Category: Anime Reviews

What do you get when you cross Trigun with Hellsing? Right, Trinity Blood. It plays in a futuristic-like setting, in which both Humans and Vampires (or rather Terrans and Methuselahs) live, but in which social rankings still remain very important.

The story of Trinity Blood rapidly changes from extremely good to extremely bad. Some episodes are unbelievably well thought out. Everything fits, and the plots leave you guessing all the time. At other times, however, the show leans a bit too much on using random coincidences and copies too much from Trigun.

The first half of the episodes feature father Abel Nightroad engaging in a couple of missions, each time accompanied with different side-characters. Some of these episodes may be a bit too complicated to follow. Other, however, were very interesting to see, especially when you were barely able to completely follow the plot, it was great to see all the different surprises.

The second half of the show, the missions begin to connect a bit more to each other, but they also take much longer than before. This may indeed become a bit boring, but the endings of each of those missions are magnificent and they will blow you off your chair. Then we have the ending itself. It consists of the last half of the last episode. I hate to say it, but it felt a bit incomplete. There are so many questions left unanswered. So many things yet to be solved. There was also a bit too much unneccesary action in the ending, which really could have been done better.

The different characters that Trinity Blood features are great. I’m especially a big fan of all the different members of the Vatican, but also the new characters introduced around the later episodes work great. Each of them has some kind of unique thread, which makes them interesting to watch. Their part was also the reason that the ending didn’t resolve in a total disaster. The first half of the last episode featured the side-characters in action. I totally loved this. Not even a second was wasted on it and each of the characters showed their utter best. Then the goodness ended and predictability began, unfortunately.

Although most of the characters were wonderful in this anime. There’s one character that just does NOT fit in this show: Esther. Somehow the creators took a liking in her, so they decided to give most of the screentime to her, instead of the side-characters. This is such a pity, because now that I think back a bit, I realize that almost all of the lesser moments of this anime featured her in one way or another.

The graphics in this anime look amazing. Especially the CG is top notch. The background music is nice to hear, but it’s not really anything special, or something. It’s just decent.

Overall, it was a very nice series to watch. Unfortunately, one character had to ruin it.

Why you should watch this: If you liked Trigun and Hellsing, or you are a fan of complicated plots, then you will like this anime.

Welcome, and say hello to the anime with the most wicked battle choreography ever. I have no idea why I didn’t decide to blog this. It’s mostly because at the time I started watching this show I felt that I was blogging too many series already. Anyway, this is a series that’s recieving waaaay to little publicity than it deserves. So many awesome stuff happens, I don’t know where to start.

Apparently, this is the second season of a show called Jubei-chan: The Ninja-Girl. I also didn’t know this until they started making references to it in the third episode. Anyway, she is sort of a magical-ninja-sword-girl, who uses an eye-patch shaped like a heart in order to transform into the reïncarnation of a sword-master who lived 300 years ago. This season, another girl, wearing an eye-patch with the shape of spades, arrives, claiming that Jubei’s eye-patch is hers. Apart from that, there are some other guys who bear the grudge against the sword-master, and also have been waiting for 300 years, and also want to beat her.

I know, it sounds horribly cliché. This anime, however, manages to make something beautiful out of this.

The power of this anime lies in the fact that it manages to utilize contrasts perfectly. Each and every character has a minimum of two very distinct moods. Mostly a hyperactive one and a serious one. By first showing the hyperactive side of the characters, the impact of the serious sides of these characters (when they get shown) becomes huge. This is also one fo the few anime in which I really like the main character. She is an amazing person, but in the end, you’ll feel sympathy for each and every one of the different character. Even the ones who seemed to only have been inserted for comic relief.

The battles are also the most amazing ones I’ve ever seen. Finally there’s an anime which realizes that power doesn’t win battles, but skills. And that’s what the characters fighting have: skills. Everyone moves so fast, it’s almost impossible to keep track.

That doesn’t mean that this show is entirely consisted of battles. Most battle usually take just five minutes, in which the show accomplishes what most anime wouldn’t even dare to try. The rest of the time is filled with some of the most amazing aftermaths, with one aftermath even taking up as long as four episodes.

I haven’t even started talking about the comedy yet. Although it’s not the best comedy ever and some misses it’s place, when the comedy works, it really works. I can’t believe how utterly creative some of the jokes are (sometimes perfectly integrated with the battles, other times just the characters being extremely wacky).

Overal, this is an amazing series. The characters are amazing, the battles are amazing, the dialogue is amazing, and don’t forget the catchy soundtrack.

Why you should watch this: if you like wicked battles, heavy drama, or just a good show, then you should watch this.

Final Rating: 89/100

This another one of those typical shounen series. With long fights, hugely powerful people and, of course, a male protagonist. I kept watching for the first ten episodes, just because the world, setting and magic system the creators created for this anime is hilarious. Every single nickname of every single warrior is horribly clichéd. So much that it actually becomes funny (for example, the strongest fighter in the kingdom named himself Scarface). When special martial arts techniques are executed, not only do the people executing them say the technique names once or twice, it also appears in huge lettters on the screen, in order to make sure that the viewer knows the name of the moves (which make no sense, by the way). The magic system is even more hilarious. Magic is sealed in cards, and when those cards are summoned, the cards start talking with an excessively overdramatic voice, telling who they are and what they do ("I am a flame! I scorch my enemies!"). When I saw these for the first time, I really couldn’t stop lauging.

This series surprised me even more when around the tenth episode, an actual story began to form, which is very rare among most shounen series. We saw some really interesting character interactions, motives and developments. Unfortunately, there were still the extremely long fights and sometimes, the scenes became a bit too dramatic, which didn’t do the series any good. The ending, also was (as expected) a horrible mess.

The character art itself looks a bit messy, and mostly typical for a shounen anime. I didn’t really care for it. EXCEPT when a character was either extremely beat down, or full of despair. At these moments, the creators managed to produce some of the most awesome-looking images ever, which really grab you, and take a while to let go. The music in this show is also awesome. The tunes realy give a reason to sit through the battles, and they really set the mood for the anime.

Why you should watch this: if you’re into shounen anime, you should watch this. But this is also a few good laughs worth for the ones who love shounen-parodies.

This is the sequel of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, another anime I really liked. The series starts out pretty decent. A new enemy appears, who defeats Nanoha in a fight. The premisse of another one of those action series.

Well, those predictions get totally trashed into the ground by the next following episodes. The creators managed to create the most amazing person for the "antagonist" of the show, and the other bad guys have some of the most depth ever seen. Especially the middle episodes are just too sad to watch, and they only get better and better as the story unravels.

But yeah, with a show like this, there was no way for the ending to be not predictable, and yes, the last two episodes indeed seem to go right the way you suspected it. Still, the creators manage to make something decent out of it.

The characters, as I’ve already said, are extremely well developed. The main characters may look a bit like other main characters, but all the other characters totally make up for it (after all, Nanoha already got her screentime in the first season, so now it’s time for the other characters to shine, the creators made the right choice for that).

As for the graphics and sound department, this show certainly delivers. The art looks great, the character art is extremely cute and the CG looks amazing. If you however, compare it to the prequel, it’s very hard to see any improvements in it. You would expect that the creators would put a bit more time in the show to make the graphics even better. The music also is wondeful, fitting each and every scene. Well, almost every scene. The ED and the commercial tune really break all of the tension the series had been building up. That is a bit of a pity.

Why you should watch this: If you like cute character art, a heavy dose of morality and furthermore a great story, then you should watch this.

Paradise Kiss doesn’t really rely on heavy cliffhangers or tensions. It’s mostly a love story, with people acting, a couple of unstabilities in the relationships, with all of it revolving around a fashon show. The show just has one climax, at the second last-episode, but apart from that, it’s just a very laid-back anime, focused on character interaction, no more, no less.

Some people may enjoy this, but I became a bit frustrated by it. The only reason I kept watching was because of the amazing OP and ED. I was looking forward to them every time I watched the anime. But I guess these kinds of shows don’t really appeal to me. The first episode was also a bit delusional, as there are a lot of wacky things going on, which had me smirking quite a few times. This really gave the impression that we’re dealing with some kind of love-comedy. Well, the comedy stopped entirely after the beginning of the second episode.

Overall, it had its interesting moments. The climax was really enjoyable to watch, the character art is different than other anime, but it looks awesome, and the ending deserves a few thumbs up. I’m just not the type of viewer who enjoys these kinds of love-shows, and twelve episodes long may have been a bit too much.

Why you should watch this: If you’re into fashon or romance shows, then this is the anime you should watch.

Shuffle! is another one of those popular harem shows. According to a lot of people it’s one of the better ones. The setting is a modern-like world, but in which the gods and the devils have made contact with the humans. This doesn’t really have an huge influence on the storyline though, except for creating the excuse to include some magic in the show.

The show is basically one guy who gets to have five different girls around him, who are all in love with him. The first half of the series shows us a peaceful pacing, with Rin and the others just having fun with each other. In the second half of the anime, each of the important characters gets their own airtime to reveal, explore and solve their own storylines, with Rin, of course, in the middle. I was very amused when I noticed one episode entirely devoted to two unimportant side-characters.

The problem with this anime is that all goes a bit too easy, and there are lot of events who need some kind of reason, but are based on coincidence. While other events with a reason were better off based on coincidences. Also, the fact that the characters keep telling Rin that they love him gets annoying after a while. Sure once is okay. But ten times, per episode, per character really is a bit too much.

About the individual stories of each of the characters. Some were very interesting, while others a bit disappointing. I also felt that the climax already came in episode 20. The climax itself was extremely awesome, but it did make the last four episodes seem like some sort of epilogue. The story presented in the last three episodes didn’t have the power of episode twenty, and it’s also very predictable. I also felt that, at the epiloge of episode 24, the only one who changed in comparison to episode 21 was Primula, while her role was extremely small during that period.

This show, of course, also has lots of good points. Each of the characters act very natural among most circumstances, and it’s enjoyable to watch the whole bunch just having fun with each other. The side characters all have something unique in them, so that’s something to watch out for. The drama moments are also mostly greatly executed. Overall, it was a decent watch.

Why you should watch this: If you’re into fanservice and cute girls, you will like this.

What we have here, is a movie that takes place 1000 years into the future. The phenomena called the sea of decay, a huge forest full of highly toxic plants who breathe out poisonous gasses and which is swarmed with huge insects, has devoured a great part of the earth. What do humans generally do when they face this kind of crisis? Right. Declare war on the insects and on each other. The insects, however, have proved to be unstoppable when attacking with millions at a time. The main character, Nausicaa (hence the title) is against all of this, loves each and every insect and is opposed to killing in any way.

This movie works pretty well. The great thing about this, is that you won’t be able to tell which ones are the real bad guys. Everyone and everything in the movie, except for Nausicaa perhaps, does some evil deeds, however, all of them have very good reasons to do so. Everyone is a victim of each other. This movie portrays it perfectly. It’s great to see Nausicaa trying to calm each and every stakeholder in this.

The movie starts out a quiet, and it takes about fifteen minutes to get into it. From that point, the tension rises by every scene. No scene feels that it’s draggin on too much. About halfway through the movie, the illusion is given that the main "bad guy", if you can call her that, will learn her lessons and stop hurting the insects. By not fulfilling this illusion, the creators just made me more curious about how this crisis was to be solved. I also foun it brilliant that the main power of the bad guys never actually gets used to its fullest powers. You rarely see that these days. I appreciated it.

Anyway, from the middle of the anime, almost all the boundaries of good and bad are shifted, until they’re shattered at the climax. Each and every character develops thoughout this period. Some may not seem so obvious, but if you pay close attention, you may notice it. The climax itself has been brilliantly done, and for a moment, it does seem that all hope is lost. The ending has been done decently, although it feels a bit rushed.

After seeing this movie, I found out that this movie ahs huge religious themes. I can’t help to agree with that statement. After thinking about it, this movie flows with all sorts of Christian and Messiah-like references.

Why you should watch this: If you have the time to watch a good movie, and aren’t bothered by the really old-looking character design, then you definately have to watch this.

Fruits Basket, the concept of a family in which the members turn into an animal of the chinese zodiac when they hug a member of the opposite sex. There isn’t really a story holding this together. Just the main person living her live alongside the family, and meeting different family members. Still this works out pretty well.

The power of Fruits Basket lies in the fact that it’s excellent in creating and developing characters. Each one of the huge cast has something unique and even an extremely well developed story of his/her own. This goes along with the incredible writing talents of the writers, which give birth to some of the most impressive speeches seen in anime.

This show also has a healthy dose of comedy stuffed in it. It works pretty well, mostly in the first thirteen episodes. At the second half the jokes become a bit more forced and repetitive, unfortunately.

One thing that turned me off a bit is that in the second half, some characters are introduced just for the heck of it and to fill up some episodes. It just felt like they had nothing to do with the main characters. I would’ve liked to have seen a bit more of the other ones.

Why you should watch this: if you like heavy drama with lots of very interesting characters, then you should watch this.

I’m watching more anime than just the ones I’m blogging. I will be trying to provide a small review once I finish them. I’ll probably do the same with the anime that I already finished before, although it will take a loooong time for me to do so…

Anyway, what we have here, is a typical fantasy story. It starts out with a decent above-average story, with a few special elements, but it still comes down to girl’s in trouble, main hero tries to save her, evil guy tries to stop them. Then, once the second half of the anime enters, one plot twist entirely changes your view of the entire story. From there on, the anime continues with a truly captivating story, that will surely make you feel along with the characters.

This anime mainly is an action/drama series, with a healthy dose of comedy thrown in. The comedy does really work, especially with the two nosy brothers who keep causing troubles. There is just the problem that this anime also tries to be cute at some moments (for example the blue dog-like creature who gets introduced in the show). This doesn’t work.

Most of the main characters have been developed excellently. You can exactly see why they did what they did, but still you can’t predict them. You’ll even feel with some of the less important characters of the show. I do, unfortunately, have to say that the two characters always travelling along with Orpen can get annoying at times. True, they do have their genious moments, but at some times they only seem like thrown in for comic relief that doesn’t work.

This story certainly has its creative moments. Mostly in the story and comedy department. Especially at the second half of the anime, the story is like nothing I’ve ever seen. Do also not miss the episodes devoted to comedy. I’ll assure you: you’ll have some good laughs.

Why you should watch this anime: if you like fantasy stories, you will definately like Orphen.

P.S. Yes, if you look at the score of this anime, you’ll see that my standards are really low. This is the table to which I’m holding myself:
0…10: A worthless piece of garbage.
10…20: Has no good points, you should never watch this.
20…30: Only watch this if you’re bored.
40…50: Has a lot of flaws, but maybe some good points.
50…60: Decent anime, but still very flawed.
60…70: Average to good anime. I’d recommend it.
70…80: Anime with some extremely good points. I really like these
80…90: These are so awesome, I’d keep on muttering about them.
90…100: These are the anime that make me go crazy. They are the best anime ever, and with very good reasons.
You may ask why I’m saving so much room for the good anime. Well, I want the good anime to have some extra attention they deserve. Some people all rate their favourite anime between 9.0 and 10.0. I’m finding this extremely subjective. When do you know what’s your favourite anime? Is it the one with the 10.0 rating, or the other ten ones with the 10.0 ratings, which may have been 9.0 as well?