Reviews

Shingu is one of those animes that comes along rarely that does what it intends to do and does it well. Shingu tells an interesting story and does it in a way that's enjoyable to watch, and somehow relaxing. Except for a few scenes Shingu doesn't resort to cheap tricks to suck the viewer in to the story nor does it try to play with the viewers emotions. It just tells a story, and not too bad a story at that.

Shingu has a wonderful old school feel to it, from the anthem solo at the opening to the wonderful jazz arrangement by Yuji Oono at the closing everything in between is a delight. The art is well drawn but not overly detailed and the background music is mostly well done jazz. The characters have the old school wide eyed look and one of the main characters is a mystery superbeing whose facial expression rarely ever changes from amusment. The characters have no problem with breaking the 4th wall and speaking directly to the audience (which usually precipitates another characters saying "Who are you talking to?"

There's even narration by the main character as was seen in older anime and each episode ends with the narrator saying something like "all these questions will be answered in the next episode" which also is another old school touch.

For all the old school qualities this is definately a 21st century anime. The concepts behind the main plot seem simplistic at first but give it time, as the episodes continue the plot and various subplots get infinately more complex. Another plus is that Shingu is unabashedly Japanese. I'm growing tired of anime that try to position themselves in a generic location. There's no question that this story takes place in a small Japanese costal town and it's refreshing to catch glimpses of Japanese culture.

I recoment this anime for anyone that's getting tired of the same old giant-robots-save-the-earth story, this one is fresh and refreshing with comfortable familiar feel to it.