Story [7/10]
"Soldiers who're born within destruction take hatred as their weapon. Listen, Canaan. You must not counter hatred with hatred...ever".
I just want to say that Canaan has one of the best intros ever. The combination of Siam's solemn voice and the sad, haunting violin music in the background just sent chills down my spine.
The story is quite simple. It's not completely original, but it does have its own uniqueness. Basically, an organization called Snake performed an experiment on a small village, exposing its inhabitants to an infection known as the Ua-virus. The reasons for why this happened is explained later in the anime, so I won't go too deep into that. The story focuses on the survivors of the experiment. However, what truly makes Canaan stand out from all the other dark war stories is the twisted relationship between Canaan (the protagonist) and Alphard (the antagonist). Alphard believes that hate is her source of power and that by conquering and controlling it, she is unbelievably strong. She tries to prove this to Canaan (and also corrupt her) through tests and trials. I must say that Alphard is the coolest antagonist ever. Her raison d'etre is badass as hell. She and Canaan have an backstory that I wished the anime would have gone deeper into.
Art [8/10]
Canaan aired in 2009. I almost couldn't believe that when I found it. It's art is well above the quality of the other series that existed in 2009. It's good enough that I could believe it was a 2012 anime if someone told me that. While the character design is awesome, the background/scenery could use a bit of work. The fight scenes are great. THE GREATEST. The animation quality of the fight scenes is definitely top notch.
Sound [10/10]
Canaan has some of the most exquisite violin music I've ever heard. It works perfectly with the mood of the anime. It induces a strong feeling of nostalgia and regret that just makes you appreciate relationship between Canaan and Alphard even more. I love the melody that Canaan, Siam, and Alphard hum.
Also, as a Shanghainese speaker, the Shanghainese was pretty darn good. It's an amazing feeling to listen to a sub and be like woah, I understand that. I didn't look into the voice actors for some of the very very minor characters, but I could believe that they imported some Shanghainese people to voice stuff.
Character [10/10]
The relationship between Canaan and Alphard is amazing, the more we learn about it. Canaan means "the promised land". It symbolizes pureness of heart, which is made more interesting by the fact that Alphard's old name used to be Canaan. Added on to this is the cute, heart pounding relationship between Canaan and Maria. The relationships between Santana and Hakko, Cummings and Liang Qi, and Liang Qi and Alphard are also great.
All the characters in Canaan have a purpose, excluding the truly minor background characters. There's nothing I hate more than a side character who contributes nothing to the flow of the plot. They all develop. Well, a large majority of them. In this sense, Canaan is one of the most complete and satisfying anime I've seen so far.
Enjoyment [8/10]
Despite all the awesome things I've mentioned before, Canaan falls a bit short in developing the background between some characters, namely Maria and Canaan. There's an unanswered question at the end that I'm still confused about and it drives me a bit insane sometimes. Also, the pace drops a bit around episode 8 or 9, where I almost dropped it but thank god I didn't.
But overall, watching Canaan is a wonderful and thrilling experience that'll leave you with a lot of feels.
