Reviews by Fernando Leonel Alba

The first thing to clarify about this anime is that the databases have their information a bit wrong, there are technically three episodes but they are not 30 minutes long. In 1995 a 95 minute movie was released, covering all those 30 minutes you see there, and in 1997 and 1998 two sequel OVAS came out, each one being an hour long. So the episode count is right, but the duration of each and the total in your account if you add it as complete is not.

The second thing to clarify is how hard it is to even find it, the movie can be watched without a problem but the sequels can only found as RAW on YouTube by searching them by their English name, and the translation of the automatic subtitles in them is hilariously wrong more often than not. So unless you know Japanese you won’t really get the story as a whole, thus making it a hard to recommend title.

As for the anime itself, it’s a political war drama about some nationalists Japanese marines stealing a nuclear submarine as an undercover mission, only to betray even their own country and declaring independence, scaling to show the political conflict it leads to between the implied countries, Japan and the United States, how each of them want to deal with the situation, and how different political parties want to benefit from it, and also heated arguments in congress about the situation, while it is also not bad in terms of battles.

With that said that last aspect stands in a place between realistic and spectacular, thus I think not a lot of people would be please with them, as the ones looking for realism would be annoyed by the not very realistic moments, while those that prefer spectacle would be bored with them most of the time. As for me, since I know nothing about how submarines work, I was mostly pleased with them and the combination they presented, thus even though there were some moments when I thought “huh? How’s that possible?” I didn’t have any real issues nor immersion breaking moments regarding them.

Since the show is overall low on action, it might seem slow paced but the truth is that at every moment the characters are investigating about the submarine, finding it, dealing with the nationalist ideals of the protagonist, showing some battles, as well as the States and Japan accusing each other of treason, then the latter and “Yamato” discussing, for the whole world to see, the dangers and necessity of nuclear power in the hands of powerful nations like the United States and how a little slip in trust could lead to a global disaster, as well as Japan is falling behind in militaristic strength and depending on others, with the weird logic of the main character being that Japan needs to have nuclear power to stand against others if needed, but ultimately deciding that, for nations to be at ease, the whole militaristic power should be exclusively in the hands of the United Nations. I guess the anime takes a stand in showing his reasoning as madness so that’s ok. And the whole third OVA is action, so there’s that.

The presentation looks and feels old by now but was good for its time. The artwork has its weak moments and there are coloring mistakes at times, but for the most part the anime looks very good for when it came out. The character designs may look simple but they are serious, mostly realistic, not repetitive, and have some of the best jawlines in the medium. I remembered the backgrounds being limited to just the submarines but turns out I was wrong, as there are a lot more things to see in it, and everything is really well done in that regard. The motions are good but mostly absent as the series is mostly characters sitting and talking, and the special effects are also really well done.

The audio department has limited but good orchestral music, sometimes with even an in-story reason for its use, and some beautiful endings. The voice acting is hands down one of the most mature and more fitting in the whole medium. The problem are the sound effects, which are really old, and even often unfitting, imagine torpedoes impacting and what you listen are sound effects from guns from the 50s while that is happening, we are talking that level of weak. Based on the Japanese people commenting this anime on YouTube, the sound effects are reused from Uchuu Senkan Yamato, thus we are talking about a series from the late 90s with sound effects from mid to late 70s, easily the worst aspect of the whole show.

Not to say that it doesn’t have any other important problems, there are three in fact:

-No ending: The anime is based on a long manga and thus the adaptation is far from over, it doesn’t even have any kind of conclusion on its own, it ends in the middle of nowhere.

-Not very good characters: Though character driven, the anime is clearly more focused on the plot, thus although the characters are mature and with good characterization, and no one is a caricature nor demonized, they are also dry, don’t have much of a backdrop, development or catharsis, and are not very memorable.

-One sided presentation of the conflict: As I’m sure I mentioned in the past, it is an issue when a war drama has clear cut good and bad guys, in the case the United States being the latter. They are not demonized, and the anime doesn’t feel like propaganda to me, but still it’s worth to mention that they are clearly presented as treasonous and inferior than the awesome Japanese marines.

As a whole, it’s a serious and well-presented political war drama for the most part but that can also make it very unappealing for most and there are serious weaknesses in the narrative that some might be even find offensive if they are Americans. Luckily I’m not and I happen to dislike that country most of the time, thus I love this anime, bite me.

Someone recommended me to watch this title last year months before it began airing as a similar series to Mahoutsukai no Yome, and although it also has a mage and their disciple studying, training and traveling together, and the main characters share voice actress, I don’t see much resemblance beyond the premise. Concept wise, I find it to be more similar to Fumetsu no Anata E, since it is about a long-lived non-human protagonist learning about mortality and the short live span of humans while traveling around the world and getting some friends and new abilities.

The issues with that title are that the protagonist didn’t have a personality initially, it was full of emotional manipulation to make you cry, the main character was becoming stronger by acquiring the abilities of his dead friends, thus coming off as feeding off of them, the secondary cast got a lot of focus on their mini arc and then disappeared from the story completely, essentially wasting time and screentime, and the protagonist changed completely after a time skip. That’s where I dropped that show but from what I understand afterwards the series mutates from a road movie type of drama to a fighting shounen which in turn drops tremendously in visual quality.

Frieren doesn’t have those issues. To start off, the animation is pretty good for the most part, there are some weak moments in the artwork and backgrounds but they are usually consistent and very good, even if typical for a fantasy series. The lighting and shading as well as the rest of the special effects are very good, except for the offensive spell that some charracters use, I don’t know why but that looks very outdated. The character designs are very simple and even kind of childish, which are not bad but kind of unfitting at first with the melancholic feeling of the show. The motions are very good at every moment, even the most relaxing ones, each character even has their own distinct way of walking, the facial expressions are very varied and well done, and the action scenes tend to use dynamic movement, like Burn the Witch, Majo no Tabitabi, Akudama Drive and some others did in 2020, and Trigun: Stampede did last year. Overall it’s pretty good in that regard, even if it doesn’t compare with Shangri-la Frontier and Kusuriya no Hitorigoto, which were airing at the same time.

The presentation is good, it’s just that the aesthetics are nothing special. Same thing applies to the audio department, the sound effects are really good and impactful and not too loud and not saturated, the voice acting is ok, nothing special. The soundtrack is really fitting, it’s just typical background music for a fantasy show but it’s very well done and at times even absorbing. The ending song and the insert song (to my understanding, used as an ending for an early screening), both by Milet fit the series really well and are quite beautiful on their own, and the lyrics go very well with the anime. The openings are not as good but the second one is better than the first, which although it had good lyrics for the story, it was strangely upbeat for this time of anime, and thus didn’t fit very well. The second one had a little more energy as well, but at least it felt more appropriate for the second half of the series.

Characterization is not the strongest aspect of the anime, the main characters have a name with a specific meaning, and their whole characterization is based around that, in anime terms, the two female are basically kuuderes and the male is the typical kind hearted but misunderstood and poorly treated harem lead. No, I’m not saying nor implying this series is a harem, I’m just saying that the characters fit some of those archetypes, and although that makes them easy to remember because of that, they don’t have very elaborate nor complicating personalities for the same reason.

What they do have, however, is backdrop stories good enough to flesh them out instead of just leaving them as dry archetypes, and they more or less serve to explain the way the characters are. More and more background information about them is revealed and they also come to learn more things about the previous important party, as it also does the audience that way.

People really seem to like the possible romantic dynamic between two members of the party, I personally don’t give a shit about that, the boy is kind but treated poorly by the girl for no reason besides “comedy”. I’ve seen the same dynamic in anime from the 90s and 00s and got tired of it. At least she recognizes later on that she was acting like a brat and they become friendlier with one another afterwards, and for some people they seem to be “couple goals” or some shit like that, I don’t really care.

What’s important is that even the basic main cast here is better than the rock turned wolf turned boy from Fumetsu, he couldn’t even talk, he had no personality nor backdrop, and he changed completely after a time skip, thus that doesn’t count as organic character development.

This anime has time skips as well but they are nowhere near as big, they don’t skip the scenes of characters learning new things, especially for the main one Frieren, who comes to realize, she knew and was closer to her original party than she always thought and she gains a purpose in life by doing what they want her to do after they died at the beginning of the story, and it all happens on screen, not between time skips.

It’s even related to the themes, despite being one of the most important heroes in history, Frieren never stood out and never truly cared for anyone else, she never had ambition and never understood how brief a human life could be for an elf like her, until she found out when trying to reunite with her old party, that’s when it clicked in and when she notices that she always took that time for granted and regrets not spending more time with them or getting to know them now that there is no going back. The rest of the series she dedicates to fulfill the last wishes of her old party and recall old times in their adventure, thus coming to realize she knew and cared more about them that she ever considered to, while also collecting some more magic here and there.

That way, the series also has the chance to flesh out the older support cast that dies early on through flashbacks, and I also realized where the main appeal and value of the series might be, as a sort of company of sorts for people who have recently lost someone and regret not spending enough time with them.

Sousou no Frieren is not a tearjerker however, the drama is presented more in a melancholic tone than anything else, which is something I appreciate about it, considering that there are so many shows out there filled with emotional manipulation.

The other mains are fine on their own, they also get flashbacks and learn new things and like I said they become closer with each other, it’s just that the focus is clearly on the protagonist, so they come off as simpler and more inferior characters, especially the guy who gets completely sidelined in the second half.

Also, compared to that other series, Sousou no Frieren is clear about what it is from the very beginning. There is some action here and there and is usually well animated, directed, choreographed and has some tactics here and there, but for the most part it’s a lighthearted road movie type of fantasy adventure where the character we follow through for the whole show is the strongest, thus the stakes are low. She might not be the most powerful in-series, but we only know that thanks to some throwaway lines, we never really get a sense of urgency or that Frieren might lose or struggle against someone. It’s a show meant to relax to and look back at some of your past relationships, with some magical beams thrown around from time to time for flavour.

Some other things I want to praise the writing for is caring about some very specific things that add to characterization and world building despite being such small details. First, since elves are so long-lived, they get easily emotionally detached from everyone else, they don’t have strong feelings for anyone, neither romantic nor sexual, and that’s why there are few of them and why the protagonist herself is so cold at first. It also helps to explain why, despite being one of the most well-known heroes in history, no one seems to recognize her at first, like Luffy in One Piece, but here is far more believable because the setting doesn’t have the same technology and the main character herself does as much as she can to keep a low profile.

Another good detail is the explaining for why there isn’t any transportation magic and for why flying magic is limited, which also forces the main cast to actually travel through the fucking setting, whereas other series have several ways for the main cast to be where they need to be when the plot requires them to. This also helps in making the anime feel like, well, an adventure, because how can you have a proper adventure if there is no adventuring, no travelling, no exploring the setting? It’s not like Sousou no Frieren has a world that needs much building nor explaining, it’s a very typical fantasy setting with typical classes, creatures and archetypes, but at least is properly written and established, and it is actually explored, while it also doesn’t function like an RPG, how many other modern fantasy anime can claim the same, eh?

That’s why the characters can’t just go wherever they want and in any ways they would like, every city and every place has its rules, and since Frieren herself knows the route well, you get a bit of lore or history from them, having the rest of the party going on their first adventure also helps, since that way the author has a reason for all the explaining to be done, the exposition is excused.

Not to say that this anime is perfect of course, since there is no clear reasoning why, despite magic evolving so much for being studied for decades and even centuries, basic spells still work the best against newer, supposedly better instructed mages, or why the only mages that know how to control and repress mana in-series are the ones related in some way to the main character.

Then, the whole thing about Frieren kind of falls apart when you consider, “wait, wasn’t her teacher a human? Doesn’t that go against her whole character arc and the main theme of the show?” And the answer from me is yes, I have no excuse for that, and consider it a big flaw in the writing.

Likewise, the second half of the show is inferior than the first, exactly because it falls for the same issues as the series I compared it to. It is a tournament/exam arc that you would find in an action shounen instead of this one, it completely sidelines an important character, and although needed for the characters to keep going, the plot stops progressing completely for a lot of episodes instead of the mini adventures from earlier, and there are a lot of unimportant secondary characters getting a lot of rushed focus.

Other series do that as well (Dragon Ball, Hunter x Hunter, Naruto, Yu Yu Hakusho) but being long fighting shounen, their characters don’t disappear completely from the story until way later. I’m an anime only here, thus I can’t tell if someone from the second cour is coming back at some point or not, but I hardly doubt it and I’m sure they don’t join the main party, essentially meaning that for at least this first season, they work against the plot by killing time and taking screentime for no reason.

With that said, it’s not straight up bad, since there are still moments to flesh out the two main girls and see them interacting, and there is still some cool action from time to time.

And also, well, there is hardly any plot in here, it’s just low on action and stakes basic traveling and adventuring with an overpowered protagonist that goofs around before solving most things thanks to how powerful or experienced she is, and although I like that she is kind of like Maomao from Kusuriya no Hitorigoto, neither an idealistic hot headed idiot typical shounen protagonist, nor an asshole that doesn’t give a shit about people like Elaina from Majo no Tabitabi, she still doesn’t actually do or not most things on her own wish, that’s why she says things like “Himmel would scold me if I did that” or “Himmel would praise me if I do this”.

Thus, despite part of me respecting the value and appeal it might have for some emotional people and for how mostly well established the writing and presentation are, the cynical bastard I am only finds boredom in here, because there isn’t much plot, the characters are simple, the stakes are low because the protagonist is overpowered, the plot devices are not the type of which I’m usually thrilled about, the setting is basic, the energy is low, the aesthetics are simple, and the second half, although it still fleshes out two of the main characters, is inferior than the first by falling for the usual meh writing of other shows. In the end I consider it a decent relaxing time passer that can be very appealing for some viewers, but nowhere near as good as the general consensus says it is, and a complete chore to watch for part of the audience, myself included. At least I can say that this anime doesn’t have recaps neither inside nor outside the episode count, which is more than I can say about the other shows I was following at the same time.

Note: there are some minor spoilers

Although I have clear genres and type of entertainment I prefer and others I don’t and thus I don’t bother to check them much, I’m up to try different titles from time to time, especially if they have odd choices in storytelling, as I’m curious to see how they pull them off. That’s why recently I watched “Come and See”, which disregards certain elements and characters from its narrative and stretches some scenes for the sake of presentation of its crazy and horrifying view on war, and “My Dinner With André”, where the director just had the two actors play theatrical versions of themselves and write their own scripts and talk over a table for two hours.

Ishura is a title that stands out for a similar reason, it has odd narrative choices, though nothing as extreme or clear as those movies, and unfortunately it doesn’t do the best of jobs in its results, thus is more interesting than it is good or enjoyable.

-The series begins as the aftermath of the death of the major bad guy, kinda like the Virgin Soul sequel of Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis though differently and too bad Frieren was airing at the same time to take the spotlight with a similar setup, although also presented in a completely different way.

-The anime is an isekai where warriors from some other world get transported to the one we follow throughout the whole season, yet never shows their lives before that, and it’s also among the few in recent memory that doesn’t work like a videogame nor has otaku pandering in it. It’s a fantasy world with its own way of how things work without conveniently functioning in a way that benefits the characters that aren’t from there.

It has several types of energies and a language barrier, which are explained briefly and clearly in the first episode when a transported character asks about that to a native one. It doesn’t sound like much, but I don’t remember watching many recent isekai paying attention to such detail.

-The premise presents the anime as a battle royale yet not in a way where everyone needs to fight against all the other characters but rather form teams, like in Drifters, or Fate/Apocrypha or Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku. Yet unlike those series, characters don’t conveniently switch teams nor is plagued by awful comedy like the first, it does not take place in a contemporary setting on which its events don’t make sense and every common person inexplicably remains ignorant about the whole thing like the second, and it doesn’t betray this element at the end like the third, where suddenly and only because of the villain being a troll, only one of the participants could survive.

Heck, despite seemingly promising a battle royale tournament in the likes of many others, but most similarly like Record of Ragnarok or Tenkaichi: Nihon Saikyou Bugeisha Ketteisen, instead plays out in a slowly built war between two seemingly allied, or more accurately in a truce, nations that secretly confront each other in a way that’s not in the open and not many people know about, thus the whole thing doesn’t devolve into complete chaos. Basically, the major characters are part of an army of one of these countries, and they don’t fight in a closed arena nor do they follow rules, but rather on the battlefield or behind the scenes.

-The weirdest choice in its storytelling is that it presents a narrative similar to the one in Juuni Taisen or Bokurano, where a character would get an episode dedicated to themselves to flesh them out. Yet unlike those anime, which would interrupt the tournament in the first or the alien invasions in the second for the sake of characterization, repeatedly and predictably whenever a character was about to die, Ishura does it in the buildup, as it dedicates half a season to show a different character or two at most and part of the setting on each episode, and without being just one of many alternative realities, nor finishing everything with a time reset and amnesia that renders the whole show pointless.

On paper, this serves a purpose in detailed world building and characterization, on execution, however, the setting is not that original nor complex for that to be need to be done, and it meant following a series with a slow buildup and without a clear direction for half its runtime and number of episodes, something that at least nowadays not many would enjoy nor would be interested in to follow through to the end, which explains why this title was vastly ignored and received such a low rating.

At least, this meant that once the introduction phase was over and the characters got together on a same place, the action was not interrupted for the sake of characterization through flashbacks like that Tenkaichi manga I mentioned earlier, or an ideological debate like in Fate/Zero, probably the most famous battle royale anime of all times.

Despite the anime being about a war, and thus violent, and despite having some lighthearted moments here and there, visually and tonally is quite serious and not edgy and not very explicit, thus you more or less can accept its pretense of being mature. Oh, and no fanservice, that’s always worth the mention, as a positive.

Finally, another good thing in the show is that not every major character is a human or humanoid from another world, here you have wyverns or skeletons or mandrakes from the world we follow as well, thus the setting doesn’t feel artificial or limited to familiar designs for the audience, and the conflict isn’t limited to characters that are essentially an extra part of it and all belong to the same species.

The presentation itself isn’t very good however, evident on the mixed bag of exposition that this series has. Sometimes a character that doesn’t know about something or someone would ask of another to explain that, and the explanations are followed with simple and clear visuals, so that counts as decent to good exposition.

Other times, however, characters that are supposed to know certain stuff or another one from long time ago, would ask them, or tell the other, about said stuff or themselves in cheap ways, just for the viewer to know, or even the narrator himself would appear to tell us something about a character that could be shown instead, and that counts as plain bad exposition.

Another issue is the power scaling, since, as it happens on most other battle royale series, some characters are simply way more powerful than others. Over here you have some that are exceptionally good at using some kind of weapon or have deadly abilities alright, but there are two that literally can kill anybody passively or just by wishing it, how can anyone else even compare? I mean there is still tension and battle choreography, but no one would believe that those two would lose unless they fought each other, and the showdowns are usually quite short.

And since this anime is based on a rather recent series of light novels and/or an even more recent manga, both of which are still on-going, there is no ending, thus you followed a series that’s half a slow buildup with no clear direction, and half short fights with some characters that are clearly more overpowered than others, with some payoff but no ending.

And there are also a lot of characters, yet most of them aren’t very interesting to follow:

-Soujirou, a young samurai that’s basically a battle freak and somehow is able to fight against supernatural creatures despite being a human from our world.

-Alus, an ambitious light blue wyvern that ran away from the others with legendary weapons but otherwise doesn’t have much going on in it.

-Nihilo, a femme fatale type of spider-like artificial humanoid war machine that fights for negotiating its freedom, but doesn’t get much spotlight.

-Kia, a clueless young girl with one of the most overpowered abilities in the series, she is just unknowingly used by others.

-Kuze, a completely passive and chill dude with one of the most overpowered abilities in the series that’s otherwise uninteresting, even Kia is more interesting to follow.

-Shalk, just a seemingly immortal skeleton/undead in for the money.

-Dakai, just another battle freak but at least he is used as an assassin in hide and hunter of possible traitors.

The only fighters I cared about in the show were:

-Regnejee, a tsundere red wyvern that fights so his species can stay and live and eat in one of the nations at war, he maintains peace between his species and humans or whatever they are called in this series, and gets to care about a blind girl that later on is suspected of being a traitor.

-Higuare, a former gladiator mandrake that constantly learns about itself and others.

Ironically, I ended up finding the support cast more interesting for having secret agendas and wanting to use the warriors in one way or another:

-Hidow and Taren for being the people behind the war and the ones recruiting all the warriors, with the second being the more interesting for having more spotlight and being more proactive and wanting to establish her own nation and being ruthless enough to spark the actual war in the open past the middle point of the show.

-Curte, a blind girl adopted by Taren that befriends Regnejee and is seemingly being manipulated by a traitor.

-Lana and Elea for recruiting warriors and being secret agents that want to kill Taren, with the second one being probably the most interesting character in the whole show for intending to betray everyone.

-Yuno, a girl that loses her town and everything in the first episode and acts as a guide for Soujirou yet secretly is out for revenge and wants him dead along with every other powerful warrior. She blames everyone for her loss yet also herself, as she accepts her own weakness and the wrongdoings of her town as the series goes on.

There are more characters but they are only interesting or important when they interact with someone else and otherwise not that relevant nor fleshed out on their own.

Unfortunately since every major character is initially looked into when apart from the rest, whenever they finally encounter they just fight and otherwise don’t have any kind of interesting interactions or dynamics between them. Nobody truly develops besides perhaps Yuno and even then just very little, and there is no catharsis anywhere for anyone.

Aesthetically, Ishura is just as an oddball as it is in writing, since it combines characters with mecha-like machines or weapons and different types of clothes in what seems to be a typical fantasy setting. I mean look at Soujiro with his casual contemporary clothes despite being a samurai from long ago, or Kia who uses a hoodie. Like I said earlier, there is an explanation, but some people will probably find it unfitting for the setting or not like the mix.

The opening is a typical jpop/jrock song and the ending is unfittingly relaxing, while the background music combines typical fantasy-like themes, epic choirs and orchestras, and some metal and even some electronic music tunes, again, it’s weird, and I don’t find it to be that great, but it’s good enough.

Aesthetics aside, I don’t think the production would please many viewers. The artwork itself is fine and the backgrounds are good, but the special effects are of lower quality, especially the CGI, and the artwork looks…I don’t know, like there’s sand on the screen, I guess? Like, again, Drifters, or if any of you remember it, Angolmois, though it’s better here and it makes more sense because a big part of the series and setting takes place over places surrounded by sand.

The motions are limited and not very good most of the time, yet out of nowhere there can be a very well made and directed action scene, yet nothing on par with the fight of the first episode.

The sound effects are great, very impactful and immersive, and the voice acting is done by very famous and experienced or plain veteran voice actors and actresses, some of which surprised me with the unusual performances that they pulled here. As a whole I would dare to say that Ishura has one of the best audio departments I’ve heard in recent years.

Down to it, this anime was kind of an interesting experiment to follow and I definitely hold it higher than the titles I compared it with and most battle royale I came across with, but not one I enjoyed nor would be thrilled to watch more of, and even less one I would see becoming very popular or loved by many people, and not an actually good isekai like Twelve Kingdoms or The Vision of Escaflowne, but for those who want something a little bit different, this is not a bad choice even though it can be quite boring and require some patience.

March 27th 2025 update

Ok Ishura is here with more and the first thing to say about it is that the aesthetics became a bit worse. Not the actual artwork though, which actually looks slightly better thanks to the setting not taking place majorly on sand and thus not looking as grainy. The rest though got worse, the noticeable and weak CGI is there more present than before and even on the backgrounds, making them look worse, the animation during fights is not as good, and this season features a lot more human or humanoid characters, so the designs are less inspired than before.

The sound effects are still as good as they were before but the rest of the audio got worse too, the new characters sound and are performed far more typically and at moments silly, and the soundtrack is not as varied as it used to and it doesn’t have the same quality. Don’t get me wrong it is still pretty good, especially the themes with choirs, but not as it was in the first season. The new opening and ending are kinda typical jpop/rock stuff highlighting the new cast, nothing remarkable, but they’re fine.

As for the plot, well, it follows the same structure of introducing characters with some politics in the background, with now some first season cameos thrown around at times.

At the very least the plot now has a clear direction that the audience knows about, and it is actually not ignored. The two kingdoms are actively looking to get the new cast on their files and the tournament, those of which fight amongst themselves even shortly after they are introduced.

In addition, the remaining members of the original party that fought against the true demon king appear to negotiate with or square off against the new heroes, and there is even a new plot point with another enemy faction in the form of the royal army of the old kingdom.

Guns are introduced in the setting and used to arm different armies and characters, though I wasn’t that impressed with it because there was already a character using a shotgun on the first season so what’s the deal.

The bad part has to do with the novelty of the narrative being lost this time, but from what I understand the series will gets to the actual tournament, so the story and storytelling that might have gotten tiresome will hopefully change in the next entry or so, assuming it is done. From what I understand the tournament itself is also very long, so let’s see it this issue doesn’t persist even with the narrative change, again, assuming it is done. There’s still not an ending in sight of course, as the source material is still ongoing.

As for characters, these are the new bunch:

-Kuuro, a gray haired kid-looking detective with seemingly a past as an assassin or something, he has some form of clairvoyance directly tied to his own feelings and instinct and shoots arrows at enemies. He is very cautious and constantly analyzes the situation. He is accompanied by Cuneigh, a fairy sized harpy-like homunculus just there to be cute and help him.

-Mele, a typical gentle giant good with kids and a protector of his village. Also an archer.

-Lucnoca, a winter dragon tired of humans dying for coming after her, so she enters the tournament to face off actual contenders.

-Hiroto. Honestly, I don’t get his deal much, another grey haired kid-looking character that distributes guns an puts characters against each other, basically manipulating various sides of a conflict, if you will. Fortunately, this character gets clearer in the last two episodes.

-Kiyazuna and her “son” Mestelexil. She seems to be an engineer and enchanter of some kind that wants revenge against a sandstorm, and the other character is like a combination of a robot and a homunculus that constantly repair each other and transmutate their combined body with any variety of weapons, including some of our world, when needed. The machine seems to be want to get stronger and fight strong guys.

-Linaris. This is the most mysterious character of the show honestly. A vampire girl that manipulates others by consuming their blood but not necessarily through the conventional way, and also by seducing them. She seems to lead a group of other characters that all together are manipulating events and armies from behind and with their powers, which seem to even be able to disintegrate people and monsters or something? High likely being the most broken contender of the season.

-Atrazek, a particle disintegrator sandstorm that ends up being very disappointing.

-Psianop, a sentient slime that wants to prove the strongest and thus it learned all kinds of martial arts.

-Rosclay, an interesting fake hero helped with radio distributed magic chants coming from other people, but not actually a bad guy, He is a good swordsman but he is just a human entering a tournament full of monsters so what he’s gonna do?

-Uhak, a seemingly blind?, and deaf? ogre that’s not bad, is very quiet and calm unless attacked, and actually seem to have learned to be violent because of humans, ironically. He is also unaffected by supernatural phenomena like
the magic incantations of the other characters, so it would be interesting to see him against the most broken characters that were introduced on the first season.

-Tu, a generic strong hotheaded good spirited high school girl, she bores me.

-Toroa, the most interesting character in the season for me and the only one I gave a damn about for refusing to be used by someone else and for wanting revenge on Alus, from the first season.

And of course some others that don’t matter much. Some details about some characters are lost because at times the subtitles were either incomplete or changed what the characters or the narrator were saying, and even some scenes showing key aspects of them were shortened or skipped and then played as flashbacks as if they actually were shown, but no, they were not.

The main issue about this new cast is being far simpler, less interesting, with more typical backstories than we’ve seen before, and not a single one gets some sort of character arc like Yuno did on the first season. And just like before, there are no really interesting dynamics and interactions amongst the characters once they encounter each other and start fighting.

So at the end of the day some aspects of this season are better than they were on the first but some are worse, ending on about the same level of quality. But I also have to wonder how many people are going to stick with its form of narrative for the whole season before it gets to the actual tournament, which from what I understand will also take plenty of seasons. On the good side for its fans, there will be less people watching the show and the most critical ones about it will leave and the scorings will keep going up everywhere (as long as the studio doesn’t fuck it up), as it happened with this season. Not mine though.

Note: This will cover both versions but focus mainly on the manga, with some spoilers ahead.

Hoshi no Samidare is an example of a cult classic manga doomed by a very bad adaptation. I had it on my list for years until I decided to read it just as I watched the anime two years ago but even if I didn’t do that I would have noticed the issues within the anime, as many anime-only people did during the episodic discussions.

Despite the infamous low budget that made most drop the anime series, truth is the manga isn’t that much better looking either. It doesn’t have the same issue of having character designs and backgrounds that don’t seem to fit in the same place, nor the horrible motions nor the pathetic special effects of the adaptation, but the drawings are still very basic and almost sketch-like, the backgrounds are very lacking and usually even absent, and the special effects are not very good either. Near the end the overall thing looks and flows much better than at the beginning, with even some quite epic scenes and moments in it, but as a whole the end result is nothing more than mediocre coming from a mediocre artist, and that is still way better than the awful visuals from the adaptation.

Obviously, the sound is only an issue present within the adaptation and man if it isn’t even worse than the visuals. The music was good but often misused and unfitting, the openings and endings were all extremely forgettable, the sound effects were pathetic for the time the series came out, to the point that you could find shows from 40 years earlier with better ones than the adaptation of this manga. And the voice acting is overall one of the worst I have heard in the medium, most voices don’t fit their characters, and the ones that do are seriously lackluster in their delivery, as if the seiyuus weren’t even trying to play their lines correctly. The only one which I remember being performed with some effort was Mikazuki and he had another problem which was being way overacted, easily the most I have heard in recent years after the cast, and more specifically, the protagonist, of Redo of Healer.

The actual plot begins with an interesting premise where seemingly villains will fight alongside heroes and against some other villains for conquering and eventually destroying the world and since the quantity of chapters is quite low, nothing is stretched out to last more than needed.

The issue with it is that at the beginning both protagonists come off as very edgy and immature with one of them also having a very edgy backdrop with a very in your face presentation, and the same bullshit Japanese handling of the clear victim having to understand and forgive the person that is clearly on the wrong, but at least here it leads to powerful character development for one of the main characters.

The plot structure is very simple as it plays out like a fighting shounen where the main group faces off against zero dimensional golems that are increasingly stronger each new time before fighting against the big bad guy, and eventually leading to a very basic and predictable finale with a sweet but very simply presented message of continuing to fight for your life and wish to live it and make the best of it even when it seems pointless and about to be over soon.

The credibility is also extremely low as the characters fight in open spaces and although it is established that common people can’t see the super powers and the golems, they should be able to see the main group jumping incredible heights or distances or being tossed around by some enemies, in what looks like an empty Japan.

Leaving that aside, the main girl of the show will come off as a self-absorbed, selfish and edgy brat for wanting to take the whole world with her, even more so because the series tries to present her as a poor victim when she is not. She is a tragic character alright but many would have it hard to find her sympathetic. To her defense I will say that her being that way is the whole point of the manga, as she begins to question herself throughout the story and, well, predictably, ends up being called out and given a new hopeful perspective and will to live in the last moments, so the manga becomes anti-edgy as it goes forward and leaves behind the juvenile teenager way of seeing life.

Despite that, the plot itself is not very good either because many aspects of it are a joke or quirky at best, since the spirits the characters fight alongside with are simple and plain looking and based around toys, their powers are basic, some upgrades come off suddenly when needed, and as a whole the story is basically two superhuman long-lived almost immortal psychic siblings playing to save or destroy the world for fun and resetting it every time until the happy outcomes happens and the bad one is defeated for good. Plus the finale becomes way too convenient and even convoluted with the use of time travel and time loops as a way to get power ups, and simple emotional motivational speeches, driven completely by ideals and emotions instead of any logic or plausibility. The outcome is also convenient, since it’s a happy ending after a time skip and the main issue was resolved and some character dynamics changed, both things out of screen.

As a partially romantic series I also want to point out that I find it creepy that the main couple has a dude in his twenties wanting to go out with a minor, and the harem aspect of the series can be annoying and unnecessary. To its credit though, the manga is clearly a support type of harem, since no other girl interested in the main guy actually tries to make a move, he is clear about who he loves from the very beginning, and the main couple doesn’t actually get together until they are both adults and their age gap is more reasonable.

Not everything in the plot is bad though, as there is a lot of downtime for the characters to actually train and get better at using their abilities and powers, so the power ups don’t come off as obvious ass-pulls, besides the final one in the story.

Not only that but it also allows for a lot of character immersion and interactions, with both their spirit companions and the other heroes, which also aided in getting the two edgy bratty protagonists to gain the more positive perspectives in life, so it also led to powerful character development for the main leads. Even that aside, despite moving as a group, no character is left as an archetype with no individuality, everyone is given a backdrop, motivation and daily life activities, and there are some interesting dynamics amongst them, whether as mentors, or partners in training, long-time friends, possible love interests, and more. Some of them even notice the hidden intentions of the two mains, so it’s not like the support cast is clueless about the whole thing.

Another positive is that at some point the author or some editor might have noticed how it didn’t make sense for the fights to take place in the open while having no one else around, so the battles move to some mountains where it makes sense to not have crowds witnessing everything and yet being able to see nothing.

Plus, aside of the subsequent golems becoming stronger, they also have some differences here and there, so they require some level of team strategy and fight choreography in order to be defeated.

And it’s not like the bad guy is fooling around doing nothing for the sake of the good guys being explored and bonding, it’s clear that he doesn’t have his full powers at the beginning, needs some time for preparation and making and upgrading his minions, and even if he did, it’s clear that the main girl is the strongest character in the series, so it’s not like he can just simply face them off without some kind of plan, thus the downtime doesn’t simply come from the ego of the villain being confident in his abilities, there is an in-story reason.

Likewise, although the main girl can simply one punch the earliest enemies, it’s not like she can do that every time for the particular characteristics of some of the later golems, and also because her powers are directly linked to the sister of the main bad guy and the actual hero of the story, thus, as the latter helps the support cast become stronger, the powers of the female protagonist are limited, and that affects her strength. Basically, the author put in some effort to excuse the action the way it is, and along the way corrected some of his mistakes present at the beginning of the manga.

There are also stakes, and I don’t mean that just for the whole world being at stake, but also because there are actual deaths amongst the good guys in here, without cheap ways for getting them back. The narrative regarding this point is not the best however, as some of them are dead from the beginning of the story, or die shortly after being fleshed out, making the red flags and pattern of deaths predictable and their exploration not very good either. At least, since every dead character had some personal connection and dynamic with another one from the group of heroes, every death leads to some impactful character development for the living.

Other things I want to count as a positive is that even though the connection between the two main characters seems kinda random at first, it’s eventually revealed that they are far more interconnected than they seemed initially, even if it’s done at a bit of the cost of their agency and free will.

Also, unlike other fighting series with similar elements having parents of the main characters being dead or clueless about the whole thing, here they exist, they are present, they notice the dynamics amongst the main ones, they serve as mentors or guides in life, the familial circumstances of each main is shown and given importance for their characterization, and the mother of the female lead is even given a very important role in solving the main issue in the story, even if it happens out of screen.

And finally, the last good aspect I want to talk about is a particular golem who is easily the best character amongst the bad guys. He is created with a humanoid form and the ability to mimic humans, and with the capability of evolve and learn, thus he is curious, yearns for knowledge, befriends an edgy boy amongst the heroes and even almost gets him to join the bad guys, and even gets an identity crisis at some point, he is easily one of the best characters of the whole manga, perhaps even the best.

The catharsis for every character is fine on paper, a good chunk of the support cast is given the proper immersion for that, it’s just that, like I said, the epilogue of the story happens after a time skip and out of screen, so you don’t get to see how their dynamics changed and thus how they achieved that catharsis in a way that feels organic.

The anime adaptation messed up the whole writing by rushing through the whole thing, something obvious to see even for anime only people, and also for changing the order of certain events, making some of the characters appear and disappear in awkward moments or having the main issues from the manga in a way that’s even more obvious, such as dying as soon as they are fleshed out, which also affects their exploration, since every moment they get to themselves is also rushed. Thus, even if the story and characters are there in the anime, the presentation was completely ruined and even the weakest aspects of the original are even way more prevalent. It’s not just the visuals in it that suck, even if those play a big part in also ruining the action and battle choreography.

Bottom line, despite being a cult classic, I found Hoshi no Samidare to be just on the same level as most barely worth reading one time action fantasy stories that’s barely worth consuming for its few positive aspects in its very flawed writing and theme exploration, for its main message and for its characters, but not exactly for the quality of its plot and story. Decent, but that’s it, and even that is way better than the mess that was the rushed and very poorly presented anime adaptation.

Anime 4/10 (and I feel generous)

Manga 6/10

To think I’ve come across this title by pure accident two years ago, simply founding it on the site on which I watch anime, despite it being fully a cartoon. Something about the cover, the name and the tagline was quite captivating, I wanted to watch it even before I read the synopsis, which is even better.

Even more, I watched this title as soon as I could, just two months before the happiest we Argentinians have been after a long time, ah, if only we knew at the time…

It wasn’t very long before someone told me that the show was canceled due to very poor ratings, despite being already completely finished, so you can imagine my sadness…

But oh well, a whole year later that second season was released exclusively for Australia and New Zealand, and just some months later someone must have torrent it or something because now it’s available on pirate sites. So, in a now very saddening national situation, being able to see this show finished was a little piece of happiness in my life.

Pantheon is basically a callback to the dark cyberpunk era of anime that lasted from the late 80s to, well, the 90s as a whole, with some titles in the early 00s, with the latest being Zegapain, as far as I know. It is clearly inspired by Serial Experiments Lain, and it references Evangelion and Ghost in the Shell, and on its second season, even Paranoia Agent.

It has all the themes and plot points of the first, only updated to contemporary times in terminology, technology used in-series, scope and handling. Unfortunately, it also means that it doesn’t have the aesthetics of those series, which were dark not only in plots and characterization, but also on coloring, directing, and atmosphere. For a good portion of people, Paranoia Agent is mysterious, Evangelion depressing, Ghost in the Shell mindfuckery, and Serial Experiments Lain…all those things, plus very confusing and at times even straight up psychological horror.

None of that can be found in Pantheon, it’s an existential and political sci-fi thriller alright, but also mixed with teen drama and romance, and some action from time to time, with the atmosphere not being nowhere close as immersive as the ones that at least three of the previous titles had.

Not to say that Pantheon is bad in that regard, the soundtrack while nothing mind-blowing, is good enough, as are the special effects, especially on the second season with its boost in action and jump in technological level. Since I’ve watched the series on two languages, I can comment on two versions regarding the voice acting.

Unlike the anime series, which were limited to Japan in their settings, this show scales up to the whole world, and since it is a contemporary western cartoon, it has to have ethnic diversity, which anime usually lack or represent poorly when they have it, and in terms of audio in this series means having a lot of different accents which for a non-English speaker like myself, it was very hard to follow without subtitles, plus Maddie sounded older than she is for some reason. Another complaint I had was that the voice acting didn’t have the level of emotion I’m used to, but that’s to be expected, as I’m used to watch animation in either Japanese or Latin American, so it’s normal that when I listen to English voice acting, the performances come off as underacted for me.

So I switched to the Spanish (from Spain) dub and the voices and performances were something more akin to what I’m used to. Since the second season is, up to date, only available in English, I watched it in its original dub with English subtitles, so the different accents, far more prominent and in quantity than in the previous season, weren’t a problem. Plus, I don’t know if I got used to it or what but I had the impression that the second half was better acted as a whole, I also found a narrative reason for the delivery to be the way it is, since by that point every character is weighed down by both a global and personal crisis, or a desensitized transhuman being with a god complex, so it makes sense for them to sound the way they do.

The visuals were heavily criticized during the first season for its simplicity in artwork, character designs and backgrounds, and for the so-so motions. Surprisingly the CGI wasn’t questioned, despite being quite noticeable and in my opinion not in the same level as the rest. If you go into this series being used to watch only mainstream animation, you’ll probably hate the animation in this show, but since I’m used to watch animation from the whole scale of quality from Asia, Europe and Latin America, I wasn’t bothered by it one bit.

The artwork though simple is always consistent, the character designs are refreshing after you watched so many anime like I did, and the backgrounds are pretty good. In the second season in particular, the artwork is better, there are more characters with a lot more varied designs, and the older ones change after some time skips, the plot scales to the whole world, so you get to see a lot of different locations, and the special effects are better than in the first season, even for the CGI, even if it still isn’t as good as the rest. The motions and facial expressions are still not that good, those are the weakest aspects in this department from beginning to end, but a bit better in the second half thanks to all the action of the last episodes. The directing can be good at some points, especially for the action scenes near the end, but for most of the duration is pretty standard, not bad, just serviceable, when you compare it with the ones from the titles I mentioned earlier, this is not even close.

The show starts with a girl named Maddie getting an e-mail from her supposed dead father, who was actually uploaded as, what I guess can be described as an advanced intelligence based on his own brain (called uploaded intelligence in-series), and that leads the characters to be part of, initially, a conspiracy of different companies and governments wanting to use them for cyber militaristic operations. Even though that is the main focus, the series also dedicates time to the personal drama of her dealing with bullying in the school and the loss and reappearance of her father, as well as the acceptance of her mother wanting to start a new life with someone else.

Besides Maddie there are two other protagonists in the first season, one being Caspian, basically an Internet troll and hacker who later on founds out that his whole life, family and recent relationships are a lie fabricated for the sake of someone else.

And the other is Chanda, who was forced to upload against his will and it’s initially trapped in a loop before getting help from previous victims, and after that he goes on to get revenge on the people that did that to him and becomes the antagonist that forms a rebellion against humanity after he develops a god complex.

Anyone that has seen Serial Experiments Lain will notice all the similarities between the two series in premise, concepts and protagonists, but while this one wants to tackle how dangerous technology can be depending on how it’s used, it doesn’t do it with the same fear of it that the other one did in its time. Another difference is that Pantheon divides its character arcs among three protagonists, while exploring the dynamics between them and with the support cast, instead of having one protagonist with a personality disorder, like the anime, thus it’s better in that regard, because even if Lain Iwakura is one of the greatest characters I’ve ever seen, the rest of the characters in her series didn’t matter much, or wasn’t nearly as explored.

The buildup, however, does have some parts that are not that interesting, such as the main character and her father reconnecting in a game, or some of the fights being fought in that videogame, which was making it feel like a not very serious fantasy series instead of sci-fi, but at least it offered some cool new designs for some characters.

Then there is the episode where Maddie and her father David ruin her mother’s relationship to try to get her to be together again with him…but that can’t be done, because he is no longer a human, or at least not in the same sense as she is, so they officially break up, so what was the point of the whole thing in the episode then?

At least it wasn’t a complete waste of time, since even though it was kind of uninteresting and not serious to watch without progressing the plot much, it was important to tackle the themes of the series, such as whether an advanced state of consciousness can or not be considered the same thing as a human, and it was also important to have an impact in Maddie’s character arc on accepting that her father is no longer there and that her family is no longer the same, as much as she would like it to be, at least not in the same ways.

And of course, another themes looked into are how non ethical the whole process of uploading (as well as another thing) someone can be, the existential crisis the character go through, and as I previously mentioned, how technology can be abused by the super powers despite the good intentions their studies and developments might have had, something which has happened several times in actual history.

Another minor negative is the existence of a Russian hacker that does his thing playing piano while being half naked and surrounded by even more half naked catgirls, why would you include such a thing in this series? It was so ridiculous to watch and unfitting within the show.

The first season ends in a kind of a cliffhanger and although good as a whole, it would have been affected quite negatively if it was left incomplete. Thankfully it didn’t happen and the series eventually got its proper continuation and closure.

As soon as the second season starts, you notice why the first was made the way it was, there is no more buildup and character immersion, it’s all about moving the plot forward from the very first minute. Time passes, consequences from the first season carry over, the plot escalates to a global scale and scope, opinions about the uploaded intelligences are divided between whether they are a threat to humanity or an advanced state to a human being possible to coexist with, both among the common people and several authorities, the themes are no longer limited to the ethical and existential dimensions about it, but also political, and several characters have different agendas and are moving the plot forward in some way all the time.

The political aspect is quite weak however, as the sides of the conflict are presented simply and in clear preference to one side, or solves long conflicts easily, whether by giving little screentime to the political enemies of the States, and not allowing them achieve anything before they disappear from the story, or by forming alliances between sworn enemies in a hurry.

I mean it coincides with the themes explored in the series, of how conflicting humans can be yet at the end of the day mutual understanding, love and connection are always possible, especially against a common far bigger enemy and threat for the whole species (in the form of a billionaire leader of one of the biggest companies in the world with a god complex and the most advanced technology at hand, heh), but the execution feels idealistic and sentimental for such a show.

Another aspect that some might have issues with is Chanda being relegated to a kind of secondary role, as a new, bigger, way more powerful antagonist takes his place, which makes him reconsider everything he has done.

At least Caspian and Maddie get even more focus and development, the former by developing a god complex himself in his attempt to prove himself and others and be someone on his own, and later on giving himself completely to fix his mistake and save the world, as well as being a link to the connection between different species in the end.

The latter becomes an activist and engineer and developer herself, before she gets the biggest role in the whole series, while the show also explores her personal drama full of grieve, loss and loneliness.

What I didn’t fancy much initially was the inclusion of romance and sex, but I guess a modern North American adult cartoon is contractually obliged to have those things or else how it’s going to be clear about its demography right? At least the execution was done properly by keeping the sex out of screen, the teen pregnancy being handled seriously and the romance being part of the themes and leading to important plot points at the end.

Throughout the second half the now two protagonists keep traveling and talking to different people and although it might seem like the plot does not progress for the sake of exploring the secondary cast, the truth is that what they do is directly related to the themes and main objective, and it also allows for character growth and dynamics, with the payoff being the huge catharsis at the end.

What it also allows is the creators of the series to show all the different locations and the global scale the conflict escalated to, as well as fill their contractually obliged diversity quota, without shoving it down your throat and without victimizing nor demonizing anyone. By comparison, last year I watched half of Undone and had to drop it because, among several other issues, the protagonist was insufferable for how she wouldn’t shut up about being descendant of Mexicans and what the States robbed off from them, when it had nothing to do with the plot or themes, at least until that point.

None of that shit is present in Pantheon, which has lots of interracial couples and marriages, and people from lots of different countries, without limiting anyone to the distorted stereotypical image that the fake progressive mind of the States thinks it counts as proper representation. This cartoon might be woke, but it’s not garbage.

Oh, and for the totally secure with themselves, their sexualities and their masculinity or femininity lgbtphobics as well as conservatives with totally really important issues, they might like to know that there are not same sex or gender relationships nor brief references to other sexualities and identities that aren’t heterosexual and cisgender in here, so they can be relaxed in watching a fucking cartoon without having to concern themselves over petty bullshit that lives free in their absolutely sane mind for some reason.

All things considered, Pantheon could have been the best series in its kind for taking the premise and plot points of the dark sci-fi era of anime and updating them and making them more relatable to the viewers as well as increasing the scope and themes considerably, but although it is a great cartoon altogether, sadly it is still not as good as it could have been.

As the pacing moves fast in the second season, that means that some events might play out in ways that don’t feel completely organic. The time skips in the series are partially responsible for that, since they take place between seasons and near the end of the show, and several developments in both plot and characters come off as sudden or drastic because of that. The missing information is given properly to fill in the gaps, but that doesn’t change that a lot of stuff has happened without showing the whole buildup to it, and the characters that you’ve been following for the whole cartoon are now different in some ways, without you seeing they change organically and gradually on screen.

And then of course, as it’s usually the case with sci-fi of this kind, it’s very hard to say if any of this is even possible, the series explains everything to make it seem like there is a consistent internal logic, and some reviews on imdb praised the realism and attention to detail to the technology used in-series, but that’s only for the first season, as the second becomes way crazier as the uploaded intelligences become so powerful they practically get super powers.

And also, it seems that every antagonist is done for good, while for the good guys there always seem to be some backup to keep them alive in some way, and that diminishes the stakes a little.

All the problems come together in the finale, which is so out there it’s really hard to even grasp, let alone level it down to something that’s relatable. We are talking about the characters, including an advanced anti-viral software, becoming multiversal beings that can control time, space, energy and matter, and create and control whole universes and timelines, that’s why they joke about having become gods, yes, it gets that crazy.

You also ask yourself, wait, did none of that happen? Was it all a simulation? Is time going to reset itself? Is it a closed loop without showing the outcome? Did they ruined the show? And thankfully, the answer is no, as you can get when you think about the final dialogues in the show, all those events happened, the characters went through them, and they want to relive them possibly changing the outcome, in a way that doesn’t interfere with all the other time branches.

I find it positive in what it means theme wise, as even if they had become powerful multiversal beings outside the realm of time and space, they want to give away all that and change it so they aren’t alone and lonely and for the chance of being together again in a way that feels material/physical, because, you know, despite being the celestial gods they had become, they are humans, and what they want to do is, human. The very last scene even reconnects with the very first through the narration that was used in it.

As a whole, despite having several issues across its whole duration, which ultimately don’t let it be the best series of its kind compared to the simpler yet better executed anime from the 90s, I found Pantheon to be the best cartoon of its years, although I admittedly didn’t watch many other titles in them, and the best one since The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, and I’m happy that this kind of science fiction (along Pluto and NieR:Automara Ver1.1a from 2023) is still done and mostly properly executed nowadays, even if most didn’t care about it.

I should’ve talked about this movie before Huang Yan because it came out earlier but well, not much to do since I watched the other title first. Whenever this film is talked about, it’s compared with that series, Perfect Blue and the works of Junji Ito, and although I see the resemblance to them in some level, I found it quite different from them and quite unique on its own.

The premise is a twist in the surgeon drama/thriller formula that several movies and Huang Yan had, by removing the surgeon and replace him with a, well, beauty water, as the title implies, that works kind of like magic in an otherwise mundane setting.

The pacing is very good, as things constantly move forward and explore the themes and main character without stretching anything and preventing everything from becoming stale, in a rather short runtime, thus preventing the movie from overstaying its welcome.

Much like Yuxi in Huang Yan, Yae-ji, the female protagonist here, is mistreated for being ugly and yet does not change in personality despite her change in appearance, unlike that other woman though, the reason here is that this main character is awful from the beginning.

While Yuxi was brave and facing hardships as the clear hero of her story, Yae-ji is the villain of her own, despite also being its protagonist. Ever since the beginning she is shown as mean, resentful, egoistic, someone that lives off her parents (and I’m not just referring to money), and someone willing to go to whatever extreme needed to get what she wants. It’s very interesting and intense seeing how lower she can go throughout the movie.

Although most of those surgeon drama/thriller movies also had villains as their protagonists, they were either acting for the sake of someone else (“Le Yeux sans visage”, “Gritos en la noche”, “Corruption”), had petty motives (“Seddok”) or were cartoonisly edgy and evil to the point of coming off as a pathetic and immature attempt of the writer and director to make his film as shocking as it could (“Les Predateurs de la Nuit”). Thus the only other title that had a villainous main character as strong as this one in both personal agenda and focus is “La piel que habito”, and even that one changes the roles of the characters through a plot twist midway.

I mean, this movie also introduces another villain in form of a surprise villain and antagonist near the end, but it doesn’t do it as well because it’s not very well anticipated and the characters are not as interconnected as those two were.

Besides that, this movie also has some themes regarding the television industry, celebrities, and of course the obsession with being beautiful and how far someone can go to achieve that, some people even found symbolisms regarding the plastic surgeon surgeries and poverty. With that said, perhaps to the limited runtime, the themes are only looked into briefly and kind of superficially, so although a good inclusion, they are mostly there to flavour and complicate the plot than add real substance to it.

There is one exception and it’s the obsession of the main character, who starts to become crazy in the second half while she has illusions of the worst thing she has done up until that point, before facing her worst possible outcome and coming to the realization that everything she wanted was always there, and that she never could have been happier only for changing her outside, without first changing how horrible she is on the inside.

The resolution for the main character is very strong in that regard, but the same cannot be said about the overall story, which is fairly nonsensical from the get go thanks to the inclusion of what is essentially close to magic in a mundane setting. Huang Yan had a similar setup and didn’t need any of that, Perfect Blue had unrealistic scenes but since that movie was playing all the time with what’s real and what isn’t, most of the nonsense was excused as very likely not being what’s actually happening and just the distorted perception of reality of the characters. Here, the supernatural does happen in a mundane setting and it feels unfitting, especially at the end where this issue is taken to the extreme.

As it’s usually the case with horror, things don’t tend to make much sense but why mix it with real world scenarios and problems here in that case? The mix comes off as very weird. Besides that, you start asking yourself if no one ever had the same or a similar case as the main character happening to them, and how is it possible for such a dangerous product to even be allowed to even be around.

At best, you can accept those nonsensical elements as surreal or just an expression of its overall “be careful what you wish for” message in its story, but I feel like I’ve seen this excuse being used by horror fans for horror fiction one too many times to accept it.

Despite that, unlike Huang Yan, Beauty Water correctly chooses to focus entirely on its main character, her backdrop, inner fears, gradual and progressive corruption, and resolution, while making it clear that the others are supportive plot devices, so it doesn’t feel like there are any loose ends in the end, even when the final scene doesn’t really end the cycle, you have to watch it to get what I mean.

The animation is great in the beginning in both artwork and motions, and you will ask yourself why the rest of the movie isn’t like that as well, not that I mind it much, since although not very looking, the CGI is serviceable, the facial expressions are good enough, the backgrounds are pretty good, there are some good and well directed scenes showing the main character introspecting, as well as her going crazy, the artwork works well for the most gruesome scenes, and just like it was the case in Huang Yan, Beauty Water is not supposed to look pretty, it’s meant to come off as ugly and scary, regardless of how much prettier the protagonist appears to be, so the visuals have a narrative purpose to be the way they are, while also not bad on their own.

The atmosphere is also very good, there are some typical themes in it, but as a whole the soundtrack is very intense and absorbing as it should for its title, the sound effects are good, and so is the voice acting. There is no opening song in here but there is an ending, which sounds both sinister and sad at the same time to me, and it fits well with the movie as a whole and its finale in particular.

So, beyond all the nonsense in its script and resolution thanks to the weird mix of fantasy elements in what is otherwise supposed to be a mundane setting with real world issues, and not being as good as another review about it that I read said it is, I found Beauty Water to be a pretty good one time “be careful what you wish for” type of story that combines psychological thriller with body horror well enough, and it’s the best Korean animation I watched so far as well as the best Asian animation from the year 2020 that I watched.

Kinda similar stuff

-Les Yeux sans visage (1960 French movie that started the surgeon drama/thriller premise, very basic in plot and writing but for its time solid in atmosphere, visuals and drama).

-La piel que habito (2011 Spanish movie and the most solid plastic surgeon drama/thriller out of the live action ones, the plot is basic but overall good for how twisted and interconnected the characters are, and the resolution is pretty great).

-Huang Yan (Donghua about a woman that gets bullied for being ugly, and kind of starts a relationship with the plastic surgeon that changed her, who in turn is obsessed with remaking women as close as possible to his wife that’s in a coma).

-Perfect Blue (Famous psychological thriller/horror anime movie about a former idol actress that becomes crazy because of a creepy stalker and lot of shit she has to deal with in her new career, way better than this one in everything).

-Junju Ito’s works (but only for a similar type of body horror and “surreal” nonsensical plots).

I initially wanted to watch this series two weeks ago but held it back for a while because I wanted to watch and review all the drama/thriller movies about some surgeon killing young girls to implant their skins on a relative of his who suffered some accident that I could find before this one series. Was it worth it? No, but not because of this show, but rather because most of those films were quite crappy.

Besides a somewhat similar premise though, Huang Yan goes in a completely different direction, as it starts with the main character having several surgeries done to her because of all the shit she was receiving for being ugly, and the surgeon that did them becoming obsessed with her because he can remake her as his wife that’s in a coma.
So, out of all the previous movies about the topic, La piel que habito is the one that has the most similar setup.

But that’s only the premise, as the series moves forward, it focuses mainly on the main character, as she becomes something of a voice against discrimination on the most watched television show of the moment, which is about women appearing in public after their surgeries are done.

I have to somewhat criticize the delivery of the message though, as what she says is contradicted by what she did, but at least it didn’t lead to a change of her personality, and the main character isn’t afraid to voice her opinion and confront people, and yet keeps finding trouble here and there.

Besides that, it’s interesting to see how the main character is treated despite her new appearance, and she learning that her change on the outside doesn’t mean that she’s going to become happier just because, and a lot of the series focuses on the mentality of the protagonist realizing and coming to terms with that, with a very good scene near the end where the “two of her” talk to each other.

This particular element leads to explore the themes of television industry and social media and how rumours about someone could be fabricated and believed by many people, possibly ruining their lives, and although nothing as extreme happens to the protagonist, it’s interesting to see the hardships she faces and how all of it helps in fleshing her out and completing her character arc.

The pacing is very good, the episodes are between ten and fifteen minutes long and yet the show uses its short runtime effectively by constantly moving the plot forward and exploring its themes and fleshing out the main character. Unfortunately, it also means that some of them are inferior than the others because events and characters’ apparitions together in one same place don’t happen very organically.

Something that it’s criticized about this show it’s the way it presents its messages and themes, and although I can see that, I won’t criticize the writing on that regard that much, since every bit of information is presented through flashbacks, dialogues, internal monologues and people talking on television, sending a message, doing exactly what they intended to do, so overall I find the script being excused for the way it explores its themes, and I don’t find the exposition awkward despite the handling of them being a bit in your face.

What I am going to criticize the writing for, is the way that things play out, as the starting points or resolutions of the conflicts always have to do with someone having a hidden camera or microphone to fabric something about the protagonist or expose someone when they are lying, which feels samey and repetitive, on top of the series not properly showing up the setup of those scenarios.

Besides that, there is also another problem regarding the other characters of the show, which is them essentially existing only as extensions of the main character or the themes. Although the plastic surgeon is somewhat explored to show why and how he came to be the way he is, not enough focus is given to him, he doesn’t really develop nor has a cathartic resolution. There is also the other ex-boyfriend of the protagonist, who is easily the worst aspect of the series because of how little and rushed immersion he is given and for how cartoonilishly evil he is presented. It’s a bigger problem because the plot had the chance of getting rid of him at a certain point, but kept getting him back just to antagonize the lead girl.

The same thing can be said about all the secondary cast, they don’t have an agenda and exist only as antagonists or support, effectively being a representation of the themes and messages and plot devices, but nothing beyond that, and they can all be summarized with one quick description.

Now, there are anime that focus mostly on their protagonists which I rated very highly, most of them among my favourites, which had the same issue, and sometimes I did bring the rating down because of that, or in the cases I didn’t, it was because the focus on their main characters was even better than here, and because the theme explorations and overall plots were far more complicated and meaningful as a whole.

The final issue is the resolution, which although solid and overall good for the main character and her arc, and also not idealistic to the point of resolving everything happily just because, it didn’t give a good enough closure to the other plot points, leaving them in a rather ambiguous situation, what happened with the ex, exactly? What about the plastic surgeon and his mother? What about his wife in a vegetative state? The show gives you an idea of what could happen regarding them, but not something that feels really concrete and complete.

As far as presentation goes, I’m giving a little bit of an extra point to the visuals, despite having the same plastic and fake looking look and limited motions and inexpressive facial expressions that lots of CGI donghua have. The reason why I’m willing to do that it’s because at the end of the day it does serve a narrative purpose, since the visuals end up representing clearly the lie of the title and the superficial views of the public within the show, as the script intended to do. The backgrounds are good for the most part, but don’t stand out much because the perspective is usually focused on the faces of the characters. There are also some visual metaphors to portray the emotions and visualize the inner monologues of the characters, so the directing is pretty good in that regard, it’s just that the quality of the CGI held those moments back from being as good as the team behind the series clearly intended them to be.

The atmosphere is good for the most part, not because of the voice acting, which is appropriate but nothing beyond that, and not because of the sound effects, which are fairly simple and weak for a 2022 production, but because of the soundtrack, which is effective in sounding either sad or sinister, even for the opening and ending songs, something that reminded me of the only good aspects that Aiyou de Mishi had.

Despite its issues and it not being as good as I expected it to be, I found Huang Yan to be a pretty good and rather unique and memorable show within the medium of, well, let’s not say anime, but Asian animation as a whole. Compared to the live action movies with similar premises I watched, it’s better than most of them, even the one that started it all, so I consider it a worthy one time watch, despite how unknown it is and how little rewatch value it has.


Kinda similar stuff

-Les Yeux sans visage (1960 French movie that started the surgeon drama/thriller premise, very basic in plot and writing but for its time solid in atmosphere, visuals and drama).

-La piel que habito (2011 Spanish movie and the most solid plastic surgeon drama/thriller out of the live action ones, the plot is basic but overall good for how twisted and interconnected the characters are, and the resolution is pretty great).

-Beauty Water (Aeni movie about a main girl bullied for being ugly that changes her whole body with a, well, beauty water, and she also kinda starts a relationship with someone after that, it takes a completely different direction beyond that point, but it’s the only somewhat similar thing to this donghua in Asian animation that I know of).

Normally, I would review a Spanish movie on its language, but since I’ve covered every previous surgeon thriller/horror movie that I know of in English, this will have to do.

It was actually because of this title that I watched all the previous ones and what a mistake that was because aside from the original (“Les Yeux Sans Visage”), every other movie was either disposable schlock (“Seddok, l’erede di Satana”, “Corruption”, “Les Predateurs de la Nuite”) or had the potential to be good but only managed to come off as mediocre (“Gritos en la noche”). La piel que habito is easily the best of the bunch.

Production wise is obviously far ahead of all the previous titles, despite its simple looking characters and the lack of a specific aesthetic, which most of the previous movies had. The visuals are overall good, the movements are good for what the cast had to do, there’s enough variety of locations and thus backgrounds despite taking place mostly on closed spaces, and the directing is good, something expected from this director, from what I’ve come to know (this is the first film of Almodóvar that I watched).

The atmosphere is pretty good as well, good and suspenseful soundtrack (unlike the bad and unfitting ones from all the previously mentioned titles), good sound effects, and good acting from everyone, even during the silliest parts of the movie.

The plot this time around isn’t about a surgeon killing women to take their skin and transplant it to his girlfriend, or sister, or daughter, or a random woman, it’s a very twisted premise of him using a woman as a guinea pig for the sake of developing an artificial skin after a tragedy, so it’s a more interesting scenario, even though it affects the character appeal for some by not giving the protagonist a decent goal.

But you know what? Since the movie is basically about sociopaths doing sociopathic things, and since in retrospect it meant not having all the gore schlock from some of the earlier movies, I was fine with the protagonist being the villain and having a selfish goal, especially because he was always presented as such, even while showing his motivation.

The pacing is good at every moment, with every scene progressing the plot or focusing on characterization, something which can’t be said about most of the previous examples, and in general having something happening to prevent the movie of becoming dull.

With that said, besides the changes in the formula, the plot is probably the simplest of all, especially after it was revealed to be a revenge plot. I don’t find much of a deeper meaning or message besides what’s happening on a surface level, I mean yeah, obsession and revenge, the same can be said about some of the similar movies.

The credibility of what happens is…low, from the premise itself, to the way the characters act, at times changing their behavior completely from one moment to another with not much reason, and even by having some silly moments, but at least some of them are explained quickly, thankfully (the dude wearing a leotard disguise and showing his butt cheeks).

The exposition is a bit awkward at times, which, out of all the movies I watched, only happened in the Spanish ones for some reason. In this one, the way the old woman revealed her past was weird, even more so because she is talking to a person that despises her. It’s a shame because soon afterwards another backdrop is completely shown, not told, making the previous scene even weirder.

The plot twist made the already twisted character dynamic even more impactful in a good and bad way, it was quite shocking and made the movie even more messed up, but my enjoyment, which was already low at that point, became even lower afterwards. At least, like I already said, it was shown properly, without any awkward exposition.

The conclusion was…kind of awesome, what the female lead did after her backdrop was revealed and how it flipped everything prior in the movie? And the final scene, that even cuts away at the most emotional moment instead of showing more than needed, as many films tend to do? Yeah, despite the villains falling for it too easily, it was still pretty great.

The characters, being kind of a bunch of sociopaths, sure are a memorable bunch, even if they don’t have the most complex and definitely not likeable personalities. Development is non-existent, no one changes from how they were at the beginning, but at least they are more and more interconnected through their shared backdrop stories, and the catharsis for the female lead was strong, after everything that happened and for how she flipped the whole movie. And it’s interesting how they referenced to it in “Wonder Woman”, since the female lead has a role there.

For better or worse, for all of its highs and lows, it sure is a memorable movie, is it rewatchable though? Mmm I don’t know about that, I find the plot simple and relying heavily on the plot twist for that, but for a one time experience, it is quite the solid watch and the best movie with its premise.

Ah yes, I finally got to “Les Predateurs de la Nuit”, the last of this bunch of movies I watched, and man am I thankful for that for I was so done with them once I got to it because of how many similar titles I watched in a row, well that, and because this one is by far the worst one of them all.

Despite coming out twenty years later than “Corruption”, this is even the worst looking movie by far, cheap visuals, standard and uninspired aesthetics, poorly made action scenes, and even the backgrounds are boring to look at compared with all the previous films. “Les Yeux Sans Visage” and “Gritos en la noche” had gothic vibes in them, “Seddok, l’erede di Satana had a sci-fi vibe because of all the machinery the protagonist had, mixed with some beautiful landscapes from time to time, as it was the case most prominently in “Corruption”, here, the whole movie takes place inside a building, whether the clinic, or a nightclub, or something else, or a vehicle. Even the aspect that clearly the makers put the most effort in, the special effects, are by now super cheap and outdated. Like, I know, this is essentially a low budget French-Spanish horror b-movie, and I shouldn’t judge it by being spoiled due to all the mainstream cinema from the late 80s that I already watched, but even for its time, all the intended gruesome and shocking scenes come off as silly instead for how cheap everything looks. There is a moment when a face is taken off and you can tell right away that is a mask.

Want to talk about atmosphere? The soundtrack is good by itself but doesn’t fit at times (the ending in particular was funnily off), the sound effects sound as good as the ones used twenty years prior, and despite having the misfortune of watching a horribly dubbed English version, even I could tell that no one in the cast was trying just by looking at them.

But the worst aspect was the plot, which was a step back in quality from even the worst previous films. First of all, it adds nothing to try to change the formula, it takes a step back to the most basic form of it. Second, despite having an inspector, hired by the father of a girl that disappeared, investigating from the beginning, he is not very present in the film, and doesn’t get near the villains in organic ways at any point, he just appeared where he needed to be in the third act just because.

And third, just like with the visuals, the only thing the makers cared of, with the director being the same one that made “Gritos en la noche” (the best imitator of the original premise in its decade), was the gruesome aspects. The sister of the doctor gets attacked randomly in the beginning on a terrible scene, and he kills his patients to use the skin on his sister’s face, because he has bisexual incestuous threesomes with her and his girlfriend, and assistant. Gross. Aside from that, most of the film is just that, two characters seducing people and killing them in gruesome ways, which look cheap because of the poor visuals and special effects.

Even leaving that aside, several minor characters act very stupidly throughout the film, getting killed by the main cast for basically doing nonsensical things, something that could potentially apply even to the biggest antagonists. And the writing gets really bad in the last act, why would you kidnap, kill, and take the face of a famous actress? Unlike the nobodies from before, that will lead you to be found out for sure. The scene where they take her face off yet her eyes keep moving, you notice “the face “ is a mask, and then that “face” gets instantly put over the burnt face of the sister of the villain and fits in instantly, is the worst in the whole movie.

The only major change in the plot structure was the somewhat tragic ending, but even that was ruined by bad writing and an ambiguous ending which feels sequel-baity and even lasts more than it needs to before the credits roll (think about Batman & Robin for something similar).

So, despite being the latest of these kind of films (until 2011) it was actually the worst in every aspect and even a disappointment coming from the same director of “Gritos en la noche”. “Eyes Without a Face” is the only worth watching retro surgeon thriller/horror movie, the rest are mediocre at best or just plain suck.

Corruption was the fifth movie of its kind I watch and since it’s British, you don’t risk watching an edited and poorly dubbed version with this one. Not that it makes it much better because it is overall a step back in quality from “Gritos en la noche”.

Since it came out in 1968 it means that unlike the previous titles, it has colours, which is a plus, but also now it’s more noticeable when something looks off, and in this case, that applies to most special effects and gruesome scenes, even for its time. Also, the movie tried to capture the trippy and colourful aesthetics from that time and place, and it looks and feels goofy in what is supposed to be a horror movie, even more compared with the gothic and sci-fi-ish looks of the previous films. There are wide shots which show some beautiful landscapes and places, so that’s a plus. The directing can be a bit weird, it abuses close ups to try to scare the audience but it’s not effective at all anymore.

Another weird thing from the directing is the music, also reflecting the vibe it was going for, which means that, just like the visuals, it doesn’t fit the type of movie, plus it’s not used very well, but at least it was better in that regard that “Eyes Without a Face”, which ironically was the worst at that despite being the best movie of the bunch. The sound effects are ok for its time and the acting…well, the main couple did their job fine, but everyone else wasn’t as convincing.

The plot this time is about a scientist who feels guilty to be responsible of damaging his girlfriend’s face after getting into a fight with another man, and you know the rest. He shares most of his scenes with the woman so that’s an improvement over the previous movie. What’s different now in this film is that the female lead is the actual villain, as she only cares about herself and wants her boyfriend to keep going with the killings, all for the sake of her face and career as a model, while he feels remorse for what he does and wants to quit, so that’s an interesting change from earlier titles and an interesting new character dynamic, despite the cost of character appear from her part. Another good thing is how the main abducted girl is not a clueless and helpless girl, but part of a band of robbers that was targeting the main couple the whole time, so that’s another interesting plot point.

Unfortunately the actual writing is weak since the very beginning because most things work the way the protagonist wants to purely because of luck, or you know, because the script says so, and the weak acting and the weird directing don’t help in making it feel any less worse nor make it any less noticeable.

It gets even worse in the third act of the film because characters appear out of nowhere, have some very trashy interactions, antagonists are taken stupidly one by one, and the final confrontation was just laughably bad. Plus the very ending of the film ruins absolutely everything by being ambitious and making it seem that nothing even ever happened, in a dumb attempt to make the viewer think if what they watched was real or not. If I wanted to watch a movie like that, I would rewatch American Psycho, which was a character study through and through, not this, so I guess that’s a much better alternative thing to do.

So in a way Corruption is the opposite of “Gritos en la noche”, in the sense that that one was implementing, and not exploiting, improvements in the plot and pacing, while this one wasted all of its potential in its new character dynamics. The Spanish movie remains then the second best one of its kind in its decade, after the only one that’s barely worth watching “Eyes Without a Face”, while this one and “Seddok” are placed at the bottom, though I wouldn’t know which one to choose as the worse one to be honest.