Whoa, the soundtrack for this series just continues to get better and better. that’s a very pleasant surprise for this series. Shougo Kaida seems to be very much a newbie composer, but something tells me that he’s someone to look out for.
The story so far has been a mix between cliches and interesting ideas, so it can still go anywhere. The biggest cliche in this episode was of course the lead character-deciding whether or not to join the organization of the other good guys. However, Yuki himself made up for it by showing that, while hey may be a bit of a wimp, that he does know how to take responsibility. In this episode he really showed that there’s no way that he would just go out on a flimsy adventure just for the sake of his family, and abandon the children around him. The creators also prepared a perfectly valid reason for him to change his mind in the next episode: the fact that he did not know that those monsters were after him. Compare that to 07-Ghost, in which the lead character at this point was randomly angsting and wandering around.
The big one-sided character for Uragiri meanwhile is Zess. This is the guy that needs the most work, and he’s going to need a lot of chemistry from the other characters to work out well, and his obsession is a bit overstated. Instead of talking things out, he instead just sends out blasts, and this guy seriously needs to grow a character.
This show is clearly no Night Head Genesis, I know that it lacks the many interesting ideas that that series had. Aside from Zess, the lack of originality right now is the series’ biggest flaw. But then again, who knows? So far the past three episodes have been solid, I’m hoping for the substance to come in the next number of episodes, as soon as we get to explore the characters.
Rating: * (Good)
I thought this was a solid episode too. Not only is the music composer good, the director is fantastic! There are all these great atmospheric touches; I particularly liked it when Luka looks up at the vanilla sky.
This is no night head genesis as you say, but it is leagues beyond Hakuouki. As for the story (Luka’s obsessive obsession etc), it sounds like you haven’t read the manga, am I right? The anime is actually sticking fairly closely to the original story, so any flaws you see originate there. I actually think the anime is doing a better job of tightening up the story than the manga.
I’m already a fan of the manga and really starting to like the anime… it satisfies my shoujo anime sweetspot.
lane: yeah, I haven’t read the manga. the director is indeed one of the reasons why I decided to blog this show. His past works have all been excellent.
Sakurabi is a master of mood and atmosphere, and he seems to have cranked things up a notch with this show.
IMO, he’s one of the most underrated talents around. While his shows have gotten some praise, it’s really his work as an episode director that stands out as exceptional. Sakurabi was the main guy on Shigofumi, and you can see similar audio/visual stylings there (ditto for the outstanding Aoi Hana Ep. 4).
My biggest worry is that it’ll fall too much into the flow of the manga :/ Without spoiling anything (although a warning if it is ‘mildly’ so) it sort of gets more comical and they spend a lot more time in hijinks at school and the homebase which… might make it a different anime than what’s started so far.
Also sort of bored with this episode actually. Its not that it wasn’t productive for the show, but its a very slow episode that forgets the plot with the mysterious student to idle a bit. I think it could’ve been a little better.
It’s totally awesome!!! >.
It’s totally awesome!!! >.
I thought it was an okay episode. Sometimes a bit cliched, but not as bad as the others. (yes, like 07-Ghost XDDD) But yes, the soundtrack for this series is getting better!