Okay, screw what I said in episode 9. This series rocks, and that episode was just an example of a bad episode, not a bad series. El Cazador is probably the most bashed series of the spring-season, due to the fact that most people stick with it, even though they don’t like it. Still, I’m appreciating this series more and more, the suspense and mystery are excellent, and I love how each episode develops the small storylines that all centre around Ellis bit by bit. I think the problem with most people is that they’re all comparing it to Noir. To be honest, Noir suffered from its repetitive format in my opinion. El Cazador is handling this quite a bit better, due to all the different storylines and characters. Another great strength of El Cazador, in my opinion, is its impact. Most of the airtime is light-hearted, but there definitely are dark elements in the storyline and history. It’s always nice, waiting for these dark moments to appear, making their impact bigger than in just any other series which constantly tries to get darker and darker. The incredible music also really helps in this. The current episode was really worth watching, even without the chance of seeing half of the cast with nekomimi-ears. ^^; The story this time resembles the third arc of Ghost Hunt. A woman pretending to have psychic powers makes it big, and then gets discovered. A few years later, she came to a village, and she successfully made the villagers believe that she was a psychic who preached for the god Chappi, who in fact turned out to be her dead cat. It’s surprising how this anime doesn’t pay any attention to the topics that are usually addressed by other anime when they deal with an episode where a person forces others into a religion. In fact, Nadie and Ellis never really criticise the fact that she deceives, and in stead the episode mostly focuses on the woman herself, and the pain she had to go through. People started to see her as a witch when she was young. It’s also interesting that she does have one power: reading memories. We also see her begging Ellis to stay with her, as Ellis is a girl who does have real powers, it’d be natural for her to indeed cling to her. We also see her do something quite interesting: make a phone call with a certain “White House”, where she plans to tell them all about Ellis. Okay, she gets executed before she can meet them, but still, why would she do such a thing? Anyway, this episode also introduces some new important characters: the ones who shot down this woman, and their superiors. I believe that they’re on the side of Blue-eyes, and the reason for them to appear probably is because Blue-Eyes sent them the information she got from Rozenberg’s desk. This was actually quite a difficult episode to understand, especially since these guys like to use big words, and they never really showed their intentions, they just spoke of them, like what usually happens in El Cazador. This makes it really difficult to understand, I may have to rewatch this episode subbed. Despite this, though, I loved the climax, which showed a bit more of when Ellis killed the professor. Apparently, he had a gift for her, and she shot right through it. It was also interesting when Ellis looked at the pictures of some witch-hunts. Regarding the other characters, LA is back, and Ricardo and Lilio still keep following Ellis and Nadie, though their role is minimal in this episode. Rozenberg, meanwhile, gets back from his trip to the desert, while he spots Blue-Eyes with the intentions to go there, based on the things she found in his office.]]>
Hm.. I’m newbie..
honestly i never heard about all of ur manga review…
It’s quite plausible for you to have never heard of my manga reviews, since I don’t do them. All you see on this site is anime. 😉
This episode was what an episode around #5 should’ve been, not 11. IMHO.
Up til now I’ve been following the show only because of my love for (Kajiura and) the other beetrain “Girls with Guns” – especially MADLAX, which, while definitely slow, did not have a single filler other than episode 1. So far El Cazador is way more fillerish than MADLAX, and closer to NOIR with its episodic format – this episode however, fills me with hope that the series might still be as good as the last 2 shows.
I suppose it’s a matter of taste. For example, you seem to have enjoyed Jigoku Shoujo’s episodic format, while to me ~almost~ every single episode was the same as the last.
I’m not saying that the music is bad or anything but isn’t it slightly underwhelming…? I expected so much more from Kajiura. Kajiura should team up with other studios instead of sticking with Beetrain filling each still scene with great music, it feels overdone really. Sunrise and Kajiura worked so well together hope other studios pick up the trend.
i liked the way u described the episode…makes me wanna watch , i think i’ll wait for starlight relese since i’m not that good at japanese but anyways thanks for the review
interesting that you hate episode 9 so much,i loved it lol,of the girls with guns trilogy,this one may turn out to be my favorite,and yes,i guess it’s a matter of taste,i have a tendency to like slow episodic animes (see ergo proxy and gunslinger girl)
I am a newbie as far as posting, but i read your blog regularly.
I personally, love this show. For me, its a change of pace and i quite enjoy that it doesn’t take itself too seriously, but is sinister nonetheless. I can’t wait to see how this series progresses.
Thanks for the episode recaps.
Maybe it was the professor that was going to shoot Ellis through the present and she had to stop him with her powers.. This anime is awesome, so enigmatic and slow..long live it! 🙂
Thanks for your comments!
true that episode wanes soo good ..