Ranked #4313

Code-E

Code-E is a fun but short anime that brings mixed bag of opinions. From the start the show throws the user a pretty deep question, "How would you live your life if you can't touch practically anything?"




Story (Good)
That is the problem our main character faces on a daily basis. Set in the not too distant future where more people are more reliant on electronics and automation, Chinami Ebihara is a perfect example of a victim of circumstance (with the help of stereotypical moe). Well you see, Chinami can't touch anything electrical because she emits EMP waves from her body. And thats not a fun power to have in the information age. This show pretty much follows her around and shows how a woman like herself would live such a difficult life. The story may sound a little off the wall but you will most likely actually feel sorry for Chinami and get more interested in her life. That is untill you meet her friends...

Character (Decent)
The Ebihara is a perfect example of a typical family, mom and dad work, they drink beer and they love each other. Reminds me of my own family practically. Chinami's chemistry to her family is executed perfectly in my opinion. Perfectly as in you can actually feel sorry for them and see that they actually care for each other even though they all live busy lives. But as i stated before, her 'friends' kind of break up that perfect harmony. Well she starts off without having any, then she befriends the cute girl that sits in front of her (love her twin tails btw). That is all fine and dandy then, some guy named Kotaro Kannagi enters to the fray. How they meet isn't that important but one cant realize how this stupid, arrogant, and borderline stalker becomes Chinami's friend and appears throughout the whole series. On top of that this stalker has a very cute and nice (and rich) girlfriend named Sonomi Kujo. The further you progress in the story it becomes more apparent that this mix of friends is what brings down this show in terms of common sense and ridiculousness. Also I'm not a real fan of the main male role being stupid as hell. I really liked the Chinami family but for the most part, everything else was very poor. There are more characters but its up to you to think they're that important to the show or not.


Sound (Fair)
The sound is pretty mediocre as well. The seiyu's do their duty and pull off perfect voice acting (as usual) where they all act their part fine and there are not problems with them. But everything else is average. With the exception of school room chatter, environmental sounds was very lacking. A lot of nature scenes, but not a lot of nature sounds, a lot of city scenes, but not a lot of city noise. Theres nothing terrible about the sound, air brakes of the bus hiss and pop like normal, static crackles and zaps, etc. But nothing makes the sound spectacular or to write about with the exception of the voice cast. Even the opening and closing songs are actually pretty bad, but I'll leave it at that.

Art (Very Good)
The art and animation is probably the shows saving grace. If you don't care about most of the characters as much (like me), then you will be at least intrigued by the 'not too distant future' they tried to make up. Theres automated buses, video billboards, everyone has cellphones that can do anything, and they even has a few DoCoMo ads for good measure. My favorite part of the technology where the school blackboards were essentially a refined version of a Microsoft Surface (google it). Since technology is also about small things some great detail were given to some scenes. All the technology was fun to look at but they even took the time to show a lot of nature and non technological areas to show that the WHOLE world isn't that engrossed in technology yet. The art itself is pretty much standard fare for a 2008 anime. Crisp, clean, colorful, and moderately detailed. Its not gonna win anything for the art but then again it doesn't look like Speed Racer either.

Enjoyment (Good)
Overall, the show shows a lot of promise and the Code-E universe was so intriguing that I couldn't stop watching. No matter how much I hate Kannagi I can't help but look forward to the next season. I hope they make even more convincing inventions the next time around.

Verdict (6.4) read more

Brought to you by the creators of the total nerve-wracking, mind-breaking, bone-chilling anime entitled Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, here comes Studio DEEN with another rare piece of work but now in the story of a girl who can’t control her powers that damages electrical gadgets known with the title of Code-E; but only lightyears away to being as ground-breaking as the former.

To accurately review Code-E, let’s do this by doing it the old fashioned way; by separating the good from the bad.

THE GOOD:
The best feature of Code-E would be in its sound department. First off, the seiyuus did their job impressively well; from being a total annoying spoiled brat to a hippy computer geek father, all the voices behind the characters really fits their personality. Another would be the calm and light relaxing tunes played as soundtracks of the anime, all these fits the mood of the atmosphere. The ending song too with a bit of sentimental touch reminds the audience what a rom-com shoujo anime is all about. However, the opening music as it did not contain any vocals although very good as well, utmost sounded like something you’ll likely hear in Lupin III making it more fitting for a mafia-related anime such as the one mentioned and not for a sci-fi shoujo anime. Setting this issue aside, the music in Code-E is undeniably the best part of it.

Animation-wise, Code-E contained crisp and clear backgrounds. From a calm and peaceful park to the busy streets of the city, all were done with great detail. As well as the lightings; it was never too bright or too dark to be distracting. As with regards to the background, Code-E is simply in par with the animation of the other anime within its time. However, as good as the background might be, the character designs though I just can’t seem to put my finger on it, felt so flat. They all felt so dull and all really looked generic. There were no special designs to distinguish them from other anime as they really seemed like copies from their archetype counterparts in other anime. And also, what I think that made the characters look less appealing was the disappearing nose. When looked from the side, their nose appears, but when looked head on this instantly disappears like magic! Well, must be prosthetics or something. And the school uniforms look less attractive than what they should have been and the boys’ specifically looked like it was directly looted from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya thus a minus for lack of originality; however, these are not really important as these are all minor issues compared to the bad – the story.

THE BAD:
You know why this anime blows? Because of that synopsis. The synopsis is so precise that it all stated what would happen from beginning to the end. So what am I basically saying? I am saying that from the first episode until the last one, there was no plot movement. For easier visualization, Code-E is like observing ants in a formicarium. These ants do what they do best which is living their everyday lives as normal ants would. Though still, it would be better to observe ants as they do still have a sense of direction, unlike the characters of Code-E who doesn’t. And no, this is not some slice of life that could be compared to Lucky Star as comparing it with the mentioned anime could be definitely considered a crime.

To further elaborate, we were introduced with a character that has an unknown special ability that causes disturbance to anyone who’s using electrical devices. Well for everyone’s sake, this unknown ability was never given any information even at in the end as to why it ever existed.

If the cause was never discovered, so what?

That’s exactly it. Each and every episode was dedicated for the discovery of this unknown phenomenon and even at the ending it was still not revealed. For audiences’ sympathy, it tried to change its look to a melodrama with the last episode’s very last minute. That’s just a pathetic excuse as the creators couldn’t fit a simple answer to this in a twelve episode anime with a never moving story. Oh did I mention the pacing wasn’t slow as there was really no story movement? Oh right, I already did. It was like watching a wannabe sci-fi that ended up being an extremely boring and random slice of life. Nothing new with regards to the plot up to the tenth episode was introduced, that is except for a number of insignificant characters. As to why these characters were introduced, the anime didn’t say so. The creators were probably thinking that it would be fun to introduce some no sense of direction characters for some poor comic relief.

So to further describe these (in)significant characters, let’s look at their personalities. All of the characters as displayed by their character designs also fell into their basic archetypes; the female lead is a clumsy scaredy-cat glasses-wearing girl. She also doesn’t know how to express her feeling just like all the female leads out there. Wow that’s really new. And the side characters are also too generic and this includes the annoying science geek who is the partner of the female lead, the highly arrogant ojou-sama, the cool and mysterious tall classmate, and a poor imitation of a wacky duo from Pokemon – the Team Rocket. Even though they might be generic, it could still be used for the better as some anime filled with stereotypes even became good at the end but guess what, there was completely no attempt for further development of the characters leaving all to be very unappealing and unlikeable. Yes, there was absolutely no character development within the span of 12 episodes. So what were they doing? Nothing. They were all just introduced to walk around just like mindless zombies without a sense of direction with regards to the plot.

Still, every show as it has its protagonist will always have a villain. This villain was introduced at the final quarter of the anime. As to why this villain was introduced, the anime didn’t said so. The creators must be having some serious fun introducing random characters eh? After some irrelevant lines by the nameless evil doer; the villain who just popped out like a zit, immediately disappeared; just like a zit.

Also another way to describe this anime is it is like a Magician’s Hat. Why? It randomly picks up stuff just for the viewers to be amused or entertained leaving lots of events look irrelevant with regards to what’s really happening. Hence, it also took a turn of events at the end as what would a magician would do to fool people as the whole anime eventually became a drama. And even so, the drama of this anime is just bad as it is. It all looked so forced as there was never a deep interaction with the characters making it all look so cheesy. “I love you” – yes you can say that to anyone for them to save you, unless you want to die.

So what’s Code-E all about? I think it’s about some science stuff explained by some nerdy high school boy in which Nickelodeon kid shows would probably be a better way in gaining some knowledge. But before I forget, this has a sequel too which is entitled “Mission-E.” But judging from this anime that took an abysmal nosedive, I doubt that it could be brought back by any redemption. Still, I would gladly recommend this for those who are feeling so gutsy and masochistic to see what an ass filled with hemorrhoids look like. Though I’m not really expecting it to have a higher score, I’m actually surprised that I’ve rated it so.

So here, a solid ONE, just because ZERO is nonexistent on the score sheet. read more