The story starts out with Juna, out heroine, being involved in an accident which leaves her dead. She feels her spirit slipping away when she is contact by another mysterious spirit who offers to save her life if she will help to save the planet and become the Avatar of Time. She accepts and much to the surprise of her mourning boyfriend, mother, and medical personal she jumps from her death bed and into action. Overall it’s a good start and we are treated to some good action right off the bat. From these beginnings you might think that this anime is going to be a pretty exciting action series. But the action soon lets up and slows down to a crawl. This is sure to disappoint some people who were expecting more action based story. Eventually it becomes a very endearing romance as well. I found this part of the series to be the most rewarding personally. The social commentary is also interesting as Juna learns about the world and what is damaging it and what could be done to fix it. Whether or not you agree with the conclusions or "facts" expressed in the show I think everyone can agree that the problems do exist. Many of these are hot political issues that have strong feelings on both sides of the debate. While I believe that some of the statements made in the show are naive and only tell partial truths at times, I still think it allows you to make up your own mind about what it is saying.
The relationship between Juna and Tokio is one of the best I have seen in a series to date. We get plenty of character development and a lot of back story on the both of them. They both feel like very real and relatable. Juna's struggle to be able to fit in with modern society after some of the changes her body goes through was interesting. This became a major part of the plot for most of the series as well as Tokio trying to understand what she is going through. Most of the supporting characters are left in the background. This is good and bad. Good because it did allow the extra screen time to our leads and was what lead to them being so interesting to me. We do get to see some important side stories regarding Juna's and Tokio's family but some of these stories are left open towards the end without any real resolution. It wasn’t overly important to the story in the end but some of it I would have liked to know how it turned out. Particularly the side story involving Juna's older sister. The most irritating character to me was definitely Chris. I found him to be a pompous know it all who is constantly telling Juna one thing and then when she does it asking her why she did it.
The production values of Arjuna are quite spectacular. From the beautiful artwork to the epic feeling of the music, this series feels like a movie in a sense. The background music in particular really makes the story feel like a grand experience and is really one of the best music scores I’ve ever heard. The animation uses a lot of CG effects which are for the most part very good. Though I am not a fan of this style it did mostly flow seamlessly with the rest of the animation.
Where my score of Arjuna really drops is in my overall enjoyment, this is mainly due to the ending. While it’s not a bad ending, I just didn’t like it and was disappointed almost across the board. There was too much uncertainty regarding the fate of most of the cast and I was left confused by many of the sudden revelations at the end. Also the social commentary got fairly intense and overbearing towards the end too which affected my enjoyment. I felt my intelligence was being insulted to some extent as characters would lament the starvation of millions in Africa yet their policies on farming and livestock production would lead to millions or perhaps billions more starving. I also found it a bit naive that simply turning off ones air conditioner for two weeks in the summer or eating a little less meat would somehow solve the energy crisis or end world hunger.
Despite my problems with how things ended and with some the series opinions, I still found this to be a show well worth seeing. If you just look at it as a work of fiction and a story and not try to take what is said as the absolute truth you are sure to enjoy it for what it is, a wonderful romance and adventure. Those looking for action and intense special effects will be disappointed however. Arjuna is anime that should be viewed by more than it has been to this date.
