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Requesting Anime Reviews!


Koby

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Have you written an Anime Review and want to give it to us, or do you want to help us out by writing some new Anime Reviews?

Any help will be much appreciated. You see, I'm wanting to get Kametsu (An Anime site) up and running finally. I've been trying to get it up since 2005 but never been successful because I've always neglected it. Well thats about the change.

Several months a go, I created a new layout for Kametsu (It's like the 8th one, lol) and since then not much has been done. Zadine wrote a few pages for Naruto, but other then that theres nothing.

So please write up some nice quality anime reviews that give the pros and the cons of the anime as well as whatever you feel like adding to it. Give it your own personal touch!

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  • 3 weeks later...

I'll do a quick one.

The Vision of Escaflowne

Japanese Title: Tenkū no Esukafurōne

Plot Summary

Teenager Hitomi Kanzaki (Maaya Sakamoto, Kelly Sheidan) lives her life peacefully, running track at school and reading tarot cards as hobbies, as well as excercising a crush on a fellow runner. This tranquility is shattered one night when she sees a mysterious young man fighting a dragon and gets drawn through a vortext back into his world, Gaea. The youth, Van Fanel (Tomokazu Seki, Kirby Morrow) is the king of a small country in Gaea that is struggling to hold back the dark forces of Zaibach. Escaflowne follows these two characters and a host of others that they meet in their journey as they fight.

Review

Story

The story of Escaflowne is nothing short of enthralling. When I first saw it I was not at all prepared to be drawn in as far as I was. Although a popular series I had not heard anything that mde me think it would be anything other than a typical girl-meets-boy-robot-pilot-who-fights-other-robots story. Was I ever wrong. Escaflowne is one of those series that has something for absolutely everyone and flawlessly mixes genres, in particular your gung-ho giant robot series with your high school girl with more love interests than fingers story (although to be fair, there's really only one love triangle). Although the plot itself may be nothing original (yes, we've seen giant robots and knights before), the execution of it, with all of its different elements, is brilliant. Apart from this, you also have some fairly complex characters and, possibly the most pleasing aspect of the show, genuine character development. As you get completely absorbed in the story it's genuinely rewarding in a nerdy kind of way to see each of the characters and their relationships with each other grow and change. Plus the bad guys are nice and menacing with just that hint of grey to make them also more three-dimensional. All in all, it's extremely hard not to get drawn into the world of Gaea.

Music/English Voice Acting

The score to Escaflowne, composed by regular anime music genius Yoko Kanno and Hajime Mizoguchi, who aint half bad either, is fairly perfect and reminiscent of middle ages Europe. There are some nice tracks in there and it never fails to at least get the job done. The opening theme is a pop ballad sung by Maaya Sakamoto that, I must confess, I battled an addiction to by the time I was halfway through the series. The dub, done by The Ocean Group, is, for the most part, spot on. The only minor hiccup is the hideous miscasting of Andrew Francis as Dilandau. Instead of being a dangerous pyschopath that we can all love to fear, Dilandau comes off as a whingy 12-year old. The voice annoyed me so much that I started switching to the Japanese audio whenever Dilandau was in the scene. Apart from that, it was a fine job with the track staying true to the Japanese original but with leniency given to allow for the different cadences of the two langauges.

Art/Animation

I had expected the character designs with eye-gouging noses to be a major deterrent from this show but to my surprise I got used to them fairly quickly. Apart from the noses, the designs are a bright, colourful mix between your typical shojo fare and your typical fantasy fair (that was a pun). The Guymelefs (Gaean for 'big robots') are also original enough that you can distinguish them from Voltron or a Gundam. The animation is of impressive quality for the mid 90's and still holds up well today.

Overall Impressions

A genuinely good series that failed to find a mainstream audience away from Japan due to mismarketing leading to overzealous editing to make sure that it was suitable for the cash cow that is the under 12 market. If you saw it on TV and weren't overly impressed, try giving it another shot unedited. If you've never seen the series before, then you should have left to find a copy of it halfway through the review, although thank you if you waited out of interest in my opinion. The Vision of Escaflowne is a brilliant one-off series that will draw you in and steal your life away from you for 26 episodes and then turn you into an Escaflowne vampire that has to consume even more Escaflowne just to survive!! Good thing there's a movie.

Final Grade A

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Yes, I already put this up in FFN. But I swear to Oyashiro-sama, this anime kicks ass!

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Higurashi no Naku Koro ni:

The title literally translates to "When Cicadas Cry" or "When They Cry." The red "Na" is actually an official part of the logo. Second season adds the word "Kai" after the entire title, which means "Solution."

Developer: 07th Expansion

Author: Ryukishi07

Genres: Drama, Horror, Mystery, Psychological thriller

Story Overview (Taken directly from Wikipedia.org)

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni takes place during June 1983, at a fictional rural village called Hinamizawa (based on the village of Shirakawa, Gifu, a World Heritage Site), which has a population of approximately 2000. The main character, Keiichi Maebara, moves to Hinamizawa and befriends his new classmates Rena Ryugu, Mion Sonozaki, Rika Furude, and Satoko Hojo. Keiichi joins their after-school club activities, which consist mostly of card and board games (and punishment games for the loser, usually him.) Hinamizawa appears to be a normal, peaceful, rural village to Keiichi. However, the tranquility abruptly ends after the annual Watanagashi Festival, a celebration to commemorate and give thanks to the local god, Oyashiro-sama. Keiichi learns that for the past four years, one person has been murdered and another has gone missing on the day of the Watanagashi Festival. Keiichi himself soon becomes implicated into the strange events surrounding the Watanagashi Festival and Oyashiro-sama. In each story arc, he or one of his friends become paranoid, and a crime is committed. Usually, the crime involves the murder of one of their own friends. While it seems impossible to tell their delusions apart from the mystery of Hinamizawa, slowly the truth is revealed.

More info can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higurashi_no_naku_koro_ni

Story Arcs

Basically, there are several different story arcs. The eight original are deemed as Question Arcs or Answer Arcs, four in each category respectively. The Question Arcs are the basic story arcs that bring up the mysteries behind events and many other things. The Answer Arcs recapitulate the events of the corresponding Question Arcs and provides most of the answers and solutions that were left hanging in the Question Arcs. Also, there is an extra special arc introduced in the second season of the anime, which would pretty much be considered a Recap + Answer Arc of the first season. More at the Wikipedia link if you want to understand more about this.

My Review - Score (9.5/10)

At first I thought it would turn out lame since it's hard to believe that lolita people would actually be able to stab, kill, and maim anyone or anything. But I went ahead and watched it since a friend recommend it to me, and boy was I wrong. It may not be as horrid as Elfen Lied was with the bloody scenes, but it's still what I'll consider grotesque. The different arcs and scenerios can get a little annoying when they repeat the basic events like with the Watanagashi Festival and the deaths of a certain couple of people, but when different characters play the villain role and more truth is introduced, it gets rather creepy. What I like about this anime the most is the splitting of Question and Answer Arcs. It keeps people watching to want to find out more. There was never really a time when I became bored and wanted to quit watching like I would with some other anime, which is a bonus.

I recommend this for those that want mystery horror + blood scenes + humor. Though the people look like lolitas to me, but on a lolita scale rating, at least it's not quite as high like Lucky Star. The graphics are actually better than that anime in my opinion, probably matching with The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Plus, by second season the graphics improve quite a bit. Also, if you understand Japanese and listen to opening of first season, you may notice the weird chanting. Well, if you watch the opening of second season, you can hear the hidden messages "I can't escape...", and if you watch 2nd season OP in reverse format, it'll sound exactly the same as the chanting in 1st season OP. o_o;; That, by far, already creeps me out.

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English Title: Outlaw Star

Japanese Title: Seihō Bukyō Autorō Sutā

Plot Summary (as supplied by http://www.animenfo.com)

Space is mainly inhabited by three different groups: the Federation, which is the real government; Various pirate clans, which use special techniques and magic to dominate the frontier; and the outlaws which are just about everywhere in between. There are also various alien races and empires which sort of fall within this category.

It is on this frontier where Gene Starwind and his 11-year old partner Jim Hawking, freelance bounty hunters and odd-job takers extraordinare, live and work. Until they happen to take a job from a mysterious woman named Hilda. In no time flat they're up to their ears in pirates desparate to get their hands on her and her secrets - an experimental spacecraft built using the pirate's knowledge and the Federation's technology, and information on the wherabouts of the Galactic Leyline. When Hilda is killed by the pirates, the ship is left to Gene. It's his ticket to freedom in space; and a big red flag for trouble, as every pirate and outlaw in the galaxy starts gunning for him.

Together with Jim, android and ship computer Melphena, ass-whooping metamorph Eisha Kurankuran, and the assasin Suzuka, Gene boldly steps force to face the future and discover the secrets behind the Galactic Leyline and his ship - the Outlaw Star.

Review

Story

Hands down, Outlaw Star is awesome. Near the beginning the episodes rarely connect to each other, you'll see them do one job for someone and then later on go and do another job, but the encompassing story about searching for the Galatic Leyline is the main draw of the story. Being hunted by the Pirates and the Galatic Federation, hunted by the powerful group known as the Anten 7 and finding out the mysterious about who and what Melfina is.

The story focuses a lot on action but there's some good character development, especially with the main character, and character interactions when they are on the ship and in space stations are awesome, some of the things they say and fight about are hilarious. The fighting is superb, especially for an older anime. The ship battles, while mostly boring in most space animes which don't involve mechs, are fast and intense especially during the fight with the Anten member with the golden ship.

Music/English Voice Acting

The music fits the anime perfectly, from the high paced opening to the soft ending. The songs played during battles draw you more into the conflict and character specific themes are delicious, like Twilight Suzuka's theme. When her songs plays you can feel someone about to die.

The voice acting is nicely done, the voices fit the characters well surprisingly. My favorite character, Aisha Clan Clan, as an annoyingly high voice but it fits her personality and once you see her in action you won't find her voice annoying at all.

Art/Animation

Again it's an older anime so the graphics aren't up there with the Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi or with Gundam SEED or anything like that but they aren't bad at all to say the least. Personally I don't need outlandish graphics to enjoy my anime so the slight paleness with the colors didn't bother me at all. The fights are beautiful animated and aren't on reels like most of the battles in DBZ or others like it. Every fight is unique which is good.

Overall Impressions

I hate when people compare this to Cowboy Bebop. Saying stuff like, "Oh, that anime is just a watered down Cowboy Bebop." or other crap like that. Why compare them? Just because it takes place in space? Then why not compare Bebop to all the 2930 Gundam series out there? Eh....that's just a personal rant though. I love this anime and it's easily in my top five of favorites. Everyone who likes space, comedy and romance with a lot of action should definitely pick this one up, you won't regret it at all.

Score: 9.5/10

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