Still a better love story than Twilight... but let's face it, Vampire Knight is similar in a lot of ways, only the vampires don't sparkle, and there are no shirtless werewolves.
Vampire Knight was clichéd in a lot of ways. One girl, a bunch of sexy guys fighting to be her lover, plot twists, and corny lines... so many corny lines... what we have here is the perfect example of what love stories should not be like if you're trying to make something original and enjoyable. But don't get me wrong, I didn't hate the series, but I didn't love it.
The story goes like this: Yuuki Cross, a teenage girl who attends an academy whose classes are split up into 2 different sections, the Day Class (for the humans), and the Night Class (for the vampires). Being head of the disciplinary committee, it's her job to keep all the raving teenage girls from going all fangirl on all the gorgeous night class students, while holding back feelings for the leader of the night class, Kaname. By her side, her somewhat adopted brother (I guess, don't really know a better term for it...), Zero, helps her out with her job as a member of the disciplinary committee himself, although he in no way has any feelings towards vampires himself other than pure hatred. With all of these crazy things going on, it's basically a "Who will Yuki choose in the end?" deal. There are plenty of other anime with a similar plotline, although I feel like the ones without vampires would be about 10 times more interesting.
Studio Deen! The studio that brought us hit anime such as "Higurashi", "Dragon Crisis!", "Hetalia", and the well known yaoi dream boat of an anime "Junjō Romantica", and in all honesty, there were some hints in there that made me think, "Oh, of course Studio Deen would add some similar traits to Junjō Romantica in this...". The art was one of the few redeeming qualities of Vampire Knight. The characters were well designed, enough to tell them apart at least, the scenery and effects were well done, and I liked the overall mood the design of the show gave off. One of the few things I can actually say I liked.
English Dub or Japanese Dub, whichever you prefer, both were alright in my opinion. Watched season 1 in English, watched season 2 in Japanese. Honestly, both were as good as the other. I liked Vic Mignogna as Zero in the english dub, and I liked Yui Horie as Yuuki in the japanese dub. For english dub fans, you won't be disappointed, and the same goes for the japanese dub fans. It's not extraordinary work, but it's nothing terrible like some anime.
Characters are what I had the biggest problem with. Characters are where I felt like I was watching Twilight with their behavior and their personalities. I was screaming at Yuuki to just pick someone to fall for instead of both giving me impressions that she wasn't even thinking about who she was gonna choose. Zero had issues. Plain and simple. He hates vampries, but he goes to school with them. He wants to murder them all, but he guards them. He loves Yuuki, but he's kind of a jerk to her. Which is it Zero, are you gonna be a jerk, or a man with feelings? And then... there's Kaname. I wanted him to just keep away from Yuuki so badly, cause he kept causing trouble for everyone it seemed, especially Zero. Zero is one of Yuuki's best friends, don't try and keep him away from her. Don't be a douche-nozzle... Sorry about the rant, I just have problems with some of the characters, mainly the main ones. As for the minor characters, like the rest of the vampires, I had no problems. They were funny, cool, and didn't cause much trouble, unlike the main characters.
Vampire Knight had it's moments. Mainly in the beginning, it was funny, with a little bit of a darker side every once in a while. Then it became a love triangle, plot twists, betrayal, and boom. Twilight. It wasn't terrible, but I gotta be honest, the main reasons I watched this series is because the fangirls in my class wouldn't stop yelling at me to watch it... next they want me to watch Free... God help me.
