Argento Soma

This Anime was almost dropped. There are some problems with this show and they mostly revolve around the primary character Ryu .... err sorry Takuto is his name in the beging and this guy is an exreteme emo! He is a victim and he wallows in it. I won't go into his reasons for victim hood, but I will say that he starts as a emo and ends as one and I get the feeling he would be a wife beater. Needless to say, I greatly dislike Ryu. Fortunately, he is not the only character, more on that later.

Aside from Ryu, there is another annoying ... aspect of this show, the music. Music was by Katsuhisa Hattori, a famous and accomplished composer / conductor. Argento Soma is a military show, based in the US, so they used military style music, kind of. It was more like music from a military graduation ceremony. Maybe in Japan, that is what they think of when they think of American military music. I don't know, but it didn't work for me.

But wait, the show is based in the US? Well, that is different and I like different. Also it is a military show, meaning adult characters, something else I like. In fact there is only one child, Hattie, in the show and she truly acts like a kid. Wow, an anime that realistically portrays the characters! Now, don't get wrong here, all is not peachy with the characters. Yes you already know I dislike Ryu, the others are likable but a bit shallow. After a few episodes they become fairly predictable but there are some surprises toward the end, so yeah, it's okay. They really take the edge off of dealing with Ryu and any one of the characters can carry a single episode with ease.

There are more things to like fore this is a Giant anime. Giant Mecha, Giant Aliens, and a Giant Robot. Yeah, the Mecha are pretty cool, the design is nice, and I really like the flight conversion, they are pretty unique although a bit underpowered. The Aliens, well they all look the same, but react differently, too bad they have no personality. The Giant Robot, Frank, I think he is the real star of the show. Frank is just a big bruiser, to fix things you just run up and hit it. If that doesn't work, hit it Harder! He also has a thing for young blonds, go figure.

Now the story. You have Giant aliens landing on earth for an unknown reason. The military is helpless to combat them. A special force is formed with advanced mecha to fight the aliens. The name of this force is NERV....... no no no it's Funeral.... Heheh, okay so the basic story is pretty much a rip of Evangelion without the religious overtones or teenage angst. But there is Ryu, he is full of angst! He is Shinji all grown up and he is still a whiner! Still the story does heavily borrow from Evangelion, transplanted to the US with Pilgrimage Point replacing Tokyo. It's okay though, there are no EVA's attached to extension cords, at least not really, there are no cords and the Mecha are not really EVAs , for the most part that is. Oh, yeah, and the ending is completely unlike anything in Evangelion, in fact it's pretty different and unique. Which is why I am glad I did not drop this anime.

Over all, it's Okay. Ryu is nauseating, the music is bad and the story is formulaic, yet I held out to the end and that is saying something.

Argento Some is sometimes referred to as pretentious, an Evangelion clone, or it's said that the main character is "emo." I'm hesitant to use the word pretentious in the many cases where it is used, as that usually just means "it had lofty ideas, but I didn't like it," and it's seldom a substantive word to apply. Similarities to Evangelion are numerous and probably the closest you'll find to a "clone" other than RahXephon; the cover, with the main's brooding, downward-turned gaze is a bit "these wounds... they will not heal..." if not "CRAWLING IN MY SKIN!" but as far as the writing and character ... of Ryu Soma goes, I don't see any real issue—I mean, going on a quest for revenge because your college girlfriend died in an accident is... kind of embarrassing, but it works in the realm of fiction, where love conquers all and we have themes about the self and connecting with others UwU.

I came into watching this thinking it might be an unsung masterpiece—certainly it has a devoted mini-fanbase on MAL and elsewhere. The beginning is strong, then by the middle it's just okay, and you ride that lukewarm okayness to the end for a stretch of about 16 episodes, a few of the reveals are kind of not too appealing, but all the writing comes together, full circle, and the end is decent and even satisfying—it could have been better, had the writers done more with the middle section. It's often said in pedestrian HOW DO I WRITE threads that every story has a beginning, a middle, and an end—they should have just cut the middle out. There was a pretty good movie here, but as a series, it's on the mediocre side.

The animation is consistent but mostly unexceptional. The direction, background art, and composition are all very solid in the beginning and fair throughout. While the character art is decent, it's mostly Ryu that stands out, and the characters tend to be missing their noses. Sometimes they don't even have a line or nostrils. Frank's design is great with its asymmetry, but all of the other aliens have one boring design.

The real problem has everything to do with the aliens. There's a mystery as to why they want to head to Pilgrimage Point, but the main problem is that the series devolves into a monotonous monster-of-the-week show. Yes, Evangelion utilized this formula, but they made it work by crafting less repetitive stories around each angel event. The angels looked incredible, and as the show progressed, they tended to become more and more abstract and unsettling. The aliens of Argento Soma and their one design only contain any variance by giving them different abilities and forcing our protagonists to cook up special ways of beating them, but it's just doggerel. It's very apparent this was on the low-budget side.

They could have set time aside for the characters to develop (and they really needed to here), but they repeat the same tedious formula instead. Either they needed to pad this series out for time, or the writer ran out of ideas—perhaps both. One good aspect that sets this show apart from other shows with the same formula, would be Ryu acting as a spy and a bit of a saboteur. Aside from trying to kill Frank a few times, he doesn't really do much other than leak information, and this had a lot of potential for greater drama, but it kind of doesn't go anywhere. I barely feel like he's an undercover agent at all, in fact. There's no sense of risk involved.

Where the authors seem to lose track of where they were going with the script is seeded at an early point. A mysterious man appears before a recuperating Ryu. He looks a bit like a rejected villain from an already cancelled Yasuomi Uemetsu hentai (seriously, he looks like the guy from Kite), he has a sinister persona, and he's one of those characters where half of his lines are quotes he memorized from Shakespeare or other writers. This guy's character and motivations completely flip, and it appears they intended to make him a figment rather than real at first.

Writer: I know we wanted to do that edgy sequence where Ryu's eyes bug-out and we find out he's insane, and the camera is all shaky during the hallucination scene, but it's not working.

Director: Eh, let's just make this guy real. The audience will wonder if he's in Ryu's head. We'll slowly unveil he is real after faking the audience out the whole show. Don't worry about the fact that cameras would have spotted him by this point and that he's under house arrest or the unlikelihood of this guy being able to manipulate so much from behind the scenes on his lonesome and that none of this makes sense. It'll make him seem like an enigmatic mastermind. The audience will eat it up.

Writer: Your rewrite of the script makes him seem like a completely different character. We alluded to him being the devil, had Ryu entering into a Faustian bargain with him, gave him all of these "I'm a bad dude" faces, and even had him splatter his pumpkin-sized tomato all over Ryu's apartment. You're going to just randomly rewrite him as a good guy?

Director: Who cares? No one is going to remember after all the filler in the middle. This is deep art, and it will be ambiguous and probably seem symbolic. Plot holes just make it more nuanced and fuzzy, they add pizazz and spice, just like real life. It's like Cinéma vérité, you know?

Writer: I don't think that means what you think it means...

Most of the themes are established in the opening episodes. The debate between the main character and the professor is a lesson on life, and the super-genius Ryu Soma is a bit slow on the uptake. The themes about connecting with others are handled in a fashion very similar to Evangelion, as this is a mech show that's a bit metaphysical. Except instead of being the no. 1 wimp in the world, Ryu is moody, aggressive, and maybe a little autistic? He'll just as soon spit in your face or insult you before going "..." but that's one feisty iteration of the most classic line in anime.

The only two characters who have any development are Ryu and Maki—I mean Hattie. Instead of the development being gradual, it's all saved for the end. Ryu is one of the better sadsack and introverted mains I've seen in recent years, and he certainly has an interesting design, what with his scars and fancy hairdo and his accident-induced heterochromia (how on earth does your eye become blue after an accident?). Hattie is 13—going on 6. I get that she spent five years in a coma and also has PTSD, but it's a bit much having her behave so childishly for almost the entire series. Then she has sudden awareness towards the end of the series and acts like she knows everything about Ryu's past relationship with Maki (what she says only makes sense if she has seen the episodes along with us) and also knows him better than he knows himself.

The rest of the cast are likable enough, but only two of them have vaguely outlined backstories, and none of them develop at all. It's incredible to see a cast interact for 25 episodes and still seemingly not know each other. The butch Misato clone gets a few decent zingers about gender dynamics, and she semi-adopts Hattie and they live together, but unlike Evangelion's slice of life bits with Shinji/Asuka/Misato... we never see them together at the apartment—or at all, to be honest. The black guy is the dependable 2nd in command, and like the 1st, he's there for delivering exposition.

Sue is about as childish as Hattie, and to contradict the beliefs of others, I think it's very accurate that she behaves this way. America now must have the lowest standards of entry into the military for a "developed" country—it's basically McNamara's Morons 2.0. I though she was supposed to be half-black and half-white, and she just happens to have silver hair (ANIME) and puts some black warpaint under her eyes, but in the last episode, she has skin as light as most of the other characters and red hair! What the hell? So she slathers on makeup and dyes her hair the entire series, then just doesn't do it at the end?

Production staff: Sir, that character is from your other series!

Director: Whatever... just leave it as is. It'll seem avant-garde or something. We're making art here. It's about emotion, not logic. Our fans will be talking about the deep symbolism of this character's transformation for years to come! As we astutely declare in the script: "It's no fun when the mystery is spoiled."

Production staff: What mystery? It's an error.

Guinevere pretty much just flirts with everyone, and she'll say stuff like "Are you just jealous? ;)" to trigger a reaction and embarrass the other characters. She also spits in at least one person's mouth. Dan (his awful British accent makes the dub unwatchable) is the rival, but he's kind of low-key about it—aside from getting irate because Ryu was hogging the computer for too long—and there aren't any homoerotic buddy-buddy scenes to break the ice between the two. The scene where they're both in the brig is basically wasted.

It's not like the writer/director lacked the ability to churn more out of these characters. I was surprised by how impactful one of the later episodes was when Ryu is reunited with an old friend. You get a little backstory and characterization in that self-contained episode, but that character already felt like he had more depth than the rest of Ryu's crew, and he went out with a bang—whereas if the same happened to Sue, Dan, or Guinevere I'd probably laugh.

The whole show after the solid beginning that leads to Ryu and Hattie being pulled into Funeral's (NERV knockoff) orbit goes like this:

Ryu: Maki, I'm gonna kill Frank for what he did to you!

Butch Misato: Psychobabble, exposition, blah blah, beep, boop.

Ryu: FRANK!

Devil: *Quotes Shakespeare and smashes a tomato in Ryu's apartment.*

Ryu: ...

Hattie: Mr. Fairy, I love you!

Ryu: Maki, is that you?

Hattie: I'm not Maki. You're a bad fairy and a liar.

Ryu: Oh, Hottie. ;)

Sue: Keep it to your perverted Japanese cartoons.

*Ryu throws Hattie in a jet and flies off*

Dan: Hey, are you going to stop them?

Black guy: I don't know. Whatever, lol.

Butch Misato: Jargon, jargon. I hope to have a really nice rose garden someday.

Guinevere: *Makes a noise indicating she's pooling spit in her mouth.*

Ryu: Maki, why don't you say something? How am I going to understand if you don't say anything!?

Hattie: My name isn't Maki, you mean stupid head!

*Time passes.*

Ryu: Are you okay, Ma—I mean, Hattie?

Hattie: I'm okay... because I'm with you. *Blushes*

Okay, obviously he doesn't hit on her, but the way he says her name often does sound like Hottie rather than Hattie... but it's just a back and forth about Maki and Frank, stuffed between battles and irrelevant segments with the other characters. Everything that happens is woven into the core concept to a frightening degree, and the occult phrase as above, so below, definitely applies here (in this instance, understanding something small, leads to an equivalent understanding of something much larger). It's kind of satisfying once the end rolls around, and I basically like what they do with it, but I'd be lying if I didn't say this show runs out of gas and is towed along to the end by the execution of the premise alone. I can almost see the ridiculously funny Evangelion ending coming up with all of the characters laughing as our smart blockhead of a main has an epiphany and says, "OH, it was all just a misunderstanding." *Ryu places his hand behind his head in embarrassment.*

Not really sure what to make of this. It seems to change a lot over the course of the series and nothing ever really becomes that clear. It also has a main protagonist who is very hard to like, but unlike other such dislikeable leads (Guts from Berserk, Sunabozu from same, etc.) has nothing which really redeems him in terms of interest (other than his snazzy hair cut). I think it’s the murkiness of the plot that leaves me with a general sense of dislike for the series. While the major plot points are addressed (or thrown away in PLOT TWISTS!!) there is a veritable ... multitude of other issues which don’t get addressed. All in all this series just left me feeling a bit meh

Argento Soma is a "diamond in the rough" with many flaws. Such has slow and tedious pacing, dated animation and an uninspired soundtrack, minus the series's introduction opening, credits and final song.

While the flaws can be overwhelming at times, they don't undo what is in store for you, and OH BOY, this anime has a lot of twists and realizations. This makes it worthwhile to watch and is suggested for individuals that prefer a more realistic approach to storytelling that doesn't rely too heavily on action or cliches to push forward character development at the cost of feeling dull at times. It's the type ... of anime you need to be patient for and not try to control. It will reveal itself to you slowly and peel back all the layers exposing Argento Soma for what it truly is; A story about flawed humans consumed by ideals of revenge, justice, survival and trauma/loss. Mystery, curiosity and philosophy are also part of this anime and become a lot more prominent towards the end of the series, passed episode 18, where the series quality improves considerably.

Speaking of the story, it's slow-paced and methodical. A heavy focus is on the main cast, who aren't cardboard copy-and-paste type cliche characters. A good example is the protagonist, who's a mixture of overly emotional and hyper-intelligent/philosophical being who yo-yos through phases of villainy, being heroic and troubleshooting problems, making him a contradicting character who's easy to both love and hate due to how unstable he is. Another example would be another main character the cast calls "Frank," who's an alien that no one understands and forces to fight for them against other aliens who all look the same; which may appear as boring or lazy to many, but there is a reason why they follow that format of appearance.

Lastly, to end this brief review, Argento Soma is nothing like Neon Genesis Evangelion; it only appears so from a superficial standpoint, as there are aliens and secret organizations with symbolic names such as Morgue and Funeral. However, the similarities end here; it has more in common with "The Iron Giant" and "Interstellar" than anything seen in Evangelion. Even the story plots and motivations are entirely different in both series. Evangelion focuses on the internal conflicts of many characters, employing many of Arthur Schopenhauer's, Sigmund Freud's and Carl Jung's theories. In contrast, Argento Soma is concerned with external conflicts which cause internal tensions, with a nod to Carl Jung's theory regarding the Anima and Animus and the concept of consciousness.

I give it a 7.5 out of 10 and suggest it to patient viewers interested in psychology and philosophy, as those will be the most fascinating aspects of the story. On the other hand, if you're looking for action or watching something for the thrill of it, then Argento Soma won't be a fun experience.

This show had so much potential, such a strong and compelling start and it squanders it all by doing nothing. Seriously, the show really doesn't do much throughout most of it's runtime, but I'll talk about that later. In the year 2059, aliens have invaded Earth and humanity is thrown into a war. Takuto Kaneshiro, a snobbish college student and mathematics major, I think, initially has nothing to do with that war. He's just an ordinary twenty-something in a strained and deteriorating relationship with his girlfriend, Maki Agata. The two were college lovers and you get more and more glimpses of how their relationship blossomed ... over time during flashback scenes. I say "flashback" because the first episode is essentially a backstory/origin story for Takuto. The real "story" happens afterwards. Takuto and Maki begin to spend less time with each other. Maki canceling plans and telling Takuto that she's busy all the time. This goes on for months and Takuto, understandably, grows more frustrated by this. It's later discovered that Maki and Professor Noguchi, a teacher at the college they went to, have discovered a new alien creature. The colossal behemoth lays dormant; not even awaken by the experiments conducted on it. Professor Noguchi gives a legendary and epic name to the alien. FRANK. FRANK-ly, I would've gone with a better name like "Epsilon Gamma 2000" but that works, too. Argento Soma means, "Silver Body" in Greek, so I wanted to stay consistent with the Greek motif.
Takuto and Maki have a sad exchange of words halfway through the episode. Takuto is clearly upset with Maki and wants her to spend more time with him like they use to. Maki tries to justify her actions, but Takuto refuses to listen and lashes out on her. Turns out Takuto was planning on proposing to Maki and throws away the engagement ring in her face. After finishing the show, upon reflection, this scene is much more tragic than what it originally was. This is going to be the very last conversation Takuto and Maki ever have and they end it on a sour note. How tragic. During the experiments, Frank wakes up. Frank is a powerful alien who wakes up in a pretty grumpy mood. He destroys the entire facility with a giant explosion killing everyone except Takuto. Half of Takuto's face is damaged and the building is in ruin. He screams Maki's name over and over again getting no response. It's just dead silence. The final scene of the episode is a damaged picture of Maki and Takuto.

What a great start! I absolutely loved it! If the anime was this episode alone, it would get a strong 8 maybe a light 9 from me. The second episode is also strong, but not as good as the first. We're introduced to a new character named Harriet Bartholomew nicknamed Hattie. I would've never, ever imagined that I would encounter an anime character named Hattie. My grandmother is also named Hattie, so I greatly appreciate that. She is capable of speaking to Frank, who escaped the facility in the previous episode. The two somehow become good friends and share a very strong bond for the entire show. Takuto is now in the hospital and is visited by this freaking-looking dude who has a great character design. Long red hair that goes straight down his back, a sick goatee, ear piercings, a lab coat, and some granny smith apples that he carries around for no particular reason at all. I'm sure it's symbolic for something, but I have no clue. He also quotes Shakespeare everytime he's on screen, so yeah, that's a thing. He calls himself "Mr. X" and gives Takuto a new lease on life; by giving him a new identity and a new job. This makes Takuto a college dropout. Join the club, dude. His new name is Ryu Soma and he now works for a military group called, "Funeral." He also has one of the most badass character designs I've seen in an anime. He has gnarly scars on the left side of his face, his left eye color changed to a light blue, almost white color giving him the illusion of blindness in that eye. He not actually blind. Heterochromia has always looked cool to me. And part of his hair changed to a white color that stands up more compared to the rest of his hair. The man looks incredible, the change isn't too drastic, but it's genius to me.

Now this is the point where I stop caring about most of the details, because once the show introduces the members of Funeral, the show goes into a direction that I'm not a fan of at all. I'll say this right now, the first two episodes and the epilouge are the only strong epiodes of Argento Soma. The members of Funeral don't really do anything for me. I don't care about them all that much, despite all of them having semi-realized backgrounds and backstories. Sue Harris, Michael Heartland, Guinevere Green, Dan Simmons, and Lana Ines are all okay characters. They all left little to no impression on me whatsoever, and I will forget who they are a week after I publish this review. With the exception of Lana and Dan. Lana was the commander of Funeral, so her face was on screen for the vast majority of the show. Dan Simmons is definitely my favorite of the bunch who gradually becomes more hostile towards Ryu. The two are practically rivals, at least from the perspective of Dan. Saying that Dan is my favorite of the bunch doesn't mean that much since most of the cast lacks a lot of character and nuance, excluding Ryu and Hattie who are very important to the show. So, I'm assuming you've already seen Neon Genesis Evangelion. Argento Soma is a Post Eva military drama/sci-fi/revenge story that follows the same trends that many other mecha shows followed between the late 90's to the early 2000's. Since Eva had such a major impact (Lol) on the anime landscape at the time, many mecha shows wanted to go into a more abstract and esoteric direction or just have a similar structure to Eva. I bring this up now because remember the midsection of Eva where it was a "What Angel are we fighting against this week" show? Y'know, a monster of the week. So imagine that, but for 15+ episodes! Argento Soma becomes so formulaic after Ryu joins Funeral, it was by far the worst part of Argento Soma. The show withholds plot relevant details from you, but sprinkles bits and pieces of clues throughout the show that are somewhat vague. Mr. X knows a lot more than what he lets on and is usually the one to give clues to Ryu, occasionally. The show just follows a set procedure for a very long time and it was not interesting in the least. The only thing remotely interesting that's going on is that Ryu is trying to kill Frank the entire time. Which is where the "revenge" factor comes from. I like that part of Ryu's character. He wants to avenge Maki and he feels that he can't move on without doing so. Funeral discovers Frank with Hattie and uses Frank to fight against the alien threat. They then name him the "X-1." Ryu is so bitter and angsty during this time, but I don't blame the guy. The experience would've been better if the soundtrack started playing Hoobastank or Shinedown whenever he showed up on screen. Fucking hilarious.

During the final stretch of episodes the show becomes more plot-centric. Big reveals start to happen at this point, which I didn't care too much about. There's a dark secret about the alien threat and the mechs that the characters have been piloting that is rather similar to Eva. I won't spoil what that secret is, but it surprising and unsurprising at the same time. A few twists near the end that did catch me off guard. *Pssssssst* There's a traitor within the group. And a timeskip ending and epilouge that I thought was pretty good, but by that point I wanted it to end so badly. That midsection was terrible and difficult to sit through. This show is also very slow and plotting. It could've done so much more with it's runtime, but it mostly just wastes it.
Now for the technical aspects of Argento Soma, the production value is okay. Just okay. It's passable. Argento Soma is a Sunrise anime made in the year 2000. Looking through their catalog they've made better looking shows even around this time period. Inuyasha was made by the same studio and it was released the same year and that show looks leagues better than this. Even Escaflowne came out four years prior and that show is gorgeous! Also made by Sunrise. Escaflowne made my eyeballs cum while this show was just average looking the entire way through. Art design and animation are all fine. The entire production is nothing remarkable, but I do like the character designs. To compensate for the lackluster visuals and animation, the characters designs, mech designs, and the alien designs are pretty detailed and distinctive, in my opinion. Despite the aliens looking the exact same way which kills the oppurtunity to have some variety. Eva, at the very least, gives all of the Angels unique forms throughout the show. I was hoping Argento Soma would do the same, but nope. And finally the soundtrack. It's surprising good. The only song I do not appreciate is the ED "Horizon." I think sounds very obnoxious and doesn't match the tone of the show at all. It's a very upbeat and brassy song and it feels very misplaced. Argento Soma overall is pretty slow, dark, ominous, and contemplative. Horizon is the last song I want to hear at the end of each episode. Easy skip for me. Everything else is pretty solid. It's nothing special but I enjoyed the OP, Silent Wind. Most of the score for this anime is very French and R&B inspired. It's all killer no filler kinda sorta!!!

These are most of thoughts and opinions on Argento Soma and I don't feel like talking about it anymore. Despite the relatively low score for MAL, a hearty healthy 6.77, this show has a very devoted cult following. I don't entirely get it. I think these people are seeing something that isn't really there or they're desperately trying to convince themselves that the show is a true work of art. 6 out of 10. It really isn't as bad as I'm making it out to be. It's far from amazing, but it's better than Raxephon and MUCH easier to watch. So yeah, I'm tired. Bye bye. My scores:

Story: 5/10
Art: 6/10
Sound: 7/10
Characters: 4/10
Enjoyment: 4/10
Overall: 6/10

I have....very mixed feelings about this show. I love the concept, and I love the finale. But...man the majority of the show was hard to get through. Nothing was terrible or frustrating, it was just largely repetitive. I wanted to drop it at several times. But I persevered and I eneded up really liking the finale both as a story, and suddenly the characters clicked. Suddenly i was attached and I wanted an S2 with these characters i was suddenly fond of. Hell, it raised it back up to a 6 and while I'm currently riding the high I debated a 7. (Meanwhile the majority ... of the story was at a 5 and I fell asleep several nights watching it)

Argento Soma isn't bad as a story, as a character piece, or as an "Eva clone" whatever that title entails. (I fully believe you can take inspiration from NGE and create masterpieces....or garbage...) But man, the fights needed more variation, and the characters needed more depth earlier. I loved the finale arc fights and the character interactions were great. But I shouldn't have had to wait to the finale to get that from them. Ultimately this story has pearls of quality worth enjoying, but you do have to sift through a lot of muck to get there.