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Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE is one of my favorite manga series. I was happy to discover that it had been made into an anime series, and after I stopped watching it after the first 16 episodes, I decided to pick it up again. I was only planning on finishing the first season, and after making my way through the last 10 episodes I needed to watch, I've definitely been dissuaded from watching the second season and just sticking with the manga, which I will be referencing throughout this review. (No spoilers though!)

Story: The story is drawn out, and the series is riddled with fillers and random ... things that weren't true to the original manga. When it was true to the manga, it was plagued by slow pacing. Things were added that were just there to stretch out the episodes to the allotted 25 minutes, such as long pauses in conversations, flashbacks, and unnecessary, lifeless panning shots. The story itself is broken into arcs: as the main characters travel, each world they visit is its own arc, which is more or less self-contained. They're not too complex, and they all follow the same basic formula: the group lands in a world, a feather is somewhere in the world they landed in, some bad guys want the feather for themselves, fight the bad guys, move on to the next world, rinse and repeat. This persists until the end of the season, but not necessarily by fault of pacing - the manga followed the same formula up until the Tokyo arc, so it's hardly surprising that the anime followed suit.

Art/Animation: The animation itself is very... lacking. Tsubasa is a beautifully drawn manga, but the anime... not so much. The proportions, especially the facial proportions in particular, are wonky. Bee Train did not do a very good job of translating CLAMP's style of manga into animation. As far as the actual movement... there isn't much of it, and when there is it's still very stiff. Scenes that should've been dynamic weren't dynamic at all. In a word, it's underwhelming. Aside from the wonky proportions and the not-so-stellar animation, the character designs are solid. I am also fond of the color choices: generally bright, colorful, and pleasing to the eye.

Sound: The sound is the thing about this anime that really shines. The opening is good and the ending, sung by Maaya Sakamoto, is beautiful. The background music was penned by Kajiura Yuki, and you can't go wrong with her; her music gives the series a feeling of mysticism and magic. Overall, the soundtrack is absolutely stellar. As for the voices, after reading the manga for so long, hearing the characters speak out loud was a bit jarring, but I got used to it. Yui Makino in particular does a great job as Sakura, and is an excellent spiritual successor to Sakura Tange (who voiced Sakura in the original Cardcaptor Sakura series and was not working as a voice actress at the time Tsubasa was animated). I also enjoyed Tetsu Inada as Kurogane and Daisuke Namikawa as Fai. I only watched it in Japanese so I can't speak for the English dub.

Character: Call me a CLAMP fangirl, but I love it when they crossover their characters. That said, a majority of Tsubasa's character are, indeed, not original to the series. However, individually, they vary from world to world, so despite the bad impression that the phrase "recycled characters" leaves, there is diversity. However, with different sets of characters in each world, not much depth is given to the supporting cast. On the other hand, the main characters are well-written for what they were given. The characters' backstories - particularly Kurogane's and Fai's - were never animated, so their motivations and subtleties in characterization might be a bit unclear. But for what it was, it was done well. The main cast is diverse in personality and their dynamic is very good - they work well together both as comrades and as a makeshift family. One thing that did suffer, however, is the relationship between two particular characters (who I will not name so as not to spoil). As the series goes on, it appears that the writers decided to disregard all subtleties regarding one character's romantic feelings for another character. It really takes away from their development and it gives the impression that the writers just wanted to rush it and appease the viewers with a romantic relationship rather than have it develop more slowly (and much more satisfyingly) as it did in the manga.

Enjoyment: Lots of filler material makes this series feel very boring and stretched out. Like I said before, when two characters are having a conversation, it seems like they're going as slow as possible just to waste time. There are long pauses in between statements, even right in the middle of sentences! It made some parts very annoying to watch, and had me thinking, "When will this be over?" The pacing issues are a huge detriment to this series. On top of that, the fillers aren't even that interesting to watch. I was disappointed to find out that the last episode of this season is also a filler! I did, however, enjoy the Outo arc in particular. I still got some entertainment value out of watching the characters I love, but the pacing and filler dragged down my enjoyment of the show by a lot.

Overall: The only things really holding this series up are the characters and the music. Everything else about it, especially the pacing and filler, is painful. CLAMP themselves disowned this adaptation of their manga. But if you're willing to tolerate the constant filler, I say go for it. However, if you'd rather have your share of Tsubasa without all the filler, I recommend heading over to your local bookstore.