Now this is more like it! This episode was much better than the first one. I still have a lot of problems with it, but at least the music has become much better. The amount of new plot-twists is also baffling. In one episode, the plot has been pushed forward as much as the original TV-series did in 52 episodes. Still, I don’t yet consider the Tsubasa Chronicle OVA to be better than the series.
That doesn’t mean that the series didn’t have its problems, though. What was Bee-Train thinking, putting such a dark story in the NHK-channel? I now also finally understand the reason why so many fillers were added. Bee-Train knew that there was no way to put some key-moments in this arc on the air, so they decided to just go with their own story and do what they were good at.
For me, the biggest problem with this episode is that it was really far-fetched. The battle underwater was already pushing my suspense of disbelief (how long can people hold in their breath anyway? And how can these guys flawlessly fight each other, just as easily as if they were on land), but that turned out to be just the tip of the ice-berg.
So, basically Syaoran was already as a kid a very talented magician. In there, he created a clone and gave this clone his eye. The task of this clone was to collect the feathers that would come out of Sakura in about ten years. In order to prepare for that, the clone-Syaoran got his eye sealed and moved to the clow-country where he made friends with Sakura, and later fell in love with her. For some reason beyond me, the original Syaoran was sealed away by Fei Wong, but he could see everything that the clone-Syaoran did.
To make things even more complicated, Syaoran is supposed to be a descendant of Clow Reed. Sakura is also the daughter of some king of the Clow-country, which gives us many hints that she too is a descendant of Clow Reed. It’s strange to think that I spent more than 52 episodes watching some very strange kind of incest-relationship… Also, Fei Wong turned out to be yet another descendant of Clow Reed, hinting that he’s either Syaoran’s father or some kind of uncle.
In any case, while clone-Syaoran is fighting under water, Fye jumps in and just starts using his magic from out of nowhere, even though he vowed not to use magic without his tattoo. Clone Syaoran then BITES the guy’s eye out, which turn out to be the source of his power. Strangely enough, Syaoran gains Fye’s powers by eating Fye’s eye. Syaoran’s powers, by the way, also increased greatly with this. Apparently, the seal on his eye was broken at this point (don’t ask me how or why), and now he’s strong enough to even pwn Kurogane.
In the meantime, the real Syaoran was helped by Xing-Huo (who was punished by Fei Wong afterwards (read: killed)), goes to Yuuko and is teleported to the Clone Syaoran. The two fight, but Clone-Syaoran is now much stronger than the real one due to Fye’s magic.
The feather turned out to be in the middle of a cocoon, in the middle of the pool. Apparently, this was the thing that kept the clean water flowing. Somehow, Sakura’s soul ended up in that cocoon. When Sakura’s body got near the cocoon, it disappeared, and I guess it ended up in the cocoon as well. She then prevents the real Syaoran from killing the clone-one. Clone Syaoran then cuts up yet another cocoon and the feather comes out. He gives it to Sakura and then walks off on his own, leaving her. Kamui, who I guess was unconscious for this time, magically reappears and pulls a person out of this cocoon. Apparently, this person was the reason why he was so protective of the water, and he’s glad that this person is okay. Seriously, the next episode has some real explanation to do, because both subplots need a lot of explanation to make sense to me. The more I think about it, the more questions I have. You can say a lot of Bee-Train, but at least they managed to make sure that everything in the tv-series made sense. Was the manga also so incredibly confusing at this point?
Oh, and there’s one character that I’ve really disliked in the new OVA: Sakura. Oh, how deep did she fall. First, she sleeps for more than an entire episode, then she wakes up, goes “Syaoran! Syaoran!”, gets overwhelmed by the new Syaoran, and falls asleep again. I seriously liked the lovable heroine from the TV-series much better.
…so they decided to just go with their own story and do what they were good at.
I wouldn’t call filler-land what they are good at, but okay.
Nope. The Manga wasn’t confusing to me during this part of the Tokyo arc, but I’ve got to admit, it came as an utter shock.
It seems the OVA is primarily targetted at fans who have read the Manga or fans who have some sort of slightly comprehensive understanding on what is happening in the canon Tsubasa world. There was that gap in the Anime after all, where they stuffed in a filler and ended with that filler whereas the Manga continued with the Tokyo arc immediately after the Record arc. The OVA story may either be OMGWTFBBQ!! awesome or downright plain rushed and confusing, the latter case probably to fans who are familiar with the series by watching the Anime only. Still, it always depends on an individual’s preference. 🙂
Well, in any case, this OVA gets more than a double thumbs up from me because of how faithful it stayed to the original (despite a few deviations). Ohkawa-sensei is a legend when she’s in charge of script and screenplay. ^^
Ok, the eye eating is the same as the heart. IF the power was condensed in the eyeballs, then Clone absorbed it by eating.
As for descendants of Clow – for all we know there might be TWO Clows. One from Yuuko’s world and one of Clow Country.
For holding their breath – Kamui does not need it. You know, being vampire and all. As for clone – he was struggling due to the water first, but when his “clone” self reappeared, it did not matter – he latter got his hand broken by kurogane and it did not matter to him. So even if his lungs are full of water, Clone would continue to function, like a living terminator, i guess. Clone is able to use the “body” to the full capabilities, with no fear that something(muscles, etc) will break.
And the Clone was created by FWR, not Syaoran. But Syaoran succeeded in messing up FWR’s plans a bit by placing his OWN eye into which he condensed half of his own personality(or “heart) and pushed it into the Clone’s eye. Syaoran gambled on the possibility that Clone will create his own heart till the seal breaks. And if it did not happen, Syaoran promised to himself to kill the Clone.
Sakura’s soul ending up there was explained already – she was drawn there by the feather. And later the entire body was drawn to the soul. Even during Beetrain’s series Sakura was always drawn to the feathers, so this time there were TWO feathers in one place, so it was strong enough to pull out only soul to that place.
AS for manga – yup, and it gets even more confusind when we find out about other character’s past and then it will all suddenly make sense after yet another revelation (even the little bits, like yuuko not getting wet by the rain in first episode).
As for Fai using magic – It was elaborated in previous episode by kurogane. Fai wants to die, but he does NOT want to be the reason of the other person’s death. As we already saw in this episode Fai knows A LOT more about whats happening and since he already associated himself with Syaoran during their journey, he can’t leave him going killer-mode. And he did already broke his vow in Library for similar reasons.
What Beetrain succeeded to do is to confuse. Guessing stuff, or making up things as they go (Fai with HAPPY past? aww come on, such a thing is not possible).
As for Sakura – lets just say this will greatly affect her character, expect A LOT of character development for her and Fai in next episode…and forget about lovable damsel in distress…
I really enjoyed this episode. MUCH more then the the hack job studio Bee Train did on the series. At least this time the animation isn’t dull (to be fair, it is an OVA series so it gets a better budget), the plot actually moves somewhere (pretty much every Studio Bee Train production has crappy and slow pacing) and finally, IMO, Tsubasa is getting animated the way it deserves. Studio Bee Train literally ruined one of my favourite manga series of all time, and it’s nice for Tsubasa to finally get some justice with a different studio.
Hello… I haven’t watched this but the third picture caught my attention. Isn’t that from XXXHolic TV??! Did they cameo her in that new series? Thanks for your ever so insightful blog posts!
Tsubasa and HOLiC are deeply linked with each other, as in they have certain events cross over with one another. If you read Tsubasa and HOLiC Manga, you’d notice they have several events that happen in both of them, and interestingly, from their own individual perspective. So yes, you do have Tsubasa characters cameo-ing in HOLiC and vice versa. Unfortunately in the TV series of HOLiC, they completely cut out the Tsubasa events but hopefully, they may change it for the 2nd season of HOLiC. Fat chance but I’m still wishing (yet still, it’ll be weird if they suddenly brought in Tsubasa characters when they didn’t appear in the 1st season before).
it’s more than just xxxholic. most of the characters are from others clamp’s works, though they may not have the same personality and/or background. x/1999, chobits, ccs, etc.
I’m not sure what you think is so horrible, pgsels. I can understand if you liked the Bee-Train version better, but this was one great episode. And, I mean, Fai used his magic “out of nowhere”? I don’t remember you saying anything like that back when he did magic in the library arc. And, I wouldn’t say he pwned Kurogane. First off, you have to keep in mind that Kurogane didn’t have his sword. And even still, he managed to break Cloneran’s arm.
Yoshi: horrible isn’t the right word. This episode was by no means bad, but I do admit that I was disappointed by it. It’s like Dav/Keiri said: this OVA is really targetted towards the people who read the manga, and knew what’s going to happen. For me, this episode was a huge confusing information-overload, especially considering the slow pacing of the television-series.
And regarding Fye/Fai’s magic: in the library-arc, he at least justified it by claiming that it wasn’t the kind of magic that he learned. In this arc, his sudden change of character really came from nowhere for me.
The episode was moving at a very fast pace because they had to cram about a volumn of information into 30 minutes (3 volumns for the Tokyo arc, three OVAs), and I was actually quite impressed by how much they’ve crammed (and horrified at how much left they have to do…).
The fight underwater was… pretty crazy to tell the truth. xD I assure you that the manga chapter dealing with that fight was not nearly as long and OMGWTFBBQ about it.
As for Fai, in the library, he was lying. He’s been lying about quite a lot of things, actually and they aren’t revealed until we hit his homeworld. The markings that Yuuko took from him aren’t what everyone thinks they are (I love how CLAMP did that part. Horray for trusting reader to jump to the wrong conclusion!).
I hope that clears up a little bit! (If you think the OVA’s confusing… oh gods, you don’t want to see what the manga readers are going through right now. Just… WTF CLAMP. WTF.)
I didn’t find it confusing, and I hadn’t read the manga prior to seeing the OVA. It’s actually so close to what happened in the manga, it’s ridiculous. Bee-Train’s pace was much too slow, and I’m really loving the animation and excitement this OVA has to offer.
Fwee~
I’ll be assuming you dont’ read the manga and only follow the anime.
Either way, fwee!
Plot Twists!!!! In Action!
The reason why it might be confusing is because of the pace and structure that BeeTrain was going through. If you followed the manga, its less confusing, as the ‘heavy’ atmopshere continued from the Library Arc. Bee Train’s ‘world fillers’ quite mess up the pace and flow of the original. Its like its jumping back and forth, from happy to sad to happy to sad, where in the manga is Happy sad sad sad, angst etc…
But i am interested into seeing how they’ll put the entire Tokyo Arc into the OVA, it was long enough as it was in the manga, just seeing it all in 1.5 hours seems ‘wow’.
But i have no complaints, It’s all good 😉
Wow! Finally something is happening.
I haven’t read the manga, but the TV series must have a bunch of fillers since many episodes seem repetitive(new place same story).
But I found the Tokyo Revealtions OVA’s very entertaining.
NOTE: This comment is full of spoilers
As I had not read the manga and only seen the Tsubasa TV series, my issue with the released OVAs was that I was forced to completely change my previous perceptions of the two Syaorans. The Syaoran of the TV series was a strong, determined person with a mysterious, dark past. The other Syaoran (the eye-patched Syaoran) was an evil servant of Fei Wang, who could control the good Syaoran’s actions. This evil Syaoran was needed by Fei to achieve his desire for power. Indeed, Xing Huo and Fei Wang seemed to want and were waiting for Syaoran’s ‘awakening’.
In the OVA, these ideas were completely wrong. The ‘good’ Syaoran turned out to be a clone created by Fei Wang; the ‘evil’ Syaoran turned out to be the real Syaoran, who heroically placed half of his heart in the clone to control the clone’s speech and actions. The real Syaoran was actually being imprisoned in the water structure, and Fei Wang certainly did not want Syaoran’s ‘awakening’.
For 52 episodes, I watched the ‘good’ Syaoran’s friendship and loyalty to Fye, Sakura and Kurogane. Suddenly this character who I thought I knew so well, was cold and heartless (literally), eating his travelling companion’s eye, treating Kurogane with cold contempt and ignoring the feelings of the person who was apparently most important to him. If only Beetrain produced their own complication and ending to the events, where everything was not so horrific.
But this OVA was very engaging.
This is a pathetic review of a great OVA. There is just no effort or energy put into it if thats the best review you could produce. Honestly, half of the events you have criticised are explained in the OVA.. FOR EXAMPLE.. The reason why the seal broke and why Syaoran put the eye into the clone.
The reason why the real Syaoran was imprisoned is pretty obvious if the reviewer actually paid attention.. Yukko said that he has paid with his “freedom and time” and besides why would he want the real Syaoran running loose from the start when the journey for the feathers began?? Obvious interference!! Think about it!
And regarding Sakura… This is where her real character development starts, all that rubbish about her flourishing into a heroine by shooting laser guns etc etc is just Bee Train filler that should only be regarded as the rubbish it is.
Usually, i wouldnt comment but i just really felt that i should after reading the immensely lazy and pathetic attempt at a review of such a quality OVA. This was a major turning point of the story and should be treated with at least a bit of effort.
Im sorry but ive hardly ever bothered to comment on a blog, but i must agree with the post above that this was a really pathetic review. I lose respect for any one who thinks that BeeTrain’s filler crap was good while Production IGs faithful rendering was “confusing?” Most issues you picked up are already explained, sometime you have to use your brain as well, an anime that spoon feeds you is not my idea of ‘character development.’ atleast BeeTrain did what they were good at? sheesh, the CLAMP authors themselves were appalled by BeeTrain ruining this great story and gave them the boot.
Also your understanding is wronf. Saoran did not create his clone. its OBVIOUS Fein-wong was trying to create the clone with his magic (so the clone would serve him) and saoran broke the barrier for a monent and transferred his eye to the clone. “For some reason beyond me…” huh?!
Also, err..the clone was NOT depicted as being stronger than the real one. I really dont know how you got that idea. The real Saoran was going to kill him with a sword while the clone was on his knees for GOODNESS SAKE, if it hadnt been for sakura’s intervention.
And this episode was about the two saorans mainly, you want to see this story , give me a break, you expect sakura and every character from the bandwagon to have 20 minute dialogues and action? thats the format of a fanservice anime where everyone is speaking at the same time and its chaos. Everything in BeeTrain’s made sense because they didnt even tell the story for a start, they were just fooling around.
And my goodness, if two people are descendents of a tribe it doesnt mean they are brother and sister! if you marry someone who is the daaughter of your great grand father’s third son’s 2nd daughter, that is not incest, and you are of the same clan. git.
Im sorry for ranting but before you diss something at least make an effort.
First of all, when I wrote this review, I was still half-confused by the information-overload of this episode, so yes, I fully agree that this review isn’t amongst my best works.
To me, who hasn’t read the manga, for example, it really looked like Shaoran was the one who created his clone and put in his eye to give it life, and that’s probably where most of my confusion came from. At that point, I was too busy wondering who the heck would be willing to poke out his own eye as a child.
Ok I totally agree with you Sakura is different from in the 1st series! She’s asleep most of the time and she’s so…girly in these episodes!! But how many episodes are there going to be of these?? I’ve looked everywhere and still can’t find anything!
There are going to be 3 OVA’s. Of course Sakura is different from what she is in the series, how she was portrayed in the series was derived from the filler-laden Bee Train effort. Finally we are getting the real story thanks to Production IG’s excellent efforts through the OVA’s. Its a shame that they didnt do the series right from the start, it would have been great. Its sad that theres only one OVA left to enjoy
…At that point, I was too busy wondering who the heck would be willing to poke out his own eye as a child…
With that sort of response you have to ask yourself… Are you the right sort of person to be reviewing anime?
Open you’re mind a bit friend, its artistic media.. Think imagination..
I am just about to start watching the Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles anime and I’m trying to figure out where Tokyo Revelations fits.
If I watch up to episode 43 of the anime and then watch Tokyo Revelations, will it make sense? Will I have avoided the filler episodes and jump straight on to the next story arc?
That was just one of the best and worst episodes ever. I love it but it made me feel horible.
@Panda
Its enough to watch till the end of ep 42 and to think that they “succeeded in going to the next world”.
Sigh, it looks my comment didn’t go down too well with most of the fans on this website. Ok, ok, I get everyone’s point that a good plot shouldn’t be the sanitised, cushioned fill ins that Bee Train created. Since it’s been about 3 months since i watched the second OVA, I guess I’ve become less attached to my perceptions of the characters based on Bee Train. So I’m looking forward to the next OVA!
it’s great and best episode
thanx ^___O
there are only 3 episodes of this series.
Well the part where you said they had an incest relationship, if you have watched Cardcaptor Sakura, then Syaoran’s mother is Sakura, someone unrelated to Clow Reed or the main Sakura you see and also Syaoran’s father is another Syaoran (might be a bit confusing) and he is only a blood descendant.
Of my knowledge, Clow Reed in Cardcaptor Sakura has no children so I dont think they are incest =D
I have never read the manga, but I gave up on the anime towards the end. Reason? There was no real character development. Same people, doing the same things, reset things every new world and repeat.
Fai always felt like a key unturned, so much potential in him and Sakura could have become more as well. Syaoran too was incomplete.
I have to say with this OAV I am happy to see that I can now stand to watch this again. Things have changed, people have evolved, and the story has stepped out of the sandbox.
The Syaoran-clone story felt like it was destined to happen, especially with the anime’s first OP, the depictions of the boy floating his face obscured, it was clear that that was Syaoran, or a clone of him.
The introduction of a Real-Syaoran, means that the concept of Syaoran can expand beyond what he once was. Either the clone can evolve to match his real self, or the real self can show just how superior he is. In any case, it just makes “Syaoran” cooler.
Overall, I hope to see more OAVs to come in the future. Unlike the TV anime, I can stand to watch this.