Short Synopsis: The party returns to Kurogane’s homeland
Episode Rating: 6/10 (Disappointing)
Wait, wut? Did I miss something here? Did some sort of extra OVA get released half a year ago without me knowing anything about it or something? What the heck happened here… when the episode started airing, the characters were suddenly surrounded by Fye’s magic for God knows what kind of reason, Kurogane chops off his own arm from out of nowhere, they then somehow end up in Kurogane’s home country and Fye starts having flashbacks of things that never actually happened…
My best guess would be that the makers of the anime decided to screw the continuity and just went animating a random chapter that coincides with the current xxxHolic Shunmuki OVA. With the OVA format, it’s of course much easier to make the cross-overs between the two, but that’s no excuse for simply omitting an entire storyline here. I was really looking forward to seeing Fye meet the guy who was out to kill him, and here they just unceremoniously kill the guy off in a bunch of mere seconds.
So yeah, Tsubasa Chronicle is a complete mess in terms of continuity. Right now, it’s clear that Bee-Train wanted to go for its own storyline. While the second season may have been seen as a bunch of fillers, it was clearly building up to something that wasn’t in the manga’s continuity. My guess is that they knew that the manga wouldn’t have ended at the end of the third season, so they went with their own direction, which might have been a success or a complete flop, we’ll never know. In any case, Clamp didn’t like others messing with their storyline and wanted a faithful adaptation, so they turned to Production IG, who also made the xxxHolic TV-series. It’s of course understandable that they’d have to pick up at the last point where Bee-Train did follow through the manga, but I really hate how they basically went “screw the people who have only seen the anime, we’re here for the manga fans”. This mighty be an awesome episode for those who read the manga, but since I’ve never read it, I just find it lazy.
This episode did have plenty of interesting stuff, though. While the animation wasn’t as good as Tokyo Revelations, the xxxHolic crossovers were definitely interesting to see. My only fear with this is the role that Watanuki is going to play in it. Every character in Tsubasa Chronicle seems to be a superhuman fighting machine without any sense of pain (look at Kurogane cutting off his own arm without even flinching, or nobody being freaked out or startled by it, or how Syaoran got impaled multiple times through the heart and chest but seems to be completely fine), so I wonder what Watanuki really can do with all these superhumans around him without becoming a superhuman himself.
This WAS for the manga fans. Why do you think they sold it WITH the manga. It’s the anime version of the volume. And to hell with Bee-Train, they fuck up the anime so bad.
LOL They skipped two major arcs – Infinity and Ceres – the fallout of Tokyo and everyone getting over it and all of Fai’s backstory (how Fai isn’t exactly Fai but Fai’s twin brother Yuui).
Kurogane sacrificed his arm so that Yuui would live.
The anime was very faithfull to the manga, that last arc aside. It’s only problem was that they toned and dumbed everything down to target it at 7-yr old girls, so I’m glad CLAMP stopped it. The Tokyo/Infinity/Ceres part of the story was very bloody and disturbing…
Ehh… Realy, read the manga.) It’s beautiful, captivating and you will find a lot of things they “accidently” missed in the anime. For example – that Bee-Train trashed not only the story, but the whole setting (IMHO, of course). They can do good job, just here they didn’t.
well if you complain because they are going for the manga readers then you should read the manga. I was totally ticked when they ditched the crossovers. I have been reading both Tsubasa and XXX holic at the same time, its a blast. The story is awesome in both manga. XXXholic anime is pretty good. I just wish they didn’t fudge up Tsubasa. It just rocks. In the scale of priorities, Manga trumps Anime in this one. If the Manga is that good leave it alone. It would be like Jackson messing with the story of Lord of the rings and changing the ending to have them fail. Though that would be interesting, you don’t do it.
Well, I was really sad too that they did not go for the Celes and Infinity arc especially after I want to more Fai’s story being animated. However, I was still happy because at least there was Tomoyo. I’m a huge fan of Tomoyo so seeing her again was nice.
“so they went with their own direction, which might have been a success or a complete flop, we’ll never know. ”
You mean most fans going this is absolute crap and CLAMP themselves changing studios wasn’t enough of an indication for you it flopped?
well, the makes doesen’t have to make the arcs of each, since the OADs are extra from the manga and they al know what happened before all this. if you watching it without knowledge its your fault. and watanuki is and very important person (manga readers knows why) and i’m very happy to see him with syaoran. and don’t worry, he goes in the next episode, so he doesen’t need to fight the superhumans. sry for my bad english~
glad that we finally get to see some manga-related crossovers between tsubasa and xxxholic.
have to agree with the others who have commented. this OAV is for those who have read the manga, NOT for those who have watched the anime only.
after all, the manga’s storyline is a lot stronger than the train-wreak of a storyline that happened in season 2.
I haven’t watched the manga, but I’ve read the background on wikipedia, so I’ll be able to understand what’s going on. What I’m really hoping for, is for them to make an OVA of the missing arcs.
Btw this wasnt released a half year ago as far as i know it got released mar 17.
And this was certainly for the manga fans and im glad they made this one because the manga story is much better then the weak one of the 2nd season. I do hope they make an OVA of the missing arcs though (just for the sake of completion)
It’s far from what I’ve been expecting, I don’t know why but I didn’t like this first ep, manga or not.
me aburro no entiendo nada
Okay. The explanation as to why the OVA is for the manga fans only:
CLAMP asked magazine subscribers what arc they wanted to see animated the most. The Tsubasa Chronicle anime got ditched because Japanese fans ditched it themselves. Tsubasa is, of course, most popular in Japan, and what popularity wants, they get. Thus, CLAMP got the feedback that most people wanted the Japan Arc animated next. And so what happened? Well, lookey here. XD This is not Ohkawa’s fault, for once, though she could’ve said something against it and didn’t (to my knowledge). Their editor thought up the idea (he’s like, their best friend, so why not?).
I love the Tsubasa manga, I’m a big fan but I was really dissapointed when the OVA’s came out. The chapters I most wanted to see come to life were the Fai/Yuui story and they completely bypassed it. It’s without a doubt the most memorable part of the whole series. I’m just going to hold on to the hope that CLAMP desides to come out with another set of OVA’s covering what they missed. And then maybe you’d like these ones better because you might get what’s going on.