To be honest, I am not sure yet which series I’m going to blog or not this season. I still need to make up my mind on that. Still, I feel like doing another kaleidoscope this season. Giving a small commentary on every episode I watch is going to be impossible, so instead I’m going to blog a different series each week, and on top of that I’ll cover the episodes that really stand out or catch my attention.
A fitting start would be the transition for Saint Seiya from its first half into its second half, because there are some really weird decisions made here… First though, about the conclusion of the first half: the animators really went all out for that, and I really like that. The story was cliched, but the really good animation and atmosphere really brought that to life and I love how much freedom they got for it.
And then… this happened. As I’ve said before, I was really looking forward to this because it shows the return of the Heartcatch Precure director. This is a guy who also directed Interlude, which was a really weird OVA that did have its flashes of brilliance, and I think that that’s what describes this first episode of Saint Seiya Omega’s new arc for me.
Because holy crap, who came up with that new character? What is this walking cliche doing, just forcing himself into the middle of the story, right from out of nowhere with that stupid outfit of his? I guess now that Koga has grown up the creators needed a new immature character to balance things out and all, but couldn’t he have been a bit more likable and less cliched? I mean, this is a cliche that only really bad sequels pull in order to drag out their storylines even more.
That’s not to say I hated this episode, but the weird thing is that I liked it for really weird reasons. I mean… that butler! I have no idea who he is, but I really felt sorry for him! The part where Seiya failed to kill that girl? I liked that a lot. That one golden saint? His speech about how shallow his own powers are really got to me.
And then on the other hand you have the animation that clearly had its shortcuts taken, including really cheesy transformation sequences (I know that there is a background from Heartcatch Precure here, but you don’t HAVE to include them, you know?). And then Koga just went and randomly pulled that giant unicorn out of his ass… So yeah, all in all this has me quite baffled on how it will turn out…
Rating: #%!*/8 (???)
You and me. To be honest, some of my favorite tokusatsu and “hero” shows have started off with baffling premises and characters that made me want to vomit, but then turned into amazing series after I got used to their weird cliches and they evolved their ideas with depth and power. Kamen Rider Ryuuki, for instance (horrible 3DCG and “transformation” sequences that made me think the previous two seasons were more technilogically advanced), became my favorite Kamen Rider series once I realized what it was doing. To think I almost stopped watching Kamen Rider because of the first few episodes…
the butler(Tatsumi) was here during the 2 first episode of Omega, it’s the Personal butler of Saori/Athena.
During the original series he have whipped an 8 years kid during an entire night(The Pheonix saint) just because this kid have made him a fool. (the 86 anime was really more violent, it was the most violent anime show of his time)
But Tatsumi is also a joke character.
Actually Nagamine, the director also worked of the Saint seiya Hades sanctuary made in 2002 under the direction of shigeyasu Yamauchi (he made 3 episode and the opening)
look his work on the opening
http://youtu.be/9-79Tmla-G0
for the bad animation of this episode, the animation will be worse in the season than during the first, 2 of the best animator of this show don’t work animore of the series (Umakoshi is not anymore neither charadesigner nor chief animation director because he work on the future second season of Mushishi and Takahashi is on Doki Doki Precure)
Actually, the beginning with Seiya/Pallas is the only thing I like in this average episode
For the transformation scenes, it was in saint seiya in the 1986 show, it’s absolutely needed for the fans of the original series (but actually my favorites was the one from the season one of Omega)
look:
http://youtu.be/tsK0R3z_q7s
http://youtu.be/VG4q5EyHEN0
http://youtu.be/TsJP6_l6rbA
as a fellow fan of the original series, I thank you. I got nothing to add
“And then Koga just went and randomly pulled that giant unicorn out of his ass… So yeah, all in all this has me quite baffled on how it will turn out…”
The giant pegasus is called a totem, that is how armors used to be stored before Abzu transformed them into crystals.
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120403004916/saintseiya/es/images/a/a5/Armadura_de_Leo.jpg
And as Kraken says, in the original series Tatsumi was an asshole, so to have him protecting Koga is a way of showing he has become a better person.
actually, there was still totem in Omega. remember the gold cloth. The crystal are more the pandora box than the totem
Yeah, I forgot that part.
I like how Seiya keeps delivering his lines in an epic tone, while everyone else speaks normally.
The armor objects (or totems) and the Pandora boxes are part of the Saint Seiya universe and should never have disappeared, like in Omega S1. I´m glad they realized their mistake and fixed it. Also, the armors are bulkier now, resembling the original series.
I think you’re thinking too much like an old fan unable to accept evolution in the series.
We are not anymore in the 80’s
I grew with saint seiya, but when I see it now many thing in it was pretty stupid and the animation was really bad.
The idea to change the design and supressing the pandora box was not bad. the crystal have much more advantage than pandora box.
It’s much more easy to travel with it, to hide you are a saint…
And the design of Omega S1 were here to give better animation as Omega is a low budget series (not like Precure).
The new design can seems more saint seiya (actually, if the Pallasite have good design, the new bronze cloth is awful, far worst than the one from season one, same thing for the totem who looks like Pokemon), c’est always make the animation worse than during season one.
The episode 52 and 53 have very bad drawing and animation.
I love the 86 anime, but I think the choic make for the season 2 are bad. Really bad.
And except Nagamine the staff of the season 2 is bad.
The new writer is Yoshimi Narita, a very bad writer who made the worse season of precure while Reiko Yoshida was a really good writer.
The new chara designer have made really bad new design for the bronze and uninspired design for the pallasite (they are just like hades warriors), It a designer who never made other thing than copying Shingo Araki.
The new animation director is a beginner who never animted an episode before saint seiya Omega (she just assisted to animate the worse Precure movie) while Umakoshi was a genius
And Now the Pandora´s box is back. I like how they make fun of the steel saint, for not being real saints. A nod to the fans I guess.
The bee guy was cool, colourful, but I´m getting tired of insect based clothes.