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What if you had a gun? The entire premise and synopsis of this series is about a photographer who anything he takes a picture of dies... but this isn't quite accurate. Garnering several comparisons to Death Note regarding "supernatural object that kills people efficiently and powerfully from a distance" one may think they are in for another analytical thriller where the protagonist can carry out undetectable assassinations, or perhaps some sort of monkey paw-esque cursed object scenario where a photo is taken of a large group of people and they all start dropping dead 1 by 1 and he has to find a way to ... undo the curse before it reaches his loved one who was in the picture. This series is nothing like those scenarios that may have been brought to mind.

The titular camera upon interacting with the supernatural powers will fire a ballistic concussive blast directly forward at the first thing in its line-of-site. Literally like a gun. It isn't a special "cellular lifeform degeneration" effect that leads to certain death either, several characters receive multiple 'shots' at point blank range and continue to remain alive. Like a gun. This anime is largely about political corruption and conspiracies so perhaps if it was in a setting where the protagonist has the only 'firearm' trying to take down legions of bad guys without being mobbed down knowing a single mistake would be certain death, sadly that is not the case. Every episode has easily 12 bad guys who all have guns and have no qualms shooting them. The supernatural element draw of this anime is immediately nullified. Granted they do follow up with some interesting limitations of the camera shots ability - it won't focus correctly in fog, if something is transparent it can't be focused on, there needs to be adequate lighting before a picture can be taken, etc.

I'm writing this review 14 years after the series came out so I'm being mindful of conventions in the medium that may now seem dated. It comes from an era where studios were getting experimental and finding what works in this field and the products can be hit or miss sometimes. I finished this series feeling like I really wanted to like it but I just couldn't. I'm told this genre of anime is considered "ecchi" - there is a lot of sexual content, and a lot of dark themes. However instead of coming off as mature and distinctive it just comes off as weird and out of place. A criminal mastermind couple will be talking about their next step in their mafia empire and then the guy will just grab a boob out of nowhere. A fugitive who escaped numerous hitmen and survives deadly injuries passes out and the detective who takes him to the hospital starts licking his face. It's not erotic, the mood isn't there, it often just feels thrown in to be edgy. There was one scene where it was used effectively but it was in tandem with bribery in exchange for sexual pleasure and abandoning your moral duty so the complexity of everything made it more effective than just 'random boob'.

The characters are hit or miss. The main protagonist Tatsumi Saiga is the main character and the series won't ever let you forget it. In the very first episode we get to see how all the women want him, but he's too cool with his cigarettes and being the only male to have a popped-collar shirt. Even the men want him too, in case you forgot that he's super awesome. He isn't given any real flaws so it's hard to relate to him or truly care about his struggles beyond a surface level.

Hibari Ginza is the main police detective who has a history with Saiga, but the writing seemed to forget to ever make her likable to the audience. I absolutely hated this character. Whenever she was getting shot at I hoped she would die, when she gets kidnapped I hoped she would stay gone. It is ridiculous how obnoxious this character ended up being. I think in 2005 she was intended to be a "sexy" and "cool" character similar to how Bayonetta is today but instead EVERYTHING just comes off as cringey. She's supposed to be a detective but constantly brandishes extremely flashy and gaudy gold-plated pistols that would be highly impractical in detective work. She constantly has tantrums and shoots people with no repercussions, including someone literally walking out of a hospital after recovering because they are interested in another woman more than her. The intros have her running a pistol slowly along her crotch and then licking the other one but as you learn more and more about her personality it just makes you think "gross" instead of "hot".

Suitengu is one of the villains who has a fairly interesting and complex backstory (one of the parts of the series I did enjoy). Unfortunately it is lacking somewhere as we eventually learn that both Suitengu and Saiga share a common enemy at one point but instead of teaming up or even taking them down separately, Suitengu continues to fight Saiga for no explained reason. It's like that part of the storyboard got moved to a later episode and they forgot that they have no reason to be enemies at this point.

The real crowning character is Kagura Tennouzu. One of the only characters the series gives you reason to care about, grow on you, and actively want to be safe, taken care of, and overcome all kinds of obstacles to have a happy ending because she deserves to be happy just for once. She was the reason I watched the series to the end because it made me invested in her struggle. If you've ever known a kind person who tries their best in the world but keeps getting beat down over and over Kagura should remind you of them in some ways.

A large focus of the plot is on a super rich crime organization that lets powerful people indulge in their desires to a supernaturally hedonistic degree. While this could have been done well, it comes off as very "monster of the week" style with each super power villain being dispatched in the very episode that are introduced, if not the very next one. There were some interesting ideas explored here (especially for a 24-episode series) like someone who loves diamonds gets the power to become pure diamond, someone who loves food gets the power to devour anything, etc. but they didn't get to be fleshed out much more than that which would have been fun I think. A lot of the bad guys seem a little TOO over the top - a guy that likes girls hands literally collects sawed off hands in a room, a guy that likes teeth literally collects teeth, a guy that likes girls legs literally collects sawed off legs in a room, etc. While there are depraved people like this we see too much of the same kind of depravity to be believable.

A major complaint I have is that the series appears to only have 3 songs. I'm not talking about the 2 openings and endings, I mean the music that plays during the episodes. You will recognize the tunes quickly because there are literally only 3 and they play a LOT. I didn't realize how much it would be fine for characters to just speak without music playing in the background until I had to hear the same song over and over and over and over every episode. It feels like they were trying to be jazzy-artsy like Cowboy Bebop from a similar era but they didn't quite have the budget for it. On the other hand the sound effects are quite effectively used. Some of the high-pitched whirring used when a bad guy is using dentist drills had me physically wincing with sympathy pain. The disgusting villain that can devour anything made some super gross slobbering noises as he devoured stuff that left me feeling grossed out too.

I don't have a strong closing summary for this anime in mind. I watched it because someone had recommended it as similar to Death Note (which I love) and this is nothing like it, so I created an account to give my perspective on this series. It is a very interesting attempt and you can see that the team gave it some effort at some points but overall I can't recommend it.