like âSaint Seiyaâ and the Gold Saints and you might end up disappointed if you hate them or have no idea who they are.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
For once Iâll start with the weak points of the series soâŠ
Okay, as the series started my first thought was: âAsgard AGAIN?!?â because itâs not like they hadnât already milked Asgard in an original movie and in an original arc of the anime, right? Do we need even a spinoff placed in Asgard? Isnât there some other places with Gods in which they could place the story? I donât know, Egypt had cool Gods, why not to use it just for a change of pace and of climate?
But yeah, itâs Asgard again, and they even fished up 7 new God Warriors that never showed up to fight Saiya and Co during the Asgard saga because⊠they werenât created yet⊠same as Lyfia, this new character who, had she appeared in a fanfic, would have surely be accused to be a Mary Sue.
Officially sheâs just a maiden of Valhalla Palace, but itâs clear sheâs put in the story to become the love interest of Leo Aiolia (poor Marin, previously SHE seemed to be the one for Aiolia), the main character of the series. At first she kind of seem to have the role that belonged to Freya in the anime, asking for the Gold Saints help, falling for one of them despite having a special connection from childhood with the God Warrior Gullinbursti Fróði (Freya didnât quite fall for the main character but for Cygnus Hyoga and has a special connection from childhood with God Warrior Merak Beta HĂ€gen) while Freya basically exists but has a nonexistent role in the story since she gets imprisoned again but thatâs not all Lyfia does. She also gets Polaris Hyldaâs role as she gets controlled by the main enemy so as to resurrect the Golden Saints and it turns out sheâs actually Odinâs representative on Earth⊠all while Hylda lies sick in bed, confined in her room and does nothing beyond putting all her faith in Lyfia, so as not to steal Lyfiaâs chance to shine.
Note that if Lyfia wasnât such a blatant rip off of two previous main characters she wouldnât be bad⊠and the fact sheâs a rip off of two main characters is⊠well excusable because itâs part of how the âSaint Seiyaâ animation works.
I mean the anime only âAsgard sagaâ was inspired by the 2ndâSaint Seiyaâ movie which was inspired by the special one-shot from the manga âKĆri no Kuni no Natasha Henâ (æ°·ăźćœăźăăżăŒă·ăŁ âThe Chapter of Natasha, of the Lands of Iceâ) so well, why should I be surprised if now the âAsgard sagaâ became the inspiration for âSoul of Goldâ?
Well, at least the Gold Saints donât have to save Athena, but just to stop Yggdrasil from bearing fruits and, in order to do so, theyâve to go into the 7 chambers of Yggdrasil and shatter the 7 Mammoth Pillars⊠pardon, the 7 statues in there. Yeah, no originality here either.
Of course the God Warriors are provided with Odin new Sapphires, though this time their purpose is just to let them get even more power from Yggrasil⊠and, surprise, surprise, Andreas Lise is actually also possessed by the new enemy⊠a God who was closed into a amphora⊠yeah, like Poseidon.
Should I also mention that, although the series tried to explain why Grani Sigmund, brother of Dubhe Alpha Siegfried and someone who knew Polaris Hylda was being possessed, never showed up in the Asgard saga (and the same can be said for the other 6 God Warriors) the explanation donât really hold up very well⊠and they didnât even try to explain why Fróði, whoâs from a family who long served Odin, never showed up either⊠and yeah, itâs probably worth to mention the 7 God Warriors arenât that well developed or original either⊠and it gets kind of ridicule how Odin always has to count on Athenaâs Saints to solve Asgard troubles and give them his cloth when he actually should have his own God Warriors.
And letâs face it, Loki is definitely underdeveloped, heâs just there to be the bad guy and thatâs it. Okay, itâs in the myth that Loki wasnât actually an Asgardian but a Frost Giant but the series doesnât even explain this, just calls him a false God.
So, after all this you might wonder⊠then why should I watch âSoul of Goldâ?
Because, letâs face it, originality was never âSaint Seiyaâ stronger trait but this series has some very good things. Although Andreas and the new God Warriors arenât that developed and the new enemy is just evil and thatâs it, this series take care to develop the Gold Saints, which is the main reason for which it was done. It gives all of them a chance to shine but also digs into either their past or their inner conflicts.
Deathmask finds back his good side and rejoin with his cloth, Aphrodite gets to show his connection with plants, Aldebaran and Muâs psychology gets developed, Saga and Aiolos confront (remember? Saga tried to kill Athena and Aiolos had to protect her), Aiolia gets to confront with his feelings for Shura, the man who killed his brother, but also gets to work with his brother, and Camus shows us he used to have a friend in Asgard.
Whatâs more, Libra DĆko gets some development and⊠well, this younger version of the old master is interesting as a character⊠even if he feels pretty different for how I was used to him.
And hey, didnât we all want to see Aiolos in action?
The episodes, more than plot driven, feel like a character study digging into them and giving them space to shine and this is SO GOOD!
Itâs literally gold if youâre a Gold Saint fan, and should I mention the battles are well done, and you get to see all their special moves, and how they get those cool God cloths?
And, although I criticized the lack of originality in the plot, to be fully honest they tried to develop it a bit, even making it âmysteriousâ as they kept the secret about who and why resurrected the God Saint and around Lyfia and Garmr ĂtgarĂ°ar, so they made an effort to make it more than just, letâs crash the 7 statues and beat the new bad guy who possessed someoneâŠ
Itâs also worth to mention that, even if the God Warriors arenât that well developed, especially compared to the God Warriors of the âAsgard sagaâ, letâs remember the âAsgard sagaâ counted 26 episodes, versus the 12 of this series and could take advantage by how Athenaâs 5 Bronze Saints were already well developed so they didnât need any character study. This gave the âAsgard sagaâ the time to take care of the development of the God Warriors and their backstories (they were awesome by the way), a time this series doesnât have as it has to develop the Gold Saints.
So yeah, this is a good and enjoyable spinoff for the fans of the series, one I definitely recommend.
It might not work for people who donât know âSaint Seiyaâ, they might feel lost and confused or just not being that impressed due to its flaws, but if youâre a fan is definitely a MUST SEE.
Also, even if itâs not something that touches me that deeply, I should probably mention it gives a lot of space to Aiolia, making him the new main character (in place of Pegasus Seiya) so, all the more, if youâre a fan of his, you should see it.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Black and Blue
Two cents of ramblings on: âYĆjo Senki - The Saga of Tanya the Evilâ (âThe Military Chronicles of a Little Girl - The Saga of Tanya the Evilâ) (Anime) - Season 1...
...and why I STRONGLY recommend it.
GENERAL DATA
Title: YĆjo Senki - The Saga of Tanya the Evil (ćčŒć„łæŠèš The Saga of Tanya the Evil âThe Military Chronicles of a Little Girl - The Saga of Tanya the Evilâ)
Media: Anime television series
Adaptation of: YĆjo Senki (ćčŒć„łæŠèš âThe Military Chronicles of a Little Girlâ) Seinen light novel series written by Carlo Zen and illustrated by Shinobu Shinotsuki
Genre: Fantasy, Isekai, Military
Directed by: Uemura Yutaka
Written by: Ihara Kenta
Studio: NUT
Original run: January 6, 2017 â March 31, 2017
Episodes: 12
WARNINGS: Well, itâs a story about a war so of course thereâs war and death and also politic and realpolitik. Also thereâs a child fighting and killing, as Tanya is pretty young (she takes part to her first battle at 9 and the story moves up to when sheâs 11/12). And of course, there are references to religion as Tanya is an atheist in battle with a being defining himself as God.
The plot in short: In a parallel universe, a little girl, Tanya Degurechaff, is a mage fighting in a war for what looks like a parallel WW1 German Empire. But the truth is sheâs nothing else but the reincarnation of an atheist salary man, who, one moment before dying, was confronted by an entity which claims to be God and rejected him, labeling him âBeing Xâ and that reincarnation is nothing else but God/Being Xâs attempt to force Tanya to finally have faith in him as the salary man said people would have faith only if they were weak and in dire straits. Still Tanya refuses to believe and declares a personal war to âBeing Xâ, doing all she can to survive as, if she were to die this time, there would be no reincarnation.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
I saw a rather good AMV âNight Witchesâ made with âYĆjo senkiâ footage, and was impressed by how good the animation was so I decided to watch it.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
The anime series covers only the first 2 volumes and a half of the light novel series. Things are cut or simplified so to fit them into the new media.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âJINGO JUNGLEâ by Myth & Roid and as ending âLos! Los! Los!â by YĆ«ki Aoi, the voice of Tanya Degurechaff. Episode 8 is the only episode who uses as ending âSensen no Realismâ (æŠç·ăźăȘăąăȘășă âRealism of the Frontâ) by Niina Mako. Iâve mixed feelings for âJINGO JUNGLEâ and âLos! Los! Los!â, as theyâre not quite my type of music but kind of grew on me. Overall I find them fitting for the anime. The visual is the opening is interesting. With colours that reminds me of an old movie, a recurring theme of gears, which remind us of the operation orb but also the machinations of the war and how the men involved in it are nothing but little gears in a mechanism thatâs bigger than them. We see scenes of war, soldiers fighting, mourning, the characters wearing their uniforms or with their flags behind, maps of the countries. In short it really delivers well this is a story that involves a lot of war. But I also like how it shows Tanya as a little girl, and then she starts walking and sheâs a soldier in uniform, and in front of her there is the Nutcracker that being X posses to talk with Tanya. She shoots it but she doesnât hit it by some sort of glass and then weâre shown the salary man she was in her previous life and thereâs blood covering his image. Itâs as if the glass she has broken is kind of a window to the past, showing us that Tanyaâs rage against Being X is due to how she died in her past life. The opening also does an interesting thing as, when weâre shown the images of Kurt von Rudersdorf, Hans von Zettour and Erich von Rerugen, their names also appear, which doesnât happen for any other character, in an interesting remarking of how those three are basically the ones that seem to be in command. Overall, I think it really works well as opening. The ending instead shows a series of images from the visual novel depicting Tanya. Itâs nothing special but, as the anime was probably meant to be promotional for the visual novel, it makes sense they would want to show the visual of the novel (especially since the anime uses a different character design for TanyaâŠ). âSensen no Realismâ is rather pretty as a music and the visual is interesting as it clearly represents explosions as pretty firework.
The plot: Itâs complicate, intricate and intriguing. I love the history reference and how it talks about politics and military and psychology. Oh, I really enjoyed it!
The characters: Well, most of the focus is on Tanya but the other characters are interesting too and different enough among them. I canât say I loved them but theyâre well constructed and realistic enough.
The visual: The characterization is very interesting. I canât say the characters are pretty in the usual way (actually I never saw someone with eyes or lips as Tanya) but theyâre all very different and well recognizable in a way thatâs pretty awesome. The visual for the background sceneries is GODDAMN AWESOME. The skies are beautiful with moving clouds and coloring, the visual from up there is also so great.
Thereâs this great cure for details that shows in how they can grow grass between bits of concrete⊠The fights are awesomely drawn and the scenes in which âBeing Xâ appear are also drawn in an interesting manner.
The musical background: This one is an epic one! Katayama ShĆ«ji did a really great work. The music well fit the scenes and give them grandiosity and action and an epic feeling. Itâs something you can enjoy hearing even if you donât watch the anime.
Overall: Oh, itâs good, good, good. I love the visual, the history behind this alternate universe, the battles, the strategic plans, the music, everything. Itâs a must see, really.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
Now, visually, this series is beautiful. I love the realism of the war fighting scenes and how they then put it into sharp contrast with how the mages fight with⊠well, magic, but I also love how the mages in a way depend from technical things, they use rifles with magic shells, they use Operation Orbs or, if you prefer, Computation Jewels that facilitates mages to compose spells, and theyâve tools to fly which vary according to from which country they are.
I love how the colouring has an odd tinge, as if it were an old war movie.
I love how well they animated the action scenes, so dynamic and fluid, I love the detailed and beautifully drawn scenery, how the skies are filled with beautifully drawn clouds, how they can be a beautiful blue but also other colours according to the time and the weather.
No, really, this is visually great.
Sure, it took me a while to get used to the chara design of the characters. Itâs not like itâs ugly but itâs⊠unusual to say the least, with Tanya having some rather creepy expressions.
Still the characters come out as expressive and one gets used to the oddity of it soon enough.
Now⊠the story.
I enjoyed this alternate version of the world which is similar yet different to ours.
I love the âfightâ between God/Being X and Tanya, how she stubbornly refuses to believe and how he stubbornly tries to force her to believe to the point he forces her to pray if she wants her Computation Jewel to work.
I like the idea of having her consider the army as an organization and war as a work, which makes for a very harsh comparison with how Tanya previously worked for a company as a salaryman.
The idea that, in her past life Tanyaâs beliefs were that following the rules one could smoothly rise in ranks but then, by the end of the series, she realized being too rational means missing to see that many men are, in fact, irrational and being lead by their emotions.
Erich Rerugen: What reason is there to continue the war? A modern state uses its military to impose its will via violence. Sacrificing the nation itself to continue the fight is madness.
Tanya Degurechaff: You are completely correct.
Erich Rerugen: Then why do you say that the war will continue?
Tanya Degurechaff: If I may be permitted to give my opinion⊠General Zettour and General Rudersdorf are logical pragmatists, highly skilled in political and military matters. They are great soldiers. As are you, Lieutenant Colonel. Our Strategic HQ is a powerful fortress of logic and knowledge. And therefore, due to logical reasoning, everyone believes the war is at its end. But it must be said that this rationale is incomplete.
Erich Rerugen: Incomplete⊠rationale?
Tanya Degurechaff: The members of Strategic HQ are far too rational. And thus, they have completely missed the point. Rationalism isn't the only thing that drives human action. We are foolish creaturesâŠ
Erich Rerugen: Are you saying that humans are still beasts, lacking in reason?!
Tanya Degurechaff: If I may be permitted to speak freely, then that is completely correct.
Erich Rerugen: And what evidence do you have for this statement?
Tanya Degurechaff: History. Though I mean my own history. My personal experience.
Erich Rerugen: Tell me.
Tanya Degurechaff: I have seen the eyes of men, burning with hatred. I have seen the moment when my talented men gave in to anger and lost their reason. I have seen a chain of revenge, driven only by hate. And so, I realized⊠No, perhaps it's more accurate to say that I remembered. I have personally experienced an insane reaction against rationalism. No matter how much we modernize, no matter how social norms affect us, humans are foolish creatures, who sometimes prize feelings over reason. A human being who's overcome with hatred will keep struggling, without regard for self-interest or reason, regardless of what they may lose or gain. That is why I cannot help but speak up. We should not become intoxicated by a temporary victory! All flames of hatred must be extinguished. [Ep 12]
Tanyaâs way to deal with this, would be, of course, aggressive. For her, the enemy you let go, will then be the enemy who will take up the gun against you.
Tanya Degurechaff: Second Lieutenant Grantz, the enemy you let go will take up his gun again. To shoot us. If we let them go, some will become new soldiers who hate the Empire.
Vooren Grantz: So⊠You want us to kill them just for that reason?!
Tanya Degurechaff: This is the order from our superiors. We shoot the enemy, or theyâll shoot us. If nothing else, we must shoot until weâre told not to anymore. Iâll pretend I didnât hear what you just said. But Iâll said once more. This is the order from our superiors. Take up your gun. [Ep 8]
In this bit from episode 8 Tanya paints it as them having to do it more because itâs an order than because she wants to, but, by the end of the series, itâs clear she has embraced the idea youâve to kill your enemies without mercy or theyâll come back to kill you.
I also found interesting this bit from her.
Tanya Degurechaff: In a cursed world, engulfed by flames of war, there was a nation known as the Empire. With its vast military power, talented strategists, and high mobility, it overwhelmed the Dukedom of Dakia, the Entente Alliance, and the Republic. Treats to its safety were removed, one after the next, and everyone was overjoyed. But that is why they could not imagine how much the surrounding countries feared the creation of a massive power in the continentâs center. The Empire went to such lengths to display the sharpness of its sword, it was incapable of imagining the terror that its sword inspired. Of course, everyone wants peace. So, to protect peace, they take up their guns and thrust themselves into battle, hoping to achieve it. So that this cruel war would end, everyone except the Empire wished for the evil enemy called the Empire to be eliminated from the world. Could there be any greater paradox? Ironically, their desire for peace caused the warâs intensification, rather than its end. [Ep 12]
The part that itâs easy to forget watching the story, due to the similarities between the Empire and the German Empire is that, in this universe, it was the Entente Alliance, the Dukedom of Dakia and the Republic who invaded the Empire first. They all crossed borders first, to which the Empire answered by attacking their forces and declaring war. The Empire defended itself and won and, as a result, gained the land of its opponents⊠and in doing so gained the hate of the opponents it defeated and scared its neighboring countries, pushing them to join forces against it⊠in some sort of vicious circle in which people paint as âevilâ the enemy and themselves as righteous, regardless of the enemy being really âevilâ the way we intend it.
At the end we see how Mary considers the Empire evil because it killed her father, but it was her father who was among the soldiers who invaded the Empire and caused the war and who, with his men, attempted to kill Tanya, who was 9 back then and merely in an observer mission when they attacked, he who chased after Tanya when she was retreating once she accomplished her mission only managing on getting stabbed by her and heâs also the one who decided to continue going after her, claiming God told him to bring her down so that he ultimately gets killed by her.
Heâs not a poor victim, but a soldier who got obsessed with killing Tanya and ended up killed in return.
And all this makes for interesting food for thoughts about whoâs really evil. The Japanese title of the series is just âYĆjo Senkiâ (ćčŒć„łæŠèš âThe Military Chronicles of a Little Girlâ), but the English one is âThe Saga of Tanya the Evilâ. Tanya however is not âevilâ in the sense she enjoys hurting others. In fact this is her motive for joining the army:
Tanya Degurechaff: In a time when war seemed unavoidable, Iâd thought it would be impossible for a poor, powerless girl to survive. But in that world, the power of magic did exist. And during the orphanageâs physical, my magical aptitude was noted. The army always conscripted those with aptitude as mages. And if I were going to be conscripted someday, it made more sense to volunteer, receive officer training, and attempt to get onto a career path. Of course, war is an unproductive and therefore wicked act. And I hated the idea of killing or being killed. But if I could just get on the militaryâs rails, my future would be assured. [Ep 2]
Tanya is moved by her self-interest, pragmatism and lack of empathy, but doesnât have the wish to hurt others.
Her enemies often define her âevilâ merely because sheâs a dangerous enemy and nothing else, same as they define the Empire âevilâ because it is the enemy. Tanya is clearly not good, sheâs a pragmatist who totally lacks of empathy and cares only about doing her work efficiently and therefore has no mercy for people who gets in the way of it, which feels even more sticking considering sheâs in the body of a young girl, to the point Erich Rerugen views her as a monster.
Erich Rerugen: If I may speak freely⊠She is a monster in the form of a little girl! [Ep 12]
Thereâs to say though that the other characters, who tries to paint themselves up as more moral, are merely making excuses for themselves to do the same as Tanya does.
They claim theyâre fighting evil but theyâre merely pursuing their countryâs interests or, even worse, revenge. They genuinely pray God (differently from Tanya whoâs merely forced to do it) but they pray God in hope heâll help them kill their enemies, or believe God tells them to kill them.
Anyway, long story short, this one is definitely an anime worth watching so I recommend it.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching: Night Witches
WARNINGS: Thereâs bullying, abuse of a child, mutilation, suicide attempt, war, death, curses
The plot in short: Bojji is Giant King Bosseâs firstborn and heir. However, due to him being born deaf, weak and tiny, not only he is ridiculed and scorned and, ultimately, his fatherâs will is ignored and the crown is passed on his stepbrother, Daida as heâs judged unfit to rule. Bojji leaves then the castle, aiming to learn to become a strong king unaware of a dark plot being consumed inside the castle.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
While on Youtube the review âThe Anime That Broke Me In 2 Episodes | Ranking of Kingsâ by The Prout Brothers caught my eyes so I decided I would give this anime a try. The fact when I mentioned it to people I knew they recommended the series only worked as an extra incentive to watch it.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
I will mention âKoe no Katachiâ (2013/14) and the first 3 series of âShingeki no kyojinâ (2013, 2017, 2018/19) as a term of comparison.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: This series has 2 opening and 2 endings, which kind of divide the anime in 4 parts. The series uses:
- for episodes 1 to 11 as opening âBOYâ by King Gnu and as ending âOz.â by Yama.
- for episodes 12 to 23 as opening âHadaka no YĆ«shaâ (èŁžăźćè âNaked Heroâ) by Vaundy and as ending âFlareâ by Milet.
Theyâre all very cute, both in terms of imagines used and music and music and images well harmonize with each other, with the opening being more ârealisticâ and placed during day and the ending drawn in an even more cute way and placed by night but for the absolute best one is âHadaka no YĆ«shaâ both in terms of music and lyrics and visual. Itâs a MOVING opening, something that pushes you to feel so much, both the happiness, the love and the pain of the characters so, for me, itâs really great.
The plot: The plot might seem simple at first, a standard story in which the hero trains to get stronger and gain self confidence but, in truth, thereâs also a conjure and intricate character relations with each character having his own goal which might cause him to get in the way of the others. Ultimately, itâs a coral work in which everyone contributes.
The characters: The characters are mostly well characterized with their motives and reasons for being one way or the other explored and explained.
The visual: Iâll be harsh, the art in the manga of âĆ-sama Rankingâ feels pretty ugly to me, however this anime knows how to take it and turn it into cute although, credits when itâs due, it make each character different, something which remains in the anime as well. The scenery isnât super detailed but it feels more like a deliberate choice to fit with the character design than anything else as itâs still done with care and anyway the colours are bright and warm and really bring in the atmosphere in many situations. The expressivity of the characters and their movements are really well cared for. Bojji doesnât need to talk, from his body language you can clearly tell how he feels, what he thinks. The sign language is also supervised so as to be as accurate as possible.
The musical background: MAYUKOâs BGM is really nice and well underlines the scenes.
Overall: Itâs a great series. You might be mistaken into thinking itâs a series for little kids because the art is cute and childish but there are also serious topics and lot of emotionally moving scenes and thereâs a great care in the characters and in their expressivity and youâre likely going to love it, really.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
I think I have to give a special mention to the second opening. Mind you, the first isnât bad but the âHadaka no YĆ«shaâ⊠is goddamn great.
We start with seeing shadows made on a wall by someoneâs hands.
Thereâs someone making a bird, then someone else makes a knight and that knight turns into a crown that rests on the shadow of âsomeoneâsâ head, said someone being clearly Bojji. At this point the music start and the visual, the lyrics and the music begin to match perfectly in a very emotional piece.
In fact we see Bojji walking on the streets with a smile but heâs ignored and mocked and ends up in the shadows with a sad face, and then we see Kage also âwalkingâ on the streets (moving from the opposite direction compared to Bojji) but someone throws him a tomato and he ends up in the shadows also, crying⊠the lyrics remarking how thereâs someone chocking back tears.
But then the song picks up its pace, flowers bloom as the lyrics talks about power and how we should shake it off when it comes from malice, shadows covering the land a hand offering a diamond and then the image of the people from Kageâs clan being stabbed on spears and knights running.
We switch to an image of Bojji, smiling as he stares at the distance and the song remarks he canât hear but what an hero needs isnât just power.
We switch to Daida comforting a child Miranjo while light appears in front of them and then many lights shines on the night before showing us a lantern being carried by Bojji who finds Miranjoâs broken mirror while the song encourages him to let himself be and watch what his tiny hands can do. At this the mirror puts together its pieces showing a young Miranjo smiling.
We then see the Gods against whom Miranjoâs people fought, and then Bosse fighting, then child Miranjo running with child demon, both happy, the lyrics talking of all the things on which he has fallen in love.
Then thereâs lot of blood falling in front of someoneâs feet (Bojji as his mother died?), Ouken and then we see child Miranjoâs eyes being covered by the child demon and her turning into her adult, sad self as the adult demon is behind her, trying to grasp her while the song mention the curses which has fallen upon people.
We switch to Kade with a sword, to Desha, a tear in his eyes as he thinks to his brother Ouken as he was before the curse, then weâve Apeas holding Miranjoâs mirror, Domas and Hokuro training, Dorshe and Daida talking fondly to the magic mirror, Bebin caressing a young Mitsumata, Kageâs mom holding him as well as Hiling hugging Bojji, the song talking of all those feelings of falling in love and asking for the light to protect what I adore.
Then we see Bojji ready to fight, Despaâs face behind him as if to remind us he has trained Bojji while the song repeats how Bojji should should shake off the power which comes from malice.
The night turns into day as hands that seemed about to squash a mountain actually shows us the beauty of beautiful sceneries from all the world. Miranjoâs mask break, Bojji leaves the embrace of Hiling to turn toward the shadows but thereâs Kage actually hiding in the shadows, offering him his hand, which Bojji takes, the lyrics pointing out how he comes closer to Bojji asking him what he is.
And all this is beautiful, it manages to show all the characters in a way that makes you emotional because it shows their best feelings but also the sad and dark things that happened to them, summarizing a bit of everything while not really spoilering too much.
So now let me tell you about the visual of this story.
The direction is amazing, the shots are beautiful, smart and dynamic, contributing to narrate the story and not just to let you see it, also helping to deliver the charactersâ feelings.
For example some shots are taken from Bojjiâs point of view, contributing in making him feel small and inadequate⊠however, when Bojji is ready to fight King Bosse, who has currently possessed Daidaâs body, although Daida is a little taller than Bojji, the visual presents them as facing each other at equal height because theyâre equal, two amazing fighters, and although, when Bojji visualizes Daida as Bosse, the shot delivers how much bigger Bosse is, compared to him, it doesnât linger on it but shows Bojji looking up confidently and the next we see of him heâs running on a wall. Basically we donât get the feeling Bojji is less than Bosse, just that theyâre two fighters of different size.
To deliver how the fightâs pace is a lot faster than what weâre seeing but yet keeping it dynamic and fast, they changed the colours to an âold movieâ tinge. Itâs our clue that both Bojji and Bosse are moving faster than we could see.
The fight between Bojji and King Bosse is so spectacular it seems to watch an episode of âShingeki no kyojinâ, which is not surprising considering theyâre done by the same studio⊠and it also well deliver the theme that strength isnât everything and that everyone has his own strong points and those can lead him to win.
The characters are super expressive, they donât need to talk, you can just read what they feel on their faces.
I mean, just look at the various expressions Bojji has when Kage tells him he wants to stay in his corner as his friend.
And itâs not just the faceâs expressions. The characters often donât just stand still and let their face do all the work, but deliver everything not solely with their face but with their bodies as well. This series is super into letting you get what the characters feel by visual, so that if you donât understand whatâs being said you still get the message thatâs said which fits SO MUCH with it.
The scenery isnât always super detailed but itâs still beautifully drawn and bright in colours, itâs vagueness giving it a child fairy tale atmosphere.
But okay, letâs talk of the story.
Another beautiful manga/anime that talk of a character with deafness is âKoe no Katachiâ. âKoe no Katachiâ is a pretty important manga as the vector of the content made it difficult for publication on any manga magazine until it was picked up after months of legal dispute by the February edition of Bessatsu Shounen Magazine, where it won first place, then, due to the subject matter, the serialization has been reviewed and supported by the Japanese Federation of the Deaf. However, although âKoe no Katachiâ includes a deaf character, Shoko, and her struggles, the main character is actually Shoya, a boy who used to bully her for her deafness along with his classmates but then was turned into a scapegoat and bullied in turn when the bullying came to the attention of the higher school authorities. Shoya went into depression, considered suicide but, before doing so, wanted to apologize to Shoko and this leads him to spend time with her.
âĆ-sama Rankingâ instead is Bojjiâs story, the story of his struggles. Yes, Bojji has a full, well fleshed out cast around himself, but the story is still HIS story, he is the main character along with Kage.
Although Bojji and Shoko are both represented as very kind, where Shoko is characterized mostly by her deafness, Bojji is characterized by his wish to become a great king.
Where âKoe no Katachiâ places emphasis in how the bullying of Shoko was caused by the school system that pushed on elementary school kids with no previous ties with her the task, which quickly to them becomes a burden, to help her to their detriment (they are uncomfortable communicating through written notes, to help her they canât follow the lesson well, they lose a contest, they are asked to spend additional time at school to learn sign language) so that, although the bullying is condemned, the blame on the kids is âlessenedâ somehow, âĆ-sama Rankingâ doesnât offer such an excuse to its characters.
On the opposite side in âĆ-sama Rankingâ the blame is placed on peopleâs prejudices, not on the system.
Where Shoko has to interact with kids who donât know her and have for her no affection and donât even know how to communicate well with her as they donât know sign language, Bojji interacts mostly with adults, most of them knowing him for years and even holding affection for him and know sign language.
Yet, almost all of them look down on him due to him being deaf and weak. Most of them donât have faith in him, canât see his potentialities, donât want to adapt things in a way that can be useful to Bojji.
Domas is Bojjiâs personal sword teacher, heâs there JUST FOR HIM, he doesnât have any other student to âdistractâ him, yet, just because Bojji is weak, Domas has no real interest in teaching to him. He doesnât try a new method, he doesnât try to see which can be Bojjiâs potential, he insists with the same exercise over and over even if it doesnât produce results and doesnât even believe itâll produce results in the future. He has no faith in Bojji nor interest in teaching him.
Hiling loves Bojji but sees him as nothing else but a misfortunate child who needs to be protected and will never be capable to do anything. She doesnât even realize Bojji can read lips.
Daida used to love his brother but, then he came to look down on him as a pitiable weakling, believing such people shouldnât just exist or kill themselves.
The people in his kingdom should respect him, if only by virtue of the fact heâs the sonâs king, but they just mock him at any turn and expect nothing from him.
And everyone feels excused to say whatever rude thing they want in front of him as if he werenât present because they believe he canât hear them but he actually can read their lips and know what theyâre saying and so they ARE hurting him.
So itâs not like the cast has excuses when theyâre mean to Bojji, they just arbitrarily decided, because heâs weak and deaf, to dismiss him as pitiful.
The story also does a good work at addressing how Bojji is not pitiful by proving when people gives him faith and helps him to find strategies to overcome things Bojji manages to rise to their expectations and do impressively good (Mitsumata teaches Bojji how to read lips and how to avoid being hit and Bojji learns to excel in both things, Despa teaches Bojji how to use a small and light rapier instead than a heavy sword to target his opponent's weak spots and Bojji learn to find and hit them impressively well). Itâs Bojji who ultimately saves everyone beating King Bosse.
We also have this dialogue:
Daida: BebinâŠ
Bebin: Yes?
Daida: Arenât they sort of spoiling Aniue, just because heâs a weakling?
Bebin: You think Bojji-sama is a weakling?
Daida: What, heâs not?
Bebin: Daida-sama, itâs been a while, so why donât we go down into town?
Daida: Why have we come to town?
Sorii: Perhaps as a change of pace, to do a societal survey.
Daida: Pointless.
Sorii: Then letâs call it a thought experiment.
Daida: A thought experiment?
Sorii: Like, letâs say⊠Daida-sama would you like to live to be 100?
Daida: What? Donât be absurd! Of course I donât want to live that long!
Sorii: Then letâs suppose, Daida-sama, that you were 90 years old. Would your answer still be the same?
Daida: Sorii, what are you trying to say?
Sorii: Please excuse me. I meant nothing in particular.
Bebin: Daida-sama, I found one of the weaklings you spoke of. One much worse off than Bojji-sama.
Daida: Worse off than Aniue?
Bebin: Not only is this man deaf, he is also blind.
Daida: Why do people like that even exist? Itâs unfair, but worst of all, itâs pitiable. If that were me, I would end my life in an instant.
Bebin: Are you saying⊠that under the same circumstances, you wouldnât have the self-confidence to go on living? If so, then he is a strong man to have overcome his plight and continue living.
Daida: Thatâs just doublespeak. IâŠ
Bebin: Iâm sure he doesnât even think about it himself.
Sorii: The reason he was able to overcome his weakness and go on living is⊠because the king is strong, and his kingdom is bountiful.
Bebin: Daida-sama, we want you to be someone who can give hope to everyone else.
Sure, ultimately Bebinâs view is still that people like Bojji need to depend on the strength of people who have what they lack and places the merit of their ability to overcome their weakness on the kingâs strength (Bebin, although helping Bojji, still put his faith and loyalty more on his disciple, Daida, than in him) but it still work to remark how people shouldnât be looked down regardless of what they can or canât do.
Itâs also worth to spend two words about Kage, Bojjiâs best friend.
Kage too, like Shoya in âKoe no Katachiâ, didnât start on the best foot with Bojji. Kage was a thief, after threatening him with a knife he stole Bojjiâs clothes and then demands from him more clothes. The difference between him and Shoya is Kage didnât target Bojji especially because he saw him as âdifferentâ, but because that was what a thief did.
Sure, Bojji and Kageâs friendship was also helped by how Kage was alone, so he was more prone to accept Bojjiâs attempts at making friends than Shoya, who had plenty of friends, was with Shoko. Kage is happy Bojji wants to be friend with him, he slowly doesnât just sponge off him but even talks with him, expressing curiosity in knowing him even if, at the start, he has a low opinion of him. He then connect with him even more finding similarities between his own tragic experiences and Bojjiâs and âŠ
Kage: Thereâs really nothing to be embarrassed about. I watched your match, and you looked so cool. You won that fight. Take pride in it. No matter what anyone else says, I think your style is just as fine as it is. No, Iâm not taking anything from you anymore. You may not know how to take this, coming out of the blue⊠but I⊠I want to be in your corner from now on, no matter what happens. I mean what Iâm saying. I mean it, Bojji.
Kage reaches out to Bojji out of admiration and a sense of connection⊠which are the normal basis for a friendship.
Shoya reached out due to guilt and self interest. In the movie is more vague but the manga explains according to Shoya, he went through hell because he couldnât hear Shokoâs voice (actually because his bullying of Shoko backfired and he ended up bullied as well) and so he wanted to apologize to her before committing suicide and then he let himself be carried by a sudden impulse and asked her if they could be friend. While Shoyaâs attempt to make up for what he did is good, itâs also very nice to see, in âĆ-sama Rankingâ a friendship that start the way many friendships start⊠and Kage reveals himself a great friend.
He sure is a BIG help to Bojji but again, heâs not doing out of guilt as some sort of repentance, but because⊠heâs Bojjiâs friend. I just love how that little guy worries for Bojji and tries to help him but, on the other side, heâs also Bojjiâs biggest fan. Itâs true part of it seems to be tied to the âshadow clanâ ruleâŠ
Kageâs mom: We do whatever we can to serve the interests of the people who need us. Thatâs what our light is.
âŠbut still Kage makes for a great and supportive friend and Bojji is equally good for him and I really love the relation between Kage and his mom. Sheâs also so nurturing and encouraging of her kid, really, sheâs a great mom, though, truth to be told, all the moms in this story so far had been loving moms. Even Hiling whoâs kind of a Tsundere mom, loves her kid very much and also, in her own way, cares a lot about Bojji.
So now⊠for the things that are instead not so great.
The anime changed the plot here and there to deliver a lot more emotional scenes but⊠while the result is great emotionally, it has other setbacks.
I mean, for example Hiling comes way too late to heal Bojji in the anime.
In the manga at the end of the fight, Domas claims he has an idea on how to deal with Bojjiâs wounds and leaves the place as people talk about calling a doctor. Then, itâs night and weâll see him in Bojjiâs room, Bojji completely bandaged, pondering on how Bojji was never destined to be strong. In that moment Hiling come and from Domasâ comment about how he was going to warn her immediately we can guess when he left he didnât warn her, and she had to be informed by someone else about Bojjiâs conditions but, as soon as it happened, she went there and healed him. At the same time this tells us Domas was leaving to warn her, not to mind his own business. Then Hiling remains with him and falls asleep there. Bojji wakes up, kisses her and then he goes trying to raise a sword but fails and meets up with Kage who says heâll become his friend. Then Kage leaves and Bojji cries.
In the anime Domas leaves as well at the end of the fight, although he doesnât comment about the wound. We later see Domas in Bojjiâs room and then leaves. At this point, a wounded Bojji tries to pick up a sword and fail and chats with Kage who volunteers to become his friend. Bojji cries then he supposedly goes back to bed and Kage stays with him for a while and then, finally, Hiling comes to heal him, though we wonât be shown itâs her and weâll discover it only much later.
So⊠the anime makes the scene in which Kage and Bojji becomes friends A LOT more emotional, because we see a badly injured Bojji left alone and still desperately trying to raise the sword, versus a Bojji who was just cared for and physically fine. Therefore the anime increases Bojjiâs drama as well as underlines his resolution and his loneliness. In this setting Bojjiâs desperation for failing in what he tries so hard to accomplish is VERY palpable and the fact that Kage came, was supportive and offered his friendship and remained with him for a while makes Kageâs friendship too result even more important.
Itâs a GREAT scene, way better than in the manga on an emotional level! On the other side⊠Hiling seems to come too late and in secrecy for no reason.
Something else that didnât quite click right for me is how the charactersâ actions sometimes donât seem to make much sense.
Sometimes itâs due to clashing morality, characters who do something pretty heinous, are later presented as cinnamon rolls⊠but cinnamon rolls wouldnât have done such things in the first place. Credits when itâs due here and there the story tries to explain why they had a change of heart⊠but, to me, it often didnât feel convincing enough. Maybe itâs just me⊠but itâs as if the evil actions were there so they could be presented as antagonists⊠and then, once they arenât anymore, all solved, theyâre oh so good people, so that, more than grey characters, they feel like confuse characters, unaware they were supposed to be white ones and so acting as theyâre black ones until thereâs no need for it anymore. But whatever, maybe itâs just itâs a story for younger audience and so they wanted to keep the transition simple.
Then thereâs the fact that not always their actions felt logical. Now, it can be this one is explained better in the manga, I hadnât managed yet to read it all, but, for example, weâve Bosse asking Domas to train his son, expecting this would increase his strength, when he know he stole all of Bojjiâs strength and therefore Bojji canât become stronger, or how, when Bojji and the others are facing Ouken, he hit them⊠and then heal them. Couldnât he do it without hitting them first?
But whatever, I still think itâs a great anime, both visually and emotionally. Sure, itâs targeted for younger audience, but I genuinely think everyone can enjoy it. Really, a must see!
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Human
Two cents of ramblings on: âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni GĆâ (Anime)...
...and why I recommend it.
GENERAL DATA
Title: Higurashi no Naku Koro ni GĆ (ăČăăăăźăȘăé ă«æ„ âWhen the Cicadas Cry: Karmaâ)
Media: Anime television series
Inspired by: Higurashi no Naku Koro ni (ăČăăăăźăȘăé ă« âWhen the Cicadas Cryâ) shĆnen dĆjin soft visual novel by Ryukishi07 and 07th expansion.
WARNINGS: Thereâs murder, gruesome murder, murder of minors, murder through torture, suicide, child abuse, violence, literal seas of blood spraying around, corruption, mental illness.
The plot in short: The quiet village of Hinamizawa is again trapped in a loop of tragedy that circles around Maebara Keiichi and his classmates. Furude Rika, who was hoping to have finally escaped June 1983, finds herself back into it. Believing now she knows how to fight fate she thinks she can escape from it again but rules are changed and now someone else is her opponent.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Well⊠I used to enjoy the âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ anime, but as âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni Kiraâ and âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni Outbreakâ didnât impress me much, I postponed watching âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni GĆâ (and âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni Sotsuâ) for a while in fear of a new disappointment and decided to watch them only when positive reviews piled up.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Iâll mention the previous âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ series and also âUmineko no Naku Koro niâ and âCiconia no Naku Koro niâ.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âI Believe What You Saidâ by Asaka and, as ending
- for episode 1 âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ (ăČăăăăźăȘăé ă« âWhen the Cicadas Cryâ) by Shimamiya Eiko.
- for episodes 2 to 17 âKami-sama no Syndromeâ (ç„æ§ăźă·ăłăăăŒă âGod Syndromeâ) by Ayane.
- for episodes 18 to 23 as opening âFukisokusei Entropyâ (äžèŠćæ§ăšăłăăăăŒ âIrregular Entropyâ) by Ayane
Although I miss Shimamiya Eikoâs songs, Ayaneâs also are pretty nice. The opening is visually good, it introduces the characters and set an unsettling mood with the camera waving as it moves other the characters, as if to hint their inner turmoils while there are noise effects and a colouring that reminds old movies. I like the charactersâ expressions that seem a mix between depressed and worn out. I also liked the creepy glimpse of Eua, who became fully visible only from episode 21 onward. The scene of Rika escaping feels like a callback to the opening of âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni Kaiâ but I liked how this time sheâs also running for an uphill road and seems even more desperate of escaping. The idea she ultimately reaches the shrine and then we see mirrored in her eye two hands moving to grab her is also interesting. The visual shows us also the places relevant in the story as well as the fragment of Oyashiro-samaâs sword and the weapons the characters used. As a personal preference I like to think of the lyrics as sung by the culprit of the game.
As for the ending, the first one is merely a black background with the credits, its only merit being that the song was actually the FIRST opening theme of the FIRST âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ series.
The second ending starts with a hand trying to reach for the page of the calendar and then shows beautiful draws of scenes relevant in the series which at first are peaceful, then thereâs hands grabbing away more pages from the calendar (which is a scene used in the anime as well) and the scenes starts to turn tragic. We end with tons of days ripped from the calendar in a room which has a lot of blood marks, so this one too well fit with the mood of the series.
The last start with what looks like the wheel of fortune spinning, and then shows images of Satoko and Rika that move from their childhood to their teenager years⊠and then switch to show Rika and Satoko in the sea of fragments⊠before what looks like the wheel of fortune but itâs very likely a huge round chandelier fall on the floor in a spray of blood, a reference to an important scene in the anime. So itâs good.
The plot: The idea of taking the old arcs of âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ and, through small variations, create new arcs (which, at first, was meant to lull the viewers into the idea this was merely a remake, to surprise them when it turns out this is not the case) is interesting, and so is the reason behind this new loop of tragedies.
The characters: The new takes on the characters are done well enough and differences in characterization with the previous series are explained so that they make sense and some of them are well psychologically analyzed.
The visual: The character design is much better than the previous, the funny faces work well as well as well as the creepy ones. The colours are bright, the scenery detailed and Hinamizawa seems really pretty, which is something thatâs also relevant for the plot.
There are also some very nice shoots or choices (like for example, in a particular gori scene, paint everything in red so it feels more dramatic and less splatter).
If anything thereâs an overabundance of blood⊠which actually fits with the series but itâs still so over the top sometimes is ridicule. Also they censored the scenes that were too bloody (and theyâll likely remove the censoring dots in the dvd) but the effect isnât that good so I wish they had chosen to draw the scenes so they wouldnât need censoring⊠but I guess that seeing the scenes without censoring is a huge incentive to buy the dvd so I get why this was done.
The musical background: Kawai Kenjiâs music is, as usual, good, with many different pieces from the creepy ones to the funny ones with traditional ones as well. Overall theyâre really well fitting the story.
Overall: Itâs an interesting idea to revisit the âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ world and a good series on its own. It however comes with the âdownsideâ youâll enjoy it a lot more if youâre familiar with the old series and the other Ryukishi07âs works but I think you can still appreciate it even if you arenât (though you might feel a little lost if you donât).
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
Iâve already mentioned it but I loved the overall visual, from the new character design to the bright colours and the care put in depicting the scenery. Hinamizawa seems beautiful, I loved the way they used colours for the sunset moments, the good moments are filled with light and colour, which really deliver well the message of love for Hinamizawa as well as the daily, ordinary happiness of the characters. The computer graphic for the sea of fragments is nicely done.
The funny expressions can be so very cute and endearing!
Still itâs worth to mention the creepy expressions are very good as well without being over the top deformed.
The bloody rooms are also very nicely drawn, though as usual thereâs just too much blood.
I liked quite a bit the use of âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ when Keiichi discovers the magazines about the murder, it well reminds you THIS IS âHIGURASHIâ.
I also liked how they introduced the changes in the storyline right from episode 1, by presenting Rena watching Keiichi and Rika watching them.
The idea of the red eyes to symbolize when the ones who travel in loops are using their powers is nice and I liked how they, starting from episode 2, set Rikaâs battle, showing her with the belief she can easily overcome this new set of loops⊠and itâs rather interesting how her beliefs backfires, how she suggests Keiichi to doubt himself when he feels afraid of Rena, when actually this time Keiichi was right and Rena was being dangerous⊠or how she basically surrenders as soon as she hears Keiichi and Shion entered the storeroom⊠and when HanyĆ« gave her the power to remember who murdered her, she was already considering giving up⊠but still, I think they portrayed Rikaâs drama well.
Rika being forced to say goodbye to HanyĆ« was a good scene as well as Rika hiding herself, planning to kill herself and the others managing to understand she wanted to find her and keeping on searching until they find her, while Rika is breaking down, crying because she canât find HanyĆ«âs sword⊠and then she finds that fragment of it but decides to postpone and die herself 5 more chances because her friends managed to find her.
Going on, for who saw the previous versions of âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ, itâs good to see Rena and Keiichi fighting each other⊠even though, if I have to be honest, the last part, in which Rena crazily stabs Keiichi while he kept on hitting her felt unbelievable.
I also liked how they reduced the pervert fanservice, though the scene in which Shion is asked to clean the clothes of a customer is still pretty gross.
The 5 additional loops are kind of rushed but works well to introduce how Rika wanted to leave Hinamizawa and attend to St. LuciaâŠ
Rika: Why did I begin to hate Hinamizawa in the first place?
Teen Rika: The answer is simple. I was trapped here for the longest time.
Rika: Yes, thatâs why the moment I was released from this curseâŠ
Teen Rika: I wanted to get out of this hick town, enroll at a fancy, wonderful school, and live a sophisticated life. Was it so wrong to dream of that?
Rika: A hundred years. A century I was trapped here. [She remembers Hinamizawa] What was it I disliked about Hinamizawa?
Teen Rika: I didnât dislike it. Not at all. The tragedies that tortured me, the series of mysterious murders, they were brought about by people, plotting and clashing with one another.
Rika: There were times when I was having so much fun, I barely felt time passing. There were times when I was lost in despair, sobbing on the floor. But no matter what happened, Hinamizawa had me wrapped in its warm embrace.
Teen Rika: Despite that, when peace returned after a hundred years of grief, and Hinamizawa smiled, knowing I could finally stay here without worryâŠ
Rika: I⊠I⊠I wished to be rid of this hick village! Why would I want something so stupid?
âŠas well as why she forces herself to stop wishing for such thing.
I found interesting how Rika, once finally arriving to a âperfectâ world, is unsettled by it. It reminds me of another âperfectâ world, Saikoroshi-hen, which appeared in âHigurashi no naku koro ni Reiâ and Rika rejected that world as well.
I liked Satokoâs definition of happiness with this bit of dialogue with Rika.
Satoko: Perhalps you just havenât realized the true nature of happiness, Rika.
Rika: Huh?
Satoko: Painful moments, no matter how small, stay in our hearts forever. But tiny moments of happiness are quickly forgotten. Forget them, and you forget how truly blessed you are, and you instead yearn for a happiness far greater than you can bear. I cannot think of a more unfortunate turn of events. Rika, youâre happy now, yes? What more could you possibly want?
Rika: Youâre right, Satoko. Iâm so happy I can be with you here right now. So happy⊠âŠthat I canât help but think something bad will happen.
Satoko: Not to fret, Rika. Our lives will be happy and healthy from here on out. After all, this is Hinamizawa. As long as weâre here, Oyashiro-sama will protect us.
Satoko is partially right. Sheâs right in how weâre prone to forget the happy moments and remember the bad ones, but sheâs basically longing for the same thing as Rika, a happiness far greater. She doesnât realize because her happiness, differently from Rika, is based on things ânot changingâ (aka Rika remaining in Hinamizawa) where Rika instead wants to change them.
Satoko canât understand how Rika wants to escape from Hinamizawa, but Rikaâs words deliver it in a way. Sheâs been trapped there for so long that for her âtragedyâ feels tied to that place. Itâs not Hinamizawaâs fault, she too loves Hinamizawa but, to her, tragedy is tied to Hinamizawa. Her wish to escape Hinamizawa, to her old self, is tied to her wish to escape tragedy.
Away from Hinamizawa she can delude herself tragedy wonât strike her and she wonât have to repeat it over and over.
Rika, in a way, grew while trapped in an endless loop, but she had to keep on acting like a young child because she âtechnicallyâ didnât grew. So for her becoming different also probably means finally being free to express that adult part of her.
Plus in âHigurashi no naku koro ni Reiâ, more specifically in âSaikoroshi-henâ we learnt Rika, in a different world, would act like a spoiled princess fawned by her entourage and who never did anything for herself, so the act she will put up when sheâll manage to reach St. Lucia fits with her character. And the fact always in âSaikoroshi-henâ she would be willing to reject a âperfectâ world, because itâs not the one she liked, to the point she would be willing to kill to go back to the world she chose explains also why she has troubles accepting the new world with no tragedies.
I also liked the Satoko reveal⊠even if, in truth, it made little sense.
I mean, Rika in âHigurashi no naku koro ni Kaiâ has learnt people can keep memories of the past loops, Keiichi remembering his past killing. We saw it in this series too, how Keiichi remembered how he killed Rena and Mion or how he attacked Teppei. So really, is it so surprising and suspicious Satoko would remember Rikaâs trap?
Sure, it wasnât a traumatic fact, but who says it has to be traumatic?
Whatever, so now we get to the part which constitutes the big revelation of how those loops came to be and whoâs the culprit.
Iâve never been really fond of the whole Hinamizawa syndrome, so the implication it was caused by HanyĆ« distrusting humans and that once she started believing them again the Hinamizawa syndrome slowly vanished leaves me a little cold, but this is probably just me.
I liked quite a lot how the breaking of Satoko was handled.
Rika pushed on Satoko her own dream, Satoko put a huge effort to fulfill it for Rikaâs sake, but it ended up all for nothing. As going to St. Lucia wasnât Satokoâs dream the burden to remain in that school grew too much while, at the same time, there was no reward for her as Rika became the princess that was mentioned in âSaikoroshi-henâ, cultivated her group of supporters and left her alone. Credits when itâs due, Rika didnât really meant to cut ties with Satoko but, at the same time, she clearly wasnât supportive enough. Satoko also, out of pride, didnât ask for help⊠but the story will show that wasnât really the point.
While I find perfectly understandable how Rika might have wanted to leave Hinamizawa and start another life, her mistake was to push her own dream on Satoko too.
Rika: Thereâs something Iâve secretly dreamed of doing for a long, long time.
Satoko: Huh? Rika, do you meanâŠ
Rika: And I want to make that dream come true with you, Satoko.
Satoko: Huh? A dream? Iâm not sure if I quite follow, Rika.
Rika: Iâve been thinking about this for a long, long time. One day, when Iâm finally able to leave the village on my own⊠I want to experience a new way of lifeâone Iâve never known before. I want to wake up in the morning and turn the page of the calendar, wondering just how the day will unfold. And when it does, my new reality will be as I never could have imagined: filled with wonder, splendor, and new surprises. I want to go to a school where I can live that life. Of course, I want to go there together with you, Satoko. I want to experience high society at a fancy school with you! Nipa!
Satoko has to come with her and share her dream⊠but Satoko is not a pet Rika can take along with her and Satoko has no wish to live such a life. The first time they discuss it, Rika pushes Satoko to agree by hitting on her pride, claiming she doesnât want to do it because she doesnât like to study, which is absolutely true and Rika knows it, but she also knows Satoko wonât admit it so Satoko ends up roped in and, while sheâs clearly not enthusiast or interested in fancy life, she tries to keep up on studies solely for Rika.
After experiencing how that world wouldnât work well for her, Satoko tries to change Rikaâs mind about it and Rika refuses. While a part of her is entirely legitimate in not wanting to give up on her fancy life in St. Lucia, the way she put things aims at making Satoko feel bad because she was refusing to help her with her dream. However, while a good friend should help you with your dreams, thereâs a limit to how far you can ask. Rika could have asked for Satokoâs support and encouragement, not for Satoko to also share her dream because, well, thatâs Rikaâs dream and Satoko is entitled to have her own. And with the following loops things get worse.
The next time Satoko outright refuses to listen to Rika and makes clear she wonât take part to Rikaâs dream.
Satoko: Rika. Iâm not as smart as you are. Moreover, I absolutely detest studying.
Rika: Yes, so do I! Thatâs why we can work togetherâ
Satoko: Please, stop talking and let me speak. Even if we get into that school, I wonât be able to keep up with the academics. And those ladylike types would never befriend a country bumpkin like me. Though youâll fit in well, so Iâm sure youâll be surrounded by friends. I donât want to be all by my lonesome.
Rika: Donât worry! Iâm your best friend. Iâll be by your side the whole time! Itâll be okay! Even after we get in, Iâll be your best friend. I wonât let you be alone! I promise!
Satoko: Youâre lying! Youâre lying. Youâre a filthy liar, Rika! I know what your idea of âtogetherâ is! Itâs studying for exams âtogetherâ because itâs boring alone. Or going to the exam results posting âtogetherâ because itâs sad going alone! Or going to the bathroom at night âtogetherâ because youâre scared! Thatâs all you mean by âtogetherâ!
Rika: Th-thatâs not what I meanâŠ
Satoko: Tell me, Rika. Being able to accomplish anything with effort is a talent in and of itself. You tried to learn to walk with stilts or ride a unicycle, but did you succeed?
Rika: IâŠ
Satoko: I could do both with ease, yet you kept struggling and failing, over and over.
Rika: I neverâŠ
Satoko: Everyone has things they simply canât do, no matter how hard they try. Iâll put it simply: no matter how hard I try, I will never excel in school. And I donât want to try! I hate it! I canât endure the pain I must suffer to help you with your âdreamâ! And then, when we get into the school, youâll forget all about me, and instead spend all your time with your fancy little friends! Youâll have nothing to do with your stupid âfriendâ! I know thatâs what happens!
Rika: Why are you saying all this�
Satoko: So now, you have to decide! Do you want your fancy school, or me? Pick one and live with it!
Rika: Why are you this upset about it? I donât understand!
Satoko: Are you going to live a fun, happy life with me here in Hinamizawa, or abandon both Hinamizawa and me?! Make a decision, right now!
Rika: Iâm sorry. I canât pick just one. I want both the school and you!
Satoko is very direct here. She told her she doesnât want to go to that fancy school, that studying makes her feel bad that it would be too much of a burden on her but Rika just doesnât listen. She doesnât understand why Satoko is upset and refuses to accept she has to concede, that she canât force Satoko to join her in that school, that she has to choose. Rika doesnât really try to understand Satoko, she just wants to get what she wants. Again she would chose a world built on anotherâs misery because that world would be one which would treat her kindly.
On the other side Satoko has, at the beginning, compromised for her own sake and tried to understand her point of view. She has accepted to go to St. Lucia with her, she had put up on studying, she has accepted Rika wanted to spend time with other girls who looked down on Satoko. And this probably had made matter worse because all this went unrewarded, becoming additional burden.
My personal speculation is Satoko got to met Eua-san because, when she entered into the ritual warehouse, she committed suicide. She looked depressed and unwilling to go back to St. Lucia after allâŠ
Eua: I digress. By your countenance, it seems you have an unrequited wish. And your longing for said wish has whittled away at your well-being. I can hear your soul crying out in anguish.
âŠand the fact she sees the horn might actually be symbolic of her seeing a weapon and using it against herself. After all, once she leaves Eua, the time has been reset and Eua said in order to reset time, Satoko would have to die.
Eua: Very well! I will grant you my power! You will become one who lives in loops, repeating through endless spirals of time until your wish is fulfilled.
Satoko: What do you mean, live in loops? I donât understand!
Eua: To reset your world from the beginning, all you must do is die.
Though this is just me. Anyway, even if we assume she didnât commit suicide, afterward Satoko begins to commit suicide over and over and this likely further caused her to break herself.
Satoko: Iâve realized something. Even if someone can live through endless loops of time, they cannot escape the damage done to their mind.
Eua: Correct. While this power grants one an endless existence, it does not promise a preserved mind. In fact, it would be correct to say this power does not make you immortal.
So yes, we arrive to a Satoko whoâs different from the start, one thatâs willing to torture and kill Rika to get Rika to stay with her, to force her own dream on Rika, when the original Satoko basically tortured herself to help Rika fulfill her dream, and sacrificed her own dream for Rika. Satoko got damaged and there was no more turning back.
And I liked how she excuses to herself what sheâs about to do, which feels again as a reference to âSaikoroshi-henâ.
Eua: Now, you control whether a tragedy occurs or not, as well as whom it strikes. But will you truly feel no guilt for using this method?
Satoko: None at all. After all, there wonât be any tragedy in the world where Rika and I are together. Anything that happens in other fragments never really happens, right? The world I choose in the end is the only world that truly exists. The previous worlds are worth no more than dreams or hallucinations.
Actually this whole new series feels like something âSaikoroshi-henâ inspired, only now weâve Satoko instead than Rika.
And, although Satokoâs plan ends up like the product of an insane mind, I like her pro-active approach to things, how while Rika hopes in luck when she tosses her dice, Satoko instead works to ensure the dice will pull out a favourable number and the more the anime develops Satoko, and let her interact with Eua (which seems a copy of Featherine Augustus Aurora from âUmineko no naku koro niâ) the more her resemblance with Lambdadelta, whoâs also from âUmineko no naku koro niâ becomes visible.
Satoko: How many times must I tell you, Eua-san? Once I decide to win, my victory is certain. I will live with Rika together in Hinamizawa. As long as that is the goal I wish to achieve, then that future is certain to come to pass. Wait for me, Rika! My dear, beloved Rika! Our happy world is within our reach!
Here in fact we can see her references to âcertainâ (Lambdadelta was the witch of Certainty) and to her mad love for Rika, also known as Bernkastel (always in âSaikoroshi-henâ Rika picked up the name Frederika Bernkastel for herself).
On a sidenote as an âUmineko no naku koro niâ fan I enjoyed the quick cameo of Amakusa JĆ«za, or better Skylark 13, as this was the code name he used in âHigurashi no naku koro niâ. He wasnât a big character in âHigurashi no naku koro niâ but he was a beloved one in âUmineko no naku koro niâ so Iâm glad they gave him space, as small as it was.
Now for something else⊠do I buy the narrative that Satoko âisâ Lambdadelta? Or better that Lambdadelta is part Satoko part Takano Miyo?
Iâve mixed feelings for this. I mean, Lambda has traits she shares with Satoko and we know Lambda, Satoko and Miyo (as well as Vier and Mitsuyo which Eua-san mentions) can be read as 34 but somehow Iâm not really fond of the idea that Lambda is born by both Satoko and Takano.
Though of course this is just me and the whole thing is so vague it can be that Lambda is just a personification of âcertain willâ that took life with Miyo and was further shaped by Satoko and anyway connections between âHigurashi no naku koro niâ and âUmineko no naku koro niâ are confusing enough (what with Eua being Featherine apparently but her being Bernkastelâs master and no mention with her having a special connection with Lambda?) and maybe I shouldnât think too much at this or, as Will would say, I would just get a headache.
Still, to sum it up, for now âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni GĆâ feels like an interesting story, with a good care for the visual but also for the charactersâ psychology, the right amount of horror and blood to allow it to fit in the splatter group, if thatâs what you like.
For fans of âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ it should be a pleasure to watch it, though I donât know if new fans would manage to follow everything. Honestly I would recommend to watch at least âHigurashi no Naku Koro niâ, âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni Kaiâ and âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni Reiâ before watching âHigurashi no Naku Koro ni GĆâ so as to better understand the series and enjoy it more because although the anime tried to explain/hint at things that were in the previous series, it couldnât really cover what 55 episodes. Or, of course, one might read the manga or the visual novels if they donât feel like watching the old Studio Deen anime showed (and if you really want to make sure you donât lose a single reference read the visual novel of âCiconia no naku koro niâ and manga or the visual novel of âUmineko no naku koro niâ and absolutely AVOID the âUmineko no naku kori niâ anime. Itâs a horrid mess).
But whatever, itâs a good series and Passione did a good work. Now if they only consider making a remake of âUmineko no naku koro niââŠ
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Toxic
Two cents of ramblings on: âX -ex-: YochĆ - AN OMENâ (OAV)...
...and why I recommend it.
GENERAL DATA
Title: X -ex-: YochĆ - AN OMEN (X -ăšăăŻăč-: äșć - AN OMEN âX -x-: Omen - AN OMENâ)
Media: OAV
Adaptation of: âXâ shĆjo manga by CLAMP.
Genre: Action, Dark fantasy, Supernatural thriller
Directed by: Kawajiri Yoshiaki
Written by: Kawajiri Yoshiaki
Studio: Madhouse
Original run: August 25, 2001
Running time: 22:34
WARNINGS: There's murder, torture, death
The plot in short: Dreamseer Kuzuki KakyĆ shares his story and some prophetic dreams he had about the incoming battle for the end of the world.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Iâm a HUGE fan of the âXâ manga so, of course, I wanted to see it.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Iâll mention the manga, the movie and the following anime series (by the way, nowadays you find this OAV sold along to the anime series of which itâs considered the episode 0).
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: Thereâs no opening, the ending is âSTRENGTHâ by Koizumi KĆhei. The song is nice and its sad music is very fitting with the mood of this OAV. As for the visual⊠itâs basically a black background on which you see on the top the images of each character in the story and below it the characterâs name and his voice actor, then, once they all had been shown itâs just a wall of text with the credits.
The plot: The idea of the plot is good and interesting! They managed to explore more the character of Kuzuki KakyĆ and, using his visions, to give glimpses of the characters and the incoming conflicts of the story without spoilering too much the viewers.
The characters: As this is kind of a preview for the series, the only characters who is explored is Kuzuki KakyĆ, while we only get glimpses of the others. Still KakyĆâs tragedy is well depicted and the glimpses manages to present the other characters as potentially interesting, especially since they often touch relevant moments of the story.
The visual: Iâm not that fond of the character design and I hate they changed the eye colours since they actually were meant to mean something. I found the background poor with the colours opaque and the scenes often dark. In short Iâm not really positively impressed by the visual.
The musical background: I enjoyed most of it so I think SatĆ Naoki did a good work with it.
Overall: Although the visual wasnât that great I found the OAV intriguing and enjoyable, a great preview for the anime that made me hope the anime would turn out awesome as well.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
Thereâs various things I liked about this OAV.
The idea of starting with the two Kamuis grabbing the swords, for example, itâs sure one that feels interesting if you never read âXâ but that set you well in the mood of the story if you had, even though it wasnât the first image of the manga.
I liked the idea of using KakyĆ to narrate this story as it works well for many reasons. For start KakyĆ wasnât in the âXâ movie so finally seeing him feels new and intriguing, then due to his nature as dreamgazer that can see fragments of the future it excuses/explains why this OAV shows us fragments of the future in an intelligent ways.
I liked how they tried to expand KakyĆâs story⊠even though the expansion didnât really clear it much, if anything it makes it more confuse⊠I mean, in the manga itâs clear KakyĆ is a prisoner and, when he tries to escape, heâs immediately shoot and then hospitalized.
Here though thereâs an old lady, whoâs apparently the master of the house, who pities him when she realizes he escaped, and the security is horrible, because KakyĆ almost manages to reach Hokuto, so he could escape, but then if the men report to the old lady and the old lady didnât mean to do him any harm, who shoot KakyĆ multiple times?
It seems almost they were protecting him by keeping him jailed and someone else shoot him⊠so while on a side I want to praise the OAV for trying to give KakyĆ more backstory⊠on the other I wish they had wrote it better.
On the negative notes instead we can already start to see changes on the charactersâ characterization or in the story that will also later plague the anime series.
For example Hokuto dies calling âKakyĆâ instead than âSubaruâ, thereâs a first hint that FĆ«ma is in the basket club when, in CLAMPâs intentions, FĆ«ma was in the kendĆ club (though, okay, this is not really shown in the manga, where still we see him playing soccer, not basket, but only in a commentary on an illustration), Sorataâs kekkai, instead than cube shaped is a parallelepiped, SeishirĆ and Subaruâs meeting takes place on the top of a building and not in Nakano in front of the Sun Plaza, how KakyĆ claims what he wants is regain the courage Hokuto gave him when he actually only wanted to die.
But in a short OAV you might miss them all and they arenât really a trouble. I quite enjoyed how they showed those fragments of future one after the other, the fragments they chose, how well they connected the imagine of feathers to them, the fragments of future seems falling feathers and then, after seeing another feather fall in the water, the image shows us there are many feathers there and KakyĆ comments:
KakyĆ: Tragedy will repeat just like in the dreams, that is destiny. Everything just goes along its flow. There is only one future. Only but one.
And as he says so feathers starts moving as if following the flow, and then they connect to this scene the bit of Kotori saying the future hadnât been determined yet and then of FĆ«ma, or better, of KAMUI saying it has.
I mean, although not all the bits are connected perfectly, overall most are in a way that summarizes the series and its themes, so yeah, this was good.
As I already mentioned I hated how they changed the charactersâ eye colour because there was a reason for them to be such colour⊠but this is a talk more fitting for the anime as in the OAV the implications couldnât be seen yet.
Still, although it wasnât visually great, I found the OAV pretty enjoyable, something I would recommend to any fan of the series⊠though Iâm not sure if someone whoâs not a fan would manage to follow it. But they can view it as a preview, a trailer of the series, and in this case it well works for its purpose and can already start to give you an idea if youâll enjoy the series or not. So well, I recommend it.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Vater Unser
The plot in short: A girl dies and find herself reincarnated into Catarina Claes, the villainess of an Otome Game, âFortune Loverâ, when the latter was a child. Aware that all the routes of the game would lead to her being either exiled or killed she desperately tries to adopt countermeasures to avoid her flags of doom.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
I was searching a funny anime to watch during summer and this one caught my eyes, probably also due to how I saw the cute Nendo of Catarina so it felt kind of familiar...
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
If youâre not familiar with the terms an otome game (äčć„łăČăŒă âmaiden gameâ) is a video game in which the main goal is to develop a romantic relationship between the female player character and one of several male characters.
Isekai (ç°äžç "different world"), is a Japanese genre of portal fantasy that revolve around a person or people who are transported to and have to survive in another world, such as a fantasy world, virtual world, another planet, future/past time, or parallel universe.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The anime uses as opening âOtome no Route wa Hitotsu Janai!â (äčć„łăźă«ăŒăăŻăČăšă€ăăăȘăïŒ âThere's More Than Just One Route For a Maiden!â) by Angela and, as ending âBad Endâ by Aoi ShĆta. The opening is just cute, simple and well match the music and introduces the characters with nice transition effects to show Katarina and the other characters as child and as adults. Maybe itâs not a perfect work of art but itâs well structured and definitely enjoyable so I liked it! The ending isnât bad but itâs nothing special either, just made by still images of the characters. Honestly I found it unimpressive.
The plot: The struggles of Catarina to avoid her doom are extremely fun to follow! The story is basically split in two, her childhood, which is kind of a prequel to the âFortune Loverâ game and then her teenager years which basically cover the âFortune Loverâ plot. The plot is easy to follow and not that deep but this doesnât stop you from enjoying the comedy of it.
The characters: The introduction to all the characters is gradual and, while they all are meant to be the stereotypical characters of an otome game⊠in the end they came out as much funnier and different than just that. Theyâre all likable and fun.
The visual: The story aims at being very pretty visually, the colours are bright and the background well cared for, even if deliberately a bit vague. The charactersâ expression can be pretty fun and chibi-like. If you want the character design is a bit simple but it works well for the story.
The musical background: Itâs actually rather nice! Nothing over the top but still enjoyable and fitting the mood.
Overall: Itâs a light and fun anime to watch! It will offer you amusement and distraction.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
So I quite liked the premise of this story in which our main character find herself reincarnated into the villainess and how she has to try to find a way to avoid her doom.
I loved how they depicted how her mind work in a way which reminded me of the movie âInside outâ, in short by having 5 chibi Catarina, each with a different character. Weâve chairmain Catarina, happy Catarina, studious Catarina, fearless Catarina and spineless Catarina and they all discuss among them Catarinaâs situation and what they plan to do.
But a big part of what I enjoyed is how they handled the concept of Otome games.
From Catarinaâs perspective sheâs in an Otome game in which the main character and heroine is Maria, which, in real life, would be a stand in for the player.
But from us viewersâ perspective, itâs Catarina the one whoâs the main character, which the game subtly hints as weâll never learn the name of the person she was before. Weâre meant to identify with Catarina, not with Maria and, as Catarina, we play âFortune Loversâ.
And, by this premise, Catarina and her actions and the effects her actions have make the game more ârealisticâ in a way.
Both Catarina and Maria are two very good girls, but while Maria is beautiful and has light magic despite being a peasant and a sad backstory and is probably constructed to be a Mary Sue, Catarina has plenty of flaws.
Sheâs lazy, sheâs a glutton, she doesnât know proper etiquette, despite being a noble she has extremely poor magic, sheâs not particularly pretty (often she jokes her face is pretty scary) and so on. Likely this is a jab to how some people play otome games because in real life charming boys donât just drop at their feet because theyâre far from perfect.
However Catarina has her own strengths as well. As said before sheâs kind, sheâs brave, sheâs straightforward and she tries her best and are those strengths what helps her to go through the various âeventsâ of the game in the right manner. Catarina feels sheâs stealing them from other characters (mostly the protagonist) but, in truth, since SHE is the main character in this story, sheâs just correctly triggering them.
Being Maria is a very hard to obtain goal, but we can all be Catarina (actually Catarina is sometimes so dense we might even lull ourselves into thinking it would be easy to be better than her) so what Catarina does and obtain seems a possible goal.
And thereâs another thing this story makes that makes it sounds more ârealisticâ than âFortune Loversâ.
In âFortune Loversâ the protagonist is meant to trigger the events when theyâre teenagers. In a short amount of time, by doing some right choices, she radically changes a conquerable character and wins his love. This is a very power fantasy but one extremely unrealistic because itâs not so easy to change people.
Catarina instead triggers those events when the conquerable characters are children and reinforces their changes through the years until they become teenagers and enter the magic academy.
So itâs perfectly reasonable the conquerable characters changed into different people since they had years to do so, and it works theyâre so attached to her since she triggered those changes and spent years to positively enforcing them.
Keith has plenty of memories of Catarina supporting him, Geordo spent years with her, learning to know her and growing fond of her, Alan was constantly positively reinforced so that he could accept that he and his brother have different strength and neither was inferior to the other and Nicol could appreciate how good she was to his sister and to him for years.
This builds a strong foundation to their changes and their feelings, way stronger than if they just met her and she made few nice things to them.
Sure, the idea she basically conquered EVERYONE, even the characters that were meant to be love rivals like Mary, when she was still a child, is also unrealistic but the idea behind it is more ârealâ because plays on real dynamics that can happen with an appropriate amount of time and effort.
Whoâs meant to identify in Catarina isnât, after all, an eight year old but teenagers, and the message is if theyâll work like she did, in time theyâll conquer their love interest. It wonât happen overnight as the game âFortune Loversâ let its players believe, but with years of work. They would just start later compared to Catarina, which is a nice message.
And while conquering Sirius Dieke/Raphael Walt is the one HARD victory thatâs not gained through years of hard work (conquering Maria was pretty easy, all she needed was someone to notice her which is an interesting way to paint the heroine of an otome game who, effectively, easily fall in love with one of the conquerable characters) but just two years spent together, the good part is she didnât cause him to fall in love with her but that she wins him over by offering him friendship and kindness.
Catarina: Thatâs what happened? And thatâs why youâre in such painâŠ
Sirius/Raphael: You hypocrite! Do you think you can save me like you did all those others, Good Saint Catarina Claes-sama?!
Maria: If this goes any further, weâre all in danger!
Gerdo: Catarina!
Keith: Nee-san!
Catarina: Iâll be fine. I know I canât save you. Iâm not the heroine here, after all. Iâm just the villainess, here to play the heroineâs rival. Of course I canât save anyone. I canât save you from your suffering but I can stay by your side. Just like they all did for me, I can stay by your side, hear you out when youâre sad or hurt, and not leave you until youâre feeling better.
Mother: Whatâs wrong? Sitting out here crying wonât make it stop hurting. Iâll stay here with you. I wonât leave you until youâre feeling better.
Catarina/Mother: So donât cry all alone, Raphael.
And this brings home another theme, everyone needs friendship and kindness, along with how thereâs not an easy way to fix people, to save them. Catarina doesnât go to him saying sheâll save him, just that sheâll basically offer him her friendship⊠and thatâs what give Raphael the motivation to save himself. Because heâs supported by Catarina, he remembers the truth, that he was supported by the person he loved, his mother, who didnât ask him to avenge her but to live and be happyâŠ
Mother: Raphael⊠Please⊠live. Live⊠and be happy. I love you.
âŠand so he fights against the dark magic user who was possessing him and manipulating his memories. And, if we want, in this case Catarina is the trigger, but there was one person who had loved him for years and that was his mother.
However, even if one doesnât care about the message, this story is great just for the light fun it allows you to have. Catarinaâs reactions, often over the top as well as her schemes to avoid triggering doom flags are so very fun!
I love all the cute, chibi expressions she has, just watching her itâs fun!
And I love how the story ends with a âfriendship endingâ of some sort, at least from Catarinaâs perception because, in truth it should be a âreverse harem endingâ because everyone loves Catarina but, since sheâs unaware of it and sees them all as friends, it works well as âfriendship endingâ.
On a fun note the anime kind of messes up a little as, once Raphael joins the Department of Magic we see walking behind him Rufus Brode/Sora Smith, the scene implying Rufus is already in it⊠but heâll only join it in the second season⊠though maybe by the time they animated this series they had no idea they would make a second season so his cameo is just a nice bonus for whoâs familiar with the following events in the novels.
I also likes Catarinaâs final words.
Catarina: When I was reincarnated as a villainess in an otome game where all routes led to my doom, I spent my days complaining about how my luck couldnât be any worse. But now, I can say loudly and proudly⊠that I, Catarina Claes, am truly blessed to have met all these wonderful people. I have no idea whatâs going to happen from now on. A new season that wasnât in the gameâs script is about to begin!
Catarina avoided all her doom flags because she adopted a very active approach⊠and the wonderful people she met became wonderful because she was a positive influence to them (as in the game they were beautiful but, surely, not that nice as characters, except with the heroine).
So yeah âHameFuraâ is a definitely enjoyable anime, not too deep or heavy but with plenty of fun and cute moments, something that gifts you with pleasurable time, so itâs definitely something I recommend!
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Electropop
Sequel of: âHagane no renkinjutsushi â Fullmetal Alchemistâ (éŒăźéŹéèĄćž« âAlchemist of steelâ) anime series dated (2003/2004).
Genre: Adventure, Dark fantasy, Steampunk
Directed by: Mizushima Seiji
Written by: Aikawa ShĆ
Studio: Bones
Original run: July 23, 2005
Running time: 105 minutes
WARNINGS: There is murder, war, body horror.
The plot in short: The Nazi, believing Edwardâs world to be Shamballa, wants to conquer it so as to obtain new weapons. Edward ends up discovering this and having to stop them.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Well, after watching the series, how could I not watch the movie which supposedly ends it?
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Iâll reference the series. Also this isnât a âletâs sing praises of this movieâ sort of review, quite the contrary. If the idea of reading a review commenting on its mistakes and weak points bothers you just stop here.
Also some info:
Shamballa or Shambhala is a spiritual kingdom in Tibetan Buddhist tradition. With time Shamballa was identified as the abode of particularly evolved spiritual beings and therefore became a recurring theme of esotericism which also fed Nazi mysticism.
Thule is the farthest north location mentioned in ancient Greek and Roman literature and cartography however in classical and medieval literature, ultima Thule (Latin âfarthermost Thuleâ) acquired a metaphorical meaning of any distant place located beyond the âborders of the known worldâ. In Germany, occultists believed in a historical Thule, or Hyperborea, as the ancient origin of the Aryan race so the Thule Society was founded.
Also you might not know it as they arenât that well known in popular culture but Karl Ernst Haushofer, Rudolf Hess and Fritz Lang, which are characters who appear in the movie, were actually real people.
Longinus is the name given to the unnamed Roman soldier who pierced the side of Jesus with a lance.
Dietlinde Eckhartâs name might have been inspired by Dietrich Eckart who was the founder of the German Workersâ Party which was the predecessor to the Nazi party.
Dr. Mabuse is a character in Fritz Langâs movie. He is a criminal mastermind, doctor of psychology, and master of disguise, armed with the powers of hypnosis and mind control, who oversees the counterfeiting and gambling rackets of the Berlin underworld
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The movie uses as opening âLinkâ by L'Arc-en-Ciel and, as ending âLost Heavenâ always by L'Arc-en-Ciel. For what regards the ending there are no accompanying images to it, thereâs just a black screen on which credits rolls so I can tell you that the song is good but⊠thatâs all thereâs to say. The opening uses scenes from the anime and rather pretty art in a way that reminds me of otome game openings. Itâs enjoyable and pretty but⊠nothing over the top.
The plot: The plot is the real sad note of this movie. It doesnât really develop the characters, it focuses way too much on Nazi Germany and on side characters I didnât really care about and that didnât really get developed that much.
The characters: We see⊠too little of the characters Iâve come to love and the movie seems to think to make up for it presenting us alternate version of them who lives in Nazi Germany⊠only they donât really get explored that much either soâŠ
The visual: Okay, the visual is very good, the background is filled with details and beautifully drawn, the colours have an odd slightly brownish tinge as if I were to be watching an old movie which fit with the Nazi Germany atmosphere while scenes in Ed and Alâs world are in bright colours as to draw a contrast. The computer graphic is not so great although not ugly but this is 2005 and, anyway, itâs way better than what will use âGolden Kamuyâ in 2018.
The BGM: Ćshima Michiru continues to do a good BGM, which, if you ask me, is well used.
Overall: The anime deserved a better ending movie. It definitely did. You might watch the movie to see again the characters you loved and because itâs aesthetically pretty but⊠Iâm not sure itâll satisfy you, plot wise.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
When I talked about the anime, I mentioned how there were things that it didnât explain and an ending it left open. So a movie was a great chance to deal with all those loose threads and expand the characters arcs so as to explain them and their motivation better⊠but no, this is not that sort of movie.
One of the characters the anime neglected for example, is Envy. Well, Envy is in the movie too, weâve left him going to through the gate in search of Hohenheim in its dragon form and so heâs in Nazi Germany too. He appears in a castle as a dragon because apparently, even if alchemy doesnât work there, homunculiâs powers work just fine, tries to kill Edward and is easily captured by the Nazi who, instead than kill or take captive Ed who had witnessed the scene, leave him there unconscious and take Envy away. Then they impale him with Longinusâ lances and Dietlinde Eckhartâs uses magic/alchemy on him so that they have him bite Hohenheim, which they had captured, so they can use him to open the gate that leads to Edâs world and heâll stay quiet because, hey, biting Hohenheim us totally worth being held captive and used by humans.
Basically Envy is reduced to a plot device.
Hohenheim let himself be bitten because he tried making a passagerway to the other side using the magic and science of this side, therefore cooperating with the Nazi and because he failed Envy, as he couldnât resurrect him but turned him into a homunculus and then discharged him⊠and also he took over the life or plenty of people in order to go on living and WHY he should care at this point after 400 years spent pretending it was none of his business is of course left unexplained.
I mean, I get he somehow wanted to help Ed going back home because in the anime he mysteriously discovered, after dumping him and Al when they were small, that he loves them, but if this needed to get developed in the anime but I could still pass over it, here it becomes beyond weird.
So anyway, as heâs been bleeding out like hell by God knows how long yet not dying, he decides heâll transmute into a gate Envy, you know, the son he has turned into a monster and discharges, something which he now rejects but not to the point he wonât use him to help the son he actually cared for, Edward and his idea of how to transmute him is to force him to bite him to⊠explosion apparently, as all of sudden he sprays all around a sea of blood by making him clench his jaw.
All this for Dietlinde Eckhart to shoot Edward a moment later but apparently she canât aim so she actually only scratches Edwardâs artificial arm, which⊠causes Edward to apparently faint and fall from an amazing height and not even get a scratch. So okay, as you might notice I also find the logic on which the movie is based beyond dumb.
I mean there are those huge plot contrivances like Edward seeing Lang, who looks like King Bradley for movie reasons because in real life they didnât look alike, so Edward forgets thereâs just people who looks alike the people of his world despite spending times regularly with a copy of Al, one of Gracia and one of Huges (and Iâll argue Noah might be a copy of Rose but with normally coloured hair) and tails him so that the latter ends up bringing him in the castle in which Envy is, so heâs around for⊠no real good reason when the Nazi capture Envy.
I mean, Ed decides to do something only when Noah goes with the guy of the Thule society, which she decides to do in front of him instead than leaving him without warning so that theyâll get a reaction from him⊠and Lang will coincidentally decide thatâs a good moment to crash with his car inside the place Edward was in so he can help him escape with a car who doesnât even have a scratch.
So for now we have no proper development of familiar characters, no logic in the plot, plot contrivances a gogo.
Adds way too much focus on the world Edward is in, which we should already be familiar about as itâs our own only in pre WW2 time so really, why should I care?
Why should I care of the story digging onto how Nazi Germany also wants to invade Amestris as if Nazi Germany attacking something or playing the role of the bad guy were some sort of new idea?
Okay, the movie wasnât made for me so maybe Japanese viewers likes this but really, there has been already plenty of anime about this so⊠couldnât we have a movie about something else? Something new, like the âFullmetal Alchemistâ universe was?
And Iâm saying this as someone who loves historical series but I felt zero need to see 1923 Germany take over âFullmetal Alchemistâ because the way it was done it felt more like they were tossing at me real life characters and random real life info just for the sake of doing it.
I could already see the âFullmetal Alchemistâ parallels with my world, the racism, the wars of aggression in the world of Amestris, they really didnât need to toss in Nazi Germany, especially because it breaks the parallels between Amestris and my world and paint Amestris like the good guys when itâs only four years they got rid of FĂŒhrer King Bradley (and Dante), who really wasnât called FĂŒhrer at random, and Mustang wasnât rewarded for getting rid of Bradley, quite the contrary, and what about all the people who supported King Bradley? Couldnât we see how Amestris evolved after Bradleyâs death instead?
But thatâs not all of the âwhy should I care?â
The movie introduces a new character, Noah, a Roma girl, whoâs sold by other Romani girls because she has the eerie ability to read the mind and is saved by Ed and seems to play as âromantic interestâ for him of some sort (but not really that much), and tries to push forward the theme of racism that was well depicted in the anime this time using her, which could be interesting if the anime hadnât done it better. But the real role of Noah in the movie is solely to read Edâs mind so that she can memorize all of Edward knowledge about alchemy and complete the transmutation circle.
I mean⊠thatâs not clairvoyance, the idea she would learn all of Edward alchemic knowledge just by peaking at his mind or that she could memorize as much as the magic circle⊠at least I think she memorized the magic circle because otherwise I donât know what use she had, she just told them there were no incantation and that they had to make circulate the power between themselves and the transmutation circle which means⊠what for those humans who know nothing of Edwardâs alchemy?
But who cares, the gate reacts anyway but Noah canât open it, maybe because sheâs just stretching her hands toward it and doing nothing?
But whatever, whatâs her point beyond that?
Express her longing for a place that wonât mistreat her due to her race? She learnt Edwardâs knowledge, didnât she saw what happened to the Ishbalans? Edward left without knowing if Mustang defeated Bradley, as far as he knows they might still be persecuting them, them who has darker skin like Noah, what makes her think sheâll be safe there?
And then weâve Dietlinde Eckhart, which we can speculate is an alternate version of Dante but who actually knows, who has zero development and itâs just evil and first claims she wants to go to Shamballa to gain weapons then we get this:
Dietlinde: Why?! Why is my magic being obstructed?! This place is a new world, completely different from our world.
Edward: It's not at all different. People live, weep, laugh, and die. There's one thing I'd like to ask you. Why did you suddenly attack? Weren't you going to use this world's know-how for your war over there?
Dietlinde: I am going to destroy this world!
Edward: For what reason?!
Dietlinde: Because it is terrifying! Once I learned that a doorway could be opened with the power... ...of the Great Serpent, and that there was another world... ...when I learned that it had power that exceeded our own... I became frightened-- so frightened that I could not stand it. I knew that I had to destroy it!
Edward: The people here would never start a war with you!
Dietlinde: How can you know that?!
Edward: We are humans, like you!
Dietlinde: No, you aren't! You may take the same form, but you are monsters from another world!
I mean, this could really be an interesting point to ponder, the idea she waged war merely because scared by whatâs different, and would tie nicely with the theme of racism⊠but itâs all so random!
She jumps from âwhy my magic is obstructedâ to âthis world is completely different from oursâ with no real logic connection. Then it turns out she has also changed her goals or that was never her goal but since her character development was nonexistent this feels just random.
Edward claiming they would never go at war with her world is dumb considering that people has followed and supported King Bradley who has waged war effortlessly so it canât all be blamed on Bradley being an homunculus, never mentioning he was lead by Dante, a human, so again this is dumb and Ed should know and the fact he says âah, weâre human like you so we wouldnât attack youâ actually doesnât hold ground because humans attack each other both in Amestris and in Dietlindeâs world so really that doesnât stand.
Besides why is she Dietlinde instead than Dietrich? The movie didnât shy away from using real people, why turning Dietrich into a woman? Because Dietrich in real life died of heart attack short after the Munich Putsch and wasnât turned into a monster during it and shoot? Why would the movie care? Is that why she only shoot in the arm Haushofer? Because the latter is not meant to die there? Why shooting him anyway? Why not knocking him out?
And we finish the movie with Ed and Al being stuck into our world so how cool, theyâre together but again, theyâre not back home and Winry is left in Amestris because Winryâs arc in this movie goes nowhere, sheâs only here to provide Ed with a new arm and leg and thatâs it.
Besides what about making Hughes a Nazi but not developing the thing at all and then pairing him back with Gracia, whoâs actually a decent person instead, as if nothing had happened at the end of the movie? I mean the idea of making him evil could have been very interesting but itâs basically not explored and the same goes for a possible switching side⊠which we donât really know if happened. Has he changed just because the Munich Putsch failed? Because he shot Dietlinde Eckhart after she turned into a monster? Who knows?
And thereâs more but Iâll stop here.
So everything is bad?
No, actually the action scenes are really, really cool, a real pleasure to watch.
Then they tried ending Wrath and Gluttony arc. Gluttony arc works, Wrathâs arc would have benefitted of some parts that ultimately were cut from the movie because apparently a lot was cut from this movie to give it the length it has and not the 3 hours and more length the original script was meant to have⊠which means they basically cut half of the movie so maybe itâs not all the movieâs fault if it was so messed up. With so much cut, of course things didnât properly get developed. But, back to Wrath, although his arc felt a bit shaky because they cut his reason to sacrifice for Alphonse, it wasnât that bad.
I somehow loved Alfons Heiderich because itâs one of the few characters the movie managed to actually develop and he worked well enough. I love this exchange between him and Ed.
Alfons: Looks like she missed you and hit your artificial arm. âAt a speed of over 11 kilos per second, this rocket will punch through whatever phenomena occurs within the doorway, and get us to the other side.â That was Haushofer-san's idea. This one-seater should also put out enough speed.
Edward: Hold on! I never said I was going to the other side.
Alfons: I want you to go.
Edward: Alfons, am I in the way?
Alfons: We don't just exist in the middle of one of your dreams. Even as my life is coming to an end, I'm still me. I will definitely be here. Don't forget me.
Edward: Alfons! Alfons! Alfons!
And then Alfons dies, shot by Rudolf Hess, but he dies smiling because he has managed to make his rocket and use it to send Edward where he needed to go. And itâs a great moment. Alfons came a lot more likable than Noah, who yes, is mistreated so I feel bad for her, but sheâs also solely caring for her own interests ignoring how Edward helped her. Alfons didnât have to help Edward, he didnât own him, but he did because he was a friend and a good person. I wish they had given Noah something more likable quality than just the sad part of the discriminate girl (and, as I already said, I found her wish to go to Amestris to escape discrimination, baseless as there was discrimination in Amestris).
I loved the dialogue at the end between Ed and AlâŠ
Alphonse: Another great war is sure to start. That could be something that's unavoidable, huh? I wonder if it's something we should be getting involved with.
Edward: We can no longer go on thinking that this world has nothing to do with ourselves. This is our world. There's no difference. This is where we live.
I mean, I like the conclusion they canât feel uninvolved that they now belong to that world⊠even if I donât like how it seems to imply they gave up on their own world and⊠Iâm not sure how they mean to get involved in WW2. I mean, they canât use alchemy, theyâll be just soldiers like everyone else. And even if they werenât to be soldiers, if they were just to walk around, they would still be involved in the war because itâs a WW whatâs about to happen with invasions and bombing and everything so really, they canât escape to it.
But whatever, still that bit was good and, as I said previously, the visual was also good. I donât know why they put Romeâs Vittoriano in Amestris but hey, cool, beautifully drawn.
So, do I recommend this or not?
Honestly itâs not a great movie, but itâs also the only way to see the end of the arcs of some characters so you might want to watch it anyway. Just donât expect much from it.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Your Hand in Mine
Two cents of ramblings on: âHagane no renkinjutsushiâ/âFullmetal Alchemistâ (Anime) (2003/2004)...
...and why I recommend it.
GENERAL DATA
Title: Hagane no renkinjutsushi â Fullmetal Alchemist (éŒăźéŹéèĄćž« âAlchemist of steelâ)
Media: Anime television series
Adaptation of: âHagane no renkinjutsushi â Fullmetal Alchemistâ (éŒăźéŹéèĄćž« âAlchemist of steelâ) shĆnen manga by Arakawa Hiromu.
Genre: Adventure, Dark fantasy, Steampunk
Directed by: Mizushima Seiji
Written by: Aikawa ShĆ
Studio: Bones
Original run: October 4, 2003 â October 2, 2004
Episodes: 51
WARNINGS: There are serial killers on the loose, murders, war, human experimentation, child abuse, child labor, body horror.
The plot in short: Due to a failed transmutation experiment the Elric brothers lost one his body the other his arm and leg. Now theyâre chasing for a way to regain what they have lost.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
Everyone knows this story so I got to know it as well⊠but, although I saw way too many scenes of it, I actually never had the chance to sit down and watch the full series calmly so I decided to just do so.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Iâll reference the manga version and also the movie âGekijĆ-ban Hagane no renkinjutsushi: Shanballa wo yukumonoâ. Also, although I usually call series with their Japanese name, since in the logo they also included âFullmetal Alchemistâ⊠well, this is the name Iâm going to use when Iâll refer to this series.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: This series has 4 opening and 4 endings, which kind of divide the anime in 4 parts. The series uses:
- for episode 1 thereâs no opening and the ending is âMelissaâ by Porno Graffitti.
- for episodes 2 to 13 as opening âMelissaâ by Porno Graffitti and âKesenai Tsumiâ (æ¶ăăȘăçœȘ âIndelible Sinâ) by itade Nana.
- for episodes 14 to 25 as opening âReady Steady Goâ by LâArc-en-Ciel and âTobira no MukĆ eâ (æăźćăăž âBeyond the Doorâ) by Yellow Generation.
- for episodes 26 to 41 as opening âUndoâ by Cool Joke and âMotherlandâ by Crystal Kay.
- for episodes 42 to 50 as opening âRewriteâ by Asian Kung-Fu Generation and âI willâ by Sowelu.
- for episodes 51 the opening remains âRewriteâ by Asian Kung-Fu Generation but thereâs no ending.
The openings are all good, both in terms of music and of images matching it. Theyâre well synchronized with the music and work well to introduce the characters and the mood of the story, implying the journey of the Elric brothers and the fights theyâll have to face. My personal favourites are the second and the forth but the others are good too.
As for the endings, itâs worth to mention although episode 7 still uses âMelissaâ the images are changed so that Nina appears in it and that in its other version âMelissaâ has kind of become a meme for how iconic it is, and, even if in smaller measure, the same happened to the third and the forth ending. Theyâre all nice and soft paced songs, with matching images which are more often still images than anything else but, overall they all work well, my favourite being the forth.
The plot: So the anime decided it would go in a way thatâs different from the manga and, ultimately, created a different plot from it. Now, you can like or hate the new plot but the key point for me is that they had actually worked to build it, inserting bits of pieces that worked to set up the conclusion they decided on. So well, I donât love this plot like the one of the manga but itâs still a well planned one, which makes for an enjoyable story.
The characters: Theyâre mostly well characterized and interesting. They deviated from the canon and some of them are original for the anime but they were still well constructed and thereâs a good psychological studio of a part of them.
The visual: The background are filled with details and the direction use the potential of this media well. I wouldnât call it an anime that strives for prettiness and bright colours but I still think thereâs a certain visual beauty and cleverness and that the artistic choices fit with the mood they chose for the story, which touches often heavy topics.
The BGM: I loved the music by Ćshima Michiru and how it was used through the series. It worked really well to underline the various moments and was very pleasurable to listen.
Overall: Itâs not the same as the manga, in the end it becomes a completely different story but itâs still a good story, worth watching.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
So when I started watching this series I savoured a feeling I had almost forgotten⊠the pleasure of watching an anime whoâs gonna take all the time it need to tell a story and isnât going to make it a speed race against the twelve episode constrain in which it tries to cram as much as possible in 240 minutes of show.
I mean they took 2 episodes, 2! To tell us about what happened in Liore and this is not a complain, no far from it! Itâs good to get a story thatâs not in a run! Iâve got so used to anime who cut left and right that having someone saying again âsit down and get comfortable that Iâm gonna take my time telling you this storyâ feels kind of amazing!
But okay, this might be just me and the fact back in my youth this was the norm, anime were made not to promote the manga but just to tell a story and their length normally SURELY wasnât meant to be merely 12 episodes.
So which are the things that I loved in this series and the ones that just didnât feel that great to me?
Well, for start I enjoyed the attempt at making a continuous story. I mean, there are what you might call as filler episodes, but they tried to make them part of the plot, like how the Tringham brothers will come back into the story or how they build on various parts of the story, expanding them but also explaining them like how Ed starts to get suspicious of what Tucker did and the truth didnât just dawn on him as soon as he saw the new Chimera he created, the importance put on Rose, how they introduced Marcoh and so on.
Mind you, itâs not that Iâm saying that all the filler stuff is good (I hated âPhantom Thief Psirenâ despite Aquroya being based on a city I love, Venice) or that it connects well with the story (while I enjoyed a lot the anime only âThe Philosopherâs Stoneâ episode, the âBarry, the Chopperâ we saw there hardly resembles the âBarry, the Chopperâ weâll meet later in âThe Truth Behind Truthsâ which is based on the manga) but that they tried and this matters.
Thereâs plenty of anime in which a filler is just something random they add to stretch the story and that they forget in the next episode. Here they tried to give fillers a reason to be added, they incorporated them in the plot.
I also liked how they put a lot of focus on Ed and his feelings, so that they went deeper into analyzing him.
Iâm not overly fond of how Ed ends up causing Majhalâs death (Ed knocks the weapon the man was using out of his hand, which flies into the air and impales Majhal, killing him) but the whole thing left him completely unperturbed and then heâs instead so upset when he kills Greed (although he stabbed him, he had no idea the wound would turn out to be fatal). While yes, Greed is ultimately a lot more sympathetic as a character and, even a better person than Majhal, so I would understand Ed regretting it more, the point is he seems traumatized by how he killed him, as if this was his first kill, never mention I was never really taken in by the idea homunculi had to die because they have no soul and are the result of an alchemistâs mistake/human transmutation.
The series represents homunculi as creatures who has a birth, grow, need to eat, have feelings negative and positive, wishes and rational thinking and who can die. Theyâre alive.
The idea they have no soul⊠itâs just speculation, itâs not like they can see it or not and decide the homunculi has less right to live than any other living creature, just because they were artificially created, and what with how Alphonse whoâs just a soul in a suit and the security guards of the 5th laboratory are also seen alive, and so are the Chimeras, but not the homunculi?
I would have much preferred if they decided the homunculi had to go just because they are a threat to humanity, after all they want to sacrifice people to create a philosopher stone and donât hesitate to use and murder people for this sake and some of them are outright malicious and wonât change their mind on this.
But whatever, I still think they did some cool things with the homunculi and with how in the anime ended up with having personal connections with Ed, Al, Izumi and Scar, I loved how they developed the character of Lust and though his role was cut a lot, I still liked Greed.
I think though they could have developed Envy more, the idea behind him was interesting but⊠it just felt like tossed there and forgotten for the sake of giving him a personal connection with the brothers and the final surprise (as well as, possibly, for the sake of the movie) and I kind of found weird how they made him a dragon like Shenron from âDragon Ballâ. I felt the Leviathan look he had in the manga was more fitting for him but it might be just me.
Even the idea of Dante had a lot of potential⊠but I felt they should have explored her more.
Still I love this dialogue she has with Ed:
Dante: Equivalence? Donât tell me you still believe in that naive theory.
Edward: Itâs no theory, itâs the absolute law of alchemy. No, of the whole world! To obtain anything, something of equal value must be lost! You couldnât have gotten anywhere without knowing that!
Dante: A beautiful story, told to comfort the oppressed and make children do their lessons. The truth is that the law of equivalent exchange is a lie.
Edward: Thatâs impossible!
Dante: âTo obtain something, something of equal value must be lost? Conversely, if you give something up, you will always get a prize of equal worth in return?â
Edward: Exactly, thatâs why people work hard at anything they do. Because it pays off.
Dante: Wrong. People work because they believe it will pay, for âequal effortâ does not always mean âequal gainâ
Edward: Like what?
Dante: Consider the state alchemy exam that you passed with flying colours. How many others took the test that day? Spent months, years preparing, some working much harder than you. Yet you were the only one who passed. Where was their reward? Is it their fault they lacked your natural talent? Or what about the equal value of each personâs life? If I clap my hands, the baby wonât survive. And if I do that, where is the worldâs balance in that? Does that mean the babyâs only worth in being born is so that it can die? Itâs doing all an infant CAN to survive, breathing, crying for help. But what does it get in exchange? People can say there is a balance, a logic that everything happens for a reason. But the truth is far less desired. No matter how hard you work; when you die, you die. Some spend their entire life trying to scratch their way to the top and still die in poverty while others are born into wealth without ever lifting an arm. Itâs a cruel and random world, but the chaos is oh, so beautiful.
Edward: Thatâs enough Dante!
Dante: Equivalent exchange is a myth. A contrived order to give sense to a world that has none. Can you accept that now or do you need another lesson?
Itâs an interesting point to ponder and one that Dante brings up. In her contempt for humans and her cold logic, she washed away the idealism and forces us to face the cruelty of the world that might not reward everyone the same, no matter how much they paid and I wish it had been explored more⊠instead⊠they kind of take it back at the end.
Edward: I had meant to give my own life as the price for transmuting Al. And yet, Iâm still alive. Maybe I did obtain something without paying the price after all. Or maybe Al is still there.
Hohenheim: You two have been journeying together. The people you met during that time, the things you saw, your pain, your effort, everything that you experienced⊠That could be the price you paid, couldnât it?
Basically, theyâre countering the idea that not all the efforts get rewarded by saying Edwardâs efforts got rewarded and that equal exchange exists and it gets even muddier in Alphonseâs speech.
Alphonse: Man must pay an equal price in order to obtain anything. That is the Law of Equivalent Exchange. At the time, we believed that to be the true way of the world. But the real world is imperfect, and there was no law that could explain everything. Same with the Law of Equivalent Exchange. Even so, we believe⊠âŠthat man cannot obtain anything without paying a price. The pain that we received must have been the price we paid to obtain something. And, by paying the price of effort, everyone will certainly be able to obtain something. Equivalent exchange is not the law of the world. Thatâs the promise Brother and I made with each other, until the day we meet again.
This speech doesnât deny Equal Exchange per se, it just expands it because it now includes pain and effort as trading values, a bit like how Hohenheim said they were also using souls from the gate as extra energy when performing Alchemy. In short the anime ultimately doesnât deny the Law because imperfect, what becomes imperfect is the understanding of it. Al and Ed didnât know other things would figure in the equation and be exchanged. But this goes counter Danteâs words that not all the efforts will get rewarded and if that they will get rewarded they might not get rewarded equally.
So⊠they tossed us a very interesting point to ponder which can be ultimately summarized in âthe world isnât fairâ then went back to it and said âno, actually the world is fair, itâs just you donât know all the elements in the equationâ. It makes for an optimistic ending but it didnât really demonstrate Danteâs point was wrong, Hohenheim is merely speculating Edâs efforts were used to equate the price but thereâs no proof of it. Ed might have not paid the full price simply because the world is unfair and chaotic like Dante said⊠but we like more Hohenheimâs explanation so we take it⊠but thereâs no one to confirm our belief, so we might as well be deluding ourselves, be the children Dante talked about.
Thereâs also a tad too much of plot contrivances and Rose seems to be taken more by Ed than by her baby as if the anime was pushing to make her a love interest⊠and speaking of which it kinds of grossed me out how Dante is also interested in Ed. I get she loved Hohenheim and Ed might look like him but still⊠I would have preferred if she planned to brainwash Hohenheim so as to get him back than consider switching for his son.
Speaking of Hohenheim it kind of felt more fatherly⊠though it felt a bit random how he âdiscoveredâ fatherhood. I mean, okay, no one wants an homunculus baby, we saw it with Izumi so fine, he tossed away his first son, I understand him here, but then he left the family because his body was rotting and okay, I get it but then he randomly comes back, exchanges Winry for her mother commenting on how much she grew when Winryâs mother was probably the same age as Trisha so she shouldnât have grown up, if anything she got younger, especially when it turns out he had met Winry when she was a baby, and then he seems to blame coming back after 6 years to his lack of sense of time, which okay, but if he left because he didnât want them to see him root it still doesnât matter, he shouldnât have returned. And then he randomly flirts with Ross even though Trisha is the only woman he ever loved but he turns down Dante because he has a wife? The whole thing is rather confusing.
And then thereâs the whole gate mess and weâre told homunculi come from the other side of the gate so they canât use alchemy and, on the other side of the gate it turns out thereâs basically our world, so are homunculi from our world/souls from our world? But the reason why they couldnât use alchemy was that they had no soul?
I mean, I would praise the anime for digging deeper and expanding ideas of the manga in the first part⊠but when we switch to the second part and we dig into the anime only content⊠it all gets pretty confusing⊠even if many ideas tossed in are interesting.
Speaking of which, I really wasnât fond with the idea of the gate connecting the world of the story to ours and, when I watched the movie, I became even less happy with it because it felt like a decision taken for the sake of the movie (which of course had to involve Nazi Germany because⊠no, nevermind, this is a rant of another time).
Still I liked the ending, how Ed and Al are now in two different world but trying to find a way to get together again, how Ed is trying to use mechanical technology since he canât use alchemy to reach his world, I love this dialogueâŠ
Edward: I should have been able to bind his soul and body together, an recreate him. But the next thing I knew, I had come to this world by myself.
Hohenheim: Passing through to here was the only way for you to keep from losing your mind and body. You must have done so unconsciously.
Edward: But Iâve once again lost that which Al did so much to give me.
Hohenheim: We canât say that everything is perfect. The whole world is imperfect, after all.
âŠI loved how Ed and All, both on different trains, stretched their hands at the same time and it seems as if theyâre stretching them toward each other. Itâs not a fully happy ending, but itâs a powerful ending.
I also liked how the theme of racism was handled and while I think the anime kind of forgave Scar way too easily, they still made him interesting.
All in all there are lot of things that are good or interesting in this story⊠as well as things that would have needed to be explained better or expanded or that felt confusing because they didnât really made sense but⊠itâs all right, I had fun watching it, it was engaging and it had parts that were worth pondering over, interesting characters and so on.
On the other side I can hardly call this a transposition of the manga. Itâs just a different story, it feels like an alternate AU, a fanfiction the anime staff wrote and, since the manga is SO GOOD, this ends up like feeling inferior by comparison. But if you forget the manga, itâs still interesting enough to be worth watching, so give it a chance.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching Hollow
WARNINGS: There are murder, loss of limbs, gruesome deaths, animal killing (for survival purposes), war and a lot of reference to history. Thereâs also some male nudity, a lot of mental issues with plenty of chara dealing with PTSD.
The plot in short: In Hokkaido a veteran from the Russo-Japanese war, Sugimoto Saichi, discovers a man stoles a huge amount of the Ainu gold and hid it then, once in jail, tattooed on assorted prisoners the code to track down the gold, then had them escape. Sugimoto, in desperate need of money, decides, with the help of Asirpa, to hunt the convicts so as to find the gold but he isnât the only one who is taking part to this gold hunt. First Lieutenant Tsurumi TokushirĆ and ex Shinsegumi member Hijikata ToshizĆ are also hunting for the gold, as well as the convicts themselves, minorities partisans and Japan government.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
I saw the promo for the anime and it got me curious so, as soon as it came out, I started watching it.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Iâve debated with myself if this should cover all the series and OAD or I should just give my two cents of ramblings for each of them. Ultimately I decided to keep everything split. Also this isnât a âletâs sing praises of this animeâ sort of review, quite the contrary. âGolden Kamuyâ is an awesome manga but its anime doesnât live up to its standards. If the idea of reading a review commenting on its mistakes and weak points bothers you just stop here.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The series uses as opening âWinding Roadâ by Man with a Mission and, as ending âHibanaâ (ç«è± âSparkâ) by The Sixth Lie. Honestly Iâm not that fond of the first opening. I get the idea behind it but the visual isnât great, itâs mostly a collection of disjointed images, the focus on how Sugimoto first was alone and then joined hands with Asirpa in this adventure but itâs overall misleading of their characters and doesnât tell much about them or the story. The music is nice though but I much favour the ending song (possibly my fave âGolden Kamuyâ theme)⊠although the visual of the ending after a couple of images of NopperabĆ, is merely a panning on a really long image that shows all the characters involved in the first series until we get an image of Asirpa and Sugimoto looking at each other and then of them looking at the night sky. But still endings arenât that much elaborated usually and this one has a touch of van Gogh in how itâs coloured so I think itâs very nice, colourful and pretty. I love how they drew the night sky and even the few transitions it contains are done well so yeah, I like it a lot.
The plot: The manga of âGolden Kamuyâ has one of the most amazing, complex and well constructed plots. This season covers only a small fraction of it and, sadly, didnât take its time to do so but went through it in a bit of a rush, with the result bits, sometimes relevant bits, and a whole arc were cut out, never mention things that got changed from the original. Credits when its due, they had already decided the arc cut was going to be turned in an OAD that would be sold with the manga, but the way they cut it in the series is poor and confusing.
The characters: The manga of âGolden Kamuyâ, in addition to an awesome plot, has also awesome characters⊠which the anime felt the need to simplify, cutting also part of the characterization in the process. I think they still managed to come across as likable and interesting, albeit much inferior to their manga counterparts and with their characterizations undermined or changed in some points.
The visual: Itâs⊠not so great when not outright ugly. I donât mind so much the horrible computer graphic (the bear they animated in the first episode became famous for it) but the fact they preferred to go with long shots instead than focusing on the charactersâ expressions, using close up like the manga did, leaving all the job to transmit a characterâs feelings to the voice actors⊠and as a final straw, they favoured still shot so much that even the manga felt more dynamic than the animation.
The musical background: Itâs not bad but not memorable either. I still thinks itâs enjoyable, but Suehiro KenichirĆ isnât Kanno YĆko so donât expect anything big.
Overall: This is a poor anime transposition of an amazing story that would have deserved a much better anime. Still, since it likely was meant to be solely a promotional anime that would end with this season and not go further, it serves its purpose. It introduces you to the story and gives an idea of how much of an awesome manga âGolden Kamuyâ is, and it encourages you to read the manga to discover the many things they left out⊠and since the plot and the characters are still so good, despite its poor quality you might still enjoy it enough to like it. But really âGolden Kamuyâ deserved better than this.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
So⊠the manga of âGolden Kamuyâ is a story I love and when I say I love, I mean I love it with the passion of a burning sun. It has great plot, great characters, great theme, great historical research. Itâs awesome really, and I wouldnât have gotten into it without the anime, as that was my first approach to the series⊠and honestly the animation was so bad I almost dropped it halfway and if it wasnât for the story that really hooked me, I would have never gotten till the end nor would I have checked the manga.
So⊠the good part is this anime has the âGolden Kamuyâ story which is so very cool you get itâs cool even despite the poor animation and the cuts⊠but that it doesnât really enhance it, actually it makes a worst job than the manga at conveying it.
Now, Iâll spare you mentioning the mistakes in the subs. They happen even in better anime.
Iâll go quickly through a bunch of things that really affect the quality of the animation because visual is important for the enjoyment of a story but here thereâs just too much to say if I stop for every single thing itâll become endless.
1) In many episodes thereâs an abuse of long shots instead than the close up that were used in the manga.
A long shot is a cheap choice as you can use the same shot despite more characters talking but it fails to deliver the feelings of the characters. If the scenery or the movements or the placement of the characters werenât important to see itâs just a bad choice. It doesnât help in the manga the characters are very expressive so losing this means to lose part of their charm.
2) The sceneries arenât that great anyway.
I realize Studio I.G and Kyoani and Troyca and Ufotable and A-1 Pictures and some others might have spoiled me but since âGolden Kamuyâ is a series also about discovering Hokkaido I think it was important to present us with beautiful scenery. But this is not the case. Except for some nice shots more often than not the background scenery is rushed in and not really detailed. Itâs not ugly, far from it, itâs just not something that will make you think âhow pretty!â or âhow detailed!â.
3) The colouring doesnât really tell us much.
Noda has started recolouring all the pages of âGolden Kamuyâ. Even in images which use few colours his colours are vibrant and beautiful. The same canât be said in the anime. Never mentioning some scenes are just so dark itâs hard to see whatâs going on.
4) The computer graphic is bad and, often, unnecessary.
One of the plus sides of turning a manga into animation is that you can finally see the art being animated, as in âmoveâ. Not in this anime though, where they prefer to use still images same as in the manga when instead they could actually give us a cool animated scene. Tsurumi talks of how Sugimoto fought like a demon? Itâs a great moment to animate Sugimoto fighting but no, letâs place a still image of Sugimoto fighting, an image that looks more static than the one Noda himself used in the manga. And⊠has someone seen the scene in which Retar slams around Tanigaki? Nothing is shown, just the camera panning on the background and then lines that should imply fast motion because this is way too fast and easy to drawn than a body slammed around. And I get theyâre trying to be clever and show us things from Tanigakiâs point of view but donât even have the courage to do it till the end by having everything turn dark when Tanigaki loses consciousness. This is not how you do a characterâs point of view, this is how you try to skip work by not animating a difficult scene.
6) Movements are, here and there, weird if not outright wrong
In the first episode, when Sugimoto gets shot, his body falls backward. When he has reached a 30° inclination from the ground if not less, he stands straight⊠which is not humanly possible. When the bear supposedly hits Asirpa, she actually seems to jump backward more than being slammed away by the bear. Asirpa, when dropped by the pimp, falls in a more awkward position than the one shown in the manga. Instead than having Prisoner number 1âs tattoo being exposed due to his clothes getting tangled in a bark and pulled, the man, despite being strangled by a cord, drops trying to free his neck from the cord and spontaneously opens his clothes, when pushed on the ground by Ogata, Sugimoto falls too slowly, Ogata wouldnât have managed to pull out the bolt from Sugimotoâs rifle moving like that and so on.
7) The direction is overall not smart
Noda in his manga takes full advantage of all the visual tricks he can use to drive home a point or a certain feeling or make a transition. The anime is not even trying to either develop the same tricks or use the ones that are proper of its medium.
So yeah, the animation is bad.
In this mess though and despite the cuts, they managed to salvage most of the plot and that one is good. The premise, the adventures in the story, the way the characters are introduced and how their arc connect, all this (which comes straight from the manga) is very, very good. Noda studied an awesome plot and, even though this is only the start of the story, itâs easy even with just these 12 episodes, to see itâs a well studied story. I love it and if youâll give it a chance youâll likely love it too.
Now instead we sadly go back to another problem of the anime.
Partly due to the aim of the anime at merely be promotional, partly due to the cuts, partly due to the quality or lack thereof of the animation, partly due to the lack of direction, partly due to how anime tend to be tamer and simpler so as to appease a wider audience, the characterization of the characters is affected.
Now, âGolden Kamuyâ has an impressive cast of well studied characters. They arenât just visually different, theyâre well studied and complex human beings with their goals their bad and good sides and zero black and white morality. Theyâre all various shades of grey which ends up painting them as very human.
The anime ended up simplifying them and trying to fit them in the black and white categories.
This is often a downside of anime transposition, as almost all of them are forced to simplify the characters so as to cut away sides that can affect negatively a wide audience (it happens also in great anime like âYĆ«koku no Moriartyâ or âJoker Gameâ for example) but in âGolden Kamuyâ it gets even more marked because characterization is changed at random.
In fact one of the big downside of the animation is⊠they donât really seem to look at the source material when drawing charactersâ expressions with the result the characters seem to react differently in the anime for no reason at all.
I mean, I understand how anime has to tone down violent or gory scenes or scenes in which the morality is questionable⊠but when you have Sugimoto waking up from a dream with tears in his eyes in the manga for a completely understandable reason (he dreamt of his best friendâs death) and with eyes completely dry in the anime (and the anime makes a close up on his eyes!) you wonder WHY thereâs such change as crying for the loss of a friend is not something thatâs better to censor.
So what can I say about the characters or, more specifically, the changes made to them?
Letâs start with a general approach first.
The character design is close enough, sure, they changed a bit the eyebrows (in the manga in many cases the characters has some lines, the anime turns them into solid blocks) but itâs no big and the only real sin they did was on placing what the fandom ended up defining a âdead animalâ on his chest instead than the hair he had, which were nowhere as much as the ones the anime gave him (hence how what they did ended up being nicknamed âa dead animal on Kirorankeâs chestâ).
As the anime tends, for no clear reason, to change the charactersâ expressions for how they were in the manga in more than one scene, this apparently minor detail ends up affecting our perception of the characters. It might not feel a HUGE change, because when all is said and done, they end up on doing the same things since manga and anime follow the same plot, but still it affects our perception of their character.
Some cuts, some choices in changing expression might also seem an attempt at making the characters more âblack and whiteâ than they were in the original.
So Iâll go a little deeper in the comparison here.
Sugimoto Saichi in the manga was presented as more social right from the start. He talks with GotĆ with nonchalance where in the anime he seems a lot more aloft, acting like he wanted to ignore GotĆ and pays him minimal attention, a point also made by the opening that depicts him as wandering alone until he met Asirpa. The anime also tends often to give him an angry or serious expression when in the manga he has more natural or even funny expressions. The anime will also completely cut his whole backstory with Umeko (except for the part in which he says heâs doing it for the woman he loves, though since Umeko is cut it gets very hard to connect this sentence to her) or the parts in which Sugimoto implied he wanted to get rich. As his backstory with Umeko is Sugimotoâs reason for being in the gold hunt, the why he would take part to the gold hunt becomes confusing. Overall the anime tried to paint him as a more positive character than in the manga (for example they cut Hijikata commenting thereâs violence lurking behind the surface of Sugimoto).
Asirpa is an extremely expressive character in the manga⊠but in the anime they tend to draw her as expressionless way more often than she is in the manga. The opening also depicted her as a smiling child BEFORE meeting Sugimoto which was untrue as, thanks to meeting Sugimoto she recovered her smile.
Ogata Hyakunosuke in the manga is presented as a capable man and an amazing sniper. In the anime you might still get heâs good at sniping even if the anime doesnât really explain why, but they cut the explanation on why he rationally decided to escape or how Tamai praised his abilities and didnât show his expression during most of the discussion with Tanigaki or how he tried to push for the formation of a sniper division so as to reduce casualties in war and his proposition was rejected. Ogataâs reasonings as he faces Tanigaki is also cut (how he warned NikaidĆ about the dangers of the binoculars reflecting light or how he figured out Tanigakiâs plan to escape from behind). Then they cut the Barato arc, and therefore most of his role in it, leaving only the start of it and the ending, which ends up on being misleading because it might lead you to think itâs Ogata who single-handedly slaughtered all those people to get the skin and hand it to Hijikata. As a result Ogata ends up losing most of his characterization.
Shiraishi Yoshitake is depicted in the manga right from the start as a great escape king, the narration informing us of his previous stunts and of how prepared to escape he is. He also escapes from Sugimoto and Asirpa despite them being close by. The anime doesnât bother telling Shiraishiâs past and have him escape when Sugimoto and Asirpa are far, so that he looks less competent. In the manga is Sugimoto who suggests theyâll use Shiraishi to enter in Abashiri, revealing his identity as tattooed prisoner to Kiroranke while in the anime Shiraishi volunteers to help Asirpa on his own, presenting himself as a convict, so it doesnât really make sense when Kiro asks what his title means and how Shiraishi is scared when Sugimoto explains Shiraishi is a tattooed convict as Kiro should have figured that out from Shiraishiâs speech, but mostly it makes Shiraishi dumb because it makes clear he didnât want to reveal it to Kiroranke yet he bragged about it in front of him.
Tsurumi TokushirĆ is left mostly as he was, they cut how he wanted to turn his soldiers into elite guards but, overall, I canât remember the changes affecting him that much.
NikaidĆ KĆhei (and YĆhei) the twins are more or less like they were in the manga, although the manga drew them more scary so as to better deliver they were a threat to Sugimoto, and KĆheiâs pain as he cried for his brother was better delivered (in the anime he seems more angry than desperate).
Hijikata ToshizĆ in the manga doesnât pick Shibukawa for an allegiance at random but because the latter owed him. In the anime this is cut so it seems Hijikata is going around picking up random criminals to help him. In the anime he also make more clear if Shiraishi doesnât join him, heâll kill him so he seems a more negative character and they cut the scene in which Hijikata compares Sugimoto to a bunch of Shinsensumi members which Sugimoto doesnât recognize, so that Sugimotoâs comment Hijikata seems a weird old man feels out of place as Hijikata merely asked if he could hold Asirpa and which was her Japanese name.
Ushiyama Tatsuma remains more or less as he was in the manga.
Nagakura Shinpachi also seems to have been left unchanged, if anything there was maybe a little less emphasis on who he was but this shouldnât really have affected Japanese viewers who were supposed to know anyway.
Tanigaki GenjirĆ in the manga is smart enough that, when he believes Asirpa canât understand him, he gestures what he wants from her and, although he talks with her, he doesnât expect a reply. In the anime he just verbally repeats it as if expecting although he canât understand her, she would for sure understand him and continues to talk with her as such. In the manga he also looks scarier when he tells her to drop the bow, so as to prepare us for how, later heâll use Asirpa as a human shield. Here he doesnât. In the manga Tanigaki also didnât get the chance to defend himself from Retar⊠but in the anime he first protects himself by placing the rifle in between them, which okay, is smart, then, instead than trying to escape he weakly tries to kick Retar away⊠which is dumb. They also cut Tanigaki referencing his father and, while not big, since part of Tanigakiâs backstory was about his conflict with his father, itâs a pity. The anime doesnât show Tanigaki being surprised by Niheiâs knowledge and the part in which he tells Asirpaâs group to leave him there to die so that he can die in the wild. In the anime when Ogata and NikaidĆ are at Huciâs home he seems to relax when he sees Osoma⊠when this wasnât the case.
Nihei TetsuzĆ in the manga there are references to how Nihei has daughters and Asirpa reminded him of them. In the anime this is cut and he seems rougher with Asirpa. In the manga she manages to make him drop her after she bites his ear, in the anime he tosses her on the ground. In the manga he grabs her as she tries to stand up and escape, in the anime he seems to press her face on the ground so as to suffocate in the snow her complains.
Ienaga Kanoâs male, wrinkled body in the manga was clearly visible but the same doesnât apply for the anime. They also cut a bit of his past in Abashiri or how she acquired the hotel and remodelled it.
Tsukishima Hajime gets his role cut, as they removed the discussion he had with Thomas. On the plus side though, while Noda wasnât consistent with his chara design back in this part of the story as he was still working on defining it, the anime instead is consistent so you can easily recognize Tsukishima in each scene he appears and they even added him in some scenes in which he didnât appear in the manga.
Kiroranke in the manga was fishing when Sugimotoâs group happened to meet him. In the anime he just appears when Shiraishi falls into the river and is captured by a fish so as to save Shiraishi, which makes his apparition look more suspicious. The fact that in the anime they cut all the casual talks Kiroranke had with the group before asking Sugimoto if heâs âimmortal Sugimotoâ also makes Kiroranke seem more suspicious, especially with how long Kiroranke takes before saying he was not under Tsurumi. It doesnât help they cut more casual talk and had Kiroranke jumps on relying that Hijikata was searching for Asirpa and that he knew what happened in Abashiri and how NopperabĆ is Wilk. Plus they changed Kirorankeâs stance as in the manga he points out how hard it would be to talk with NopperabĆ and tells Asirpa it would be impossible to ask him, while in the anime he claims this would be easier than tracking convicts, implying this was what he wanted her to do with his revelation. The scene in which Kiroranke lies and claims he doesnât know why Wilk tried to take the gold as well as the one with Kirorankeâs family is cut. While cutting Kirorankeâs family cuts part of his characterâs background the fact Kiro lied would turn relevant in future arcs. We also donât see how strong of a fighter Kiro is.
Inkarmat is overall the same, if anything she felt a bit creepier in the manga when she said Asirpaâs eyes are the same as her father but thatâs all.
So again, itâs worth to repeat that, if this series were to stop at being a promotional one, the cutting and oversimplifying wasnât necessarily a big deal, because, although it still makes it a poor transposition, the series goal wasnât to stand on its own but to encourage you to read the manga, so you could find all the info about the characters. In short this would be kind of like a summary, and a summary wouldnât tell you everything, would it?
But it becomes a big deal if you want to judge this anime as a transposition, because if we view it as a transposition of the first chapters, itâs not faithful and poor, rushed in and not really planned beyond a general âhow can we tell this story as fast as we can?â
On the plus side the voice actors do a great job to try to bring to life the charaters. When the animation fails to give the characters an expression because it chooses to go for long shots or similar things, it rests on them to pass the charactersâ emotions to the audience and they really do a good job at it.
We reach the climax of âthis is a promotional work, not an anime that stands on its ownâ in the last episode.
Episode 12 starts by presenting us with 1 minute of animation that will be later used as the start of the first OAD which will be sold with volume 15 of the manga starting from September 17, 2018 (episode 12 was transmitted on June 25, 2018). In the manga this is the beginning of the Barato arc which loosely, either took place at the same time as the Ienaga arc or at the same time of the Inkarmat arc.
Itâs however a parallel arc to one of the two with evident no point of connection with them.
Well, episode 12, after showing us that 1 minute, completely ignores the Barato arc and fully focus on the Inkarmat arc⊠to abruptly return to the Barato arc short before the end showing us another minute of it which is basically its conclusion, without really explaining anything of what that had happened in between the start and the ending, so, as mentioned before, it seems Ogata slaughtered all those people single-handedly. Those 2 minutes were completely unnecessary to the story, they could have just skipped them. They donât serve as a connection with the Barato arc which is a relevant arc, yes, but completely disconnected from the events of the Inkarmat arc. Theyâre placed there solely to promote the Barato arc⊠which will be sold with the manga so they work as another big âbuy the manga!â promotional message.
And really, thereâs nothing wrong in a promotional series but this doesnât mean it has to be done with such poor quality.
âGolden Kamuyâ is an amazing story, they could have made a little more of an effort in animating it so that the quality of the anime would also work into promoting the series. Instead, if we were to judge from the quality of the anime alone, this story is saved only by the stunning plot.
Now, someone might have noticed I skipped commenting on the âGolden DĆga GekijĆâ. What are they?
A set of 12 original net animation (ONA) which were released, one after the other, on NBCUniversal Youtube channel as the anime was ongoing and made available only for one week, after which they would be no longer accessible. Now the quality of the animation is beyond bad, but the idea for those less than 20 seconds bits is merely to be a bonus. They add nothing to the plot they just depict in as less frame as possible an omake or even a cover or a short moment which didnât make in the animation.
Theyâre an extra, so it makes complete sense their animation quality is lower than the anime (which already has low animation quality) and theyâre fun and kind of cute so Iâve no complains here.
And with them Iâll wrap this long commentary up to remark that ITâS REALLY A SHAME how âGolden Kamuyâ wasnât animated better and that I definitely recommend you to read the manga instead than watch the anime but, if you really want a preview or a quick recap, a sample of some sort to see if you can get interested into the story before tackling a manga thatâs likely going to be more than 31 volumes long, well, yeah, the anime will work just fine as an introduction.
Despite everything I complained about itâs still enjoyable and covers enough of the story to give you an idea of what you should expect, so if you really want a general idea of the story before tackling it, well, the 1st series of the anime is what will be perfect for you. Just remember that the manga IS SO MUCH BETTER ITâS IMPRESSIVE! So really, READ THE MANGA!
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching: ćœă«ć«ăăăŠăăă [Inochi ni kirawa rete iru "Hated by life itself"]
Two cents of ramblings on âYĆ«koku no Moriartyâ (âMoriarty The Patriotâ) (Anime) - Season 1...
...and why I STRONGLY recommend it.
GENERAL DATA
Title: YĆ«koku no MORIARTY (æćœăźăąăȘăąăŒă㣠âMoriarty The Patriotâ)
Media: Anime television series
Adaptation of: YĆ«koku no MORIARTY (æćœăźăąăȘăąăŒă㣠âMoriarty The Patriotâ) shĆnen manga by Takeuchi RyĆsuke, illustrated by Miyoshi Hikaru.
Genre: Crime, Mystery
Directed by: Nomura Kazuya
Written by: Zappa GĆ
Studio: Production I.G
Original run: October 11, 2020 December 20, 2020
Episodes: 11
WARNINGS: There's murder, drug abuse, mistreatment of minors, discrimination, implication of sexual abuse of minors.
The plot in short: The story is a very loose retelling of âSherlock Holmesâ by Conan Doyle, however this time the main protagonist is professor William J. Moriarty, whoâs now represented as a man committing crimes in an attempt to fight the corruption of the English nobles so as to create a better world.
HOW DID I STUMBLE INTO IT
The title got me curious and since Studio I.G usually makes very good series I decided to try it out.
THINGS YOU MIGHT WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE TACKLING THIS
Iâll reference the manga version on which this anime is based, the manga âFushiji Fushijiâ (ă”ăăă”ăă âWonder wonderâ) by Yamazaki Hiroshi, the manga âDeath Noteâ by Ćba Tsugumi and illustrated by Obata Takeshi, the anime âCode Geass: Hangyaku no Lelouchâ (ăłăŒăăźăąăč ćéăźă«ă«ăŒă·ă„ âCode Geass: Lelouch of the rebellionâ). Oh and the movie âThe silence of the lambsâ.
MY TWO CENTS ON IT
THE SHORT VERSION⊠or what I can tell you about this while trying to keep spoilers at the very bare minimum.
Opening & ending: The series uses as opening âDYING WISHâ by Tasuku Hatanaka, and, as ending theme, âALPHAâ by STEREO DIVE FOUNDATION. I quite liked both song and I love, love, love, both the opening and the ending. Theyâre both awesomely drawn and well matching with the songs, the opening is filled with symbolism and foreshadowing which makes it pretty intriguing. The ending, if possible, is drawn even better, even though itâs mostly a panning of still images and it too drives forward an interesting message.
The plot: This first season loosely covers the first 4 volumes of the manga (and a chapter from vol 5). Loosely because they actually skipped 3 arcs and added one. Each arc is a case the Moriarty brothers take, but the structure of its presentation might differ from case to case. This season works mostly an introduction to the characters and the story but we also see an evolution in the situation as the characters start to interact and the Moriarty brothersâ plan begins to unfold. Personally I enjoyed the series both for the overarching plot that it starts and for the episodic plots that it contains.
The characters: As this season covers only a small part of the manga we get introduced only to a part of the full cast and since not all the arcs of the manga are covered Fred and Moran are less developed than their manga counterparts, the anime focusing more on the Moriarty brothers as well as on Holmes and Watson. Still, the characters come out as interesting and likeable and thereâs a care in depicting the minor characters involved in the various stories, even though they often get to end up being simplified a bit, often either to tame down the story or due to time constraints.
The visual: Personally I think the anime did a good work of reproducing Miyoshi Hikaruâs work. The character design is faithful enough to the one of the manga and thereâs this amazing cure in the background which I really love. Here and there however I feel the quality is a little less than good though it will probably get fixed in the dvd release. There are some interesting stylistic choices too so itâs still very pleasurable to watch.
The BGM: Oh, no doubt I love it. I truly enjoyed Tachibana Asamiâs work on this series, the music well underline the mood, stays with you and itâs pleasurable to hear.
Overall: Itâs a good, well done and intriguing first season. I would personally wish it had been longer, so as not to cut arcs and take more time exploring the characters but nowadays seasons are mostly short so I guess they couldnât do things differently. Itâs still a good work and a good transposition, even though if you want to know more about the characters I recommend you to read the manga.
THE LONG VERSION⊠or what I loved and hated about this with, of course, TONS OF SPOILERS.
Let me dig a moment into the opening and the endings as I think they really did a good job here. The opening really get you in the mood of the series and gifts you with little gems of foreshadowing and symbolism.
It starts with the sun disappearing so we find ourselves in the dark side of the day and of London. Then it well introduces the Moriarty brothers and their helpers (Fred and Moran) and then send them walking for the night streets of London.
The scene is interrupted by the nobles entertaining themselves with a masked ball⊠uncaring of how a lily (usually used as symbol of purity and innocence) lays in a pool of blood. The only one who pays it any mind and picks it up is William Moriarty, which basically foreshadows the whole plot of the story, the nobility is uncaring of other peopleâs suffering while he wants to help. As the lily seems to redden further in blood we basically get a flashback of a poor girl selling lilies having her flowers tossed on the ground a noble deliberately stepping on them with cruelty while sheâs desperate and then disappears in red petals. The lily in Williamâs hand, now completely red, burns.
I mean, this whole scene isnât just beautifully drawn and takes care to match with the music in both melody and lyrics but itâs of an awesome symbolism for the series down to how London will burn in the following season.
Weâre treated with some more symbolism, fruits which quickly grow rotten, a poor street and a cemetery, a statue of the angel of death then, in a maze of thin threads, Sherlock appears and this too symbolizes how heâll have to untangle the skein of the Moriarty case. Sherlock runs with Watson and the next we know is he and William are pointing their respective guns at each other head, foreshadowing another scene in the next season.
Then a bird flies above them (birds, Iâm not sure if theyâre crows or ravens, are used to symbolizes the Moriarty brothers) and, superimposed to it, we see hands being joined and then the other 2 Moriarty brothers and William and Fred, so as to symbolize how theyâll join forces with William.
We get a flashback of the Moriarty house burning down and then of Williamâs eyes. To better tie him to the bird, his eyes are then covered by birdâs wings and we see 3 birds (symbolizing the Moriarty brothers) fly away. The songâs pace get fast and weâre showing Fred and Moran fighting, Albert smiling (as he basically fights from behind the scenes, using his own power to aid his brotherâs plan) and then Louis fighting as well.
William then, in a scene that reminds me a lot of the opening of âZankyĆ no Terrorâ let himself be fall from what weâll discover is the big bang tower, watching the city as it burns, and foreshadowing how he plans to end his plan. As if this foreshadowing isnât enough, the scene switches again, William joins his companions in a room and points a gun at his own head. All this is beautiful animation, smooth transitions and intriguing storytelling that well fit with the music and the lyrics of the song which I recommend to read as you enjoy it. And I love it.
And what to say of the ending?
It starts depicting a simple episode of the Moriarty brothersâ childhood. Theyâre just having fun painting some walls with beautiful scenery (which is symbolism for how they are hoping in real life that, with their actions, they can paint a beautiful world).
I love how they did the colouring, it reminds me of watercolours, I liked how they had bright colours all over the characters, how the clear colouring of the scenery makes it look like as if everything is filled with light. Although itâs made by still images on which the camera pans, it has its own dynamism, the characters in motion and expressive. It reminds me of the manga âFushiji Fushijiâ (ă”ăăă”ăă âWonder wonderâ) by Yamazaki Hiroshi whose message was just to discover the wonderful beauty of the ordinary all around you.
Thereâs an interesting contrast between the lyrics and this calm and happy moment, well harmonized by the music that still seems happy and dynamic but it has a purpose.
In fact the hopefulness and the wonder are kind of shattered when, at the end, we have a really clever transition.
The image moves from the brothers looking at the painting they made in front of them, to the beautiful images painted behind them, as if to hint those images, those happy moments will become their past, something theyâll leave behind, and then the image quickly shift and we see the three brothers, now adults, under the rain and among ruins (are those the ruins of the place they painted?). Albert has a bittersweet expression, the corner of his lips are turned up but the rain makes it look as if heâs crying,
Louis keeps his face down, in the shadows and is not smiling,
William is smiling but itâs a smile that doesnât reach his eyes, which are on the ground, a forced smile.
The rain soaks them like tears, in a way it washes away the memory of the colours that covered them because, despite their beautiful hopes and dreams, what they had to do was dark and painful and definitely not nice, the sad contrast between idealism and realty.
The songs end showing the Moriarty coat of arms on the ground, in a giant puddle (or outright under water) the words âJe crois en moiâ (âI believe in myselfâ) clearly visible as the song ends with âThere is no turning backâ which fits so well with how the Moriarty brothers canât return to that time of their childhood⊠how they can only advance until the end.
So okay, said this letâs move on the story.
As I said the anime starts with an original only episode. Why this choice when they instead cut manga arcs? Why not to animate another manga arc instead than create a new one thatâs loosely based on âThe hunting of the Baskervillesâ? Why not to just animate âThe hunting of the Baskervillesâ instead? Why did we ended up having âThe earlâs crimeâ instead?
My guess is that the anime was very invested in making sure we would know weâve to root for the Moriarty brothers, but also that we were aware that, although they want to create a new world, theyâre not Yagami Light from âDeath Noteâ but are closer to Lelouch Lamperouge from âCode Geassâ.
So what they do?
They first remember us who was Professor Moriarty, the Lord of Crime in Conan Doyleâs tales by starting the story showing us a kid reading âSherlock Holmes â The final problemâ book and, as his father gives the book a look, his gaze falls on a photo of Professor Moriarty (and the image of Moriarty is a copy of the illustration by Sidney Paget which accompanied the original publication of âThe Final Problemâ) and then we hearâŠ
Narrator: This is the tale of the man who confounded even the great detective Sherlock Holmes⊠Professor Moriarty, the Lord of Crime.
âŠand, as we hear so the image switches from the picture of the book to an image of William Moriarty as weâll see him in the series, all busy writing mathematic expressions on a blackboard, but then everything seems to take fire as he keeps on writing and then everything fades to black.
From this start we might even think the story was going to represent Moriarty as we know him from the books⊠an evil mastermind⊠though the story would start from his past, as the Moriarty we see writing on the blackboard is clearly younger.
And this is a device to raise interest. Then the opening starts.
Iâve discussed about how awesome the opening is above, but when you first see it, you might not catch up all the symbolism or only part of it and therefore fail to see the full picture and this too is a good idea.
Then the episode starts and in a nightmarish red atmosphere (as every image is painted with a red filter) someone chases a poor kid, captures him and makes clear heâs going to make something terrible to him.
We donât clearly see whoâs doing this so we might be tricked into thinking itâs Moriarty himself⊠but then it turns out the guy implied to be a young Moriarty is reading on the newspaper about the kidnapping and this can divide the audience in 2 groups, those who realizes by the glimpses we saw of the abuser he canât be Moriarty and those who didnât.
And here the anime does another clever thing with this bit of dialogue.
Louis: Itâs hard to believe a human being could do such a thing.
William: (smiling) Itâs human to think that this could not be the work of a man.
The fact William can smile in such a way for such topic feels suspicious, the anime plays with our pre-existing ideas of how professor Moriarty is evil. Is he bragging when he talks with Louis? Or is he genuinely analyzing the case? Or is he planning to offer his services to the child murderer?
And then, as he studies the case we get this lineâŠ
William: Peopleâs fancies do not get taken by that which is out of view. They want what they see.
âŠand doesnât all this starts to look like a reference to âThe silence of the lambsâ?
Clarice Starling: The thing is that Lecter said everything we need to catch him is in these pages.
Ardelia Mapp: Dr Lecter said a lot of things.
Clarice Starling: He's here, Ardelia.
Ardelia Mapp: Is this Lecter's handwriting? "Clarice, doesn't this random scattering of sites seem desperately random - like the elaborations of a bad liar? Ta, Hannibal Lecter."
Clarice Starling: "Desperately random." What does he mean?
Ardelia Mapp: Not random at all, maybe. Like there's some pattern here...?
Clarice Starling: But there is no pattern or the computers would've nailed it. They're even found in random order.
Ardelia Mapp: Random because of the one girl. The one he weighted down.
Clarice Starling: Oh, Fredrica Bimmel, from... Belvedere, Ohio. First girl taken, third body found. Why?
Ardelia Mapp: 'Cause she didn't drift. He weighted her down.
Clarice Starling: What did Lecter say about..."First principles"?
Ardelia Mapp: Simplicity...
Clarice Starling: What does this guy do, he "covets". How do we first start to covet?
Ardelia Mapp: "We covet what we see -"
Clarice Starling: " - every day."
Ardelia Mapp: Hot damn, Clarice.
Clarice Starling: He knew her.
Now, child murder is one of those crimes that are considered morally terrible by a lot of people included criminals. If you add to this a comparison between the criminal and the culprit of âThe Silence of the Lambsâ you create in peopleâs mind the image of a monster.
And, as William keep on talking, itâs clear heâs not the culprit, but the fact he claimsâŠ
William: This may be a case in which we become involved.
âŠmight still make people to wonder on how he would get involved.
Professor Moriarty wasnât a detective, he was a crime consultant, a lord of crime, so what is he up to?
And thereâs also something else thatâs incredibly smart, the whole mention of how a victim was an orphan with William discussing the lack of relation between noble men and orphans.
Louis: Still, one of the victims⊠âŠappears to have been an orphan who slept on the streets. What of him?
William: Ah, yes. Noblemen and orphansâthere is nothing quite so far removed as the two worlds in which they live. Assuming thatâs the case, it could be the clue that leads us to our culprit.
And at this point the dynamic between the two starts to resemble the one people would expect between Holmes and Watson but thereâs more in this line that just that, the foreshadowing William knows personally the distance between nobles and orphans.
And then Albert appears and goes visiting the father of one of the victims, Eden, but who pays attention to the discussion might notice that heâs an earl⊠and the episodeâs title was âThe Earl's Crimeâ so is he the culprit?
Meanwhile as we are introduced to the poor father, we start to pity him. That man is destroyed from pain for his loss⊠and heâs a nice, humble man, a loving father who lost a beloved child. We sympathize with him, we want justice for him.
Then William approaches a boy⊠but in case we still have doubt itâs clear heâs merely doing so to investigate on the case⊠and then William and Louis are joined by Albert and their goal is made clear, provide the poor father with a chance of vengeance.
So, now we know for sure William, Louis and Albert arenât involved in the child murders and are hunting the culprit⊠and we all side with them because what he did was terrible⊠but just in case we need an extra push letâs have Earl of Argleton, aka the culprit, be introduced⊠and at the same time William confirm what we assumed, that he is William James MORIARTY.
Then William, engaging conversation with the Earl, acting as if he were Sherlock Holmes (to the point even the Earl observes he seems a detective) points out from where the various objects the Earl is wearing come. The Earl is impressed by his deductions but for us, viewers, the scene is a further proof the Earl is guilty because all those objects come from the shops from which worked the murdered kids. And, as William progresses, even the Earl realizes thatâs the point heâs trying to make.
And then weâve William say this.
William: You prefer the meat of young hares, yes? Tender, not yet fully developed, and so fresh that it still drips with blood, which you take your time to savour, nice and slow.
And, as he says so, we see the shapes of young boys running, and they seem naked, and theyâre smiling and itâs clear thatâs how the earl sees them⊠Previously we were merely said the killer âtarget young boys for their amusement, and then, after theyâre done, slaughter themâ.
You might even think the amusement was in the hunt⊠but now it has been made clear the Earl lusts for those young boys. And if killing a child is considered one of the worst crimes, it pales to sexually abuse a child. The series as now successfully painted the Earl as the most disgusting monster ever.
So why is this so very important?
Because you ends up agreeing with William that this person deserves to be killed, that the world would be better without him. And this means that in the viewersâ eyes the figure of Moriarty despite being called âcrime lordâ and âcrime consultantâ will be viewed as someone who bring justice, not something like Yagami Light who forced his own justice to the world, but something we all agreed upon is justice.
The Earl is a monster. He deserves to die.
This episode also becomes a chance to let us glimpse Lois in action. In the manga he would start to be more active much later, ironically exactly in âThe hunting of the Baskervillesâ while the anime decided to put him immediately at work. While this choice sacrifices part of the character arc of both Louis and William (there was a reason why Louis wasnât as active at the start), since âThe hunting of the Baskervillesâ was cut, it made sense to put it here.
Thereâs also the beautiful artistic choice to show William arriving driving a coach as the scene is completely covered by fog with the sounds somewhat muffled.
It feels creepy, like the death itself is getting on that place. And then it turns out the tables are turned, the coach was likely Earl of Argletonâs one and this time it was his turn to be kidnapped, taken there and tied over as he had done countless times with the boys⊠and itâs William, instead than him, the one who gets inside the place, his red eyes shining as he gets inside.
And really, the colouring is so brilliant here because itâs mostly greyish brown and white but then there are some colours that shine and are clearly visible.
Williamâs eyes and tie which are red⊠his blond hair⊠Edenâs red tie and his empty blue eyes⊠the Earlâs fear filled blue eyesâŠ
And then thereâs a flashback in which William is shown talking with Eden.
Eden: Are you certain you can grant my wish⊠âŠSir William?
William: Mr Eden, what you are proposing to do Is unfortunately categorized by this twisted world as a crime. Knowing this, does your resolve remain unchanged?
Weâve a flashback in a flashback, with Eden thinking at what happened to his poor son before he nods.
William: Very well. Then I, crime consultant William James Moriarty, accept your request.
And with this we go back to the present and to Eden pulling out a pair of scissors. Itâs clear what he wants to do and William urges him to be quick about it. We see nothing of the gruesome scene that happened after, just darkness and a scream, but weâve gotten to a point where few of us would deny a poor father the chance to avenge his own son abused and murdered by such a monster.
Light returns as William lights a match and this too symbolizes how Williamâs actions bring light in a world filled with darkness. Birds fly away and ravenâs feather flutter around him so that we now will get the symbolism in the opening.
Eden joins him and William kindly offers him his tissue so he can clean up before he personally takes care to close the door of the place in which Earl of Argleton was killed. We donât see the Earl, just some blood but itâs clear it should have been a gruesome mess and this too is clever.
Some anime like to show things up but merely implying is much more powerful because you can actually imagine a scenario as bad as you prefer.
The episode ends showing Eden being back to normal. Although this is kind of a dangerous message to give out (vengeance by murder bringing you peace, I mean) it makes sense.
The ending for this episode is just a black screen on which credits runs but it makes sense to postpone seeing the images in the ending AFTER this episode, when weâve seen âThe scarlet eyesâ and got to know the young versions of the Moriarty brothers.
After the ending the anime leaves a final bit explaining how the Moriarty brothers went through the trouble of erasing everything so that the death of the Earl and his coachman donât even make it to the news, so that they successfully created the perfect crime.
With this the episode ends and now the series has successfully created a mind setting in which we know William helps people in committing terrible crimes⊠but in a way we see him as Robin Hood, as if those crimes were an act of justice because those people were terrible but due to social differences and privileges they were also untouchable and this was the only way to punish them.
William is not Yagami Light, who passed judgement on people because he felt better than them, he really feels a lot more like someone who brings justice were none can be obtained but with terrible methods. Like Lelouch Lamperouge, he took what was helpless and gave him power so that they could obtain justice.
Long story short, this episode exist to make as easy as possible to see William as a good guy despite committing crimes and âThe scarlet eyesâ couldnât quite drive to the same result.
Itâs not solely just because the anime tamed it down, so that the nobles involved seem less abusive than in the manga, but because thatâs what those nobles are. In âThe earlâs crimeâ we have a paedophile murderer, so itâs easy to say he deserved a horrible death but in âThe scarlet eyesâ we just have abusive people.
Theyâre bad, mind you, but this could still lead to the discussion âdid they deserve to be murdered like that though?â They were Albertâs real family after all. They were horrible but they hadnât killed anyone yet. And the decision to murder them is taken by three children who all benefit from their death. And what about young William preaching to kill all the bad nobles to a group of children?
Mind you, Iâm not saying that the âThe scarlet eyesâ is bad, in truth itâs a lot more interesting than âThe earlâs crimeâ but it moves on a huge grey area⊠which is great if you want to think things through but if youâre handling a short anime and need your viewers to immediately stick with the main character⊠well, it doesnât work so well.
So yeah, âThe earlâs crimeâ might not be quite as good but it works well as first episode, and it serves well to make viewers understand to what William is referring when he gives his speech about wanting to fight the whole country.
William: Our lives should have the same value⊠Everyone should have an equal right to happiness⊠But in this country, that doesnât exist. This class system places a curse upon people. Because of it, peopleâs hearts are tainted and twisted, giving rise to devils. In which case, the opposite is also true. Once the devils are cast out, peopleâs hearts become clear again, and the curse is lifted. The country will assuredly be beautiful.
And if you hear all this and think to episode 1, you see how the unfairness of a class system allowed a man to abuse and murder young poor boys and how murdering him fixed everything. Itâs an easy to understand, immediate message and one that can easily be shared by the viewers.
So yeah, it works. Itâs not great and morally elaborate like the other episodes but thatâs exactly its purpose. To be as straightforward as possible to drive home a concept.
So, yeah, I think they did a very clever thing with episode 1⊠though, on the opposite side, I hate how, due to the limited episode number, its existence meant to further cutting chapters from being transposed. And itâs not just that chapters were cut⊠even those that were transposed were often changed so as to make them short and simpler.
Mind you, the episodes still remains powerful and well done but theyâre actually a lot less strong than the original.
For example in âA rare breedâ which is the transposition of âThe one grapefruit pieâ all William does is to cause the viscountâs death because he let a child die. In the manga he lowered the rents the townspeople had to pay to live on his newly acquired property, stole the control of the town from an evil baron (in the anime they decided to turn Baron Dublin into Viscount of Belfor), forced him to regret denying to the parents of the sick child a glass of water by causing him to feel sick and desperately needing water, write down a formal apology to the child as well as a testament that, once he were to die, his tenant farmers would inherit his lands and then caused the baronâs death.
Itâs a much bigger accomplishment for a more complicate plot which is much more tied to the state of society than the one of the anime, who merely focus on a nobleâs wrongdoing toward a poor family⊠but âA rare breedâ is still a very good episode, even if simpler than what gave it inspiration.
Another downside of the cuts is that, as I mentioned before, the characters gets less fleshed out than in the manga, which is something that strikes hard for the minor characters. Moneypenny gets cut off and the same goes for Von Herder and Mycroft Holmes (although theyâll manage to recover the two of them for season 2), while Fred and Moran will get a lot less characterization.
Major characters will also be affected by the cuts, although they wonât have it as bad as the minors.
StillâŠ
William James Moriarty, Albert James Moriarty, Louis James Moriarty, Fred Porlock, Sebastian Moran, Sherlock Holmes, John H. Watson, Miss Hudson, George Lestrade, I loved them all. They might be not as fleshed out as in the manga but theyâre still interesting and very likable, especially William and Sherlock. I love those two guys theyâre perfect.
Now⊠for whoâs not familiar with âSherlock Holmesâ and doesnât get why this story involves the âMoriarty brothersâ instead than just professor Moriarty, that is because Takeuchi RyĆsuke, the manga author, found an interesting way to solve the contradictory information about Professor Moriarty. Professor Moriarty has no given name in the first story in which he appeared (âThe Final Problemâ) but gives him a brother, Colonel James Moriarty. However, according to another story (âThe Adventure of the Empty Houseâ) itâs said that is professor Moriarty whoâs named James and his brother is not a Colonel but a station master. So Takeuchi RyĆsuke decided to interpret all this as Moriarty having two brothers, one of which is a Colonel (Albert) and giving to the three siblings the middle name of âJamesâ so that when they play the role of Lord of crime the three of them can say they are âJames Moriartyâ, which is quite clever if you ask me.
And then, because repetita iuvant, the visual is so very great, from the art used for the background to the way the scenes are framed. Really I love this.
So, to sum it up, the first season of this series is a very good first season and actually I hope the fact that it differs slightly from the manga will also work to persuade you to read the manga because boys, the manga is awesome.
And now let's end this with an AMV about this series I recommend watching: Confrontation
