The Epic Of ZektBach

Zektbach is the pseudonym for a bloke who makes fantasy themed electronica music. The music all comes together as part of a story of sorts in the forms of character CD's and so on. To expect a story of any real quality from these is perhaps asking too much. And, to be fair, the music is pretty cool, which is what he's selling. Lots of ladies doing chanting and all that. But still, the anime based of it is awful.

The story is about a woman with a magical sword who lazily swings it against hordes of heavily armoured grunts on CGI horses with terrible aiming ... capabilities. The fight scene at the start is pretty much entirely a disconnected from the siege scene that happened to be going on at the same time, except with lots of characters we don't care about and strange CGI horses, of which all 10000 or so fail to hit her with bows and arrows even though she's travelling in a straight line. And then she attacks them with her magical sword. This sword man, it's beyond glorious! It destroys anyone who stands in its path with its wide knowledge of physics and biology formulas, along with some Matrix hacking to go along with it. Why does this sword use maths yet the girl wielding it uses dancing? I do not know, for it is never explained. But little is explained in this OVA, so let’s not worry about that for now and head back to the story.

So, emotionless and personality-less girl who wields the sword then has a bunch of s'life conversations with her childhood friend (a generic moe girl who looks totally out of place in amongst an Arabian setting) and her brother, who's one of those bishies who spends his time cracking vaguely flirtatious lines, read off the 'idiots guide to being a flirtatious anime character' handbook, while leaning nonchalantly in doorways. The cliches go on and on, which, while bad in itself, gets even more jarring when they toss in cliches that don’t fit together. Everyone is so stoic and emotionless, yet they're also doing that whole leaning nonchalantly in doorways thing? The two just don't click.

Being only 30 minutes long, the plot leaps about at a rather silly rate. Barely 10 minutes after an adoring crowd bow at the feet of our heroine, they put her up on a cross and bay for her blood, shouting crucify her, crucify her. But then *spoiler* she breaks free! Which I would have thought was a pretty surprising thing to happen for the viewing public, but everyone was so stoic that they simply treated it as though the fact a mass-murdering machine was on the loose should be treated using the same tone of voice they use to describe an oncoming wisp of cloud. Maybe they too saw how inevitable and obvious that she was going to escape that they had long since gotten bored of the story. The main character seemed pretty bored by it too. She had just killed all her friends, her love interest (RIP brother, may you lean nonchalantly on heavens gates), and the people she claimed to have spent her life protecting, yet she seemed utterly disinterested in the whole thing. Neither was she particularly interested in the fact she had this amazing power. Characters in this anime simply weren't capable of contorting their faces in such a way to express anything other than stoic indifference

The Epic of Zetbach is pretty dumb, but thankfully it's dumb enough to be entertaining. The magical sword cutting through CGI horses always got a laugh out of me, as did the bland reactions the queen had to the mass murdered escaping. Plus, the character designs are hot (I do rather like Arabian anime girls) and the music aint shabby, so honestly I quite enjoyed watching this. So bad it's good? Yeah, Epic of Zetbach holds that title with pride.

Story 5/10
At first, with the interesting opening, typical narrator voice zoom, and awesome war scene introduction, this would seem to be a high rating anime/ova. However, after the intro the main action dies down, it awkwardly turns into some type of mystery and mass murder anime. As I'll say later in my analysis of the characters, the characters start to act like idiots (somewhat justifiably) in a way that emphatically annoys the viewer. It basically just leaves one irritatedly wondering "..." (see below).

Art 7/10
Although the main character and her sword are well done, the marching soldier computer graphics make one want to ... look away because of their simple, blocky movements and structure.

Sound 8/10
Opening music is cool, character voices are fitting, and background sounds are in most scenes. Villager voices become annoying (stop saying banzai!!!)

Character 6/10
Characters seem fine at first, however, multiple flaws which appear later leave one thinking "what is this bs, how idiotic can they be?" (mostly in reference to friend character)(supposedly justified by the demonic nature that has become present).

Enjoyment 5/10
Does one even have to ask (opinion viewable above).

Overall 6/10
Could have been way better if it had gotten rid of a few characters ("nii-sama") and didn't have the bad cg. Dancing übermensch genocide, few good characters, and interesting setting only redeeming points. Feels like an intro to a longer anime (in a bad way). A follow-up to this could be very promising if it is made.

Overall this OVA was pretty boring, nonetheless the storyline was kind messed up and your gonna say "WTH just happened?"

The only good part of this OVA was the character design and that's all I have to say about it.

So,I would not recommend this to anyone because your just gonna waste 30 minutes of your life over it. ( I just did.)

Overall the anime wasn't bad for a short story. The character designs lacked originality as all the main women were nearly naked with large breasts and not dressed for the battlefield at all.

Where it shines though is past that, as the story is about a sword that is cursed or curses the wielder. It's a reminder about too much power in battle and not learning when you've been utterly defeated.

The strengths are the original plot dealing with a cursed sword, even though this sword seems to tap into the matrix. The idea of a dancing sword style and the fact that a strong woman ... is at the core of it.

The weaknesses are the fact that they never explain how the curse transfers onto the regular soldier, it's only left to speculation.

Overall it was enjoyable, however it might not be everyone's cup of tea. There's lots of mindless killing and a very grim plotline. However for something that would be a short story, it's not too bad.

Also, avoid the SubDesu subs if you can as they are not translated properly at all.

it was good for a one episode OVA. it would have been better if it was a bit longer, kind of left me wanting more. i enjoyed the story line quite a bit and the characters seemed well done. i would definitely watch more if they ever decide to make it into a full anime or a movie

Rate of 6
seen via english subtitles.

The message of the story is a joke on the cover image for this piece. Your first thoughts might be this will be a black and white flick. Wrong! In fact what you saw was the message enforcement at it's best. You may have heard don't judge a book by it's cover but there is also everything is not black and white. Which brings me to the story.

A quest for control lead to power. Yet, power came at a price. A set-up similar to that of a genie. I mean think about it. You find a relic on display ... in a long forgotten tunnel with nothing else and you want to use it?! Aren't you going to question it's history on why it might be there?

Overall it brings a good message of respect no matter the cost but i can't help but feel as if i am missing something that was either not covered or something.

I would recommend this to a teen of 16 and up.

p.s. Then ending i can't distinguish as merciful or spurned.