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May 23, 2015
Some stories are written to illustrate an idea. This anime tries it's very best to express something profound and interesting. It succeeds.. for the most part. I am editing this a few weeks after watching the show, and I want to add that the ecological message it delivers is quite effective. The idea that we are the ultimate predators, that the old law of survival of the fittest no longer applies to us because while we may be weak as an individual, we wield devastating power as a society, that we are focused on our definition of survival at any and all costs is compelling
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- because it is true.
This verse from the opening theme illustrates this perfectly:
A human baby
When will they find out
[When will they find out the true fact yeah]
that at the point they were born, we are
[we are winners]
(the) winners of Earth
I am more impressed with this show now that I have put some time between myself and the last episode. Watch this anime.
Enjoyment: 8
Overall, a good show to watch. It is an emotional and thought provoking ride that I was happy to be on.
Story: 8
The story tries to talk about what it means to be human and what it means to live as an organism in a complex ecosystem. The ideas presented in it are worth thinking about and even if the story doesn't convey everything it wants to as well as it wants to, there is plenty of food for thought.
The plot follows the traditional high school hero and throws in other one dimensional characters to help him along or offer advice. There are some very interesting elements such as the episode titles [Crime and punishment, The selfish gene], the serial killer who wears a T shirt with 'REDRUM' on it, that hint at a greater philosophy driving the story than simply Monster Battles. This makes the world well fleshed out.
The first half seems to see things from the human perspective and the second from that of the parasites. It is interesting to see how valid the arguments from both sides are.
There is also, unfortunately, the annoying feeling of having the writer try to consciously pull on my heart strings. That is well and good when I agree subconsciously to go along with the ride, but not so much when the audience knows exactly what they are trying to do, and it ends with a bogus emotional pay off.
There are also some plot holes, but the story moves at a pace that prevented me from dwelling on them too much.
Characters: 6
Character development is sketchy. One character - migi - is the only one who gets well fleshed out. Shinichi is someone I grew to dislike over the course of the show. He is the voice of exposition in some cases and coming from him, it doesn't seem believable. Migi on the other hand definitely gets the short end of the stick and still manages to stay awesome.
There is more of the casual misogyny that we have come to expect from anime.
Art: 8
Quite good. There are a few glitches here and there but the fight scenes and movement in general is good.
Sound:9
The opening and ending themes are atmosphere appropriate. I liked them a lot. The sound track is pretty good too. The voice actors are serviceable.
I watched this in a marathon session without having read the source material.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Jul 21, 2013
A masterpiece.
There are some shows that are addicting, some shows are to be gulped down like a severely dehydrated man drinks water and then there are some shows that need to be savored, shows that are are like a balm on irritated skin - cool and soothing, to be used at regular intervals and at each time giving so much satisfaction. Mushishi is the latter kind.
Watching it while letting the amazing art, beautiful sound and touching stories wash over me was such a great experience. It is an anime that could have gone on forever and I would have watched every minute of it. You
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can just see the amount of love, work and thought that has gone into crafting every frame of the show. Every scene is a work of art. The scenery captures more than just the image, it captures the soul of the place.
The world is particularly impressive.
What struck me as extraordinary was the fact that there were no evil people or creatures. There was no monster that the hero is fighting. The people aren't evil for the sake of being evil. There are occasional grey characters and even they are just out to survive. Even if something is harming us, the idea that we should consider that it is just trying to live and we should tolerate it is so foreign in this world. In our world the knee jerk reaction to something bothersome is to destroy it. Ginko's empathy is not seen as something extraordinary in the anime, just a part of the world. That universe is completely fleshed out.
The mushi live an existence separate from what we know as normal and that is okay.
The stories are complete and they work very well even taken without the whole. What moves the stories are the characters. We are only introduced to them for a short while and we see them as human in the sense that we don't understand them completely, we don't have to understand them completely but we know their story and that matters.
I love detective stories and Mushishi is paced like one. Introduce the problem and have the detective figure it out. The eureka moment doesn't give the same jolt that I get when a detective figures out a problem we are baffled by even when we have all the information, but it is still nice. Another important part of the anime is love, in its most powerful and intangible form. It is in every story and in every form.
The music flows through the show. The opening track is with its visuals sets the tone perfectly and drops gently into the story, the background slowly pulling its viewers into the story and keeping us there till a few seconds after the credits start to roll. The feeling that the story continues through the credits, that the story continues beyond what we have been told, that the characters we were with live on is solely because of the beautiful music.
Ginko is the main character but it isn't really about him. This is such a strange show that way. It isn't character driven in the sense that we need Ginko to make the story interesting. In many episodes he seems almost like a foot note in the main story. Even in the final episode, where I was expecting some kind of bang, just has him as a secondary or even tertiary character. It is a testament to how compellingly they have written that world that we don't need an anchor to sink into it. His western clothes remain a mystery (albeit a well dressed one).
I really wish there were more episodes of Mushishi.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Jul 19, 2013
An anime like no other, Steins;Gate is the best I have seen in a long time.
Story:
The story begins with the usual bunch of characters that we tend to file under the common tropes. The fan service girls, the hentai geek and the off beat main character. The first few episodes are nothing extraordinary. We follow the lab members as they go about their daily lives accepting Phone Microwaves as time machines as a matter of course. The show then kicks into gear and by the 10th episode I was hooked. It is paced like a detective story with slow introductions which familiarises us with the
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characters and when the crime takes place, jots us out of our calm observational reverie and into a state where all the slight comments and actions of the characters in the past take on a new meaning.
The cohesion of the story is what impressed me the most, Going back and watching the first episode after the final one brought the story back in a full circle. All the dots connect.
Stories about people of different kinds coming together and forming a new makeshift family with strong bonds are some of the best kinds of stories and Steins;Gate is one of the best of its kind. The show has just the right amount of believable science and science fiction, humor (situational, ecchi and slapstick), love (hints of harem, between friends and the epic kind), revenge, action and a whole load of heart.
What is actually amazing is that this show points out so many of the common tropes and then turns it on its head.
Time travel? (Not a common theme, I agree) ALL your actions will have consequences.
Tsundere? Points it out and writes probably the most fleshed out female lead - ever - in anime.
Shounen-ai? Sex really doesn't make a difference.
Inter-dimentional travel? Love conquers all. No, really. (Not the fake kind. I'm looking at you Vision of Escaflowne.)
Harem? It's NOT obvious (or even important for the most part) who the lead will end up with.
Character:
Okabe Rintaro is the soul of the show. He is honest, brave and kind. His motivations are those we can get behind completely. He is just a guy wanting to do the right thing, to do what is best for his friends and he does them. He does them with such simplicity that I sometimes forgot how heroic his actions actually were.
His counterpart in a land populated by weak, large breasted and decorative females is Makise Kurisu - a genius theoretical physicist and neuroscientist - different. She is the perfect counterpart to Okabe and is believably the better half.
I am amazed that two of the best characters I have ever come across in recent times are from the same anime. The greatest thing about this couple, which I haven't seen in anime, is how real the relationship feels. The parts where she is there for him when he needs her - silently or vocally, him calling her by her name in a moment of clarity, her using his methods of being goofy to cheer him up feel so genuine and real. In the special episode when he says "In any world lime, any time, any place, I love you" is as swoon worthy and on par with any great declaration of love.
It feels like the whole show is an understatement of the great things in life - love, sacrifice, loyalty, curiosity, achievement and friendship.
Art:
Amazing. If you're like me and don't really notice the animation when you're watching, focusing more on the story, then this is one show where a second watch is definitely in order. Some scenes are like a sad, sweet song come alive. Hamasaki Hiroshi - the director has done a wonderful job. So much character in every frame.
Sound:
The opening track is "hacking to the gate" sung by Kanako Ito. It is a beautiful song which fits seamlessly with the tone of the story. The opening's visuals make complete sense by the end of the anime which like the end of the story itself, gives a nice sense of closure. The music used throughout the show is approprialtely pulse quickening and melancholy. The use and silence and cicadas is impressive.
Overall:
This is a must watch 10/10.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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