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May 27, 2024
Adventure stories, at least the ones that do it right, are more about the journey than the destination. Similarly, a great character arc isn't made great by how it ends - it matters more how the characters arrive at that point, and watching them grow can be the most fulfilling aspect, even if what we tend to remember best are the more seismic shifts.
Vagabond is a manga that focuses on the journey first and foremost. Musashi doesn't reach a destination, but he also doesn't have a specific endpoint he's aiming for... Well, I suppose that's not entirely accurate. Musashi spends much of the series wanting
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to become invincible under the sun, and strives for it constantly even when he struggles to understand why he'd go so far to achieve it. His history with his father and those around him certainly explains it, but what is interesting about Musashi is that he isn't solely (or even chiefly) the result of those influences. He's a person who struggles to balance the expectations of what he believes he must be with all the competing interests presented to him, whether those are romantic, duty-driven, or even upending his whole concept of what it means to be truly invincible.
But this story would only work so well if it was all about Musashi. The story takes long asides to follow Matahachi, someone who is having a very different journey of self-discovery as he tries to find the person he somehow successfully hides under layers of lies. It follows Otsu, a girl who is both entirely out of her depth when it comes to this world of powerful swordsmen, but also someone who understands the humanity of the people behind those swords better than most. It follows Jisai, a disgraced sword instructor who reluctantly cares for a small deaf child. That child, Kojirou, becomes one of the more interesting foils for Musashi as he grows.
And those are just some of the main cast. Other characters like Soho, Seijurou, Baiken, Ryouhei and Denshichiro function as their own foils to Musashi in distinct ways, both pushing him and learning from him. Several characters become essential mentors to him, seemingly living on as spirits in his mind. How Musashi treats his self-proclaimed students at various points across his journey tells us how much he has changed, and the fact that his journey sometimes meanders away from combat entirely to provide Musashi with something new and essential to appreciate showcases the author's willingness to test him in new and novel ways throughout.
I'm a sucker for great character development, and this series has it in spades. There's a reason this manga is so widely beloved despite its going on hiatus at such an awkward point: it is really more about the journey than the destination. Knowing how certain things will play out would be great, but I don't have to see that to love what we've gotten so far. Of course, it's also visually stunning, with tremendous detail and motion conveyed on its pages. It's a masterpiece, plain and simple.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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May 23, 2024
I had the pleasure of watching Nadia and the Secret of Blue Water a couple of years back. I'm not making a comparison between the two simply because they have "Blue" and "Cerulean" in the title, but more because the series have decently similar premises. Both are adventure stories helmed by a young girl that involve a mix of sci-fi and fantasy elements. They take place in very different worlds, with this story taking place in our world and Nadia taking place in a very distinct one, and a lot of the direction and characters in the story are distinct.
But that's part of the
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problem: this story just lacks Nadia's swagger. It's got a decent enough adventure and as long as we left William out of it, I think it had some legs. The various vehicles we saw, the relationships they developed (even if they felt a bit dragged out), and the concept of the Floating Liquid was interesting enough to keep the series afloat for much of its run.
But William hung like a spectre over all of it, and from the beginning, it was obvious that he would be the main villain without ever justifying why. Setting aside that he was just absurdly, cartoonishly villainous for the reason that he had a complex after his mother died, which is already pretty weak, his actual plans were completely and utterly baffling.
That might not be enough to sink the show on its own, but the character writing in general left something to be desired. Jane is a pretty basic character who had glimmers of something more interesting as she struggled with the negative implications of technology and with her love for her family in the face of William's outrageous crimes. Those are both somehow quickly forgotten. George is somehow unknowingly a party to some pretty terrible shit, gets upset that he did that, and sacrifices himself for no reason. We get more interesting with some of the side characters, but even with someone like Barsac who presents a competing interest, he doesn't get an opportunity to act as a grey character, instead almost consistently acting in support of the central cast.
To its credit, this series doesn't go off on useless side-tracks like Nadia did for part of its run, but it's significantly less satisfying of a story overall and lacks the gravitas in its characters to carry the narrative. It's fine enough for what it is, but lacks the strength required for a recommendation.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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May 20, 2024
This movie, like the series it follows up on (in fact, much more than that series), feels like a staged performance. Whether we're talking about scenes that go harder or interactions that seem significantly darker than the series proper would ever have featured, they are all very much a performance, depicting both what the characters wish to deliver to one another and a display for the audience (both us and the giraffe). That's an impressive mode of story-telling that largely short-circuits any complaints I have about how this plays out. Fights feel toothless? Because they are, by design. Arguments feel a little stilted and out
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of character? That's what the performance demands of them. Even large set-pieces that feel absolutely insane like the giraffe becoming part of the performance and turning into a giraffe-shaped amalgamation of fruits and vegetables seems purpose-built to fuel the performance as it goes forward.
So, it's all staged. It's a performance meant to give a bit of closure for these characters who are exiting this stage and moving along their own individual paths, whether they truly want to or not. And I definitely bought into that, particularly in a couple of the performances.
That being said, I don't think all of them worked to the same degree. It was legitimately thrilling to watch Claudine and Maya come to blows in what was probably the best choreographed fight in the bunch, as well as just an opportunity to understand more of the headspace these two occupy. Considering they're the top students at this school, it makes sense that they'd be peak. Some other matches certainly went hard in the visual design, particularly both involving Hikari, but I've had pretty consistent issues getting into her headspace throughout and this was no different. I more easily understood the characters opposite of her each time. I wish we'd gotten to spend more time with Nana, who dominates the stage when she's there, but feels like she didn't get enough attention on the character side as opposed to the performance side. Mahiru gets a strong scene, and though she's largely relegated to sitting and pondering through much of it, Karen gets a strong wrap-up. Junna got a strong scene as well, though it seemed like Futaba was just capping off a story that already felt resolved in the series.
So, overall, it's a very strong performance that felt like it was only let down by some less than inspired character building. Visually inspired with a lot to love on the choreography, this definitely exceeds the series, even if I wanted a little more out of it.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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May 10, 2024
There are a lot of things to love about this series that are pretty straightforward. I think the music is consistently strong, there's pretty great fight choreography throughout (as might be expected of one large stage show), there's an investing plot to follow that takes some intriguing twists and turns, and since there's a central aim from everyone to become the "Top Star," there's a really good central conflict that keeps things interesting.
Even on parts of the series I didn't particularly love at first glance - the relative safety the girls experience in these fights with bladed weapons, the mostly predictable sets of fights
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leading up to the finale, and the two girls ending up at the center of it all in the end - actually fit quite well into the central themes of the show and match its aesthetic. This is a giant theater first and foremost, after all. It's a production, one that the giraffe who observes it all claims to "understand" because it's straightforward. The Starlight play acts as a play within a play, a microcosm that dictates generally how things will go in this arena. I kind of love that, and I think the themes of the series are pretty solid as a whole.
The difficulties I have are with the characters and their individual arcs. There's a certain degree to which I see each character's arc as an individual, which means their stories necessarily are contained to a certain span of time and wrap up in some form by the end of it. I recognize that there are many characters in this series to juggle. Still, I found it difficult to buy the means by which so many of them wrapped up. I won't spoil individual arcs, but many of them felt too neatly resolved, particularly one that felt pretty central to the narrative and had some broader implications for the plot. The series offered lots of interesting character arcs, but they almost all felt like they ended chiefly because the plot demanded that we move on and pull focus to the leads. That might be thematically appropriate, but it bleeds these arcs of significance and makes certain sacrifices that come later feel like they only meaningfully affect two people. It's not so much that they vanish into the background either - we continue to see them late into the series and they remain important, but their roles seem to shift to support rather than continuing to seek that "Top Star" status.
A lot of interesting opportunities at worldbuilding also take a backseat to the central relationship. There are other schools where this is happening and where other wishes have been granted and performances are ongoing. There are other classes of students being admitted to this school, or who are the upperclasswomen to our central cast, yet we hardly see them. I know there is enough going on that keeping the story pretty tight is kind of required to make sense of everything to create what I would say is still a pretty fulfilling arc for the central two, and maybe the movie does more in this regard, but I was left wanting a bit by what the show teased in its broader strokes.
Overall, while I thought this was a really good series, its focus ends up drawing attention away from the aspects that most intrigued me. The central two get a good arc, but I can't say I was ever solidly invested in their characters, whereas I was interested in getting a deeper dive into some of their fellows. I think there's a lot to love about the world that was built here and the cast is diverse and interesting enough to keep things interesting, but I also see some missed opportunities that hold this back from greatness for me.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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May 6, 2024
This series left me frustrated, but I should probably have seen the writing on the wall early on. It's a series that is built on the "style over substance" paradigm, and at least early on, it largely succeeds in that regard. The fight choreography, particularly in the first episode, is pretty incredible and the animation is generally great. Even as we got into later episodes and the fights became more chaotic, making the choreography harder to discern, I could still appreciate some of what they were doing.
Then, several episodes in, we're presented with CGI mech suits. I was initially hesitant about it, since none of
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them looked that great, but it was still interesting to see how these contributed a new layer to the fights, adding new abilities and fighting styles into the mix (one guy just fights with his legs in his suit), as well as the need to recharge them. Not bad.
Then, we're introduced to another set of mech suits and... yeah, this is where my enjoyment of the fights truly falls apart. I don't so much mind seeing the first one in action, particularly since we get a very good idea of the speed and gravity of its attacks, but after that, their inclusion in the series largely serves to make it easier for the animators at the expense of audience enjoyment. You don't feel that speed and gravity in many of the future episodes (until they get souped up again at the end, at least), the aforementioned diverse mechs become virtually useless, and the fight choreography becomes stiff and lifeless, especially by comparison to the series' 2D fights.
Unfortunately, that's the direction the series' best aspect took over its run. I'm not going to do a deep dive into its narrative because, frankly, it's too shallow for that. It's a basic revenge story that also shows signs of weakness early on, as Higan seems to be incredibly badass only when it serves the plot. We get some background to try and invest us in the life of Higan and his wife and child, but much of that comes too late to give us any meaningful connection that makes the opening scene feel impactful. It doesn't help that Higan seems to just get assistance whenever he needs it to keep the plot moving - it's a surprisingly passive way to generate literal and figurative plot armor for him throughout.
And then there's the larger narrative. I think the world itself is potentially interesting, but they squander it by focusing on a few key plots among its characters. AUZA being this tech giant who has an uneasy alliance with the central ninja group seems like it could be rife with opportunities, but that plot goes from too basic to needlessly convoluted to incredibly frustrating over its run as alliances are made and broken. The same holds true with the ninja organization: the more we learn about them, the more frustrated I get with all the various motives at play and even the way we got to this point. Couple that with the number of fake out deaths and real deaths that feel manipulative and you get... something, I guess.
The plot just feels strangely weightless in the end. Maybe that's because I'd lost interest, or maybe it's because the series seems so incredibly cliche in how it wraps. I won't spoil it here, but I predicted virtually every beat in the final episode before it aired. Every reveal felt incredibly obvious, even though several required substantial character assassination, and the number of contrivances for that final fight left me entirely disinterested in the outcome. Couple that with some lines that feel right out of Peacemaker without the tongue-in-cheek delivery or humor and this series ends with a dull thud.
A pretty big waste of time and potential to just give us a few strong fight scenes and a threadbare plot, all of which makes me wish they'd just put this effort towards a better project. It's too simple to be bad, but it lacks anything to elevate it above an exceedingly average series with little to recommend it.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Apr 26, 2024
This is my first Clamp series (aside from Code Geass). Yes, I'm a neophyte when it comes to this particular corner of the anime world, and regardless of what else I say, I am interested in seeing more series from Clamp, though not because of the various cameos in this series. Those were honestly a little distracting.
And I'm not entering into this one with a negative attitude towards it. Sure, it's a little saccharine, but that's kind of the point. A young woman appears suddenly in a town with a talking, fire-breathing stuffed animal with the chief goal of mending peoples' broken hearts. If that's
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not a premise for a saccharine show, I don't know what is. So when people start inviting this random stranger into their homes and preschools, you just kind of roll with it. That's the kind of show you're watching. It's not meant to be strongly realistic.
That's the vibe I rode through much of the series and I genuinely had a good time with it. The set-up of Kobato meets and helps a new person in the town felt like a great way to build out the world, including some very touching stories about lost love and letting things go, in particular. I only wish we'd gotten to see more instances of this, or at least gotten to see how her many interactions changed the town around her - honestly, just a few SoL moments of her walking down the street and running into people who know her by name after walking in a stranger would have helped establish the depth and breadth of connections she was making beyond the small scope we actually see during the series.
But therein lies the problem: I think this is the best stuff in the series. The throughline stories involving a moneylender trying to tear down the school, Sayaka's relationship with her estranged husband, Fujimoto's background and, most especially, Kobato's entire reason for being here along with Ioryogi just don't work nearly as well.
To start, the series strings along watchers with a lot of its central mysteries. It's not necessarily a problem to have big reveals towards the end of a series, but it does mean that we can't really interact with a characters' past or their aspirations. We're told from the start that Kobato wants to go... somewhere. It's not clear where for a very long time, so it's hard to get behind her desire, which is the central drive of the series. It's just too vague to get invested, and when things are finally revealed, I'm usually left with more questions than answers. What seemed clear often was revealed to be far less so, and character motivations make less sense when considering the answers we are given.
But it's not just the mysteries that bother me. Even when revelations come sooner and characters linger in the story, they shift from apparent threat to background noise back to threat and finally to... pillar of support? There are opportunities to both establish and build on relationships that are missed, turning much of what happens into an arc that takes such sudden turns that it gave me whiplash. It's not like there were no breadcrumbs leading up to these moments, but they made me question a lot of how characters behaved and why for much of the series.
And then there's the relationships. Leaving aside issues of how these narratives resolved, I didn't find that the story did much to invest me in any of the romances. If anything, it made it actively more difficult to root for the pairings it aimed to establish. I'm not going to spoil any given relationship, but the show actively rejects some of the more obvious chemistries it establishes in favor of something that feels forced and contrived to happen by the plot itself. Another relationship is both built on an untold amount of time together and marred by strife, but since one of the characters hardly shows up after they apparently reconcile, we hardly get to appreciate seeing it mended. For a show about mending broken hearts, it was disappointing to see it falter with its longer-running examples.
Finally, there's the ending. I know I've vaguely alluded to some of what's there, but as a whole, it just left me wanting. There were elements that felt like they were just there to leave us on a certain note, and the show didn't seem to care how we got there. Sure, it was once again that saccharine sweetness, but it felt like we were duty-bound to end up there rather than seeing it build more organically.
The show is still a good time when it just sits with these characters and offers moments for Kobato to be a real force for good. It's just a shame they're baked into a story that left me scratching my head or frustrated so often.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Apr 22, 2024
I had a really good time with this one.
I was more continuously invested than with Tatami Galaxy, though this series doesn't wrap up as expertly as that did. The time machine itself is quite the vehicle for telling the story, leaving me grasping for hints from previous episodes - I think this might work even better upon repeat watch. It's more the ride than the destination on this one, though it's also nice to see some closure on some of the central plots of the series as a whole. Much to its credit, this also improved on the amount of attention various side characters
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got, something I felt was distinctly lacking in Tatami Galaxy. The animation is also on point, providing some of what that series gave in a sharper package.
Really, my only issues with this one are that the episodes were too short to give me everything I wanted out of a 6-episode run (it crams in a lot, but we often get side-tracked - not that I'm complaining, since I love the side-tracks), the humor of the series still doesn't quite hit for me, and, even after they dedicate a whole episode to him, I'm still kind of baffled by Ozu. He's a great plot vehicle, but such a strange character.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Apr 18, 2024
I was looking forward to this with some trepidation. Anthology series are usually pretty hit or miss for me, often with more of the latter and less of the former. I like fairy tale-based stories, but I wasn't sure how these would be translated into anime. Given how distinct these stories were from the originals, it also meant that these stories couldn't lean on nostalgia for these stories as much. They have to stand largely by themselves.
So, how well do they stand? In general... not so well. These stories are self-contained, so if the plots are complex, then these stories had the unenviable task of
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making things clear for the audience while wrapping up their narratives. I don't think many of these accomplished that, particularly as so many of these were either full of plot holes or just refused to provide necessary information. The series has visual flair, and the interludes between stories are serviceable, but here are my individual thoughts for the episodes:
Episode 1: Cinderella. This has an interesting idea to tackle by inverting the original story. I love it as a premise for how this could play out, and it had all the makings of a story that could work, particularly as there's a good deal of psychological torture that plays out over its length. It's great to see the toll this takes on her family. For me, what I find wholly unbelievable is that the person perpetrating them lives in a house with so many live-in servants that never discover what she's doing, even though she often goes into her room and speaks to her living doll. And that's the strangest thing for me: the story sports a fantasy element in the form of this doll that could have been used to address why everyone in the household seems blasé about so much of what happens, but never uses it in that way. If it did, it was never clear, so the doll just functions as someone for Cinderella to bounce off of honestly throughout this episode. There's another purpose for it that I won't spoil, but it's largely just personal for Cinderella, so it has no effect on the broader plot. It's an exposition device rather than anything plot relevant.
Episode 2: Little Red Riding Hood. This story should have been an instant win for me. It's basically Dexter in a sci-fi world, and once again, the setup is strong. There's a lot to love about how the Wolf functions in this story, even if all he is in the end is just a sadistic killer who wants the tactile experience. No one in this story is particularly deep or interesting, and the world is only surface level (though that is literally by design). Still, the story feels strangely lifeless. Maybe it's the fact that it's leaning into the nudity, blood and gore, but somehow keeps all these elements just off screen, only showing us the end results. This is the kind of story that would have worked better for me if they had gone all in.
Episode 3: Hansel and Gretel. This took a lot of cues from The Promised Neverland. It definitely deviates at a couple of points over its run, as the Witch plays a more nuanced role here than in the fairy tale, the role of the parents is distinctly altered, and the titular children are given a lot of agency. Then we get to a pair of twists. I won't spoil them here, but both feel strange and leave me with more questions than answers about the overall plot. It's kind of crazy that even the characters themselves point out substantial plot holes and oddities in how this play out. I can't say this worked for me.
Episode 4: The Elves and the Shoemaker. Unsuccessful writer finds his muse in a young redhead. I like the idea here of a writer dealing with the fact that his only lauded work is stuff he doesn’t remember writing, but it ends up far more convoluted and I’m honestly not sure what it wants me to take away from the story. There are good ideas here, but they're buried in something stranger that never fully comes together.
Episode 5: The Town Musicians of Bremen: It's similar to Trigun with an all-female main cast dealing with a gang that has taken over a town, and it keeps things simple while making the character designs pop. I enjoyed this one for its simplicity - unlike so many of these episodes, it doesn't feel like it's trying to cram too much narrative into too little space. It's not without its issues - one of the central three feels largely superfluous at best and annoying at worst, the newest addition gets scant little exploration beyond one moment in her background, and the ending leaves me wanting a bit - but it's effective and fun, even if it's more style than substance.
Episode 6: The Pied Piper of Hamelin: While this was the most visually interesting (evoking some Ghibli), it's another example of the story ending up largely confusing due to just... so many lapses. There are stretches of time and choices made that are just glossed over to a confusingly vague degree. There's some interesting worldbuilding in the village, but that contrasts sharply with the Piper themselves who just left me baffled, acting both as a character and as a force in the story and not really working in either respect. Couple that with a pair of leads who are just off-putting for so many reasons and I found myself just weirded out by the experience.
Overall, it's a bunch of interesting ideas that mostly didn't get the space to breathe. Even some of the better stories like episodes 1 and 2 missed opportunities to really make their stories come together or pop, while many of the others floundered in their attempts to tell a cohesive narrative or make sense of some of their more outlandish concepts. The ride's interesting enough that it was worth sitting through, but it's hard to recommend outright for the strange turns it took.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Apr 16, 2024
These specials are a strange, strange ride on a submarine that turns solid surroundings into liquid.
I was genuinely pretty flummoxed watching these specials. They're only 6 minutes apiece, so it's not like I was expecting anything amazing, though I can't say I was expecting three largely disconnected stories that function based on a kind of nonsense logic that I can't really get onboard with. They're interesting in that they give us some chances to see the odd character interaction that didn't appear in the main series, but honestly, the only scenes I really connected with narratively were the ones at the end where whoever was
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telling the story was chided for shoddy storytelling in some way, shape or form. That's kind of what these were: just an opportunity to try something zany and string it together with the throughline of involving a submarine that defies physics, a harpoon, and our cast of... heroes? Hard to say at times.
Really, what you come here to watch these for is the animation. It's definitely rougher than the series is known for, but that's kind of got its own appeal to it. The color palette is pared down, often to very basic extremes, and they definitely don't always go for fluid movement. I still dig it, even if I can't say this was reason enough to go through these episodes by itself. Might appeal to others more, hence the "Mixed Feelings."
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Apr 16, 2024
I had a really good time with this movie. It's certainly got a lot of visual flair, often displaying moments and scenes in unique styles to do a lot of the storytelling visually. It can be a little blunt at times in the dialogue, sometimes to the point of hitting you over the head with its themes, but that honestly fits in well for me, especially as this is a movie where its two central leads need to be hit over the head. The Black-Haired Girl spends much of the movie charting a path forward and excelling at pretty much everything she does, but can't
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perceive anything beyond that path, including her own feelings or those of the people who stumble into it. By contrast, Senpai has trouble moving along his path, stumbling the entire way as he endlessly pursues his goal of having the Black-Haired Girl see him. Even then, he stumbles, not knowing what he wants out of being seen and arguing endlessly with an army of inner selves about whether he should even put himself out there. At least for me, it's a relatable inner struggle made manifest in some of the most absurdly over-the-top scenes in the movie.
It's nice to get to spend more time with side-characters in this one. It's not necessarily that they get a lot of depth, but they're interesting insofar as how they facilitate the plot and the MCs. Higuchi and Hanuki are back and it's nice to see that they've fallen into a very chaotic lifestyle together as they impart various pieces of wisdom while engaging in just about every zany thing they can manage within a short time. There's a whole subplot involving a traveling group of performers working in defiance of the powers that be led by the Underpants Leader, a man defined by his love of someone else who got hit in the head with the same item as him at the same time. It's with characters like this that the movie occasionally managed to get a laugh out of me, so a little better than the series did. Ri Haku and the Used Book Market God also managed to direct some fantastical portions of the plot, making for some of the more absurd scenes. Still, not as captivated by the comedy as I was by just seeing the crazy ways its plot unwound and trying to guess how it would come together.
It's not episodic like the series, it's one complete narrative with a linear (albeit winding) plot. That makes it easier to follow and keep up with, but I'll admit, I kind of missed the way Tatami Galaxy told its story. Still, there are a lot of interesting visual flourishes in this one and things come back around quite readily from early in its run, and even though it was quite as visually innovative (it didn't jump back and forth between live action and animation), it certainly went hard in the animation department. I had a great time with this one, even if it wasn't quite as mind-blowing.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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