Now that all Summer series have debuted, I can say this for certain: Uta Koi has the best soundtrack of the season. Even though this is a season that has three of my favorite composers in it (Yuki Kajiura, Kou Otani and Hikaru Nanase), it is Yasunori Mitsuda who until now was completely unknown to me who really stole the show. And on top of that, the soundtrack is also really well used, and knows exactly what tracks to use at each moment.
And yeah, this series is just fascinating. The Heian era is one that doesn’t appear often in anime, in favor of the samurai and Sengoku eras and all, but I still find that onE very interesting. This series takes people shrouded in mystery (in this episode’s case Ono no Komachi and gives its own interpretation to them. The most important creative liberties here are Ono no Komachi’s position and the reason why her lover couldn’t visit her for the full 100 days.
it just takes a while to get used to these weird stylistic choices that the creators went with. This time, Fujiwara no Teika dressed up as the new Tokyo Sky Tower… okay. And yet, for the childish voice he uses, the actual episode took itself pretty seriously and didn’t feel childish at all, and it also put a lot of emphasis on the misogyny that reigned during those days.
Rating: Excellent
Actually, anime that take place in the Heian Era aren’t totally uncommon. I can name a few.
Inu Yasha
Shounen Onmyouji (my number one all time favorite anime EVER!)
Harukanaru Toki no Naka de -Hachiyosho-
Samurai Deeper Kyo
Prince Mackaroo
Otogizoushi (I think)
I think set in Heian is one thing, properly using it as a unique background is another. With that said it was an romantic era, i think there’a probably a lot of literary inspired work set in Heian
Is “Samurai Deeper Kyo” really set in Heian? The costumes and setting is too much of a fantasy and even so i’d put it more in Edo period or at least that’s how I remember it. And I also was under impression that InuYasha was set in Sengoku?
Some other anime placed in Heian era are: “Kai Doh Maru” and of course “Genji”, there are also some elements in “Hakkenden” and “Gasaraki”.
At any rate when compared to Sengoku or Edo era, that’s not much.
Inu Yasha is Sengoku area.
And Samurai Deeper Kyo went too fantasy later on that I feel harder to call it even a historical manga, let alone Heian
And the charactersitc of Heian period, its elegant sadness, did not transfer well to anime. I love Genji Monogatary Sennenki btw, and actually feel a bit disappointed that this anime is not so well-directed. (Even though you might argue that Genji is very chessy)