Category: Red Garden

Great episode, this series stays at the high level of quality it’s been displaying for the past few episode. The mood also was very gloomy, and I loved it. (^^)

The episode starts with Lisa’s funeral. The blonde woman also gives the foursome a red gem, which will make everything about the strange night in which they were supposedly killed clear when it is buried in the soil. Now, the question remains whether to bury it, and a small fight starts. And that’s when I realized another one of the great points of Red Garden: at times, it featured people just talking right through each other. Dialogues like these move extremely fast, but due to the heavy attention to detail, they take quite a while. Quite an interesting and most definitely enjoyable effect.

Okay, in the end, they bury it. It seems that each of the four girls knew Lisa in some way, and there’s a good reason for this. Lisa seemed to have had a new boyfriend, and she invited the girls to show him to them. In there, however, they found Lisa killed in a bathtub, and some strange guys came and stabbed each of the four girls. The blonde woman then came, and revived all five of them, using borrowed life’s. Lisa, however, was kidnapped, it was the same scene we saw in the first episode. This means that she was the only one who didn’t revive. Still, I think that this is only the tip of the iceberg regarding the mysteries of this show.

Another thing I love about this series is that it shows how everybody’s everyday life changed because of the things that happened. Not before long, other people will start to involve themselves with the girls, as each and every one of them has been acting strange and down.

I am LOVING the direction this anime is going. In almost every other anime I’ve seen, whenever characters are put in front of unexpected danger, they’re surprisingly calm. They run away a bit, think quietly about the situation, drink a cup of tea, experiment a bit with their new-found powers and the enemy’s gone. Though in Red Garden, this is not the case. The girls really have to struggle for their lives, they’re scared, they shake. If this keeps up, Red Garden is going to be awesome. ^^

I love the diverse cast of characters. There’s only one girl who really has had experience in fights. The others clearly have never fought at all. Target tries to run away, though her courage fails her at times, especially when she’s the monster’s target, Kate tries to help others and ends up getting bitten and Rose is just plain hopeless with situations like these.

Another thing I really like was the singing scene. For what seems to be one of the first times ever, plain high school girls don’t suddenly have the same singing voice of a J-Pop idol. And their voices actually sound full of despair. It’s a great job done by the voice-actors. Still, a lot of people seem to be turned off by it. Is it that important to hear J-Pop idols sing all of the songs? Same with the graphics. The reason most people don’t check out this series is because the art is out of the ordinary. I find it beautiful, though I’ve read on a fair number of other blogs that the art was a major turnoff. Do characters really have to be the same style for every anime out there?

Especially the aftermath was great to see. Four normal girls are actually being forced to engage in life-threatening situations. They seem to have special powers, but they don’t have any experience at all. If they refuse, their lives get taken away for certain. The looks on their faces when they heard this was amazingly beautiful.

Still, I’m wondering how the series will be continuing. If I recall correctly, Red Garden will have 24 episodes. It’s clear that over time, the girls will get more and more experience, and learn to use their powers better. I’m wondering how the creators will manage to keep this anime interesting, as the girls will probably end up getting used to the fact that they’re being used.

(Edit: urgh… this will be another one of those horrible anime to screencap, as most of the interesting scenes seem to be playing at night… )