Category: Finished Series: Mystery/Suspense

This show. Talk about a mindscrew. This episode once again was just brilliant. There was so little action in this episode: it was just people talking, trying to convince each other and trying out various kinds of diabolical schemes. This episode just kept pushing things further, and added things like defying logic and fate to the mix.

I can’t believe how well the build-up of the previous episodes got used. This episode finally revealed how people are able to talk through each other, and immediately this show uses that theory to make a plausible explanation for Hakaze to return. And as if that wasn’t already a twist enough, it turns out that one of the biggest reasons for the plot to actually start was wrong: nobody from the clan killed Aika.

There were two things that I realized here that got left unmentioned, but need to be answered. First of all, how does suicide work? Could it be that Aika wasn’t murdered, but instead orchestrated her death herself. In any case it is very heavily being hinted that Aika was the priestess of the tree of Exodus. Second of all… are they going to remember to remove those strings on Hakaze’s skeleton. I mean, I shiver at the thought that they’ll remain stuck out of her body if this goes on!
Rating: 6/8 (Awesome)

Okay, so for those who haven’t read the previous work of the author of this series, Spiral: it is basically a series dedicated to mind-games. The characters move from one elaborate puzzle to the other and there is this evil organization that requires them to solve it. It’s fun, but also pretty formulaic and these mind games were pretty much the only reason to keep watching it. If anything though, it showed tht the author is really good at them. But holy crap, I must say that he really struck gold with Zetsuen no Tempest.

Spiral was just a series in which people moved from mind-game to mind-game. Zetsuen no Tempest instead has an epic storyline that happens to have mind-games in them. It has much more to offer than just the mind games, but when they appear, they really shine like never before. After all of the build-up and world building that the series did in the past, we can finally get to the point where this has to be used in order to out-wit Samon, and this is just the second week in a row in which my mind has been blown. You can really see Spiral as the prototype for Zetsuen no Tempest.

I love how Yoshino just came up with this ridiculous theory that makes no sense in order to bet under Samon’s skin. You really don’t often see a villain who isn’t completely confident in his cause, but that makes it all the more interesting: in this story, he is the one trying to achieve his goal against all odds and instead the main characters have someone like Hakaze, who can pretty much nuke the world on a whim when she gets the chance. It’s such a fascinating change of roles here.

And yeah, I loved how Yoshino tricked Samon in giving away something really crucial here: the nature of time travel in this world: if you talk to someone in the past, the effects of that become noticeable immediately. They can really use this: now that Hakaze knows that she will die, she can take actions to prevent it, and these actions will manifest themselves in the world they’re currently in. Just how? Who knows?
Rating: 6/8 (Awesome)

Okay, I think I just watched the single best episode of the Autumn Season from the series that started there at least. That was just amazing.

THIS is what I mean with using your build-up well. After the slow pacing of the previous episode that took so much time in showing flashbacks, and was so careful in setting everything up for this episode, having everything just turned completely upside down within 20 minutes was just freaking amazing. I’m just blown away by this.

Everything came together here. It was already one thing that Hakaze was living in the past, but then this episode came with Mashiro who easily changed sides, Samon who was too busy clinging on trying to keep things safe as possible, Yoshino coming with that ridiculous idea to get Mashiro to change sides yet again. The delivery was also just perfect, I loved how blown away Samon was by all this, or how on-wavering Mashiro was from his goal. Yoshino as an observer also played a brilliant part, and at the center are these two dead girls who had such a large indirect impact on everything.

And holy crap, the music of this show is awesome! It had been on the background for the past few episodes, but this time it played a really big role again. And with this, yeah. Not even Jojo or Psycho Pass can match how well this OST manages to contribute to its series when it’s really on fire.

This episode once again gave me that delightful feeling of being blown away by something. It’s not a feeling that I get often, and yet I’m really glad that this show achieved it, because I love it, and it just kept going, without any weak spot whatsoever. Please Tempest, keep up this pace.
Rating: 7/8 (Fantastic)

This season is delightful in how many long series there are, and it really shows in the progression of the series: lots of shows are still in their building up stage. There are so many shows who actually have the time to set things up correctly. And the thing is that the build-up of these series is really good. Tempest is probably the purest in build-up, having the slowest pacing so far in terms of stuff happening, but this episode delivered one heck of a cliff-hanger.

There were the hints: that skeleton should have come from somewhere. It’s still a bit hard to believe that a body would decay entirely within just two years, but nevertheless, I love this time travel twist when it appears that not only has Hakaze spoken to the future, she will die shortly as well. On top of that, it’s looking more and more like the main characters in this series are the villains, set up by the Tree of Genesis who is really hinted to have orchestrated Aika’s murder. It also makes this quite an impressive series in which half the main cast is already dead at the start of the series. You don’t see that often.

Meanwhile the background of this series is getting more and more interesting, combining a lot of fiction together. Destroying the world in order to recreate it without flaws is turning into a cliche right now, but this show uses it well with its back-story. After the incredibly fast-paced Eureka Seven Ao and Un-Go, it’s also interesting to see Bones do another really slow-paced series again and making it work.
Rating: 5/8 (Great)

A romance episode, with the fantastic soundtrack that this series has. That’s quite something different for a change, but boy, was it good. This episode just continued to show the relationship between Mahiro, Yoshino and Aika. The pacing is much slower than I expected after the first episode, but the detail this episode brought in their relationship was really impressive, even without the soundtrack.

The subtle chemistry between the three of them was particularly great: each one of them had something of an edge: the romantic tension between Yoshino and Aika was great in how Aika kept teasing him, the awkwardness between Mahiro and Aika was great, and Yoshino’s mistrust compared to Mahiro’s trust was great too.

And then there is the way in which this series has been building up for the past couple of episodes with a really long background arc, and I must say, that it did this the right way: by making the build-up interesting, and the thing they’re building up for with a lot of potential: at the end of the episode I really couldn’t wait for the story to continue again, and yet I never once got bored during the flashback arc. The third thing that this show needs to do is actually make the build-up worth it. Ah well, that’s up for next week.
Rating: 5.5/8 (Excellent)

This is the episode where Zetsuen no Tempest set itself apart. It already had hints before that its story was very different from the usual, but here this really paid off when suddenly everything is turned upside down.

I mean, before it just seemed that there were a bunch of parties that were all acting independantly. This episode revealed so much connections between the different characters, and all of those connections are different. This episode was full of all sorts of bonds, from alliances to truces; I really liked the diversity.

Especially Mahiro impressed me in this episode, though. His mistrust of Yoshino, combined with how Yoshino seems to trust him completely worked really well in this episode, especially combining the tensions with Aika. It’s an interesting episode to reveal that the two of them were more than just siblings. And as much as I’d like to pull the hate card for doing the not blood-related thing again, they actually chose that relationship themselves, rather than making it some contrived excuse to have incest.

Also, Hakaze actually being the one more likely to destroy the world. Nice twist.
Rating: 5.5/8 (Excelllent)

I must say, this episode found quite an interesting place for its characters to fight: inside an aquarium. They also used this whale skeleton, and I have to say that it’s quite a bit better than “generic street 232”.

But that was not what this episode was really about: it was about the villains. Even though most of the screentime showed the lead characters, it detailed the back-story for this series, who Samus is, what he does, why he left his strongest enemy on an island instead of just killing her, and it’s revealed that he instead just declared her dead.

Also, everything happens for a reason. The show will very likely build further upon this theme for the rest of the series, but for now it’s already quite interesting in the way that the dead girl used to say this. After dying…. this left quite an impression on Yoshino. Also, this may have been me missing something, but has it already been revealed how she died?

At least we now know why he has the hairstyle he has: it’s something she gave to him. Should have seen that coming. I do wonder what happened to his glasses, though. Did he end up wearing contacts?
Rating: 5/8 (Great)

This was a very quiet episode, but it showed much more the strengths of this series: its characters. The action of last week was nice and all, but this time this show was all about the characters and their back-stories, and I just find that much more interesting.

The story between the two leads is quite creative, and it also really shows some of their edges. Mahiro as the kid who grew up always feeling special and violent, Yoshiro as the kid who was quite intelligent and came with smart ideas. While people can change a lot in their transition from kids to teenagers, it still is good to keep establishing their characters like this early on in the series. And I have to admit that especially Yoshiro coming up with the story of Mahiro saving that puppy made me laugh.

What also surprised me about this episode was that the two of them just barged into a house and made use of their supplies. That’s quite… different and unusual for protagonists to do. I mean, Yoshino objected at first, but he happily plundered a fridge there. But then again, by the time people will wake up, everything would probably have spoiled.

Also, commenting on how to cook celery. These are small details, but also bring a ton of character.
Rating: 5/8 (Great)

This was the weakest episode of Zetsuen no Tempest so far, mostly because it was nearly entirely about a big action scene with little else happening, other than getting the two lead characters to stay permanently together and solidifying their goal with the revelation that the killer of the girlfriend/sister is somewhere in the Kusaribe clan.

The reason why the action scenes in the first episodes rocked so much was that there was a lot of stuff happening at the same time. When nearly an entire episode is dedicated to one, there just seems to be something missing. The action itself was pretty nice, albeit a bit dragged out. The one flaw of it was that it tried to be smart, while using coincidences. Yoshino coming up with the idea of tracking someone using blood and healing magic is smart, but afterwards he comes with this crazy plan of hoping for helicopters to attack at the exact right moment. Or take the scenes where they’re running away: they don’t use magic there. It’s all a bit too scripted, unlike the dynamic first two episodes.

But still, the concept of magic in this series has some definite potential. The restrictions this series puts on its characters are great because they put limits on the powers of the characters. This may seem weak at first, but it puts much more complexity at their actions, rather than just having people spam beams over and over until one side goes down.
Rating: 4.5/8 (Good)

As for the shows I’m not going to blog:
– Tonari no Kaibatsu-kun has way too much competition. Beyond the other shoujo series this season, it also has Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo to worry about (I mean: we have a relatively normal lead who falls in love with a character with a huge personality problem, surrounded by a cast of colourful characters, and it’s directed and series composed by two members of the gender opposite of the target audience – it’s pretty much the same premise only shounen!) And with that, it just doesn’t stand out as the most interesting. There is just too little charm for me to keep watching.
– Chuuninbyou demo Koi Shitai is even worse though. With that series, the characters are all trying way too hard to be funny. I know that that’s the premise and all, but that doesn’t make it any more bearable.

Zetsuen no Tempest however is my top pick for this season. Fantastic soundtrack, great plot, great characters, interesting ideas, excellent acting, excellent action, very good animation and the pacing is also pretty damn good. There are more shows this season that have that though. What really sets this show apart is how it manages to bring all of that together. It all just fits, and out of all series this season, it is the best at combining its animation, soundtrack, characters, plot and acting together at the same time for its storytelling.

I really like the characters as well. They are teenagers, but the male lead is quite un-typical in his level-headedness, even quoting macbeth at one point. He’s the center of this story, but beyond that there is much more going on. The action also can be quite smart when it wants to, with the male lead using his cell phone in order to check up on the outside. Okay, it didn’t work, but it was much better than just sticking out his face without knowing what’s going on.

There was one strange moment of illogical decisions though: the point where that woman used gas to smoke out the male lead and drive him to the top of the school building. Her plan succeeds, and he ends up right where she planned him to be… and she just walks right into his trap. Not sure what happened there, but this episode did emphasize human weaknesses a few scenes later. It seems that magic can make anyone superhuman, though anyone without magic still has to obey laws that are more human, as shown from the shock that woman fell in when she nearly crashed to her death, probably also with the help of some G-forces.

Oh, and I still need to gush about the soundtrack of this show. It is just amazing, and this episode showed many tracks that didn’t appear in the first episode, showing that it’s far from a one trick pony.
Rating: 5.5/8 (Excellent)