Elitist Anime are very dangerous at times, due to them being alluring. When a group of people circlejerk something over and over again, it becomes very difficult for a newcomer to see the flaws in the show that those people are praising. Some elitist Anime are deserving of the praise when you think about them critically, but then some boggle the mind as to how they are even receiving said praise in the first place. Today we take a look at Haibane Renmei, an Anime that is so beloved by the Anime community, to the point where it has become one of the holy elitist
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Anime and is praised as one of the best Anime series of all time. So, is Haibane Renmei really deserving of an elite status? Or did the masses blindly praise another title simply because the artstyle looked different and it was created by a group of people who had previous successes in the past? Let us find out.
The story starts out with a group of people called the Haibane, who come out of a cocoon due to unexplained reasons. Then, due to said unexplained reasons, they are forced to live in the world they were born in, in order to atone for their sins, find forgiveness and reach the afterlife, which is heaven. From this simple fact, we know that Haibane Renmei as a whole is supposed to represent a purgatory of sorts, and this simple reason is why it fails. To start off, the concept is unoriginal, a purgatory has been done many times before in other Anime such as Angel Beats, and in other works of fiction as well. An unoriginal premise is not a problem here, as it can still turn out to be a good one with the proper directing and execution, but Haibane Renmei is a show that is the very definition of wasted potential. Instead of having a purgatory where the Haibane get punished over and over again for their sins, until they atone for them, these Haibane are given first world pleasures and get to live a life that is full of content. Do you see the problem with this? The Anime doesn’t know what it wants to be, since it alludes to the fact that the world is a purgatory, but instead it gives us Haibane living in pleasure and happiness. Moreover, the story turns boring upon knowing that the Haibane do not face any struggles or labor, and that this one is another slice of life where cute girls do cute things. Some fans have argued that the Haibane are beings who face mental torture instead of a physical one, since the Anime deals in metaphysics rather than the physical. This might be true and one would have accepted that fact, if only the Haibane were given actual mental torture instead of the Anime waiting until the very end to give the viewers a glimpse of it. With this, Haibane Renmei becomes an Anime of wasted potential, and is neither good nor is it deserving of the praise it receives.
Moreover, Haibane Renmei’s concept is inflated to the heavens by it’s fanbase. It doesn’t matter what there is beyond that sacred wall that the Toga are protecting, since when passing through that wall the Haibane are forgiven and given a new life in peace where they ascend to heaven. It doesn’t matter what is beyond that wall since crossing the wall in itself is a metaphor to crossing into the afterlife and attaining nirvana. A nice and cute little concept, but people over-inflate said concept to no end, until it becomes rather trite.
--- The rest of this review contains minor spoilers for Haibane Renmei, and is advised to be read after completion of the series ---
The Anime suffers from major plot holes, aside from everything else that is wrong with it. To start off, the Toga are a major plot hole in the story, and are an addition that is unnecessary. When they say that nobody can travel beyond the wall, it is clearly presented as a symbol for death and the afterlife, but that raises the question of how the Toga are capable of travelling through it. A pretty clear cut case of terrible writing. Some Haibane Renmei fans have tried to refute this by saying that the Toga are a different species that is able to access the afterlife as well, and that we, the audience, don't know why they are in the setting of Haibane Renmei and how they got there in the first place. Regarding the Toga, the fact remains that it's in tradition with the "Leave it to your imagination" theme it had going on. Maybe the Toga were chosen by the God that created Old home and the afterlife to create order? Maybe it’s something else? Who knows? The problem with this is that if the nature of the Toga is just left to interpretation, their role in the story is nonsense. They exist for no reason, except to call the central metaphor into question. A pretty clear cut case of bad writing.
The characters in Haibane Renmei are all one dimensional, bar one - Reki - who is only given meaningful development at the very last episode of the show, and her change of heart was interesting, even though very poorly directed. What about the others then? Kuu received essentially no character development before suddenly changing in preparation for the day of death, and there was no buildup to it. Kana, Nemu and Hikari all fit neatly into their little archetypes with little thought as to what the purpose of those archetypes is in the first place. Some people argue that Kuu was essentially a catalyst, and if that is true, then that actually makes her worse since if she's just going to amount to a plot device, then there's no reason to have it in the first place. Fans argue that Kuu had been getting development since the very first episode, but I don’t believe in that junk for a second. Kuu’s emotions suddenly changed just to show the audience a glimpse of what it is like to be a mental patient and what happens to those who are mentally tortured and hate themselves. She was not a real character more so than a plot device.
All the talk of the gods, particularly in the latter half of the series, ends up just being meaningless and is there only to accompany the angel aesthetic the characters have going for them, that does nothing but make the show look smart with no actual depth to provide. The show also relies too much on open ended interpretation rather than solve it’s plot like the other series within Abe's trilogy did, which does nothing but again, make the show look smart with no actual depth to provide.
The audiovisuals in Haibane Renmei are very weak. The show has aged quite poorly, and the presentation is both lifeless and bad. The CGI windmills in some of the episodes are appalling to look at, and the character designs look like they took Lain Iwakura from Serial Experiments Lain and cloned her over and over again with the addition of wings. Comparing this one to Texhnolyze would be preposterous since the latter has character designs that are beautiful and creative, and unique, while Haibane's look the same. The soundtrack in Haibane Renmei is nothing striking, and is not memorable in the slightest. The opening, Blue Bird, is a fun listen, though feels awkward to watch rather than to just listen to, so I’ll give them that at least. The animation is lackluster at most times and the presentation feels stale as well. As for the soundtrack, there is minimalism that is prevalent here, so there is not much to critique over.
--- End of spoilers ---
Overall, there isn’t much else to say about Haibane Renmei. Is it an Anime deserving of the elitist praise? Far from it. This is an Anime that is overinflated with praise simply because it has an intriguing concept, a unique though mundane artstyle, and creators who are known for making some of the best Anime ever created. Other than that, the show contains way too many flaws for it’s own good to be called a good Anime, much less a great elitist one by extension.
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Sep 23, 2019
Haibane Renmei
(Anime)
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Not Recommended
Elitist Anime are very dangerous at times, due to them being alluring. When a group of people circlejerk something over and over again, it becomes very difficult for a newcomer to see the flaws in the show that those people are praising. Some elitist Anime are deserving of the praise when you think about them critically, but then some boggle the mind as to how they are even receiving said praise in the first place. Today we take a look at Haibane Renmei, an Anime that is so beloved by the Anime community, to the point where it has become one of the holy elitist
...
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
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Sep 22, 2019
Omoide Poroporo
(Anime)
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Recommended
Omoide Poroporo, otherwise known as Only Yesterday, is one of the most underrated movies to have ever come out of Studio Ghibli’s discography. It is easily the best made movie in Ghibli’s history when it comes to the visual presentation, and Takahata here showcased how he was a master of both color and visuals. Omoide Poroporo was a movie that was made to be targeted towards women upon it’s release, but due to Isao Takahata’s brilliant directing, the movie managed to become a success around men and women alike.
The story surrounds Taiko, a twenty seven year old woman who leaves the city and her ... work for ten days to go on a vacation in the rural areas and relax her mind. What really sets this movie apart from the rest of the others is the fact that on the way to her destination, her little self from when she was younger comes along on the trip, and from there on the woman starts to remember all of the nostalgic bits and pieces from her past, both the good and the bad of her childhood. The movie’s narrative transitions seamlessly from twenty seven year old Taiko to the young and innocent Taiko, often with the use of phone calls to convey that the movie has transitioned from past to present and vice versa. The dangerous thing about this film is that the two sides, her young self and her old self, are contrasting in tone and color, to the point where one would naturally care for a side and not the other, or find themselves caring for one more than the other. Luckily, this movie tried to make the chances of that happening slim. Taiko’s adult persona is very interesting with her introspective demeanor, and her longing for a better life. She finds herself in a place that many young adults her age find themselves in, and that is to still be holding onto the dreams of the youth while trying to work towards her goals of taking care of a family and living up to society’s expectations. That, in turn, makes the child brimming within her to not go unnoticed and makes her all the more relatable towards people who are in the same age gap as her and facing the same issues she is facing. The most interesting part of her family is her father, who seems like he looks down on himself in shame due to the fact that he didn’t achieve his dreams while young. He cannot let go of the past, which contrasts with Taiko letting go of the past while also valuing how it shaped one up to be, and embracing all those moments in life, both the good and the bad. Every character in this movie felt like a real person, and it was very interesting to see a slow paced, coming of age, female driven drama Anime. You don’t see those often, especially in an Anime, and that is the thing which made this movie all the more of a unique and enjoyable ride. The audiovisuals are some of the most unique out there, if not the most unique for a Ghibli movie. The contrast of visuals between the life of young Taiko and her life when she is all grown up is interesting and worked on very well. The most striking aspect about Only Yesterday is it’s use of color and visual design to achieve it’s themes about self-discovery through re-discovery, and to grab the viewer into both old and young Taiko’s perspectives of the world around them. Only Yesterday operates on two time periods, those being the past and the present, and Takahata managed to infuse each separate time period with a distinct personality and a life of it’s own. For example, Taiko’s past is filled to the brim with simplistic usage of colors and light colors, and the most used color is the color white, which seeps into the edges of the screen. The past has this nostalgic feel working for it, which creates a striking contrast with Taiko’s present, a present that contains very complex and colorful colors, and very realistic details in both characters and setting. The reason for that is that Taiko’s past is, intentionally made blurry and less detailed, due to her not being able to recollect her full memory on what had happened during certain events of her life. This is not necessarily to say that one part of her life is better than another part, as both of them are equally as good as each other, while providing thematic depth and more insight into the main character’s life. The settings are also affected by the visual decisions as well, since the skies are more clear and white in the past, providing for a nostalgic feel, while the skies in the present are more lively and in-the-moment due to the bright blue colors used. Moreover, what distinguishes past from present in Taiko’s life is the usage of the color red, where everything she wears and uses is red in the past, and red disappears in the present. That is not to say that the red has disappeared completely from her life, but more so that she doesn’t completely let go of the past all the while still holding value to it, which is while she still uses red things, she barely does as often as she did during her younger days. Taiko now mostly wears blue, and her present is surrounded by blue and green lively colors. That is not to say that she has rejected that past, because her hair tie, for example, is still of the color red, just that it is behind her back, which is to show that she still acknowledges the past while not letting it interfere with her present life. On the journey of her discovering herself though, she finds plenty of red. The plant that Taiko is picking is a flower that is used as a red dye, her love interest wears red and his final scene, and the transport vehicles that she uses during the final scenes are colored red. I can rave on and on about why this is Studio Ghibli’s visual landmark, but I think you get the gist. The main musical theme used here is not as striking as some other Ghibli ones out there, though still good on it’s own nonetheless and conveys the mood of nostalgia and melancholy quite successfully. The end scene is one of the best scenes in all of Anime, and how it ends, and how the credit roll is displayed, is one of the most brilliant uses of a credit roll in Anime history. If you are a person who is interested in a coming of age story from a female perspective, then this one is a must watch. This is one of the best visually directed Anime movies ever made, and is easily the best the top one in the Ghibli discography, and that is due to the fact that Isao Takahata took a mundane concept such as the life of a young girl and her maturing into a female adult, and turned it into such an amazing and visceral self-discovery journey.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Sep 22, 2019 Recommended
Kaiji’s second season is not as good as Kaiji’s first season. While it has a stronger start than the former, and while it is littered with better animation and more charismatic characters, there is something about it that just doesn’t hold up to the first.
The concept of the arcade machine is intriguing and the tactics used in that arc are nothing short of brilliant, but it is the fact that the arc dragged on for so long and the episodic structure became about finding a way to beat the machine and the old man, that it became redundant to sit through. The first season ... of Kaiji, while having a weak start, managed to flip everything on it’s head and change it’s formula multiple times so that it could become a refreshing ride. This stuck with one thing and repeated it over and over again until became predictable as to what would happen, and that is: Kaiji coming up with a genius plan, the men at the arcade owning Kaiji and beating his plans, Kaiji retreating to come up with a better plan, and the old man laughing at Kaiji. Rinse and repeat. Moreover, the ending is not good or unique like the first ending in the first season of Kaiji. Without going into needless spoilers, the first season’s ending was both immensely cathartic and very unique and one of a kind, hard to find elsewhere. This season’s ending was lackluster and felt really bland and generic. Not really a bad ending, but it left a bitter taste in my mouth as opposed to the first season’s unique end. It does have a moral message and delivers it’s theme quite well, but it just feels mundane and more like a dues ex machina than a natural ending. The final villain in the first season was better than the one here, which added more spice to the payoff of the first season. The audiovisuals are great, though I miss the beautiful melodies of the first season which were more visceral to Kaiji’s whole experience. Tracks such as Chorus, which elevated the mood from fun poker to instant sense of danger are missing here. The animation has not changed, and Madhouse is as consistent here as the first season, so that is something good. Kaiji’s second season does not quite reach the peak of the first season, but it still does solid in most of what it achieves. Good music, nice visuals, and tactics that were brilliant and well thought out, though took really long to give the viewer a payoff. This season is not as good as the first, but it is still worth checking out.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Sep 22, 2019 Mixed Feelings
Mononoke is generally thought of as one of the most artistic shows in the medium, if not the most artistic one out there, and it is hailed as a more artistic version of the famous Anime Mushishi, filled with bright yellow and orange colors in contrast to Mushishi’s dim grey and white foggy ones, and animation that comes off as surreal for most of the time. The problem here is that this Anime, although artistically achieved what it wanted to achieve in the long run, became one of the most nauseating experiences I have ever had with an Anime, if not the most nauseating experience
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I have had with a TV show period.
First of all, regarding the narrative, the storyline is formulaic, and that is a major problem. This series tried to follow in Mushishi’s footsteps: A lone man travels far throughout different lands in order to cure citizens from some diseases of sorts. The problem here is that once you watch the first episode, dislike it and decide that it is not for you, you are bound to dislike the rest of the series. If a series starts off bad and does not work to change the Anime from there on then that is not a good thing at all, since most of the Anime’s episodes are similar in tone, directing, story and audiovisuals. A problem here, faced by Mushishi as well, is that this Anime becomes rather monotonous and redundant throughout it’s short twelve episode run. We start off with the traveler who is a medicine seller, he sees trouble that is occurring and taking place, he rushes in to save the ones who are being infected and hurt by said creatures, and he saves the day. Rinse and repeat until you get the average runtime for a short Anime series. The problem here is not the storyline, not at all, the problem here lies in the fact that this same plot is repeated several times over until it becomes rather redundant and tiring to get through. Another problem that this Anime suffers from is the fact that the artstyle, while being rather unique, is too bright for it’s own good. This in turn leads to a rather nauseating experience in the long run, and not a fun or pleasant one. At least Mushishi’s grim and grey color palette set the tone for the series successfully while not being insulting to the eyes. This on the other hand, is too much to bare and witness. Overall, one wishes to critique many of the aspects of this show and analyze them, but the problem arises when there isn’t much to critique over. Mononoke is monotonous, slow, just like Mushishi, but now they decided to make it visually unpleasant to watch.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Sep 22, 2019 Mixed Feelings
Gintama is a very inconsistent and overrated series.
Many Anime fans tend to praise Gintama as the best battle shonen Anime of all time, and they inflate it’s status even further by giving it perfect ratings, and while Gintama is a show that does good in some aspects or during some arcs, it fails at being a consistent show throughout it’s long two hundred and two episode run, which hinders it from becoming good or even great by extension. Gintama is definitely not a bad show, far from it actually. It is just that Gintama suffers from problems that cannot be overlooked, and today we ... are here to see why this Anime is fine as it is, though not good and certainly not the greatest. The first problem or issue that Gintama suffers from are the filler episodes that almost every battle shonen suffers from. While there aren’t many filler episodes in this series, there are still some filler episodes that cannot be overlooked, and they hinder from the overall show. Fillers hinder a show due to them not being necessary to the overall plot, and while the filler episodes here are considerably less than those of other famous battle shonen series, they still exist and cannot be overlooked. A second issue that this series suffers from is the lack of any imagination or thought when it comes to the comedy in it. The comedy throughout the whole series boils down to: - Poop jokes - Toilet paper humor - Someone calling Kagura his boss - Someone saying “Zura Ja Nai, Katsura Da” - References to other Anime such as Dragon Ball, Nausicaa of the Valley of the wind, and such - Funny faces - Jabs at otakus - A homeless man - An angry brother and an angry sister beating people up because they are angry Due to this, the characters become plot devices to convey one or two jokes every episode rather than develop and move on from them. Heaven forbid a character evolves from the same joke he was given since the first few episodes, into a character who actually becomes developed and well written. Heaven also forbid this series learns how to create most of it’s jokes without the need to rely on references from other Anime, take a jab at some, or just use the same joke over and over again until it becomes stale. Toilet humor is hysterical the first time it is used, and the second time is not a big deal, but when it exceeds that line, that is when we have a problem. Besides that, the humor in Gintama is not so bad, the references could work at times and when they do, they turn hilarious and are genuinely some of the funniest episodes an Anime fan could see. Take a look at episode 119, which is probably the best Dragon Ball Z parody an Anime or anything for that matter ever pulled off. The same goes for episode 110, which is easily the funniest episode in the whole series, if not the entirety of Anime as a whole. Gintama has genuinely funny humor when it works, but alas, these episodes are a rare gem to find in a series that uses and repeats the same gags over and over again until they turn trite. The third and most important issue that Gintama suffers from is the lack of a plot or a narrative that connects all the episodes together one by one. It feels meandering, as the viewer wonders why they are watching this series in the first place. Due to there not being a plot, it becomes predictable as to what it’s formulaic episodic structure will be: Either an episode about something absurd that comes out of nowhere due to this world being inhabited by all kinds of zany creatures, some unfunny jokes which are repeated over and over again, or some random enemy coming from afar to wreak havoc on the city. Rinse, and then repeat. It all feels pointless, because why watch Gintama when there isn’t even a plot or end goal in sight? This is my biggest problem with the series. After indulging myself in the long and predictable episodes, I felt dissatisfied with an ending that did not give me a solid conclusion to the series. Now granted, this is a series that is ongoing and there are different seasons, but that is not a valid excuse to end it on a lackluster finale. Take a look at Hunter x Hunter, which is the greatest battle shonen ever created, while the manga was ongoing, the Madhouse staff ended that Anime on a very good note, to the point where it could be considered the actual ending to the series without hurting it’s narrative. Other issues that this series suffers from are the other issues that other battle shonen suffer from: The hero is too strong for his own good, and while he does struggle to get a win, it is still out of the realm of logic how he wins his battles. The fillers which I have mentioned above. The same predictable battle shonen formula that other series suffer from, where a villain shows up and then gets defeated, and the same juvenile jokes repeated over and over again. Gintama only has one thing going for it, and that is the fact that there is no power escalation in the series. Now that we are done with all the narrative elements of Gintama, let us take a look at it’s characters. The characters in Gintama are divisive. Some of them are rather well written and well developed, others are not so much. The characters that are one dimensional in Gintama are: 1. Katsura and Elizabeth, who are only in the series for the simple gist of making referential humor and acting silly to amass some laughs. There is nothing more to Katsura other than calling Kagura boss and saying “Zura ja nai, Katsura da.” He does not develop throughout the whole run of this Anime. 2. Shinpachi, as his whole character arc revolves around bullying his otaku friends and being an obsessed idol fan and having an annoying voice. Granted, he does get some episodes where he falls in love with some girl, but that episode is unnecessary since the Anime glosses over said girl, and is never used to develop his character further. 3. Most of the female cast, with the exception of Kagura. The women in the series either amount to fanservice or to annoy the males, that is it. Kagura is amazing though, as the series centers some or many of it’s episodes on her. The characters who are well developed are Tomoya, Sugo, Gorilla, Kagura and some others from the Shinsengumi, as well as some villains like Itou and lord Housen. Speaking of Housen and Itou, their arcs are the best in the whole series, followed closely by the Benizikura arc. As for the rest of the arcs, they aren’t nearly as emotional nor do they contain the same level of character depth. Overall, Gintama is far from being the best battle shonen out there, as it suffers from many issues to even be called a good series. When an Anime makes you question the first fifty episodes of it’s run and think “When does this get better?” you know that Anime won’t turn out to be a good product. Though Gintama is not a good Anime, it is not a bad one either, as it has some very strong episodes going for it.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Sep 18, 2019
Dumbbell Nan Kilo Moteru?
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
There are Anime that try to be the jack of all trades, and they very much succeed in doing so. Then there are the Anime that try to do the same, only to fail miserably and fall flat on their faces. This Anime is not exactly the latter, but it comes close to being so, and why is that you ask? Because it tries to do so many things, but it doesn’t quite hit the mark with what it does, and it becomes obvious to the audience that it is trying it’s hardest to stand out, rather than just be a silly ecchi disguised as
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a sports Anime. First of all, it tries to be an infomercial about sports, yet it doesn’t quite succeed in doing so since it’s busy trying to be a comedy as well. The comedy is not that funny or bone tickling anyways, since it is the same redundant gag repeated many times during each episode, and the whole gist of this Anime overall is being an ecchi that isn’t really an echhi, and that it is disguised as a gym infomercial or a slice of life about girls training.
The comedy lands solidly due to the good production values and the decent delivery, but other than that there really isn’t any other merit to said comedy, since it gets repeated many times over until it turns trite. The production values are decent, from the decent animation, to the welcoming color palette, to the fine soundtrack, and there aren’t any complaints towards them. They are fine as they are and serve the show well enough. As for the characters, they are the typical, run-of-the-mill slice of life characters. They aren’t really anything to write home about, yet they aren’t really one dimensional per say. Hibiki is not really a poorly developed character, she is nice as she is. However, Akemi is the basic rich girl who lacks anything that would make her stand out. Think of any typical and plain rich character you could find elsewhere and you will get her. Characters aren’t really bad, but they border on tame for most of the time, and they feel like they are epitome of slice of life characters. This Anime is a good Anime for the ecchi fans out there. Panty shots, thigh shots, gigantic tatas and everything else an ecchi lover wants, they can find it here. It is hot and it most certainly delivers regarding that aspect. The characters are good looking enough as they are, and that alone will attract ecchi lovers, and the fanservice most certainly delivers as well. The unfunny faces could turn out to be a problem though, and they ruin from the immersion of enjoying the sexiness that this Anime gives off. Overall, this is a fine Anime. What really hinders it from being good is the fact that it tries so hard to be the jack of all trades, yet it only succeeds in one thing, and that is being sexy. It wasn’t a bad watch at the end of the day, it was a fine watch as it is, though I think that ecchi lovers will enjoy this one far more than I did, even when some unfunny bits are to be expected here and there.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Sep 15, 2019
Hellsing Ultimate
(Anime)
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Not Recommended
Hellsing Ultimate is genuinely one of the dumbest Anime one would get the displeasure of watching. It boggles the mind how people think this Anime is good or even great by extension, and seeing the amount of praise it gets boggles the mind, as this one suffers from many major problems which cannot be overlooked. So, what are the problems that Hellsing Ultimate suffers from?
To start off with the characters, our hero Alucard feels like the epitome of what it means to be a mary sue. Does he have character traits which define him? Of course not, since he is nothing but an underdeveloped, ... unbeatable, one dimensional mary sue who does what he wants and what he pleases because the plot said so. Is he able to be beaten? Yes, but only when the plot needs him to stray away for a while, then after that he comes back because he is supposed to be an immortal vampire who never dies because of plot, even when the other characters beat him fair and square through a smart strategy they had developed early on. Speaking of the other characters, they exist just for the sole purpose of moving the plot forward all the while being one dimensional archetypes themselves. You’ve got the central villain, Major, whose only character trait is to be evil and speak in a funny German accent just to get some cheap laughs from the viewers. You’ve got a woman who owns Alucard and is supposed to be his master, and her character is never developed other than her being his master, and to drink wine and speak in a posh accent I guess. She was so forgettable, to the point where I forgot her name. The other characters are the same, they either exist for the sole purpose of telling an unfunny joke, or to progress the plot forward without gaining any real characterization in the process. Reading some of the reviews here, they rave about the greatness of the characters, yet they never go into specifics as to why said characters are so great. I wonder why… As for the unfunny jokes, this Anime is filled to the very brim with them. Were you hoping for a serious and grim Anime about vampires and soldiers fighting each other to the death? Jokes on you, we’ll give you the silliest, most addlebrained “comedy” Anime that ever tried to take itself seriously. Even when it should be funny and invoke laughter out of the audience, it doesn’t do anything of significance nor does it succeed in getting said laughs. Moreover, the juxtaposition between comedy and seriousness completely breaks the audience’s immersion in the plot, as one cannot be invested in a serious scene because the Anime breaks the viewer’s immersion and the serious tone that it was going for with unfunny jokes that come out of nowhere. Seriously, the comedy displayed here is worse than that of Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, and that is genuinely saying something. To put it in simpler words, the Anime does not know what it wants to be, because if it’s goal was to be a hysterical parody of vampires, then it has certainly failed in it’s goal, since it neither is funny nor does it not break that rule by trying to take itself seriously half of the time. Moving on to one more problem that this unfunny sack of underwhelming doodoo suffers from, it is that the episode length is long. There is a reason one watches Anime, and that is because while it not being the best medium out there, it at least makes up for it by not torturing the viewer for more than twenty minutes at a time. What does Hellsing Ultimate do? It lengthens it’s twenty minute run per episode into forty slow and lengthy minutes, which boggles the mind since ten minutes of this catastrophe were unwatchable, much less forty. Even when sped up, it doesn’t help either since you are constantly seeing characters you dislike being shoved right into your face all the time. You can’t escape this terrible catastrophe no matter how hard you tried, as it is inherently bad by itself. Overall, there isn’t much else to say about Hellsing Ultimate. It is boring, trite, unfunny and at the end of the day it is meandering. Why is it meandering you ask? Because the main character is an unbeatable mary sue who barely shows any emotions and the outcomes therefore become predictable.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Sep 15, 2019 Recommended
Many say that slow Anime series are always the boring ones, and they might be right in what they say, because who has the nerve and patience to sit through a twenty minute length of an episode with barely any action and dialogue that keeps being shoved into their faces? This is what people usually think of when they think of slow paced Anime series: No excitement, no intriguing arcs and no endearing characters. All in all, most people think that slow paced Anime series are not enjoyable, until they watch Kaiji Ultimate Survivor. Kaiji Ultimate Survivor proves that a series that relies heavily on
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dialogue and moves at a snail pace can still be entertaining, amusing and even addictive to watch all the way through. This is an Anime series that is meant to be binged, so much so that one could finish it’s entire twenty six episodes in one to two days only.
The plot is not the strongest out there, it starts off with our main character Kaiji being in debt, and then magically getting caught and transported into a cruise ship that holds gambling tournaments for the poor to become rich. Now why would a company do that, rather than getting the money they want? The premise does not make sense, and is weak overall. The series starts off weak, in both premise and first half. The first half is boring gambling games that are slow, and have no merit to them whatsoever. After the first half is concluded, the series moves into what is possibly some of the most enthralling and exciting episodes one will ever get from this medium. Do you like the feel of suspense upon seeing people die and never coming back? Do you like the feel of suspense upon seeing sadistic rich people toy with poor people and playing with their lives as if they meant nothing? Do you like the feel of suspense in your Anime? If so, then this second half is made just for you. It is an arc where realism is taken to peak, and no plot armor or conveniences are present whatsoever. It is enthralling to watch, as Kaiji and his companions face life threatening situations, and it feels all the more suspenseful when the Anime takes it’s sweet time to explore each character and their fears. You would think that the slow pacing would hurt it, but you are wrong, as that slow pacing managed to turn the Anime into a much more enthralling ride, since you get to experience what each character is feeling all the way though. Now, onto the third and final arc of the story. One would think that this arc would lose quality since the previous arc had been established as some of the most suspenseful life or death situations there is, but you would be wrong to assume that. This Anime excelled in suspense during the final arc, as the enthralling experience was even larger than that of the second arc, and that is genuinely saying something. The audience clings onto a wounded Kaiji, as the man tries to win his way through the devious acts of the hierarchy. He tries to weasel his way into a definite win against two people who are much more experienced and dubious than him, and this makes up for a very adrenaline pumping ride. He injures himself and his body parts are held at ransom if he loses! The subversion of expectations is immense here as well, since the audience cannot predict the outcome of the situations that are about to occur. The finale to this show is one of the best and most shocking endings one could find in an Anime, and without spoiling anything, it definitely makes the whole ride worth watching in the end. Kaiji also has a very unique and polished artsyle, so if you are one of those people who love wacky and unorthodox artstyles being present in your Anime series, then this one is made just for you. The style is both creative and does not feel like it was made for the sole purpose of standing out amidst the audience. The way the characters are designed adds more punch to their hilarious and over the top facial expressions when they are losing, and adds more catharsis when they are on the brink of losing all hope as well. This is an artstyle that was essential to making Kaiji stand out as an Anime that is both hilarious and heart wrenching at times, and it truly shows during the most important scenes. It was also a breath of fresh air from all of the redundant Anime artsyles you would see everywhere else. Kaiji is not an Anime about gambling at the end of the day. As many of you would like to believe, this one stands out because it is an Anime that subtly touches on many themes that would go over some viewers’ heads. Kaiji is not an Anime about gambling, it is an Anime about life and the consequences of not following your own dreams. It is an Anime about the poor and the rich, and that is why a major arc from the series focuses on life and death situations, not gambling games. That is because this Anime never wanted to be about gambling, more so than it wanted to convey serious messages to the audience. What is truly brilliant about this series, is that while it never wanted to be about gambling, it’s games are still brilliant and well thought out, even when some have nothing to do with gambling and are more focused on being mind games. The soundtrack in Kaiji is both immense and visceral to the whole experience of the Anime. The ending song is one of the best ending songs one would get from an Anime and the soundtrack is very enjoyable to say the least. Why should it be a surprise to anyone though? This series was made by Madhouse, the same people who have made the Death Note, Hunter x Hunter soundtracks, and many more soundtracks which are very enjoyable to listen to and memorable in their own right. The tracks “Chest” and “Chorus” have a certain feel to them that is similar to that of Death Note’s, and are immense for conveying a tone of seriousness in the show, though the show does not shy away from giving the audience tracks which are less serious and are still a great listen, such as “Wish”. Overall, Kaiji is an Anime that is immense and deserves every bit of hype that it receives, it may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but for those who want nothing but sophisticated, enticing mind games that leave you wanting more and more of, then this is the right Anime for you. It is something that truly deserves the hype.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Sep 15, 2019
Steins;Gate
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
Steins Gate is one of the most famous Anime of all time, especially on this website, and during the last twenty years or so that have passed, many works that do not deserve any fame or recognition have unfortunately garnered a lot of fans, and we saw a lot of these works get sanctified and venerated by others, whereas in actuality, these Anime do not deserve five minutes of your time. So, is the original Steins Gate Anime one of those Anime, or is it something that is worth your time and investment?
The story revolves around a young guy of nineteen years of age ... who is called Okabe, and he dreams of inventing a machine which controls time, and for that he sets up a laboratory in a modest apartment, then he commences in his projects with two friends of his. The first of his friends is a girl that has no relation to his experiments, but she is only there on the count of her being a really close friend to him, and she is called Mayuri. The second friend is an Otaku guy who is of the same age as the main character, he is called Daru, and he is the one who does all of the technical work in the laboratory. This small team is then joined by other people, the most important of them being a genius girl who is called Makise Kurisu, so that she can help the main character in accomplishing his goals. This is the main body structure of the story which is unaffected by the time changes. There is also a body structure on top of it that is changing throughout the course of the Anime’s run. Each set of episodes is changed to serve the course of the story, and this means that the overall story structure is complex and not simple, but not to a negative degree. I find that the structure of the story is distinctive and adds an effective touch to support the element of time travel in the story. We will go through a period of research and preparation that will last about five episodes in the first timeline, then through the second period, the second timeline which is crowned by the Dmail technique, where the characters send messages to the past, in an alerting manner so that they could change some events which occurred in the present, and that changes the current present into a different version with different circumstances. These changes turned some of the events in the present into beautiful for some people, but in turn it caused a tragedy to other people. This drives us to our third period, the third timeline which centers around Kurisu’s device – leap machine – and it works on sending the present tape to the past in a limited manner, and here the hero tries to fix what he ruined during the second period. Then we move to the fourth and last period, and we return back to the first timeline by using a time machine from the future, which was constructed by Daru. Here the protagonist seeks, after learning his lesson from his previous failures, to fix things from their roots by not tampering with what happened during the past directly. The story ends after the hero succeeds in saving everyone. This is the body structure of the story in a more detailed manner, and it is divided in a lively, fun and convenient way to follow, because the story depends on the machines and the gadgets that are used, and that is a lively thing to have in a narrative, because the events can be shaped according to the capabilities of each gadget. Add in to the fact that the writer added something very imaginative to support the story, and that is the fact that everybody forgets any new time change, so they live in the new present without knowing that it indeed has changed, with the exception of the titular protagonist, and this is what makes the time travel aspect of the story tight. An issue is that the writer did not explain why the main protagonist has this memory ability in the first place, but he made the story more exciting by making Kurisu remember what had happened through her dreams. The characters in Steins Gate are standard, none of them have any noticeable flaws within them, nor do they have any qualities about them that would make them three dimensional, but some of them do have qualities which manage to bring them closer to excellence, and this is noticeable especially in the two characters Okabe and Daru. As for the rest of the cast, there really isn’t anything special about them. The general atmosphere between the cast gives off a theme of a harem, which occurs when one person of a certain gender is given love and care by many people from the opposite gender. The undertones of a harem in this story are not suitable at all for it, because who is this scientist who gathers random girls around him? And who are these girls who are interested in someone who is as weird as the titular character? This all weakens the believability in the relationship between the characters, and to add more insult to injury, there really isn’t any comedic paradox to help ease this issue. What weakens the seriousness of the story more is the fact that all of the characters are young people of age, which really borders on illogical in a story that is trying to make time travel seem as realistic as possible. The protagonist and his mates are otakus, and not real scientists, and this is a weakness again in the believability of the characters with accordance to what they do. The dialogue between the characters is divided into two parts: Technical dialogue which revolves around everything having to do with time travel, and general social dialogue between the characters which improves their relationship with one another. The technical dialogue is fairly good throughout the show, but the latter dialogue is standard and tends to weaken during it’s emotional parts at times, and tends to be strong at some other parts, especially during the last quarter of the Anime. All of the arcs in Steins Gate suffer from an issue relating to realism. There is no interaction between the characters of the story with people on the streets or shops in a way that supports realism or gives the story life. To make matters even worse, all of the characters who have a relation to the time travel aspect of the story surprisingly know each other, to the point where even the shop owner downstairs was revealed to be the FB. Moreover, all of the characters are naïve and kind in an unrealistic manner, to the point where one of the characters sacrifices her father so that her colleague would not die. This is very unrealistic, especially according to that certain character, who is supposed to be a bit selfish and arrogant, but the writer at the end of the day is stubborn to the point where they write all of them as kind and naive, in a stereotypical and unrealistic fashion. Now let us take a look at the four timelines and periods which take place in terms of quality of the events and it’s developments. We have the period of research and investigations, and it contains the character introductions, and the general goal and atmosphere of the story. It is also the period of experimentations when it comes to innovating and understanding how the first time machine works. This period of time also contains the beginning of the Anime of course, which is one of the worst beginnings for any story, period. The beginning moves through the events in an unstructured manner, and without even finishing the contents of each event. The events themselves do not support the general goal of the story, and do not succeed in identifying the characteristics of the main character in a correct manner. An example of this is him seeing the death of Makise Kurisu - who has no relation to any of the characters at this point of the story - he doesn’t even begin to question the matter, and this means that the beginning of the story is an inverse start, and there has yet to be an inverse start this bad. What makes matter even worse is the fact that the comedy is implemented very early on in the story, and how would the writer expect the director to take a time travel story seriously if he was implementing jokes from the very start? With this, the beginning solidifies it’s status as both bad and rushed, and is one of the worst inverse starts of any time travel story. The events which take place during this part of the story move in a slow pace, and without any hooks or any cliffhangers at the end of the episodes, and this makes it hard for someone to sit through it and for some to drop it upon first viewing. The second period in the story is better than the introduction when it comes to storytelling, and the events start to become better when the characters start using the Dmail technique, and this means that the story actually commences at this stage. The time related events are generally good, and it is fun to watch the changes that will be created because of them - even when some of them are unbelievably unrealistic - such as the boy Ruka transforming into a girl if his mother changes her eating habits. The social events are good as well during this stage of the story, and the comedic touch from the hero of the story is nice and fun, as well as that of his colleague Daru, which suits his slightly perverted personality. As for the rest of the cast, they really aren’t that developed, as most of them resemble most other Anime characters, but not to the same annoyingly quirky extent. We then arrive to the third period, which contains many positives and many negatives. The events start to get even more interesting after the changes the team of Okabe make, where even one of the characters gets killed off, and finally we enter events that are sharp and substantial to the story, but unfortunately are transformed into repetitive and stretched out events. For example, the writer takes a lot of time in showing the idea that there is no use in travelling in the near future to change the events of the story, and that Mayuri will eventually die despite all of their efforts. This subject matter took up a bunch of episodes, either to stretch out the content and for financial gain reasons, or because the writer does not know how to show this idea without using up too many episodes. This turns the idea into less beautiful due to the stretching that takes place, and it could have been executed in a much better fashion. Okabe’s relationship with Kurisu becomes more crystal clear during this arc of the story, and the romance is fairly well done. The Anime contains some action scenes, the first and foremost of them being the event where first death of Mayuri took place. Here the action turns very weak and very becomes hard to take seriously, as Suzuha beats up armed men in a matter of seconds, yet none of them think of pulling the trigger and shooting her and Kiryu waits for her to finish beating them off so that she could aim her gun at her. Again, very unrealistic for an Anime that is trying to achieve realism in a fictional story. We finally arrive at the fourth and last arc of the story, where the Anime reaches it’s peak when it comes to the time travel aspect, and the mad scientist Okabe becomes more capable in controlling the time travel aspect of the story. Excitement is positively increased, and the characters manage to identify the main danger when returning to the first timeline. During it Kurisu dies, and we move on to a time machine that is more advanced, and the main character begins to try out ways to stop the catastrophe from taking place. The obstacles which he faces are fairly entertaining and believable, and it is fun to see how he reacts to those dire circumstances, and this means that Steins Gate truly starts to get better from the very weak beginning, until we arrive to the fourth and final arc which is actually good. This arc contains the ending, which is very good, and an amazing conclusion to Okabe and Kurisu’s relationship. There is a colossal difference in quality when comparing the frail beginning of Steins Gate to it’s strong ending. The character designs are suitable for this kind of story, the hero being the least striking when it comes to his design. Generally speaking, the character designs of the characters resemble the characters’ actions and personalities, the best thing about them being the clothes that they wear, as all the clothes fairly support their traits. As for the movements, it is fairly good. The camera angles were chosen correctly, except for a couple of fanservice shots which weren’t really necessary to the story, especially something that is trying to differentiate itself from other Anime. The English dub is very well made, and the voices are suitable for the characters, and the quality of the actors is good. As for the Japanese dub, it is excellent, especially the voice actors for Okabe and Mayuri, and the voice actor for Okabe managed to bring and add a comedic touch to his character, which wasn’t to be found in the main script. The soundtrack is fairly good, but nothing spectacular, as the tracks stand out the most during a couple of moments in the show, such as the end of episode nine when Okabe finds out about Okihabara street not having any Anime or games anymore. Overall, Steins Gate was a fine Anime. What detracted from it becoming excellent was the weak first arc, which had a very frail and vacuous start, ignoring the fact that the show had many stretched out and repeated events, which could have been cut out from the Anime. If this Anime were cut down to a twelve episode run, then it would have made for a much better experience overall, and if the producers had changed the weak beginning of the story to a beginning as strong as it’s ending, then this show would have achieved excellence.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Sep 15, 2019
Princess Tutu
(Anime)
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Recommended
The magical girl genre is riddled with many Anime that are looked down upon with disdain by the Anime community, ones that are thought of to be “Too girly and childish” for an audience of Anime that is both well versed and well thought in what they watch and speak of. For such a bold generalization, there is always an exception, and the exception to this generalization is none other than a show called Princess Tutu. Princess Tutu is an Anime that ran from 2002 to 2003, and since that time has amassed a huge cult following of Anime fans who swear by their lives
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that this show is the end game to all magical girl shows in Anime. While I can see that Princess Tutu is very unique compared to all of the clones that resemble each other in that genre, I still do not view it as a masterpiece or an end game to anything Anime or magical girl genre related. Rather, Princess Tutu is a good and ambitious work that deserves respect for it’s boldness to stand out among the crowd, but nothing more than that.
The positive aspects that stand out in Princess Tutu are it’s orchestral soundtrack, where every piece is classical music and no other kind of music genre seems to be prevalent there. This, of course, gives the show the classy feel that others within it’s genre do not possess. Although it’s soundtrack is nothing but classical music, the Anime does not go full orchestral like something such as Legend of the Galactic Heroes per say, since that would be breaking it’s ballet code. Rather, the Anime implements classical pieces from artists that are ballet related, such as – Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Stravinsky and many others. It all feels classy and has this certain feel to it that other Anime don’t, even outside of it’s niche genre. Add in to the fact that the Anime implements certain classical pieces into certain moments perfectly, and you’ve got yourself a coherent work that is full of pieces that perfectly fit in with scenes, culminating in a product that is coherent from a directing standpoint. The soundtrack of Princess Tutu is not only unique, but is also very memorable, since many of the show’s viewers have heard the famous classical piece that is “The Nutcracker Suite” by Tchaikovsky, and if you say you haven’t, then I simply do not believe you. This certain piece plays throughout the show’s thirty six episodes in it’s opening theme, reminding it’s viewers that they are watching a show that takes itself seriously and succeeds in doing so. This particular piece is also used in most of Tutu’s transformations as well, and most of those transformation scenes are both memorable, visceral and are done very well. The other musical pieces did not stand out as much as The Nutcracker Suite, but they did their job in terms of conveying emotion. In the musical department, it definitely succeeds in bringing out it’s full potential, and has many pieces that both stand out, and are memorable at the same time. It certainly is unique in that department, since very few Anime use classical music as a soundtrack, much less ballet classical music. Another positive aspect about Tutu is how it succeeds in it’s tonal shift. This is also a negative aspect of the show, but we’ll get into that later. The tonal shift in this Anime does not feel forced unlike most Anime that are presented to the viewers. Unlike Madoka Magica for example, the Anime requires a bit of patience and mental fortitude on the part of it’s audience, as it is slow to get from the light hearted stuff to the dark parts of the show, and it isn’t very clear storytelling either, since much of the show’s first half is littered with ambiguous symbolism all throughout, such as the symbolism concerning the crows. The Anime also does not have any semblance of shock factor added to it, nothing in the series resembles anything that is shocking or feeling forced – It all feels natural due to it’s willingness and patience to undergo slow but meaningful world building and character interactions in it’s first half. With well written character interactions as well, the Anime starts to show us the bigger picture slowly. Speaking about the characters, they all shine brighter than Tutu’s diamond or the prince’s shard upon reflection due to how impressively well written they are. To start off with the characters, you’ve got Fakir, who is the best character in the show in my opinion. Fakir starts out as the typical jerk who does nothing but bully a character called Mytho into doing what he wants. Fakir’s brilliant character arc then takes a major one eighty turn to show the viewer that he isn’t what he is conveyed to be at first. Through pithy interactions with other characters such as Ahiru, we slowly get to see another side to Fakir that we never thought of seeing at first. He gradually starts to show emotions such as sorrow, sadness and grief to Ahiru, without even realizing it since she is in her duck form. As the episodes go by, we get to see more and more to Fakir, and we then start to realize that all is not what it seems when we get a backstory and a convincing reason for why he does what he does in the first place. I would say that Fakir is the best character in Tutu, not only because of his character development or change, but because of how subversive he is as a character, and how he managed to fool most of the viewers, me included, into believing he was genuinely an ugly hearted character at first glance. I would say that his development was done spectacularly, since unlike all of the other characters in Princess Tutu, we do get to see a backstory explaining why the knight Fakir does the twisted things he does. The ending to Fakir’s development is indispensable, because Fakir starts off as someone who is not willing to finish off the story Drosselmeyer placed him in, but after realization that he really cannot do anything else and is fated to doom, he finally accepts that his place in the story is to stop running away from his fears and write the ending to release Mytho, Kraehe and all the other characters from the doomed fate of DrosselMeyer. Speaking of fate, all of the characters in this show are doomed to a predestined, foreordained fate, the most significant of these characters being the titular character Ahiru, also known as Princess Tutu. Ahiru starts off as a naive girl who does not know any better about the world around her, and of course, this is authentic since she started off as a duck at the end of the day. Through her interactions with the likes of Fakir, Mytho and Kraehe though, she starts to gain a sense of humanity and a reason for why she needs to do what she does, which is to find the right path and end the story alongside Fakir. The interactions she undergoes lead her to develop subtly, until she reaches a point where she abandons her basic ways of thinking in order to become a better person. Of course, Ahiru is still stubborn enough to perform the ballet dance she always performs during the end of the show’s run, but that is to show the viewer that she has only abandoned her false ideals, which were to selfishly keep Mytho all to herself, and only kept her positive attributes intact. She realizes, just like Fakir did, that sticking to false ideals and accepting your place in the abyss is not the right decision to go through, that a fairytale cannot end on a tragic note. That is the best thing about Fakir and Ahiru, they start off as polar opposites, but have the same end goal, and through unfeigned interactions with one another, they develop so that they finally become two sides of the same coin. Perhaps the best episode to strengthen Ahiru and Fakir’s bond was episode 12, “Banquet of Darkness”, which shows both Kraehe and Mytho having vanished. Ahiru helps Fakir back to his dorm and binds his wounds. When Fakir wakes up, they decide to search together for Mytho, even though Fakir still refuses to team up with her. They search all over town but can't find him. Finally, Edel shows them the way. After they do go there, Fakir finally discovers that Ahiru is indeed a duck, and not just any type of duck, it is the duck he saw infront of him when he was crying and pouring all of his emotions out. When he realizes that, he starts to discover that maybe he doesn’t need to run away from his own emotions, which further strengthens the point of the Anime, which is to accept who you are and not run away from it. For characters who also got synonymous development to Ahiru, you’ve got Kraehe, also known as Rue. Princess Kraehe starts off as nothing more than a companion to Ahiru, but through slow and meaningful bits of development, we get to see her true nature halfway through the show’s run. She is twisted, but she is sympathetic enough to root for her, even if she thinks and acts in a disturbing manner. While Kraehe does have some evil moments here and there littered throughout the show’s run, she still has some reasonable intentions behind her questionable behaviors. Just like Ahiru, she suffers from something that is known as a “Doomed Fate”, and she wants to change it just like Ahiru wants to, since the show implacably shows her as an opposite to Ahiru. She wants the same goals, has the same selfish desires, but is shady and drawn in dark black colors; unlike her brightly colored counterpart. This is not because she is malicious by nature, but because of her father’s abuse and using her to get to Mytho so that he could obtain his shards. Who is to blame for all of this mess? Who could be so evil and vindictive as to allow such a thing to occur in the first place? None other than a character called Drosselmeyer. Drosselmeyer is the main villain of the story, and he is a very weird and niche kind of villain to say the least. You don’t get much from Drosselmeyer’s type in Anime nor in any other form of media for that matter. He looks fun, feels enthusiastic and is cheery on the surface, but he is very selfish when you reveal the bigger picture about him and his end goals. Drosselmeyer is also a unique one, since he is a meta commentary on writers, something that is rarely seen in any form of media, much less in Anime. What is so fascinating about this guy is the fact that he raises an interesting theory by being present in the show, which is “Are writers evil people?” The fact that writers have the will to place their characters in such dangerous situations, and sometimes give the story the occasional tragic ending, would that make them inherently evil? That is what makes him a very interesting character, even if he is unlikable. Drosselmeyer has to be one of the most evil villains in Anime due to how selfish his ideals and ways of thinking are, and he is the different version of “The humans are the real monsters” and a fresh take on this too. Although most of it’s characters were fairly well written with complex motivations, there were still some characters I personally did not like or saw that they didn’t have any real purpose in the narrative of the story. For characters I barely enjoyed, I would have to say the award goes to Mr. Cat, who is the ballet instructor for Ahiru, Rue and their classmates. This character did not really arouse any strong feelings of hate from me, but he was a tad bit irritating to say the least. He is an unfunny, one dimensional archetype that has been used over and over again in many Anime that came before Princess Tutu, and in many Anime that came after it. The side character that is used to get some cheap laughs from the audiences is the archetype I am talking about. This type of character can be used efficiently and can work well if given the right amount of care, and if they do not repeat the same joke over and over again. Unfortunately here, we see Mr. Cat say the same unfunny line over and over again until the nail finally beats us dead and it becomes trite. The “Will you marry me?” line he said was bone tickling the first five times I had heard it, but to say that I enjoyed it after a while, especially with the dark tonal shifts starting to show up into the show, would be rather preposterous. The character did have some strong parts to him at the end of the day, such as his backstory with his cat sensei; but other than that, he was a useless gag character placed in to amass some cheap laughs from the audience, and he certainly amassed nothing from me. Another character I personally did not find intriguing is Mytho, who is the prince of the story who’s lost his shards due to Drosselmeyer taking them away from him. The problem with Mytho, is that he is as lifeless and as underdeveloped as Mr Cat. Mytho basically has two emotions throughout the story: Either he is not feeling any emotions at all, which prevents the audience from feeling any emotional connection towards him, or he is being completely evil. I understand that Mytho cannot feel any emotions due to his shards being stolen and kept away in another places, but his character arc felt forced to say the least. What the show could have done to make it all the bit better is show some backstory to Mytho when he wasn’t so emotionally distraught and robotic, so that the audience could relate to him and to how he came to be like this. The visuals in Princess Tutu are pretty neat and haven’t aged at all in my opinion. You could release Princess Tutu today and nobody would be able to notice that it is an old Anime. This is all thanks to it’s inventive studio - Hal Films, who were responsible for some of the most visually striking Anime such as Aria: The Origination and Kaleido Star. The scenery looks absolutely stunning and fitting for a fairytale story, and the character designs all look visually striking as well. Some people might complain about the character designs being a tad bit too girly for their liking, but I rather found them to be fitting of the magical girl genre and the tone this Anime was striving to convey, especially with how it helped subvert audience expectations at the end of the day. From the character designs, my favorite one has to be Kraehe’s, since her character looks both innocent when she is acting as the normal classmate Rue, and malicious when she actually becomes the vindictive princess Kraehe. While Mytho was not a character of my liking, I did find his design to work well at the end of the day. When he lacked the emotion he needed, I found his design to be very homogeneous of a robotic person, and it worked quite well. When he turned evil, his design also worked well in convincing me that he was indeed bordering on vitriolic actions. I still had some contentions with the animation, since I felt much of the show’s budget was thrown into certain iconic scenes, such as Ahiru’s transformations into her princess form. The other parts of the show really did not feel well animated as those specific scenes. Aside from a bit of contentions I had with it’s animation, I still have to give it credit where it’s due, this show looks visually pleasing. Now that we are done with the positives for the show, I will have to get into the negative stuff that rubbed me off the wrong way. Princess Tutu had some issues that cannot be overlooked, and are less subjective opinion and more objective deficiencies on the Anime’s part. My first gripe with Princess Tutu is how it juxtaposes comedy scenes with serious scenes, and how unnatural it all feels at times. There isn’t anything wrong with juxtaposition, sometimes it can lead to some pretty hilarious episodes in some Anime, but unfortunately, it wasn’t the case here with Princess Tutu. This show does not know how to balance it’s humor with it’s twisted stuff. In one episode, you will get a character being controlled and taken over, performing some questionable shenanigans throughout the episode’s run. Then, in the very next episode, you will get the same comedy scenes recycled over and over again. Add in to the fact that the twisted stuff takes place at night, while the beatific moments take place during the day, and you’ve got yourself episodes that are so other worldly different and contrasting in tone that it just doesn’t fit in properly with the narrative. I talked about how Princess Tutu is a work that is coherent in it’s specific scenes, but to say that it is a coherent work in it’s episodic structure would be a lie. This Anime does not know how to balance it’s different tones, just like most Anime that try to be different but fail. Another problem I have with Tutu is the fact that it does not know how and when to introduce plot elements into the show. The Anime starts off with barely anything resembling a princess or any crows, then with unnatural info-dumps and unforshadowed events at points, it completely ruins it’s appeal. The slow pacing is also a pain to get through, since the show takes it’s sweet time to build upon it’s lore and magical elements. Some filler episodes are present here and there as well, such as the typical slice of life episodes where they learn and dance, which detracts from personal enjoyment and borders it on meandering. The plot becoming rather redundant after a while also detracts from it’s value. This can be seen in the episodes where Ahiru transforms into Princess Tutu and saves the day. It became predictable after a while, seeing Ahiru transform multiple times over the couple of multiple episodes so that she can defeat the multiple monsters of the week, or so that she could save Mytho from a being in danger. The episodic structure is rather vacuous and could have been trimmed and done a bit better, since it does contain filler episodes that do nothing to move the plot forward. All in all, Princess Tutu is a work that deserves respect for it’s ambition, it’s choice of music, it’s beautiful visuals and directing, but failed due to some questionable execution. Had the Anime executed it’s narrative in a better way, then it would have been truly a masterpiece, but unfortunately it failed at times. Princess Tutu is a work that is still to be enjoyed, it provides a good lore, many metaphors and a meta commentary that is hard to find anywhere else, much less Anime.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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