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Apr 3, 2009
Ahhh.... the insanity that can sprout from Watanabe's head. Puni Puni Poemi is quite a lot of the usual insanity that you can expect from him, especially if you've seen the last episode of Excel Saga.
This OVA binds together a truelly atrocious story, shallow characters with no character development, random fan service and an overdose of humour.
And guess what, it balances out. PPP proves that you really don't need a best-selling story with deep characters and all that to bring across some great comedy. In fact, most of that stuff can stands in the way of comedy, and Watanabe carefully steers around all of the
...
depth that you can put into an anime, clearly avoids any sort of explanation to anything and refuses to put any form of character development into this anime. And you really won't miss any of it.
The maniacal comedy, the hyperactive main character, the clearly shallow and senseless supporting characters, all of that works for the comedy factor in this anime and is there for nothing else but the comedy.
Alright, let's run through the scores.
Story: 3
Well, the story is horrible, just to be honest. It's a magical girl story with the objective to make as little sense as possible. The entire set-up of how Poemi becomes a magical girl is about as ridiculous as you can find, and the why's, how's and what's aren't touched in any way.
However the comedy that the stupidity of the story creates is a different matter all together. The idiotic situations that Poemi blunders into, one after the other, create some great comedy.
Art: 7
The art is fairly decent and works really great with the story. The characters are well presented and the sudden shifts in styles are also very good and well placed.
Sound: 8
Really... nothing to say about the sound here. The use of Poemi wanting to be a voice-actor is well expressed and the general feel of the sound in the anime is good.
Character: 3
The character design is really bad to say the least. It lacks practically all forms of depth, character development is non-existent and the supporting characters can sometimes be replaced by cardboard cut-outs (and they might even show more depth then the actual characters).
However just like with the story, those characters are there to serve the comedy factor, and they work perfectly as they are.
They just shouldn't be used for anything other then comedy.
Enjoyment: 9
The anime just works fantastically. The humour is great, the atrocious story and lack of character design just don't matter when those are the things that make the comedy work here.
The only downsides to the anime are that Poemi's hyper activeness can really get on your nerves, the senseless fan service can sometimes work against the story since it's so blatant at times and the fact that it leaves you with a good couple of questions at the end about what happened in the anime doesn't help either. Atleast if it didn't numb down your brain.
Overall: 10
This anime just proves that good comedy doesn't need to involve a ground breaking story, well written characters or even decent dialogue.
It's a comedy from start to finish and everything that is in it just is there to provide the comedy. There is really nothing more to say about it...
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Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Mar 20, 2009
It's kinda hard to write a review about this anime, since there isn't much for me to criticize on. The story is extraordinary good, the characters are well designed with loads of character development going on, the art is of a superb standard and well, it has everything going for it...
This is the anime that made me an instant Bones fan, they made something unique here. The amount of depth they put into the story is incredible, the main characters are all very different and and all the backgrounds are pretty much explored, even those of most of the supporting characters. The plot progression is
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good, there are hardly any filler episodes and the pace just keeps you interested and captivated.
It's really hard for me to write this review... If you have read any of my previous reviews you would know that most of them are driven by what I don't like about a certain anime, and all I can really do with this one is pretty much the same as my review of SaiKano, which turns into a stream of praises.
Well, onto the scores then...
Story: 10
The story is outstanding, the amount of depth in the story is out of this world, the progression and pace are great and it really captures the imagination. The plot twists are sudden but well placed and the entire theme is pretty much unique.
This is the kind of quality I've hardly ever encountered in an anime before.
Art: 10
The artwork is simply stunning, the characters are well designed, the motions are fluid and natural and the action sequences are great. It really fits perfectly with the story and the sound and becomes one stunning experience.
Sound: 9
The sound is great. The voice-actors are well chosen and Yoko Kanno shows again why she's one of the best in the business. The opening theme is also really well chosen and fits perfectly with the whole anime.
Character: 10
Like I said, the character design and character development is amazing. The interactions between the characters are natural and throughout the story we get to see more and more about the characters and their backgrounds. The development hardly ever ends and every time the veil is lifted just a little more.
The characters feel like they belong in the story and there isn't a single character that seems out of place or useless to the story.
A perfect score for pulling that off!
Enjoyment: 9
The anime is highly enjoyable, it isn't a perfect score since at times it loses sight of the story and progression slows down a bit, a sudden lull in the pace. But I guess that's also good, if you stay at a constant high all the time you'll exhaust the audience.
Overall: 10
A superb anime. The story is clearly unique and the characters are great. This anime will really suck the viewer in and won't let go even after it's finished. It has great action, drama and a well rounded deep story.
There is hardly anything left that I can comment on, truelly one of my favourite anime!
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Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Mar 20, 2009
Ah yes, Death Note. One of the few anime that I could understand that hyped. The popularity of this anime is not surprising, although I consider it's quality below that of the manga, which in many respects is better then the anime.
What does surprise my about the popularity of this anime is the willingness and the amount of people that throw themselves over it, and the readiness to call this the best anime ever made.
I'll agree that this is one of the better anime of recent years, and it's obvious that it's quite good, it even spawned a couple of similar anime (Code Geass comes
...
to mind). However that's not to say that it's without faults, and the same goes for the manga, which has pretty much those same faults.
One of the problems with the story is that the writer wanted to make it complex, and I do like what he did with it. It included some nice ideas like "Doublethink" (Read 1984 by George Orwell for what that means, and I really recommend that book. It's even clear to me that Tsugumi Ohba took some inspiration from 1984 and Brave New World) and had some good amount of plots within plots. However the story severely suffers when the complexity increases, even to the point that it becomes confusing of what happened with the story because of the overcomplexity of the story telling and all the plots going on. That doesn't quite happen with Death Note but it gets close to that at times.
Another problem lies with the characters. Several of the main characters are given a beyond human intelligence, this causes several problems.
One is that most of them appear as smug, arrogant, self-centred twats, which makes it hard to identify with the characters and at times completely propels the viewer out of the story.
A second problem is that at times the characters seem to posses information and knowledge that they couldn't and shouldn't know or have obtained. A good couple of actions couldn't have been taken unless the character taking them knew what another character is doing at that time or will do sometime in the future. Of course you can predict that someone could take that action but that takes an extreme amount of knowledge about that character and the circumstances that take place at that time. It's practically impossible to do that unless you can see the future or have read the script. This again caused me to fail to identify with the main characters.
Alright, let's get down to my scores.
Story: 8
The story is well written and well presented, it has a lot of depth and many unique items that have rarely been explored in anime, like the moral problem of having a villain type character as the main character.
It however suffers from the afore mentioned problems of going the route of over-complexity and illogical actions of the characters that they couldn't have taken without knowledge of future events.
However, all in all the story is very good and the issues presented in it are quite gripping.
Art: 9
The artwork is of a very high standard, very fitting with the anime and the type of story. There is hardly anything that I can comment on it.
Sound: 8
Fitting with the moods, clear and good choice of voice-actors.
Characters: 5
As said earlier, the super-human intelligence of the main characters are a major drawback on the whole experience. Another point is that the supporting cast is almost completely 2 dimensional, they have hardly any character development and can at most times be interchangeable, they just needed a character to take a certain action at a certain time and at most times it doesn't really matter which character takes that action. This causes the supporting casts to completely lack any depth since they are mostly there as puppets used for story progression.
Misa is especially annoying and useless.
Enjoyment: 9
Even with all the above problems the anime is highly enjoyable and can easily draw in most viewers, even though it sometimes catapults them out of the story by inexplicable actions of the characters or downright stupidity.
Overall: 8
I'd have to say that even with the problems it's still is a very good anime, and among my favourites of recent years.
A well presented story that has a good pace and hardly any fillers.
Nice take on morality and a good psychological detective story.
It's quite good, even though it has some faults, but then again, hardly anything is perfect.
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Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Mar 16, 2009
Now people that have been reading other reviews that I have written might know that there is one thing that I severely crack down on, and that is overused character types and clichés, and this anime is just overflowing with them.
The characterlist consists of the biggest amount of over-the-top cliché characters, the situations are all so familiar and the story seems to be rather generic at first.
Yes that's right, at first. In this anime the clichés actually work and the characters fit perfectly into the story, even if you get the standard practically emo main male character, the airhead that has an overobvious affection for
...
him, the tomboy, the robot-loli girl and everything else that you can possibly imagine. And it works beyond comprehension.
The reason for this is that the anime is set out as a parody on all the clichés and the generic mecha story telling. It's so far over-the-top that they even do that with all the clichés and surprisingly that's what makes them all funny again.
You know the cliché about a girl wanting to make lunch/dinner for the guy of their affection and it turns out she can't cook to save her life and it ends up being pure poison? Well, that one is in here too, however the guy is the ship's cook, and it's not one girl but three that try to push their poison onto him. The situation surrounding that whole tired old cliché is so absurd and completely ridiculous and the way the characters react and interact make it absurdly funny again, and it continues that same trend all the way through the anime.
However, this anime isn't just a vehicle for bizarre takes on clichés, it also has an incredible story and takes some completely unsuspecting plot twists, and because of the characters, and the empathy you'll start to feel for them as the story progresses, it turns into something that many mecha anime of today can learn a great deal from.
Nadesico can truelly strike some serious hits in-between the maniacal comedy, and that's a feat of amazing writing.
Now after this lengthy intro, let's look at my scores:
Story: 9
What can I say, the story is a work of art. Even if it's over-the-top in some places and filled with clichés, it works amazingly and it can really immerse the viewer. It works in both the comedy and the serious parts and the plot twists can take the viewer completely by surprise and throws all speculations to the ending overboard.
There were several moments when I was really wincing at what was going on because at times the story just goes too far with being over-the-top and that lowered the score for me a bit, because wanting to press forward to get past several parts isn't really what needs to be included.
But overall, an amazing story, so a 9.
Art: 7
The art in the anime felt rather generic for a mecha anime at most times, but since it's intended to appear like that, I really shouldn't complain.
It works well with the story, even if and maybe because it looks so generic.
And since it works, it earns a 7 for just being good.
Sound: 7
Well, to be honest, I'm a story and character kinda guy so I don't really pay much attention to the sound, I do put on the original Japanese version because I can't stand most of the American voice actors and I think in most cases part of the story gets lost in translation, and a little feel for the characters since the Japanese are usually better at fitting voice actors with the characters they represent.
But I digress, the sound didn't bother me in one bit and the mood fitted well, so a 7.
Characters: 8
I'm a bit split on this subject. The characters are completely generic, cliché and over-the-top, so I should be rating this a big fat 1, however they fit so perfectly with the feel of the anime and the whole story that it wouldn't be the same (or any good) without them being the way they are.
So I guess I can do little else besides rate is as an 8.
It's very good, even though over-the-top, generic and cliché.
Enjoyment: 10
Seriously, this is one of the most enjoyable anime I have seen.
Immersive story, loveable characters, great humour, immense depth and still able to be serious to the point that the viewer will actually take it seriously instead of thinking that they are trying to be pretentious.
There is hardly any comment to make... It's enjoyable to the extreme.
Overall: 9
Taking all of the above comments and scores into account, I can only say that this anime is just great!
It's sadly underrated in my opinion and should deserve much more attention than it has gotten.
There is hardly anything left to say, so I give it a 9 for being overall great.
Afterthoughts:
Too bad that people that are going to watch Nadesico from now on will try to make comparisons with Gurren Lagann...
I can only say to those people that Gurren Lagann is indeed just as far over-the-top and cliché as Nadesico, however Nadesico shows clearly that it's a parody, using great humour and a captivating story, while Gurren Lagann doesn't clearly show that it wants to be a parody (I don't even think that it is meant as a parody).
In my opinion there isn't much on which you can compare them, except that they are both mecha anime that are a bit over-the-top and full of clichés. The major differences lie in how they present themselves, which is something that in my opinion works extremely well for Nadesico and what breaks Gurren Lagann for me, since it seems TTGL tries to be serious and not a parody.
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Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Mar 12, 2009
As far as anime go, this is one of the most overhyped titles that I've ever seen. I've never been someone that has followed any hypes or paid my attention to them, but the hype around Haruhi was so excessive that I just had to find out what it was, and to be honest, for the life of me, I couldn't discover the reason for the hype.
A couple of people that I call friends recommended this anime to me telling me how great the story is and how fantastic the characters are. When I watched Haruhi the first episode was a real shocker, it was
...
so bad that I immediately wanted to turn it off and throw the DVD away and watch something else, but not wanting to disappoint them I kept on watching, so I put the first episode in fast forward, although that didn't really change the fact that it looked terrible and was maybe written by a 3 year old.
But anyway, enough ragging on the introduction, let's take a look at the scores.
Story: 3
The story of Haruhi is shown in a non-chronological order, it consists of 6 story episodes randomly thrown between 8 filler episodes. Those 8 filler episodes don't actually matter to the overall anime and show no character development or help the story advance in any way. In chronological order those 8 episodes happen after the 6 story episodes and the only reason I can see for their inclusion in the anime is to stretch the length of the anime, since the 6 story episodes can easily be fit into the time frame of a single movie.
The 6 story episodes show a decent although more or less generic story. It has it's moments and I can certainly enjoy those 6 episodes, however the inclusion of the meaningless filler episodes and the terrible opening episode (the one where they are making that movie) detract from the story and make the viewing a much less pleasurable thing for me.
All of this leads me to conclude that the anime has a rather poor story, since 8 of the 14 episodes don't have any meaning to the anime and what remains is an atleast competent athough generic story. So, a score of 3 on the story part.
Art: 8
The art is of a high standard and the anime certainly looks good, however the visual design of a lot of things in the anime (like the characters) is rather generic and I feel that the makers could have done a lot more then what is shown.
Sound: 7
The sound is well executed and the songs are nice. In terms of sound effects they could have done a lot more, since they could also have done more with the visuals (they usually match).
Characters: 2
The character design in the anime is rather pathetic. They used basic character templates that are as overused as can be. Heck, they use character templates that actually seem to be imported from a generic "H-Game turned Anime" like say Green Green or Fate/stay Night.
Those basic templates are: Spineless Male Main character (Kyon), Easy Achievement Girl (A girl in a H-Game that you can't go wrong with and has the most direct part to the H scenes, obviously I mean Haruhi with this), Emotionally Distant, intellectual girl with glasses (Yuki), Bigbreasted airhead (Mikuru), the little sister (Kyon's sister obviously) and the possibly gay supporting male character and main character's best friend (Itsuki).
Besides the generic overused character templates the anime shows little character development, with which I mean that the character development is limited to less then half the episodes in the anime. In the story episodes there is a good amount of character development, I would even go as far as saying that those 6 episodes have too much of it, and story. I feel that they rushed those 6 episodes and jammed too much into it.
With all of this I can only say that they produced rather dreadful characters, badly designed and straight from an H-Game with rather inconsistent amounts of character development. A dreadful score here.
Enjoyment: 3
An anime consisting for more then half of the episodes out of filler (heck, even Naruto and Dragonball Z had a smaller percentage of filler), with generic characters, the most horrible opening episode ever seen in an anime and basically everything I mentioned above this, you can guess that I certainly didn't enjoy it very much. A 3 is all it can get.
Overall: 5
All of this amounts to a rather mediocre anime in my opinion. If they removed those 8 filler episodes and worked out the story a bit more it would have been a much better anime, even with the substandard character design.
After this huge rant I still cannot imagine the reason behind the hype surrounding this anime. But then again, something as generic and stretched beyond comprehension as Dragonball Z also still has a huge following.
I guess this will be one mystery that I won't be able to solve...
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Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Mar 10, 2009
I just don't seem to be able to wrap my head around this anime and the ideas of the people at Gainax behind making it...
It seems almost like what Quentin Tarantino did with Kill Bill, which is a throwback to something that was mildly popular back in the 70s. Gurren Lagann seems to do the same thing, as in copying the over-the-top style and cheesy writing from the mecha anime from those days. Or they made a parody on that exact same thing by going even further into it then they did back in the 70s.
I'll admit straight away that this type of anime is
...
not my style, especially since I'm someone that loves an anime with a great story, which is something that seems to be put into this anime as an afterthought to fill in the few seconds in between the senseless battles and fanservice.
I'll give a rundown of the scores, as I usually do.
Story: 2
There is something of a story put into this anime, but it's far from original, full of plot holes and succeeding in making as little sense as possible. The story is mainly used to drive the main characters from fight A to fight B while occasionally stopping for some fanservice. It's definitely not used to explain the events of the story, and when they try to do that it fails miserably and leaves holes in the plot large enough to fly a spaceship through.
Art: 6
It's decent to look at, although it does have quite a few repeated scenes (some even to the point of being nauseating) that are shown and reshown in several episodes. I also felt that the inclusion of "manga" style images broke the flow.
However even if the art was decent to look at the amount of cheesiness that it threw at the screen was so far over-the-top that it made me want to go and do something else that didn't include have to watch this anime, even Dragonball GT seems to be preferable over this at times...
The style of the art seems modern but the way in which it's used is fit for an anime from 30 years ago.
Sound: 6
It's decent, but like the art and the story very cheesy. The screaming out of a character's name during a death scene is SO overused, done to death and over the top that it really should become punishable by death to use it.
Characters: 2
What can I say... They are shallow, have very little character development, many seem to be included for the sole purpose of fanservice or comic relief and the amount of cliché character traits is as over-the-top as the rest of the anime.
We've got the whiny spineless emo teenager, the "I'm so cool that I'm gonna die halfway though the series" guy, the bigbreasted airhead, the faceless nameless enemy that's as 2 dimensional as can be, and so forth, and so forth.
The character design and character development are practically the worst I've ever seen.
Enjoyment: 4
Yeah, it was a load of fun action topped off with fanservice, atleast if you don't mind an almost complete lack of a coherent story and got plenty of crackers to scoop up the cheese with.
Overall: 5
It's a bit of fun, looks nice, sounds kinda nice but trips over it's own plot holes.
2 dimensional stock characters with hardly any development going on and a shaky over-the-top lack of a storyline.
In my opinion mediocre at best, which is something that Gainax seems to be specializing in lately.
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Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Mar 9, 2009
As overused as the genre of highschool (comedy) romance is, it does have it's gems between the many titles that have been made around the theme.
Clannad doesn't really shine inbetween all the other titles but it does have it's moments.
Story: 6
The story of Clannad is a decent one, although relatively standard. A guy with a complete lack of a backbone and no ability to make any decisions meets a girl that shows an interest in him and they waltz around each other for the majority of the episodes until at the end of it they finally decide to declare their love for each other.
A generic
...
highschool romance story that is about as overused as can be.
It does have some original points, especially at the beginning but soon drops into the standard cliché that has been used since the start of the genre. Although even if the story is as generic and standard as can be expected, the comedy is refreshing and it does have it's original points, but the fact remains that it's a huge cliché.
Art: 7
The artwork is nice and well used. It's pleasant to the eye, gives a good mood and is fitting with the type of story that it sets. Nothing really noteworthy or outstanding, but it's fitting and decent.
Sound: 7
The sound is well used and creates a good mood. I especially liked the use of sound effects and music in the episodes around the theatre episodes.
But again, not outstanding but decent.
Characters: 6
The characters are one of the things that were grating against my nerves. The spinelessness of the main characters and their indecisiveness, although standard in this genre, is completely overused and done to death.
There is however a decent amount of character development and well presented background stories.
However the massive amounts of overuse of old clichés works against the whole of the characters.
Enjoyment: 7
It's a decent anime and I generally enjoyed it, eventhough the characters and the story was more or less generic. It could have been worse but it lacked in originality.
Overall: 7
A decent anime, but easily forgotten and lost in the background of the hundreds of other titles in the heavily overused genre of Highschool (Comedy) Romance.
Lacking in originality and overused basic character traits, not outstanding but entertaining.
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Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Mar 9, 2009
An incredible anime, and one that has an intensity that completely took me by surprise the first time I watched it.
However there needs to be a warning when you’re going to watch this anime, and that is: Don’t watch it if you’re sensitive to depressions. It’s one of the emotionally heaviest animes that I’ve ever seen.
Alright, the scores and the breakdowns:
Story: 9
SaiKano has an incredibly story, extraordinarily intense and superbly written. The depth that the story presents to us goes well beyond that of many anime that are presented to us. In terms of depth it falls just short of the manga, which goes a
...
bit deeper into the story and fills in the few gaps that are left in the plot of the anime.
The transition from manga to anime was very well executed and one of the best I've seen so far. The impact of the story remains in great detail and the interactions between the characters and the desperation of them is almost perfectly represented.
The only reason why it got a 9, is because they left out a few points that were better explored in the manga.
Art: 9
The art is stunning and vibrant, and really well used to show the emotions of the characters and their situations. The anime also strikes a good balance between the visuals and the story, neither putting an emphasis on either of them and combining them into a whole.
A well deserved 9 here.
Sound: 7
The sound fits pretty well with the anime and doesn't take an overtone in it. The effects were few and not well expressed, it could have been put to better use. The makers could actually take a good lesson from Texhnolize in the way of sound since they blended it very well in that anime, and I felt that in the subject of sound SaiKano was slightly lacking. A 7 for that.
Characters: 10
Character development and character interaction is where this anime shines in the most. It's extreme in every way, from the interactions of love, anger, desperation, depression and loss, every one of them was presented in a realistic manner and with a great impact.
Background stories are well explored and things that are left out of those stories feel like they are left out for a reason and aren't really missed in the whole sense of the story.
An extreme amount of care for the characters and their place in the story gets this a perfect score.
Enjoyment: 10
Eventhough this anime gives you an extreme hit on your emotions and can drive you into a depression, the story and the great execution of it, the loveable characters and the extreme depth gave me great enjoyment, and as it stands now, I've watched it over 10 times.
Overall: 10
A fantastic story, great characters and everything I've said up till now make me practically unable to stop praising this anime. I don't have enough words to say how great I feel this anime is.
People would have to see for themselves how well this anime is made and presented, although the heavy emotions that this anime can create in people can put some people off. The extremes that this anime presents and the heavy choices presented to the characters and the high amounts of empathy that the characters evoke can have a resounding effect on the viewer making this anime hard to watch at times.
So see for yourself and let yourself be surprised, this anime is well worth it.
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Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Mar 9, 2009
Gainax has been known for making quite a few anime of a decent standard; however there is also a decent amount that fall quite a bit short of any form of standard. Melody Of Oblivion is one of those, this anime is the embodiment of the word mediocrity. It’s mediocre in every way.
What follows now is a breakdown of the scores that I attribute to this anime.
Story: 5
The story is nothing special, it’s not an unoriginal, generic piece of randomness, it does have quite a few original things in it, however those remain either unexplored or disappear in the huge amount of uninteresting other stuff
...
that the makers felt were better to focus on.
The entire story is original in a sense, it explores a couple of things that haven’t been seen (much) in other anime, however the story is executed in such a way that the mediocrity of the execution overshadows any original piece of the plot.
Just an explanation of what I mean with the mediocrity:
The shallowness of the characters and their interaction, the predictability of the whole story and the whole senselessness and shallowness of it, the random use of fanservice with no relevance to the story, all of these items lead to the impression to me that this entire thing is extremely substandard and mediocre at best. The story is poorly executed and that’s mainly due to not writing it from the point of view of writing a good story but writing something that can encompass the fanservice and other useless side-items that they wanted to include into this anime.
All in all, a mediocre story that deserves a 5.
Art: 5
The art itself can be described in the same way as the story, mediocre at best. The fanservice scenes are repeated over and over and a good couple of other scenes are repeated over the duration of the anime too.
What struck me as most odd in this anime is that it took me quite a while to figure out that the main character was male and not female.
It has no great points but no real bad points, so a score of 5 is decent here.
Sound: 5
The sound is not outstanding in this anime, just like the entire anime itself. Nothing stands out and the sound is no exception.
A well deserved 5 here.
Characters: 4
The characters are mainly shallow and 2 dimensional. Many of the background stories remain little explored and their interaction is unnatural and forced. The main character’s indecisiveness and his lack of a backbone (and probably every form of higher brain function) are especially annoying.
Many of the characters are easily forgotten and some seem to be only included to provide either comic relief or fanservice.
Forgettable characters and a lack of character development earn this part a 4.
Enjoyment: 4
If you enjoy a mediocre anime that doesn’t seem to see any form of improvement as the “story” progresses, then this is probably an anime for you. For me, it wasn’t enjoyable as such, and this is reflected in a below mediocre score.
Overall: 5
As a whole it’s a substandard anime that Gainax seems to be specializing in lately. The whole thing is an “Epitome Of Mediocrity” instead of a “Melody Of Oblivion”.
It’s bland, dull and the story is overshadowed by unrelated elements such as fanservice. The characters are easily forgotten and lacking in character development.
Overall, the whole this is just mediocre…
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Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Mar 9, 2009
The people that made this anime really tried their best to make this anime as bad as it can be, in my opinion. It's rare to run into something that ticks so many wrong boxes as this anime did with me.
I'll give you a breakdown of the scores and the reasons behind why it earned those.
Story: 1
At first glance the story seems quite interesting, however when I watched it, it quickly reminded me of several other anime and all originality of the story went completely down the drain.
It's basically an almost direct combination between Tekkaman Blade, The Guyver and the Devilman AVO. Especially when you
...
get near the ending the similarities with Tekkaman are beyond obvious.
It does have a couple of interesting things but they are completely lost in the almost direct copying of the stories from the other 3 anime.
The complete lack of originality earns this anime a clear 1 for story.
Art: 2
A quick warning if you want to watch this anime, it can seriously damage your eye sight.
The art at first can be described as generic and bland, just mediocre.
However it's quickly made clear what sort of artist they approached for the making of this anime. Someone that loves static scenery that includes huge blocks dyed with primary colours. Someone that takes the lazy way out when deciding which colours would work for this anime.
The static images, the huge amount of giant blocks in primary colours and the cheap visual effects amount to a rather unpleasant viewing of this anime and earn it the rightful rating of a 2.
Sound: 5
Completely unremarkable, but then again, it could have been drowned out by the visual assault of bad artwork and the complete lack of an original story.
Characters: 2
Same with the story, the characters are also a merger between the characters from Devilman, Tekkaman and Guyver. Even the transformed form clearly reminds you of that.
Beyond the main character, the supporting characters are 2 dimensional at best. Shallow stock characters that are easily forgotten and unremarkable in every way.
There are a few characters that do seem interesting, however they get too little screentime and their background isn't really explored.
All of this amounts to a dreadful score on the characters rating.
Enjoyment: 1
It is clear to see where this score comes from. When having read through the previous explanations it's very easy to deduce that watching this anime wasn't enjoyable in any way for me.
The horrible visuals, the unoriginal story and the shallow characters made me want to bury this anime in the deepest crater on Pluto.
Overall: 3
So, overall, this anime is just plain bad.
The only redeeming factors that it has is that it only lasts 13 episodes, so it didn't stretch out the pain for very long. And that it spawned a spin-off that completely obliterates this one, which is Nurse Witch Komugi-chan. Than anime is just pure awesome, and since it was very loosely based on this anime (uses the same characters) it saves Soultaker from receiving an overall score of 1 and gets a 3 instead.
So, ending notes:
A complete rip-off of more decent anime, filled with bad visuals and shallow easily forgotten characters. The only remarkable thing about it is it's spin-off and the thought of why on earth they made this anime and launched it.
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Thank you in advance.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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