Phantom: Requiem for a Phantom: Season 1 Review

Phantom: Requiem for a Phantom is essentially Gunslinger Girls: The Teenage Years, where the assassins are gun-totin' invincibles that wear tight black body suits and a less cool version of Hei's mask from Darker Than Black.

STORY

As in Gunslinger Girls, here, we have main characters, Ein and Zwei, that are forced into becoming ruthless assassins for an organization called Inferno. Inferno's aim, as far as I can tell, is to take over the entire underworld of gangs, mafia, and other criminal organizations. To facilitate this, Inferno has a bunch of fear-inducing assassins, and the top dog is anointed with the title "Phantom."

The story revolves around Inferno's machinations at world domination and the internal scheming and rivalries that set the screen afire with bloodshed. The scheming, etc., is not particularly interesting, and most of it is nonsensical, but then again watching anime always requires a suspension of disbelief for maximum enjoyment.

Slightly more interesting are the character's storylines. The viewer gets to see how Zwei is recruited by Ein, the first Phantom of Inferno, and turned into an assassin worthy of the Phantom title himself. We see how Zwei, in turn, sets in motion a chain of events that leads to another young person getting turned into the third Phantom of Inferno. Those were the more interesting stories to follow, rather than the random plotting and scheming.

I hated when the setting shifted from the criminal underworld to a random high school in Japan toward the last third of the series, but I suppose that can't be helped. Where there are teen anime characters, they must attend a school with a bevy of annoying female characters -- isn't that written in the anime rule book somewhere?

ANIMATION

The animation was quite good. A few cinematic choices annoyed me. First, I was frequently annoyed by the long, drawn-out action sequences (e.g., Cal vs. anyone when she was using that watch) and the even longer, drawn-out death scenes.

Second, many of the random quasi-naked and sexual scenes bothered me. I'm no prude, but I feel strongly that nudity and sex shouldn't be used solely for eye candy or to appease fan lust; I prefer when they are used to further either the story line or the character development.

For example, I found the scenes of Scythe Master's oiling down of Ein's young, mostly naked body and of Mio's clothes being ripped off disturbing. Ditto to the constant shots of Clo's cleavage or the scenes of her feeling up Zwei. And I didn't think they added to the dynamic between the characters in a productive way.

By contrast, I didn't mind the obviously sexual positions that the directors occasionally put Zwei and Ein in -- not because I "want" them to "get together" or anything, but because their physical body language illustrated something about their characters that their words did not. In other words, in that case, the sexual cinematography added something to the story.

Third, I must declare that I hate scenes where characters scream "Nooooooooooo!!" or some character's name at the top of their lungs. So much more might be said with a scene of quiet agony. Not everyone reacts to strong emotions by screaming "Caaaaaaal" or "Errrreeeen!!!" (or, for that matter, "Steeeeellllllaaaaa!!!"). The screaming-when-upset/grieving motif is overused, ineffective, and, quite frankly, irritating.

Other than that, I found the animation to be pretty good overall. Nice, dark colors.

SOUND

The music for this series was below average, in my opinion. The ending theme to Phantom has got to be one of the more annoying songs I have heard in anime. The angel choir musical interludes were a bit too... obvious for me, I think, though I must admit to enjoying the hilarious "badass sexy" musical theme that accompanied Zwei/Reiji's succession to the Phantom title. The song so obviously screamed "I'm now a badass sexy assassin wearing a sexy suit" that I just had to laugh.

As for the voice acting, I wasn't the hugest fan. I found that the English voice acting from our leads, in particular, was kind of wooden -- especially Zwei/Reiji. I can remember only one line where Zwei's delivery really stood out for me in a good way (the scene where he yells at Cal that she'll be "fucked up too"). Ein/Eren's voice was a little too "I am a robot, and so my voice is flat."

And, of course, young Cal's voice annoyed the hell out of me, as young anime girls are wont to do. (To be fair, I enjoyed older Cal's voice a lot -- it had a nice grit to it that reminded me a little of Angie Harmon's work as Barbara Gordon in Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker.)

CHARACTERS

The characters were a mixed bag.

Phantom attempted to develop some characters, but fell short of building an emotional connection between the characters and the audience. Clo and Lizzy, for example, never resonated with me as characters on any level. Neither did the gaggle of high school girls near the end of the series. The series tried really hard to flesh out Clo beyond her breasts -- they gave her some flashback scenes to her days on the street with her brother, for example, but it felt like a haphazard attachment of emotional baggage rather than something that truly motivated her character. Likewise, Phantom made a half-hearted attempt at carving out a space for Daisuke Godo and his buddy, Shiga, but it was exactly that: half-hearted.

As a villain, Scythe Master was too much of a caricature to make be truly great, but his pale white hair and awful suit and sunglasses made for an easy man to hate (oh, right, and the fact that he turns young people into killers). NOTE: For an example of a deliciously fantastic villain, see Azula from Avatar: The Last Airbender.

As for our main characters...

Reiji/Zwei had the standard pretty boy design -- he looks similar to Light Yagami from Death Note. His transformation from the inexperienced boy (dressed in plain clothes) in the first half of the season into the badass Phantom (complete with gold chain, longer hair, less baby fat, and a sleek, sexy suit with PINK dress shirt) was pretty blatant, but hilarious. His character development did take some nonsensical turns -- why did he rejoin Inferno after being beat up a bit? why did he go ballistic when going after Scythe Master? But overall, Phantom did a good job with fleshing him out as a character. But I would have loved to see Reiji attempt to go home to his family and watch that interaction, rather than just see him make one phone call. A missed opportunity.

Eren/Ein looked a little bit like Rei from Evangelion. She was too frequently unclothed or half-clothed. And she was almost too robotic, too brainwashed to make a compelling character. When you create a character whose primary character traits are 1) lack of memory; 2) lack of free will; and 3) complete obedience, she becomes hard to care about as a lead. Of course, this made her ultimate face-off with Scythe Master meaningful. But it was a long way to wait for a payoff at the series end. I suppose Ein's shell started to crack as Reiji/Zwei ascended in Inferno, but Phantom didn't really let the viewers see any interesting character emotions from Ein's descent. Another missed opportunity.

Lastly, I will just say that young Cal = Annoying Anime Girl Archetype. Older Cal was pretty interesting, though 1) the use of the watch that Reiji gave her was gimicky and overdone and 2) how did she grow so tall (and how did her breasts grow so large) in the span of two years?

OVERALL

It took me a while to warm up to Phantom: Requiem for a Phantom, but I ended up enjoying it. From the guns a'blazin' to Reiji/Zwei's "badass" Phantom song, there was a lot to enjoy. There was a lot to dislike as well, but overall, I found Phantom to be worth the time investment.

Tokyo Majin: Season 1 (Parts 1 & 2) Review

I picked up Tokyo Majin for two reasons: (1) It was available on Netflix and . . . I thought the guy on the cover was cute (yes, I admit it), and (2) A reviewer on Anime Planet mentioned that it reminded him of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, one of my favorite TV shows.

I really wanted to like this show, and in some ways I did. But it was also painfully bad in many other ways. I explain below.

STORY

The story line in Tokyo Majin was completely disjointed and nearly incomprehensible. It seemed like the writers were throwing everything together randomly and trying to make it feel coherent. It wasn't.

The season started out with monster-of-the-week episodes, but then grew into longer story arcs that were supposed to be connected in some way, but weren't really - not naturally anyway.

Even if the main plot had been coherent, it didn't turn out to be very interesting. Superpowered bad guy wants to destroy Tokyo, and he's manipulating people to help him do it! Good guys want to stop him! And they do! Wow, really? That's it? Basically, the story sucked.

Also, the "big reveal" at the series' end about the "vessels" and "deities" lacked any meaning because of the problem I describe in the "Characters" section.

ANIMATION

The character designs in this show were decent, but kind of weird. Tatsuma had his adorable sweatshirt and trademark finger-less gloves. But then they made another guy, Kareha, that basically looked just like him and robbed Tatsuma of his unique glory. All the girls had hairs sticking out in random directions, which was weird. I did enjoy the design of the first major baddie, Kozuno, as well as Marie Claire, the fiery bug-eyed girl that hung around with him. The Gigantor Nurse was also cool. Other than that, nothing special about character design.

I also didn't particularly enjoy the animation in the series. First, the supernatural elements tended to have a hazy, washed-over feel to them. Second, the action looked stilted and not particularly smooth. Third, the cuts between scenes were really abrupt, which made the show hard to follow and quite confusing.

SOUND

I loved the mix of music in this anime. The opening theme was a kickass heavy metal song by ACID that was reminiscent of "Howling" (the theme from Darker Than Black). It really set the tone for the anime. What I really appreciated was mixing in classical music - in particular, the dissonant chords followed by the fast 16th note violin passages (a modified version of Vivaldi's "Winter" from the Four Seasons, perhaps?) - during the action scenes. The use of strings really complemented the action on a screen in a unique way - not your average heavy metal action scene accompaniment.

As for the voice acting, it was a mixed bag: mostly unremarkable. I was intrigued enough by Tatsuma Hiyuu's English voice actor to look him up. (Okay, fine, I admit, maybe I was kind of in love with him. So sue me.) It sounded just right for the character - easygoing, unassuming. Aoi's voice actor, of course, annoyed me, as female leads are wont to do. And Daigo's voice actor took too much of a "meathead" approach for my tastes. Komaki's actress was decent, if a little unvaried. And Kyouichi's was fine, if not particularly subtle.

CHARACTERS

Good god, it felt like the writers took character crack, because this show was a giant character clusterf*ck. Characters that we were supposed to care about sprouted up like noxious weeds and robbed our main characters of valuable screen time. Which was infuriating, because I quite liked our main cast.

But who were the random drag queens? And the gaggle of guys with scars that hung around with Kyouichi? Why should the audience care about the look-alike Oribe twins, who were randomly introduced and had no personality or backstory whatsoever? Who are all of these old geezers that appear randomly to explain mystical stuff and then don't do anything? Why did they have to make mind-control baddie, Sagaya, a regular character, not to mention the nurse that works at the hospital? I'll admit I was a bit intrigued by the rabbit-feeding teacher (who remains a mystery to me), but was I supposed to care about the blonde female teacher? Who was the random blonde chick that they showed hanging around with the bums under the bridge (I have no idea)? Why did they have to bring in some new, random Alan Claude character to be one of the deities? Why did they devote screen time to the random detective and the autopsy guy? And then in the second season, they added even MORE characters in the form of the Martial Fist assassins - one of whom was just a copycat version of Tatsuma, too! Gah!

I was hoping they would come up with something cool for Kareha, the Tatsuma-look-alike (say, perhaps, Tatsuma's evil twin or something), but instead he was an incredibly boring character. Anyway, I digress.

I don't have a problem with ensemble shows, but when you have such a huge cast, you have to DEVELOP the characters for your audience to care about them at all. Otherwise, when old geezer #1 gets shot up with arrows, or blonde teacher gets her arm blown off, all it elicits is a yawn instead of a feeling of peril.

And **SPOILER** when the identities of the vessels and deities were revealed at the end of the season, I felt cheated because 2 of the deities had barely registered on my radar.

The presence of all of these excessive, unnecessary characters took away screen time from the main cast, who I actually kind of enjoyed. The show took the time to develop interesting backstory for Kyouichi, Tatsuma, and Daigo, which I appreciated. However, I wish the show had done the same with Komaki, who came off a bit one-dimensional. As for Aoi, they gave snapshots of her backstory and tried to explain why she feels such a need to protect people, but it wasn't very effective. She was just a very nice, boring character with little depth and annoying, patronizing speeches. And Kisaragi was okay, what with the family legacy burden on his shoulders, but he also had little depth as a character.

The lack of depth is pretty much a running problem in the show, except for maybe Kyouichi and Daigo.

My favorite part of the show was watching the main cast interact with one another, and watching their interactions change as they fought together over the course of the show. It did remind me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in some ways: gaggle of young teens fighting against the forces of evil. Except Buffy explored larger themes through its cast and supernatural storylines; Tokyo Majin, not so much.

I did enjoyed the romantic undertones, though I wish the writers had drawn more drama and created more tension from them. I mean, Daigo loves Komaki, who loved Aoi, who loved Tatsuma, who's basically asexual but is also loved by Kyouichi, who may also be loved by Aoi, who is loved by Kisaragi? Come on, we needed to see some bitchfights out of all that angst and tension!

But unfortunately, the gaggle of extraneous characters - including the annoying Reporter, who was mostly a useless character - dragged the show down and ate up valuable screen time. So there was no time for bitchfight awesomeness.

OVERALL

I wanted to like this show. Tatsuma was so good-looking. And I loved the little "tch" sound that Kyouichi made every time he scoffed. And I thought Daigo's backstory with his troubled teen years was very well done.

But nothing else in this show really worked. If Aoi's power was so powerful, why didn't she kick more ass? Komaki was given one "backstory" with her archery friend, but not much else. Why not? Oh, right, because the show was wasting time on the gaggle of extraneous characters.

Such wasted potential...

Black Butler: Season 1 Review

STORY

This show had such an interesting premise: an orphaned son of noblemen makes a contract to see his soul to a demon in exchange for the demon's help in seeking vengeance for his parents' murder. The demon takes the form of the boy's butler and will obey his every order until the killers are brought to justice. When that day comes, the demon will consume the boy's soul.

Great premise! And a good writer could have done a lot with it. Unfortunately, for me, the execution on the premise fell flat.

Starting, by the way, with the way most of the premise was rapidly unfolded within a few seconds in a montage scene at the beginning of the first episode. There's so much juiciness in the basic concept that I would have loved to have seen it unfolded slowly, like a good mystery. I would have loved to see at least an episode or two from the viewpoint of the other servants, wondering how the hell this creepy red-eyed butler gets all his shit done so perfectly, without the viewer's having had the benefit of Explanatory Expository Montage.

Instead, the show dumped it all upon us at once. Which I might have forgiven it if had something interesting to do. But it didn't. Most of the show consisted of a bunch of aimless, unconnected, useless, uninteresting filler episodes. Most of the episodes followed a Sherlock-Holmesian detective style, with Ciel (for some reason that the show did poorly at explaining) acting as the Queen's guard dog and investigating the supernatural mysteries. A few episodes here and there were interesting from a character perspective, but they were the exceptions.

Even the main plot itself, when it finally got going, felt sorely lacking. It was awfully forced, from a thematic point of view, and mostly incoherent without even satisfactorily resolving the central mysteries of why the Phantomhives were chosen for cleansing.

The season was at its best when it focused on the relationship between Ciel and Sebastien - especially when tension rose between them at the season's end. I wish they had done more with the relationship throughout the series to cap it off with that delicious ending. It felt as if the relationship stayed stagnant for most of the season . . . and then it ended just when things got interesting.

I should also note that the series suffered for its uneven tone. I appreciate that it was trying to mix humor with the dark, but that worked best when it came from Sebastien, and not when scenes of darkness were juxtaposed with sight gags from the Gaggle of Annoying Servants (see "Character" section below).

ANIMATION

Middle of the road. Some of the colors were a bit bright for my taste, but that's just personal preference. Nothing to write home about, although I did appreciate the attention to detail in animating in the Victorian era. The character designs obviously appealed to the man/boy love fangirl crowd, with a dash of Annoying Anime Girl and Androgynous Villain with Boobs for the fanboys. I suppose Ciel's English noble-boy wardrobe changes were fun to watch, but overall there was nothing particularly interesting about the character designs.

SOUND

I enjoyed the music for Black Butler. The opening and ending themes were not memorable, but the music during the show itself was appropriately foreboding and created a dark, brooding atmosphere.

I must also comment on the excellent voice work for the leads, Ciel and Sebastien. Brina Palencia did the English voice over for Ciel, and it was perfect: the way she enunciated each syllable and imbued it with haughtiness and contempt. Sebastien's voice actor also did good work. Even with the umpteenth repetition of "I'm simply one hell of a butler," I never tired of hearing his voice. I can't say the same for anyone else in the English dub, though.

CHARACTERS

The annoying character ratio on this show is off the charts. As in, the majority of characters on the show are extremely, extremely annoying.

Exhibit A: Lady Elizabeth, Ciel's Annoying Simpering Anime Girl betrothed, complete with squeaky shrieky high voice and no redeeming traits whatsoever. That episode where she was turned into a doll was deliciously freaky (and accurate). I was hoping she would die a rapid, horrible death, but, alas, no.

Exhibit B: The Gaggle of Annoying Servants, including Red-Haired Maid, with the awful shrieky cockney British accent, Super Strong Guy, with awful girly voice (a horrendous Jason Liebrecht!), and Annoying Cook, with no cooking skills. Oh, and I forgot to mention Old Butler Guy Who Deflates. Each servant also came with a suitably annoying voice (at least in the English version - sorry, Netflix only has the English dub). Toward the end of the series, the writers attempted to give the servants all interesting back stories, but by then I disliked them all so much that I didn't care. The servants were supposedly used for comedy, but mostly they were just annoying. Later, the servants were used as cheap emotional parlor tricks, but that failed because they were annoying and, hence, conveyed no emotional heft when they were put in peril.

Exhibit C: Red-Haired Scythe Grim Reaper, who was mostly a plot device, and not particularly interesting. Or funny. Fun character design, but that's about it.

Exhibit D: The Undertaker Reaper - also not particularly interesting. Or funny. Creepy, but not creepy enough to be interesting.

Exhibit E: Lau, the Chinese guy, who appeared in random episodes without my ever knowing who he was. It's still not clear to me whether I was supposed to have known who he was before the episode that actually focused on who he was.

All of the above greatly diminished my enjoyment of the show. The sole saving graces, I suppose, were the main characters, the arrogant and dark lord Ciel Phantomhive, and his black butler, Sebastien Michaelis. The erotic undertones of Sebastien's desire to devour his little lord's delicious soul made each interaction all the more fun to watch, and the show played up on this obvious theme quite well. From the character designs to the random scenes of Sebastien bathing Ciel, to Sebastien seeing Ciel in various states of undress, Black Butler made every detail feed back into and tease out the demon-master relationship. After all, the central premise of the show is that a demon wants to devour a child's soul: the show would have been remiss to not capitalize on the twisted perversions hinted by that premise. As it turns out, this was about the only thing the show did right.

OVERALL

I suppose I enjoyed watching the show, although so many of the characters annoyed me. Every time Lady Elizabeth appeared in an episode, I groaned. I found the mix of dark themes with the supernatural interesting, but the attempt to mix dark themes with humor was not always successful. Again, the central relationship between Ciel and Sebastien was the most interesting to watch - and I say this from a character standpoint, not because I particular enjoy man/boy love anime or found the characters attractive (which I didn't particularly).

But, as always, it came down to the story. Or, in this case, the lack thereof. Black Butler lacked a compelling enough story to support the interesting central characters and premise. The main plot felt thematically forced, instead of unfolding organically from the seeds of a planted mystery. The main villain was weak, one-note, and uninteresting, and hardly the dramatic equal of Sebastien.

Overall, the season was a mixed bag. I will not be watching the OVA or the second season.

Tales from Earthsea: Anime Review

An animated Studio Ghibli film by Miyazaki featuring magic and dragons and wizards! Can't go wrong, right?

Well... first let's clarify that it's not Hayao, but his son Goro Miyazaki in the directorial seat. Second, it's a Studio Ghibli film, so the animation will be gorgeous; that's a given. Third, I'll note that I have never read the series on which the film was based, so I have no opinions whatsoever about the film's supposed deviation therefrom.

My conclusion? Tales from Earthsea a beautifully drawn, breathtakingly rendered, but otherwise terrible film. I initially stopped watching because I found it unbearable. I then forced myself to finish after reading some positive reviews to see if the film's ending redeemed it; it did not.

STORY
The problem starts with a terrible story. I don't know what the books are like, but the film lacked any sense of narrative focus or cohesion, not to mention momentum. It goes something like this (SPOILERS at the end, so beware):

The movie begins with unexplained events that indicate that the world is out of balance. Then, Prince Arren commits an unspeakable, unexplained act of violence for no apparent reason and meets up with the wise wizard Sparrowhawk who, for some reason that escapes me, decides he wants to mentor this random stranger he met in the desert. The duo travel to a town for some reason that escapes me. The town has evil slavers that work for an evil wizard named Cob because, for some reason that escapes me, this is all necessary to the story. Prince Arren saves a girl with a scar from the slavers, but ends up getting captured himself. Sparrowhawk saves him, and the whole incident contributes little, if anything, to the story, except to show that (1) slavers are evil; (2) Sparrowhawk can do magic; (3) Sparrowhawk can and will rescue Arren.

Arren and Sparrowhawk then go to a woman named Tenar's house for no other apparent reason than to embark on a spirit-heartening farming trip. There, they find that ploughing the fields, playing with oxen, and getting in touch with God's green earth rights all that is bad with the world. Sparrowhawk leaves for a day and shit turns hairy when the slavers come and kidnap Tenar on Cob's behalf. Arren wanders off to run from his as yet unexplained demons and gets captured by evil wizard Cob. Cob, the evil looking drag queen, offers Arren a mysterious black-looking drink and claims in a creepy voice that it is no poison; for some as yet unexplained reason, Arren drinks it and then suddenly begins to mistrust Sparrowhawk, the man that saved his ass multiple times and has shown no signs of Saruman and only signs of Gandalf. In the meantime, Scarfaced girl wrestles free and runs to warn Sparrowhawk.

Sparrowhawk goes to Cob's castle to confront Tenar's kidnapper. His magic is useless for some poorly and hastily explained reason. Cob the Drag Queen sics Arren on Sparrowhawk, because he has learned Arren's "true name" and can thus control him, for some unexplained reason. Sparrowhawk is captured and taken to await execution. Meanwhile, Scarfaced girl follows an apparition of Arren--later revealed to be the "light" of Arren (please don't ask me what that means)--to Cob's castle, where she finds a conveniently opened side door and sneaks in.

Scarfaced girl then confronts Arren and asks him why he is acting so fucked up. He whines that no one should bother to save life if it will all just end in death. Oh, woe is Arren! What darkness lies yonder! Scarfaced girl makes what I'm sure was meant to be a heartfelt, uplifting speech about how fearing death means you fear life, and how it's all just one circle of life, mumbo jumbo, life-death yadda yadda. She utters Arren's true name and, voila, he breaks free of Cob's evil spell and values life and is now able to unsheath a magic sword for an as yet unexplained reason.

Arren now kicks some ass with magic sword, saving Sparrowhawk and Tenar from execution by jumping off a high building. Cob turns into some old creepy Voldemort-like thing--he's been trying to cheat death. Arren tries to stop Cob, but Cob chokes Scarfaced girl to death. Except that for some unexplained reason, SHE IS ACTUALLY A DRAGON and burns Cob's sorry drag-queened ass. Arren says, cool, now I have to go answer for the crime of patricide/regicide back in my hometown, but let's hug and hang some time, aiite? Dragon Scarfaced Girl says, yeah, thas coo'.

Yeah. That's the story, or the essence of it anyway. What the eff? Maybe some of these important details were explained, and I just missed them. But maybe I was too busy falling asleep or trying to keep my mind from wandering as one illogical, nonsensical event slooooowly tumbled into the next.

ANIMATION
The character design in this film was very simple--some might say too simple. Prince Arren was a rehashed and far inferior version of Ashitaka from Princess Mononoke, only Ashitaka's reindeer-mount and cloak were gifted to a different character, Sparrowhawk (aka Gandalf from Lord of the Rings, only less high on hobbitleaf). Scarfaced Girl was San from Princess Mononoke with facial scarring, longer hair, dingier clothes, and 10x less spunk and beauty. The characters barely had three different facial expressions throughout the film. But really, the character designs didn't bother me so much.

The landscapes and cityscapes were breathtakingly beautiful, and I found my eyes fixated on the backgrounds rather than the characters. It's good to know Studio Ghibli still knows how to make one helluvan awesome looking film.

SOUND
I have no complaints about the sound. The soundtrack was decent (and somewhat cheesy, but I'm okay with that), but mostly forgettable. I watched the dubbed version on Netflix and enjoyed Willem Defoe's delicious take as Cob, especially when accompanied with Cob's drag queen look. The other voice acting was fine. No complaints.

CHARACTERS
The characters in Earthsea had some potential, but the story did them few favors. So much more could have been done with these characters.

In Arren, we had a prince with a sordid past and a tangle of dark emotions and impulses--the makings of a fascinating character. He needed a coherent coming-of-age and redemption story, or else some clever variation from the traditional fantasy tropes. Instead, we got a mess of confusing dreams with lots of oozy black liquid.

In Scarfaced girl, we had a fierce, passionate foil to Arren that needed to come out of her shell. She does so literally and explodes into unexplained dragon-form, but her more figurative emergence is barely explored.

In Sparrowhawk, we had a wise mentor-figure who could help Arren grow. Except that he didn't really help Arren grow; he just saved him a few times and let him tag along and did some farming with him. And while Sparrowhawk's bout of powerlessness at Cob's castle was necessary for Arren to show what he could do, it was manufactured out of cheap, nonsensical plot devices. Come to think of it, aside from being "the archmage" who wanders around (doing what? I'm not sure), Sparrowhawk is pretty bland as a character.

And in Tenar, we had a warm motherly figure who had no real purpose in the story. Tenar needed to be a character in her own right, as opposed to the bland accompanying mother figure that she was. She needed a better fleshed out backstory, or something to define who she was as a person.

Cob was an acceptable villain, but fairly conventional and uninteresting. He was the drag queen version of Voldemort, except that he was capable of oozing. His goons, including the ugly head slaver, were far worse: totally one-dimensional and, unsurprisingly, evil.

OVERALL
Overall, I was sorely disappointed with Tales from Earthsea. I really, really wanted to like it and was excited to see that it had appeared on Netflix. But I found the lack of coherent narrative to be fatal to an otherwise beautiful, contemplative film. There were characters that I wanted to like, but couldn't, because they were given nothing interesting to do. Sorry, Goro, but Earthsea was a fail for me.

Eden of the East: Series Review

SUMMARY: Fascinating premise, but the execution fell short of what it could have been.

STORY
I would call Eden of the East a plot-driven anime. The premise is fascinating: Taki, the protagonist, finds himself naked in front of the White House with only a handgun and a cellphone and he has zero memory of who he is or why he is there. He discovers that the cellphone grants him near unlimited power--for the purpose of being Japan's "savior."

That interesting nugget is the engine that drives the Eden ship, the hook that keeps the audience wondering who gave Taki the phone, who Taki really is, who the other selecao are and what their motivations are.

The story that ended up unfolding was, for me, a wee bit of a letdown, but your mileage may vary. I do appreciate, though, Eden's engaging and thoughtful premise, which cleverly taps into modern-day themes like youthful malaise and activism through technology.

ANIMATION
The animation in this show was good, from the colors to the characters. What impressed me most were the cityscapes and backgrounds, which provided remarkably realistic backdrops for the show.

SOUND
The music in this show made very little impression on me one way or the other. For the most part, it was unobtrusive; it was also not striking in any way. As for the voice acting, I watched the English dub and for the most part, the voices are fine. No super annoying girls, thank god. Also, I should say that I have liked every single dub of Jason Liebrecht's that I have heard (Taki in Eden of the East, Luck Gandor in Baccano--despite the hammed up accent, and most notably Hei in Darker Than Black).

CHARACTERS
The lack of compelling characters and/or character development really held this anime back. Had the same plot been executed with well developed, interesting characters, Eden of the East would have hit a home run.

Let's start with Taki, the protagonist. While perfectly affable (and hence tremendously likeable), Taki doesn't seem to have much substance as a character. Sure, he likes movies, and he's a quick thinker, but . . . there isn't much else to him. His past remains a mystery; he doesn't learn or grow; he just kind of... is. He's certainly someone the audience can get behind, but there doesn't seem to be anything else to him other than that he's likeable.

As for the rest of the ensemble crew, they suffer even more from lack of substance. Saki, while only about a 4/10 on the Annoying Anime Women Scale (10 being most annoying), is a whole lot of nothing. Same goes for the rest of the personality-less Eden crew, whose names I actually don't even remember.

Had Eden of the East spent some more time developing at least the two main leads into characters the audience knows and should care about, the anime would have been far better for it. As it was though, the show relied on the mysterious plot to drive it forward and neglected to fill out the characters on the ride.

OVERALL
Overall, I enjoyed Eden of the East, but I thought it had the potential to be so much more. I wished the show had given more substance to its characters, to give the audience a personal investment in the story. As it was, curiosity about the plot carried the show. It was still an enjoyable experience, but it could have been more...

MOVIE REVIEWS
What was an intriguing and fascinating premise the first time around--Taki erasing his own memory--turned out to be gimmicky in the first Eden of the East movie. And what had been an intriguing mystery that drove the story in the series slowed to a halting, boring standstill in the second Eden of the East movie. Faux-deep social commentary on modern society got packed in via heavy-handed dialogue scenes, alongside a nonsensical plot that plodded to a poor, whimpering close. I enjoyed the series, but found the movies left a bad taste in my mouth.

Baccano: Series Review

I chose Baccano as my first post-bar-exam anime conquest. It more or less paid off in entertainment value and was generally very fun, but the show lacks that special touch, that emotional punch, and would likely have zero re-watch value.

STORY
The storyline in Baccano unfolds in a decidedly non-linear fashion and skips across time and across different points of view. Because Baccano encompasses a cast of over 15 characters, the plot is an ambitious one that tries to tie everyone together in one massive cross-century story. Scenes skip in time, place, and POV, and while I didn't find it confusing, I could see why some might lose patience with the show's slight schizophrenia. The same events will often be portrayed in at least two different ways, creating the appearance of depth and texture.

The problem with breadth, of course, is that in most cases it compromises depth. It was interesting to see the pieces fall into place and the characters' roles get filled out in the plot, but once the plot is all pieced together, it's actually pretty simple. I'm not sure that if the story were told in a linear fashion, it would have been at all compelling (which, to the show's credit, means the writers were smart to jumble it all up as part of the fun). That is to say, Baccano is a show I've watched this once and will probably never watch again.

ANIMATION
Baccano is quite pretty and stylish, with its 1930s backdrop and dark, muted colors. Nothing too bright, although sometimes the faded 'faraway' 1930s look was overdone a bit. I was afraid that I would get everyone confused with the large ensemble cast, but the character designs were unique enough to keep everyone straight. No one character stood out stylistically, though, which in retrospect might have been a good thing. As for the action, while I enjoyed the tommy guns and bloodspatter and knife work, they were nothing special or unique. I also found that some of the scenes on the train (e.g., involving the Rail Tracer) were almost too dark for me to see what was going on.

SOUND
The opening sequence to Baccano is extremely catchy, fun, and also helpful in that it reviews the names and faces of the huge cast of characters. This is the only show that I have watched other than Darker Than Black where I don't skip over the title sequence to start the episode immediately. The music was just too much fun to fast forward through! I wasn't similarly impressed with the ending sequence, but I thought the music throughout the series--all very '30s and jazzy, of course--was well done, though not as cool as Cowboy Bebop or Darker Than Black.

CHARACTERS
Whew, there were a LOT of characters on Baccano. The show, I thought, was an exercise in character definition, not character development. None of the characters were really developed over the course of the series; they stayed pretty much static, with the possible exception of Ennis.

That said, the show did a pretty good job of defining its huge cast of characters, which was necessary to keep them all straight. Well-defined characters don't necessarily translate into good characters, though, and for the most part, I found the characters to be hit or miss.

For example, Isaac and Miria, the two incompetent, stupid, eccentric thieves were kind of funny the first few times they appeared, but then they just got irritating; it didn't seem as if they were contributing anything valuable to the storyline either. Similarly, Eve Genoard and Lua Klein were both meek, subservient, boring characters with no personalities, and Vino/Clare Steinfield and Ladd Russo and the mechanic dude in the OAVs were all pretty much the same character: crazy homicidal maniac. By contrast, I found young Czeslaw quite fascinating and wanted to know more about him and his motives. I wanted very much to like Firo, but I don't think he was developed enough for the audience to really connect with him at all.

...which about sums up my reaction to these characters. They were flashed on the screen, quickly defined so you could tell who they were, but then sort of just plugged in where they were needed. I didn't really have emotional investment in anyone in the huge cast.

OVERALL
I enjoyed Baccano, but it didn't really hit close to home or resonate with me on an emotional level, which isn't to say it isn't good entertainment. Its fun soundtrack and great opening sequence kept me clicking "Play Next Episode" despite the fact that I didn't feel a need to know more about the characters or the plot. All in all, pretty good, but not that great.

Cowboy Bebop: Series Review

Cowboy Bebop occupies something of an exalted status in the anime world, much like Akira and certain Miyazaki films that can do no wrong.

There are a lot of things to like about Bebop, starting with the fact that it is downright COOL and that the music is awesome. But although I really enjoyed the series, there are also a few things I would have liked to see done differently.

Bebop is an episodic, character-driven series that can only be described as... futuristic space cowboy western / noir comedic drama. The concept is simple, yet stylish: we follow the adventures of Spike and Jet, bounty hunters on the ship Bebop, as they hunt down their prey... not always successfully.

There is what I would call a "main" plot involving Spike, his past with the Red Dragon Syndicate, and the storyline with characters from Spike's past (Vicious and Julia), but most of the episodes in the show have absolutely no connection to the main plot and do nothing to advance it.

For me, this was both a strength and a weakness of the show. The episodic nature of the series meant that each of the four recurring characters got screen time and development, even the crazy Radical Edward (who starting out kind of annoying but later wormed her way into my cold, dead heart with her endearing loopy-ness). I loved the episode where bits of Edward's past as Francois are revealed and found her exit from Bebop remarkably... sad! I enjoyed the exploration of Jet's past as a cop and the revelation of how he got his bionic arm.

And, of course, who doesn't love Spike Spiegel--what a sexy, impetuous, cocky badass with a stylish 'fro character design and dark murky past. With his skinny black tie and blue suit, Spike just oozes "cool," especially when his wiry frame is kicking ass and his shot is dead-on.

But I actually appreciated Faye Valentine's character the most. Faye was both sexy and kickass, competent and lazy, and beneath that puckish, sassy exterior, she had multiple layers of loneliness, doubt, and the need to belong and find a human connection. Best of all, her voice was nice and low and normal sounding.

I will also note that the relationships between the characters were very well done as well. Despite Spike's proclamation that he hates women and children, by the end of the series, you see that the Bebop crew has, as Faye would say, become a place a belonging.

I mention the episodic nature of the show as a weakness because I wish that there had been a few more episodes or hints, however, dedicated to moving forward the main Spike-Vicious-Julia plotline. The last two episodes of the show were powerfully done, not to mention brilliantly filmed (with strong, striking images). But I felt that they would have had more emotional heft if the audience had received more . . . morsels along the way. For example, earlier, more frequent flashbacks of Spike with Julia, or Spike with Vicious, or of Spike's time with the Red Dragon Syndicate generally.

No review of Bebop is complete without a comment on the amazing music. I can't really explain why it was so awesome. From the second the opening sequences flashes across the screen and the jazzy trumpets blare, Bebop sets the tone of how the series will be: improvisatory and just plain cool. The music is spot on throughout the show, but I noticed its excellence most during the final two episodes. (Angelic choirs, anyone?)

I have a feeling that Bebop will improve with additional viewings, that there are deeper messages and morsels hidden away that I just didn't catch because I watched the episodes so... episodically, for lack of a better word.

This is a series to own! FRIVOLOUS PURCHASE, HERE I COME!