TLDR: Ryuu no Haisha (Dragon Dentist) was an amazing story-driven show broken down into two parts of 45 minutes each. My personal score for the show is a strong 8 to a light 9. Although there were a few things technically wrong that I noticed throughout the series, It was packed with emotion and grasped your interest for every second (after episode 1's first 15 minutes). The only thing holding it back was a half-boring first episode and technical issues.
Story - 9 Art - 7 Sound - 7 Characters - 8 Enjoyment - 9 Overall - 8-9
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(IMPORTANT) No spoilers in individual reviews of the episodes alone. There WILL be spoilers in my final thoughts, and I will mention that before it happens.
This review was constructed on my opinion of the 1st and 2nd episodes as stand-alone episodes and more on a technical level (NO SPOILERS). I will have my final thoughts after the above-mentioned which will explain my feelings on the episodes together, and plot discussion (WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS)
My (no spoiler) impression of episode 1 below:
I personally hated the first 15 minutes of the first episode. After that, I felt like it kept a booming potential, but never put it to use. This doesn't at all mean I think it's bad, I would give the first episode alone a 6 or 7. I feel like the second episode will bring the series up to an 8 or 9, however, the flaws will keep the series as a whole a guaranteed 9 or lower. The first 15 minutes were boring as hell, especially the first war scene which served no purpose other than telling you that war is part of the story, and there are attackers in the air. I'm sure a lot of people would doubt my criticism of the first 15 minutes, saying that it's such a small portion of the show, but its a third of the first episode. I could barely bear the first 15 minutes, and it was obvious that they are at a much lower level than the rest of the show's quality. The first thing you see when starting the show is this uninteresting explanation of dragons or something that I don't remember anything other than it was boring because that's all it was. There is a shot in the first 10 seconds of the war scene where there are 3 (might be 2 I forget) copies of the same face right next to each other. It would be forgivable if it was a background character but it was the 3 main characters on the whole frame. The next few minutes is a boring war scene of a war that couldn't have made me more annoyed. The only interesting thing about the whole scene was how the... whatever the main characters were found out the enemy was airborne. The first scene broke the show for me, and I couldn't help but notice every bad shot, (there were lots of them) awkward line of dialogue, and unexplained detail. Past the first part, though, there was a scene that managed to do a good number on Bell's character. From there we launch into a short compilation of Bell and Nonoko just living their lives as dragon dentists. Speaking of them, it's interesting the jobs they have to do. It's nicely explained what someone's job is as a dentist, however, they don't explain one or two things. Depending on how episode two goes, this will either be left to interpretation or explained. That seems to happen a lot in the first episode, strange dream-like sequences with lots to explain. The characters weren't the most interesting people you could come up with, but they were believable and managed to capture your attention the whole ladder half. The "twist" didn't feel shocking at all though, and I felt like it turned out to not change anything, and felt uneventful.
My score for episode one \/ \/ \/
Story - 8 Art - 7 Sound - 7 Characters - 8 Enjoyment - 6 Overall - 7
Although I wasn't amazingly entertained during the 1st episode, it sure did a damn well job at setting up the 2nd one...
My (no spoiler) impression of episode two below:
The second episode of Ryuu no Haisha starts off a similar way to episode 1, except it's not boring! It also was, however, a completely shoehorned in scene that didn't feel like something naturally happening. The scene started off with a reporter of some sort typing some history of the dragon, before getting her life saved by it. It's only 5 minutes but it's such a random exposition dump that felt completely unnatural. Along with that, there were some sound effects that felt out of place such as a metal machine creaking sound for the dragon opening its mouth. After the first 5 minutes, no other scene sticks out to me as particularly bad. In the second scene, we're kind of left on our own with one thing or another plot-wise, but it sets up the scene well. The war scene doesn't end there, taking up a big portion of the episode without leaving my dissatisfied. Plopped in the middle of this we have an emotional scene where bell describes in detail what happened to him in the war, and I couldn't help but feel sorry for him. At 15 or so minutes in, we see a horrible CG action scene, but the animation seems to pick itself up after that. There is some "survivor" guy who just happens to never be shot, ever. He ends up being a big chunk of plot armor half the time, but he's not the worst antagonist you could have in a show. The next part of the show is non-stop action and amazing character development. There were only minimal complaints I had (most of which weren't worth mentioning or remembering anyways). The symbolism was so amazing and every moment was filled with expression. The whole episode wrapped together at the end, with only 1 or 2 things that felt unfinished.
My score for episode two \/ \/ \/
Story - 9 Art - 7 Sound - 7 Characters - 8 Enjoyment - 6 Overall - 7
My overall/closing thoughts on the series as a whole (spoilers):
I thought that the first episode was a bit boring, but it did a great job at setting up the events to come and characters. It has a lot of things left to the imagination, but the 2nd episode made everything feel complete. The story was beautiful and felt complete at the very end. I enjoyed the dragon setup, but I don't understand how people are chosen to be dragon dentists, and it was never explained how the teeth just spit stuff out. The scene with the older woman (I forget her name) having that strange hallucination-like sequence was amazing. I think it was really interesting for her character to be the thing that just wrecked havoc and killed everyone, but could've been handled slightly different. Bell's character in the second episode really sparkled and was handled perfectly.
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Feb 22, 2017
Ryuu no Haisha
(Anime)
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TLDR: Ryuu no Haisha (Dragon Dentist) was an amazing story-driven show broken down into two parts of 45 minutes each. My personal score for the show is a strong 8 to a light 9. Although there were a few things technically wrong that I noticed throughout the series, It was packed with emotion and grasped your interest for every second (after episode 1's first 15 minutes). The only thing holding it back was a half-boring first episode and technical issues.
Story - 9 Art - 7 Sound - 7 Characters - 8 Enjoyment - 9 Overall - 8-9 ... |
