About half a year ago I had the absolute pleasure of reading through the Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance light novels, and after having caught up with them I consider it one of my favourite series to date. Consequently I was of course very much looking forward to this anime adaptation; however I still felt a bit awkward about it because as it is, Blade Dance is not really an amazing series from the very beginning. It isn't until a few volumes of content down the road that it starts getting exponentially better; however this mere 1-cour adaptation doesn't even reach that far into the
...
story. As a result, people watching this anime will most likely think of it as just yet another cliché harem series, which by itself isn't wrong but it's only scratching the surface of what Blade Dance truly is deep down.
In short, Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance takes place in a fantasy world where magicians called Elementalers (or Elementalists if you prefer) form sacred contacts with elemental spirits in order to be allowed to wield their powers. However this privilege is only given to pure maidens of noble families who undergo training in order to become spirit contractors. This means that there are no male Elementalers... or at least there shouldn't be but *as it happens*, there is one exception to that, namely the story's protagonist Kazehaya Kamito. Consequently he's transferred to the rich girls' classy school as the only man in an ocean of girls. Sounds cliché and overused as hell I know, but I think it utilizes that premise better than most other such cases out there.
Now undoubtedly the most important part of a harem series is the characters themselves, as if they're not likable then it will suck no matter what, so here's a rough draft of the most important ones:
Name: Kazehaya Kamito
Role: Protagonist
Description: Good natured, dark history, strong fighter
Comment: Not a pervert, not a wimp, not dense. Actually a competent harem protag for once
Name: Terminus Est
Role: Contracted spirit, bEst girl
Colour: White
Description: Ancient legendary sword spirit, expressionless, snarky
Comment: One of the most nosebleed-inducing characters in existence, total moe overdose and perhaps the main reason to watch this series. Don't you dare drop this anime before she makes her first appearance (episode 3)
Name: Restia Ashdoll
Role: Former contracted spirit
Colour: Black
Description: Antagonist(ish), motives surrounded in mystery
Comment: Cute yet seductive character design, hard to figure out for sure what she's thinking or what her personal goals are most of the time
Name: Claire Rouge
Role: Tsundere Ojou-sama #1, emphasis on the tsun
Colour: Red
Description: 95% tsun, 5% dere, Kamito's self-proclaimed "Master"
Comment: Imagine Louise de la Vallière except without Kugimiya Rie and you won't be too far off the mark. Also a closet pervert though
Name: Rinslet Laurenfrost
Role: Tsundere Ojou-sama #2, emphasis on the Ojou
Colour: Yellow
Description: 50% tsun, 50% dere, extreme rich-girl aura, Claire's childhood friend
Comment: Without a doubt one of the most strikingly Ojou-esque characters out there
Name: Ellis Fahrengart
Role: Tsundere Ojou-sama #3, emphasis on the... creative ways of insulting people
Colour: Blue
Description: 33% tsun, 66% dere, captain of the Sylphid Knights
Comment: Strong sense of justice and a quite straightforward personality, but on the inside she really only wants to be treated like a girl
Name: Fianna Ray Ordesia
Role: Perverted Ojou-sama
Colour: Purple
Description: Playful and teasing personality, frighteningly bad at cooking
Comment: Aggressively seeks to seduce Kamito for her own reasons. She's good at teasing people but not so much at being teased herself. Also somewhat naïve
Short version would be that some characters are more likable than others, but there's bound to be at least *someone* everyone would like from the cast. Est is by far the most popular but Restia and Ellis have some sizable fanbases as well.
As far as the production value goes, the art style looks mostly like how I imagined it would and is quite pleasing for the eyes overall. The animation quality however is uneven at best. For panoramic sceneries and close-up character shots everything looks fine, but every so often during more distant shots the characters' faces will look completely distorted and just plain weird. It really feels like they skimped on the budget in that area and sadly it drags down the overall impression of the visuals quite a lot as it'll constantly nag you in the back of your mind.
The soundtrack however, the only aspect I had absolutely no expectations on whatsoever coming into this as a LN reader, sure as hell was the real surprise of this show. The OST is just soooooo catchy, I was so impressed with it and it really has its own feel to it. It's not particularly J-pop-esque, but rather gave me some East European or tribal vibes... I think "wild" might be a good word to describe it. Note that I'm not just talking about the OP (though this one is a bit more "normal" than the others) and the ED with this, but the soundtrack as a whole including the CD-only tracks (like Shukusai no Elementalia for example) that aren't in the anime itself are also fantastic and I'd recommend you to run to your nearest YouTube and check them out if you haven't. Also one does not simply mess with a group name as legit as Ni-Sokkususu (pronounced Knee Sockss) >.>
Moving on, overall this is definitely not a show that would ever be labelled as "deep" or "intelligent" or "artistic" etcetera, but that's not what an ecchi harem show needs anyway. What it needs is cute girls and mindless fun, and as far as that part goes at least there's not much to complain about. Some people might get annoyed at Claire but she's only one among many, and there's bound to be at least someone that can carry the show for every viewer specifically. In the end, anime is simply entertainment media and for that purpose alone, Blade Dance does its job. That's all there is to it really.
However as a final note, as someone who's read the novels I really want to get this message across: since no second season has yet been announced despite the anime being finished airing, combined with the fact that (to my knowledge) it didn't have the best BD sales in Japan, it’s worryingly likely that no more content will ever be adapted for this series. If that really does seem to be the case however, then I really recommend you to at least try out the LNs instead. I'm not going to be one of those hypocrites who keep yelling stuff like "the source material is so much better, don't judge it by this anime" etcetera, because that is definitely not the case. In fact I think this is a quite respectable adaptation as a whole; not perfect but good enough. Rather it's simply that the story improves immensely pretty much from the very moment at which the anime ends, and thus judging the full story merely from what these twelve episodes cover alone will give a quite unfair image for the series as a whole. This is essentially just the prologue. The main arc of the novels begins literally the second the last episode of the anime ends.
Though if you're not quite that hardcore and simply want to watch a show casually for plain fun, then this adaptation on its own still does a good job at doing just that, and arguably that's really all you ever need to ask for when it comes to anime.
Alternative Titles
Synonyms: Seirei Tsukai no Kenbu, Bladedance of Elementalers
Japanese: 精霊使いの剣舞〈ブレイドダンス〉
More titlesInformation
Type:
TV
Episodes:
12
Status:
Finished Airing
Aired:
Jul 14, 2014 to Sep 29, 2014
Premiered:
Summer 2014
Broadcast:
Mondays at 20:30 (JST)
Licensors:
Sentai Filmworks
Studios:
TNK
Source:
Light novel
Duration:
23 min. per ep.
Rating:
PG-13 - Teens 13 or older
Statistics
Ranked:
#59982
2
based on the top anime page. Please note that 'Not yet aired' and 'R18+' titles are excluded.
Popularity:
#644
Members:
365,591
Favorites:
927
Available AtResourcesStreaming Platforms | Reviews
Filtered Results: 33 / 33
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Your Feelings Categories Oct 13, 2014
About half a year ago I had the absolute pleasure of reading through the Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance light novels, and after having caught up with them I consider it one of my favourite series to date. Consequently I was of course very much looking forward to this anime adaptation; however I still felt a bit awkward about it because as it is, Blade Dance is not really an amazing series from the very beginning. It isn't until a few volumes of content down the road that it starts getting exponentially better; however this mere 1-cour adaptation doesn't even reach that far into the
...
Oct 1, 2014
The best way to describe Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance is that it is basically a remake of Zero no Tsukaima with a few additional archetypes thrown in and a few intricacies removed.
The show is a very standard harem, somewhat in the vein of Infinite Stratos, where the main character is the only male elementaler in a school for female elementalers. Predictably, he quickly runs into a cast of about 5 girls who all have affections for him. What the show does well is pacing. Most harem shows have a few episodes of pointless stalling to focus on one individual girl and pretend that they are ... Sep 29, 2014
Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance or Blade dance for short is one of five anime adaptation of LN that simultaneously announced by MF Bunko J. For you who have watch many anime by synopsis alone you can see which direction this series will take. Yes this is harem romance comedy with fantasy setting and dash of action. Nothing new here but it's not like being unoriginal equal boring. Blade Dance is type of series that not try to hard to be deep or complicated series. Instead it achieve what it is trying to do becoming simple yet enjoyable series.
Now we are talking about animation and ... Oct 18, 2014
In every anime season there are always the usual category of shows that we expect. There are those hyped shows that everyone wants to watch, there are the romance shows that prove to be either promising or not, and finally, we have that one show every season that you can tell, you can tell will be bad. Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance.
Story (4.99/10): The story of Tsukai no Blade Dance revolves around a magical world. In this world, there are spirits in which only women or girls, are able to make contracts with these spirits and use them as different weapons of ... Apr 13, 2015
It's been awhile I haven't done a review so I decided why not, fair warning this review is only for the anime I won't included aspect from the LN. I know alot of you won't like it, but stick with me ok, I'm a bit rusty.
Anyways Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance doesn't seem like an all out series, but for those who don't know this is all just the prologue, the actual story doesn't happen until a bit further on. But again I won't be getting into that, just saying for those who came from the LN and starting to watch this, don't expect anything ... Oct 1, 2014
This show is what i would call the ultimate surprise. This show is something that comes out of no where. You just have to get through the cliche infested first episode
Story wise the story itself is good, What makes this story great in my opinion is the back stories of every character and how they all seem to come together with each other. That is the main reason i personally love this story. Ren Ashebell win the blade dance years ago greatly influences all the female maidens at the school. Restias actions greatly influences Kamito and Greyworth. That to me is a great story, when ... Oct 2, 2014
Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance: light novel adaptation! Yeah! You know what that means? Deep, meaningful themes? Character Development? Great Dialogue? Hahahaha, hell no. As with most (if not all) light novel adaptations, Blade Dance is a romance/comedy/harem/fantasy anime catered to the otaku audience. My expectations for this anime were insanely low and all I expected was nothing but a generic, mindless fanservice anime and that's exactly what I got.
Story (25%) - 2/10 The story is as generic as it can be. It's nothing but an obvious setup for a harem and there isn't much thought put into the setting. Now you may be thinking "Sure, ... Oct 1, 2014
Ok, so what we've got was another one of those harem based fantasy anime, where it was some sort of "Infinite Stratos" kinda of thing where a school for girls was suddenly been invaded by a guy who can do what them girls can do kind of thing, soooooooooo, generally there is no story except a plot where a red head bitch was trying to have the guy all for herself because of what he can do and what he has so that she can win in the so called "Blade Dance" and the rest was the usual them girls competing for the guy's affection,
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Jul 13, 2016
Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance
This anime wasn't have a fantastic story that can make you hold breath during the show, but what makes me can still enjoy this anime..??. First character, character development in this anime is very nice, indeed not too influential to story, and so many tsundere character in this anime, but character in this anime have a charm of its own. and my favorite is Terminus Est and Ellis Fahrengart. Terminus Est is the best girl in this anime, loli who always melting situation, she is reported as a powerful sword spirit known as a demon slayer, she sometimes put a chocolate in her ... Aug 18, 2016
Story: so the story is pretty much like that this guy was in a blade dance 3 years ago as a girl he ends up meeting a girl named claire who he ends up meeting when she is bathing and than they get a seal wont spoil the rest
Art: the art is pretty good nothing bad about it Sound: the sound was very good also had a very nice ending theme song i liked Character: now the characters kinda are freaking good you do get a different variety of characters to this anime Enjoyment: now i freaking enjoyed the hell out of this anime for the ecchi too ... Jan 12, 2016
Story:
Where to start with this story... Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance tells the story of a special young man named Kazehaya Kamito (the only reason I know his name is because every freaking character whines his name at least a dozen times every episode). Kamito lives in a magical world where wealthy members of society send their daughters to some school with other girls to master the art of contracting spirits for some reason. These spirits are used to fight each other for no particular purpose. The contracted spirits come in many forms, from elemental spirits to golems to even the MC, who, by the ... Oct 25, 2014
I was pleasantly surprised by this one and it's quite a shame that it seems like it won't be getting a second season as lots of plot points are left unresolved. If you really value having closure and you are not willing to read on I would avoid this one, you will find no closure here.
What we have seen so far of the plot is not particularly complicated. Kamito Kazehaya is a boy who can utilise magical powers that usually only girls can use. He attends an otherwise all female school and has a shady past. This one is another good example of how to properly ... Mar 4, 2015
This is like a small remake of Zero no Tsukaima in a different time.
The anime overall is good, though its not because the story is so amazingly captivating. I feel that the story is the weakest part of the series. Its kind of meh, girls with magical powers that summon stuff that fights for them. Unique isn't it? The most I like from this anime is how similar Claire is to Louise. But this requires you to have already watched or watching Zero no Tsukaima and also like it in order to like this one. IMO, this is the good part of the anime with the ... Dec 27, 2015
Describing this one of many shows that "the anime industry spits out every season" is somewhat of an injustice. You will find there is a lot more to Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance than your everyday harem series.
Plot: This is an anime primarily about fighting and magic-wielding, which is nothing new, but it is more than enough to keep you interested for 12 episodes. The other main theme is harem/romance. What this show does well is prevent the two themes from conflicting with each other and therefore the plot feels serious yet the romance is sweet and entertaining, and compliments the story well as a form ... Oct 24, 2014
This review will not have any spoilers(I'll try not too) and will just be me explaining on how I like/dislike the anime. The first thing I will talk about is the story. It is in the supernatural genre with the character controlling spirits with a contract. The story is good, but I did not like the ending as much since it left me on a cliffhanger. If you would want to see what happens next, you would have to read the manga or hope that they will make another season at some point, which isn't a high probability since it has been out for awhile.
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Feb 29, 2016
Light novel adaptions are a weird thing. Sometimes they’re incredibly rushed by trying to put so much information into so little time. Sometimes they're incredibly slow and take their time, doing absolutely nothing interesting in their time span. I came into Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance knowing this, without having any high expectations for the show. Did my moderate expectations bring disappointment? No, not quite, but Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance certainly didn’t completely live up to them.
Blade Dance takes place in a world where humans can become spirit contractors that use “spirits” for things such as battling. However, only young girls can ... Jul 23, 2016
Already imagine how this anime turns into? Well if you guess it will be a harem, yeah it is, with lolis and kawaii characters everywhere.
But don't worry for the ecchi-ness contents, it isn't too much and this anime is not a waste for your time. The story centers around Kazehaya Kamito--the hero-who is the candidate of The Demon Lord in a world where spirit can only controlled by pure maidens. Those maidens are studying at Areishia Spirit Academy which purpose is to educate them to be an Elementalist. The storyline is quite difficult to resume and if I try to resume it, ... Oct 3, 2014
Zero no Tsukaima can be called as the first series which success the fantasy harem genre series. And now every series with the same genre in each season try to follow its success. One of them is Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance (Blade Dance) for Summer 2014.
Blade Dance is just your typical harem series. The MC is the only boy with the ability whose only girl can only wield, just like IS. And the story went as oh I found an enemy, let's the girls fight and I will help too. Oh, don't forget some unnatural ecchi scene. It's the same recipe. Even there are ... Dec 6, 2014
This anime is undoubtedly an enjoyable experience. The story itself is fairly interesting. It follows Kamito and the girls whom he befriends at the academy he is whisked to. The characters are lovable, and each has their own backstory, filled with rich events and overflowing with mystery, captivating the interest of the audience. The only flaws in this anime would be the producers and the excess of fa nservice. As far as pacing goes, it seems to be flowing nicely along, up until the last few episodes. The last episodes feel rushed, and parts of the original manga is left out. The fan service
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Sep 15, 2017
This is my favorite series of all time(anime+novel), so maybe some parts may be just me. Okay let's start, this anime has been adapted from the Light Novel by the same name written by Shimizu Yuu, it has that cliche feel to it at the start but the story only gets better as it goes on, unlike most other harem series(zero no tsukaima, I'm talking to you), what I mean is that while this does not have that unique setting that most people want, there's actually a very big world built and it's very well used as the story goes on.
Now let's talk about ... |