Ranked #118

Spice and Wolf

Wolf and spice can be summed up fairly easily. Be prepared for ALOT of dialog. In essence, its about a story about merchant trading during medieval times. A time when the word of the catholic church was more important than anything else and anyone else was deemed a witch or heretic. Since it is set in such archaic times it would be a perfect fit to have an anime about merchant trading.

Ever since i was in middle school I used to play video games with trading and how prices rise and fall from location to location and how supply and demand and even risk margins for investing in certain things to turn a profit. That was the main goal, to make money. And that is the main goal of our main character Lawrence Kraft. Through his travels he entrusted a small heretic town that believed in a wolf god named Horo that watched over their crops. And it just happens that Lawrence Kraft befriends this god and he soon finds out that she just wants to go home. And so the adventure begins....

Being a story about trading goods there is bound to be alot of dialog between bartering, negotiating, trading information and the chemistry between Horo and Lawrence. If theres going to be alot of dialog an my anime it better at least intelligent and make sense. Luckily this show does it very well, almost perfect. And its safe to say this is because how Horo and Lawrence feed off each others energies so well that you almost feel like you're right there arguing with Horo. Theres no "voice in the head" in this anime, all their thoughts and ideas go between each other and nothing is never left out. Although little background details are left out for time constraints, viewers with an open mind can understand most of the unmentioned side stories. Those who cant figure out the small things, the subbers (ayako) were nice to place side notes for every episode. Its very refreshing to see an anime that actually takes time to explain things to the point that you are convinced enough to believe the situation at hand.

Lawrence and Horo are the only main characters of the show so having a good chemistry between them was key but also having a strong seiyu cast for those two is another reason why this show is addicting. Their voices emit their emotions perfectly and the background music just makes this show so much more elegant and beautiful. Its basically consists of a string quartet. Who ever composed all of the background music must be one of the best composers I've ever heard. I never knew so many emotions can come out of just a group of strings. Environmental sound effects are just as what you would expect after hearing the beautiful strings and artwork. Crickets chirp at night, flames flicker and click, they're all of high quality. But they never interfere with the dialog at all which I enjoy the most.

The last component that brings this whole show to masterpiece status is the artwork. This show is best shown on HD resolution definitely. You can see all the painstaking detail it took for all the artists to draw all the settings of the medieval towns, each cobble stone looks different from each other, the stained glass is painted with perfect care. Even all the guild halls and churches have a massive feel to them. Everything about the artwork screams perfection and is easily one of the best artwork I've laid my eyes on. The character animations aren't as greatly skilled as the background and static animations but it does hold a medium-high quality at best. But Horo and Lawrence are still quite memorable throughout the whole show.

Overall this show crams so much information and dialog to the viewers its easy to say that its not for everyone. But this is indeed a very intelligent, beautiful, and intriguing show. Its a show that you will either understand or not. As for me I love shows like this that leaves JUST enough out for the viewer to make them think and analyze about the episode they just saw. And I am a total sucker for beautiful artwork and music, but character chemistry is what drives me (and all my other 10's on my list) to score this a 10.

...mind you this show still isn't for everyone.

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A show about a merchant and an incarnation of a harvest-wolf-god, set in a beautiful medieval world.
So, a merchant named Lawrence encounters the incarnation of the harvesting god - a wolf god at that. Her incarnation looks like a human except wolf ears and the tail to match. Then, he's supposed to accompany her to her home country in the north. On top of that, it's all set in a medieval setting. That's pretty interesting, if you ask me. It lays the base for a good adventure anime; which I definitely like.

This show doesn't have a vast array of main characters - it's mainly Lawrence and Horo (the wolf-god) so far. Well, they're both good characters, and I especially like how Horo is a contrast in herself: She is pretty smart, and wise - as she says herself several times - at times. Still, she can be pretty child-like, and has a personality that doesn't really indicate wisdom or smartness.

Lawrence is, well, a pretty average main character, I think. I don't really have much to say about him. There's one thing I don't like, however: They both try to act though towards each other, hiding their feelings. Or something like that. Anyway, I am pretty tired of seeing that, even though it's turning into a standard part in a recipe for this kind of anime.

Ah, and I really like the setting of the show, as I mentioned earlier: A medieval world. I find it really awesome to watch this show with its medieval feel - I've always been a sucker for that.

All in all, this can turn into a pretty good show. I'm going to recommend this to all of you adventure anime fans out there. However, it can be pretty confusing in the first episodes - I'm just starting to understand it after thinking a bit about it. But that may just be me, so watch it yourselves!

To 'Not Helpful' voters (and you 'Helpful' voters too): Feedback greatly appreciated =) read more