Slayers Evolution R Review

Posted on August 18, 2015 by dreager1

It’s been a little while, but it’s time to review the final season of Slayers! I actually saw this one some time ago, but it ended up getting buried in the backlog of reviews. I’m trying to set everything free from that backlog so at last, Slayers is here! I’d say that the franchise ended on a high note. Evolution R was more fun than Revolution although I’d probably still say that Next is still the best season. The short episode count does this season no favors as well.

Lina and her friends are still seeking the Hellmaster’s jar to free the people of Pokota’s kingdom. It’s a tough journey though and the heroes don’t even know where to look. Luckily, they run across a lady named Nama who believes that she knows where it is. The heroes find out the hard way that the journey won’t be so easy. Zuuma is still on the loose and wishes to destroy Lina, but even worse is the fact that the heroes will need to revive Rezo in order to save Pokota’s people. Is this a good tradeoff as Rezo was a fairly intimidating villain?

Considering that the season is only 13 episodes, the show definitely felt no pressure to speed things up. The first 4 episodes are basically stand alone fillers as the heroes experience a lot of tough situations with Nama. A fish claims that Gourry is her husband and there’s an episode where Nama and Amelia get to bond as they fight dragons. Luckily, these stand alones were actually pretty good for the most part and I would say that they were a significant improvement over the fillers in Revolution. Of course, Slayers is one of those series that always get to its height when the plot starts and this season was no exception.

The three episodes that followed wrapped up the Zuuma arc. He ordered the heroes to protect Radock as he would come for the guy and destroy the heroes on the way. They comply, which leads to an ultimate confrontation with him as well as two monsters who randomly jumped in. Honestly, that was easily the most random part of the whole arc. I suppose that Zuuma has connections, which is how he was able to summon them.

Those three episodes were a lot of fun. I actually enjoyed the Radock plot as his son gave the heroes a hard time and Radock was always very stern and strict. There is a twist about him that I can’t say I was too pleased with, but in theory it’s a good twist. One thing that I liked about this mini arc was that Zelgadis and Amelia actually got to fight for the first time in a long while since the monsters targeted them. They were lucky that Lina was around the first time and lucky that Xellos showed up the second time. The fights just showed everyone how Zel and Amelia are completely outmatched by the modern villains. They got some good hits in and are still good fighters, but the problem is that monsters are typically better than humans. Add in the fact that these monsters were pretty tough and that’s the game for the heroes.

Still, even though they lost, they did put up a good fight and I can’t put enough emphasis on how glad I was that they got to fight. I feel like the side characters should at least fight once in a while to remind us of why they’re even here. With the Zuuma plot out of the way, the heroes could finally focus on bringing back Rezo, that is…if they want to bring him back! With 5 episodes to go, that’s a decent amount of time.

We get some happy episodes for a little while and then the heroes finally revive Rezo, who had pretended to lose his mind. It was interesting as it feels like he was pretending, but maybe he was actually in an artificial “drunk” state due to being in the jar for so long. That’s one way of looking at it anyway. Zelgadis also almost betrayed the group as he tried to destroy the jar, but couldn’t bring himself to do it and Pokota tried the opposite thing. Once the heroes settled down and thought about this, they still brought Rezo back.

Well, he kept his end of the bargain at least. The parties started up and I wondered if the second last episode would actually end on such a mild note, but then the twist ending occurred as Lina appeared and confronted Rezo on the roof. The reason why he had been making some odd decisions was that he was still merged with Shabranigdo. This has given him a significant boost to his power. Xellos arrives to stop this as that level of power could even threaten the monsters, but he is completely and utterly crushed. Rezo then admits that he can’t handle the power and tells the heroes to deal with him before blowing up. The big battle is here, can Lina handle Shabranigdo once more?

The cool part about the final battle is that the show pulled out all of the stops. Sylphiel returned for a quick cameo as she made a barrier to stop one of Shabranigdo’s hits. Like always, she started out strong, but ended weak as she started overreacting and basically being a non factor. Even the famous Inspector appeared to talk tough for a little while. Shabranigdo looked supremely impressive and I’m always reminded of why he’s such a great character. He talks about dreams a lot here as he stomps those of the heroes. There are really no bosses who can stand up to him as he makes strong fighters like Xellos and Lina look like children. Seriously, Xellos can’t deal any damage to the guy and Lina’s attack only works if he gives her about 10 minutes of time to charge up. In a one on one fight, that’s not happening.

All of Lina’s allies joined up in the attack for one of the most brutal moments of the series. They’re all taken down and one of the heroes had her fist literally crushed by Shabranigdo’s immense power. You always feel bad for Lina’s allies as they get beaten up pretty badly in every climax. This one was no different and it’s how the show tells you that the stakes just got real. Typically, it’s all fun and games even while in the middle of an intense fight scene, but the comedy angle is always dropped for the big battle.

As for the characters, there’s not much more to say about them than what has been said for previous seasons. Lina is still a good lead and easily one of the best female anime leads of all time. At this point, I’m going to say that she is the best lead and none even come close, at least I can’t think of any at the moment. It was great to see her finally use the Giga Slave once more as that attack is really great. She even gets a new design out of it although it doesn’t act as a power up in this case. (Which is surprising)

Gourry’s still a good sidekick even if he can be a little naive. Actually believing that he was the father of a fish was a little dramatic for him, but I am glad that Gourry gave the task his all. If you’re going to do something…do it right! It’s unfortunate that he didn’t have the Sword of Light for most of the series though since it meant that he couldn’t really participate in most of the action scenes. I suppose that he will get another chance in the future, but at least he did get to fight in the final battle and he was also around for Zuuma.

Amelia was a solid character as always. Her role was fairly minimal, but she keeps the group chipper with her optimism. I also do think that she’s still a little stronger than Zelgadis although it’s probably close. Zel continues to be used mainly for comic relief in the series. He finally cracks in this one and tells Rezo to make him human again, but the guy gives him the classic….”I can’t!” Since Zelgadis seems to believe him, that may have finally ended that plot. The fact that Zelgadis still thinks of Rezo as his teacher is a bit annoying though and I’m seriously not a Zelgadis fan.

Pokota is still a pretty bad character and I’d go as far as to say that he’s a terrible one. The show would be better if he was simply not here at all. As it stands, he’ll disappear for a while at times and his lack of lines in other episodes will make you forget about him. He just wasn’t needed in this season and I wish that the show could have made him more likable. At least the Inspector briefly appeared to help us forget about Pokota.

Nama was a fun new supporting character. The show makes it obvious what her secret identity it, but it was still a fun injoke for the fans. We finally got a crossover between the show and the movies. There’s even a battle between Lina and Nama to parody the films and it’s a great homage. Nama always was a fun character to have around and I wonder how her dynamic with the other members would have been had she not lost her memory. It’s something that the series should explore as it would be quite enjoyable to see. Nama didn’t get to help too much before she was taken away, but her abilities are still on par with Lina’s from the olden days so she could have been a very valuable asset to the team.

Zuuma is still a cool villain although he went a little lower in the ranks for me after the twist. I don’t think Zuuma even needed a twist, but he’s still a cool assasin. He was doing quite well against the heroes, but then Xellos appeared and that was basically game over for him. As good as Zuuma is, he doesn’t have nearly enough firepower or speed to deal with a monster on that calibur. Xellos also has high speed regeneration in case he ever was hit in that battle. Zuuma will likely never appear again, but he definitely had a good run.

As for Xellos, he was good in this season. It’s still a little iffy how the heroes get along with him, since Xellos is constantly betraying them, but that’s their choice I suppose. I was glad to see Xellos get some action scenes here since that meant he wouldn’t be all hype and no action. His fight against Zuuma was short, but showed how powerful he was and I liked his battle against Rezo. We rarely see fights between beings on their level of power in Slayers so it’s always a treat. I feel like Xellos is awkwardly in the middle of the power levels. Either he completely wrecks his opponent like with Zuuma and Lina or he gets completely destroyed like with Gaav or Shabranigdo. There is never a middle ground with him although the closest would be Valgaav. It’s always fun to see him lose, but he was actually a good character in this season so that’s good.

As for Rezo, this show should definitely prove without a shadow of a doubt that he is still evil. He did some good works along the way, but we find out how he experimented on people and basically did not care about their lives. He was doing it all just to get his sight back. He sacrificed a whole lot of people just so that he could gain his eyesight back for a minute or two before deciding to die once again as Shabranigdo awakened. All of that…just for a few minutes of eyesight. He certainly only cares about himself, but Rezo certainly makes for a powerful villain. I don’t care for him as a character, but he’ll always have that nostalgia feel to him. I already talked about how awesome Shabranigdo is so I don’t really need to go into that again.

Evolution R was really just one big nostalgia trip. We got to see old faces like Sylphiel, Rezo, and Shabranigdo again. That was really neat and it makes you want to watch the first season again to relive the good ole days. Even having the Giga Slave back was a nice homage to the good ole days. If this is how the animated Slayers franchise ends for now, I’d say that ending with nostalgia is always a good way to go about things.

As always, one of the reasons why Slayers is so fun is its balance between action and comedy. There can be a lot of serious moments and then a lot of light ones. Sometimes the show will do both at the same time. It keeps the show from taking things too seriously while still treating us to a lot of good fights and interesting plots. This formula is what has really made Slayers what it is. Luckily, the chest jokes were also pretty minimal here and the show was extremely light on fanservice if there was any at all. I can’t remember a single hot springs moment, although I suppose there may have been one in there somewhere. Either way, it was very light overall like I said.

As expected, the animation is really good for this season. The energy effects are spectacular and that really helps for the fight scenes. After seeing this, the older Slayers seasons will probably seem extremely dated by comparison, but I like that 90’s style so it’ll still be cool. That being said, the modern style is so sleek and streamlined that it is very nice to look at and makes all of the characters look even more impressive since their attacks have basically leveled up.

The soundtrack is also good. At this point, I’m very used to the themes and feel that they work well. I liked the ominous track for the rooftop confrontation and the battle themes work well too. It’s not exactly a 5 star soundtrack, but I’d probably give it a 7. It’s good and sometimes, that’s good enough when all of the other areas of the show are on point.

Overall, Slayers Evolution R was a success and it was quite an enjoyable show. In some ways, it may have even been better than Next. It was shorter, but I can’t say that it really had any miss episodes. Pretty much all of them were great, or at least good. The filler could get to you sometimes when it was too many of them in a row, but once the action started up, the show never really looked back. If a good climax can save a movie, the solid second half for Slayers is what always tips the scales. I definitely recommend this if you’re looking for a good fantasy anime and even if you haven’t seen the older seasons before, the nostalgia factor should help you get into this show. I’m going to miss Slayers. Hopefully it gets a new film or show someday!

Overall 7/10

Dragon Ball Z Resurrection ‘F’ Review

Posted on August 5, 2015 by dreager1

Well, it’s time to look at the latest DBZ film. I got to watch it dubbed right off the bat, which is great thanks to the limited theater release over here in the US. Battle of Gods was a lot of fun, (9/10) but I still did walk away from it with a lot of mixed feelings. I thought this one ended up being much better and it certainly felt more action packed, which is a good thing!

For the plot, Frieza’s men go to Earth and grab the Dragon Balls in order to awaken Frieza. With their master back, they head out to space so that Frieza can train a little before going back to Earth to fight Goku. Unfortunately, Goku and Vegeta are training with Whis at the moment and are far away from Earth. Can the Z Fighters hold out for long against Frieza’s entire army!?

All right, there is a lot to talk about here so let’s start with the technical factors, move on to the characters, and then wrap up with the power levels discussion. Heh heh, let’s just say that there is quite a lot to talk about on that subject and I even had a member of the audience to back me up on that part!

First off, the animation looks quite good. As you would expect from a modern DBZ film, the fights are very intense and it’s great to see all of the attacks with the modern animation. (Except for the Spirit Bomb, which is still being saved. Probably for one of the final gods) The film still uses that intriguing CGI effect at times for when the characters are clashing. I could honestly do without it, but I’ve never minded having cutscenes in the middle of the epic fights so it’s all good. Would the scenes be better if they were purely animated? Most definitely, but the fights still look great.

One interesting thing to note is that the fights really emphasize power over speed for the most part. Gone are the quick flurry of blows from the older films and I thought that Battle of Gods actually showed off their speed more. Goku and Frieza is actually a slow fight as the film slightly slows the speed in the background so you can focus on each blow. It’s a good effect although I’m hoping for some more speed in the next film since I always love a really fast fight. It’s just epic to behold!

Resurrection F’s soundtrack is one of the big areas where this film beats out Battle of Gods. We had some pretty great themes here while there were no memorable ones in the other film. Frieza’s opera theme is certainly epic to behold and that rock intro to it was great as well. It sounded like Death Note’s second opening. I also really liked the remix of the main DBZ theme even if we only got a short glimpse of it. I guess it’s straight to Youtube for the full version eh?

I’d also say that the writing is good as you may expect from the legendary Akira Toriyama. Even Master Roshi seems like a likable character if you didn’t know any better. He’s portrayed as one of the smart fighters since he quickly estimates how many soldiers need to be defeated and he also looks impressively good ~~at the expense of the other Z fighters~~ as he takes down multiple waves of soldiers with his original Kamehameha and solid fundamentals. That being said, there are still some things that I’m a little iffy on, but I’ll leave that to the individual character pages.

An interesting part of Frieza’s plight is how hell is portrayed. It’s always been a fun interpretation in DBZ world, but Frieza essentially states that Hell is only valid for Earth. If you die somewhere else, then it is a different hell or afterlife so to say. It’s a very intriguing premise and I suppose that it is a little similar to Marvel’s universe where there are many different hells. Hela, Mephisto, and Death all have their own version of the place and that seems to be what DBZ is gunning for. I don’t think it will really be delved into, but that would be an interesting concept to tackle.

Goku is the lead character so it’s only natural that he is a solid character here right? I’ve always liked Goku as he is a great character and he was written really well here. He constantly warns Frieza that fighting him isn’t really the best move. Goku is actually more overconfident, maybe even slightly arrogant than usual, but with his power level, why shouldn’t he be? While his weakness may apparently be that he lets his guard down, I woudn’t call it much of a problem. It doesn’t happen too much and shouldn’t have even happened here except for plot hax and Whis needing to make a point.

Goku still tries to spare Frieza multiple times showing just how heroic he is. However, at the very end, he unleashes a final blast as he makes a critical decision. Considering that hell here is actually quite pleasant and not painful in the slightest, one can argue that destroying Frieza isn’t so bad. It’s still the concept that you should think about, but Goku isn’t a stranger to destroying his foes. Whether accidentally or not, he typically unleashes a final Kamehameha that does the trick. Since a lot of fighters are reincarnated eventually once they turn good, Frieza should be back as well. I didn’t really have a problem with Goku finishing Frieza off though as they can still continue to fight in Hell if Goku so desires. (He probably won’t since he has a good sparring partner with Vegeta!) Since Hell is just a part of Earth according to Frieza, it will be interesting to see if the heroes have to visit the real deal in a future film if one of the gods lives there. The future films have a lot of promise even if I don’t see them getting quite that serious for a few more films as the heroes build up their power levels a little more first.

Vegeta was naturally an exceptional character in this film as always. My one gripe with him was probably that he waited a little too long to do anything while Frieza was messing Goku up. I (Along with the audience who were stating different ways that they thought Vegeta would intervene) expected Vegeta to come in with his iconic neck kick or at least catch Frieza’s punch. While he still did get his turn to fight Frieza, I thought that he could have moved in sooner. His fight with Goku was pretty awesome and his unwavering confidence is back in full force. I’m also glad that he doesn’t want to team up with Goku since a 2 on 1 fight isn’t the Saiyan way.

Whis mentions that Vegeta thinks a little too much before he fights while Goku has the opposite problem and it’s nice to see the film depict this in the fight scenes. Whether intentional or not, you can see that Vegeta fights Frieza in more of a standarized way as he chooses optimal ways to hit the guy while Goku just unleashes on him with a flurry of solid blows. Vegeta uses several of his combat techniques from the video games which was a lot of fun and his personality is still one of the most enjoyable in the franchise. It’s easy to see why Vegeta is such a fan favorite and I still consider him to easily be the best character in the series. I’m glad that they’ve cleaned up his portrayal since Battle of Gods. It’s also worth noting that he continues to show more natural talent than Goku. Goku needed the death of Krillin to make him turn into a Super Saiyan and Vegeta just trained for it. Goku needed the power of 5 Saiyans to unlock God Mode. Let’s just say that Vegeta’s classic approach continues to work wonders for him.

Frieza always was one of the best DBZ villains and it was great to see him return. While Perfect Cell is still the coolest of the big 3 DBZ villains, I do prefer Frieza to Buu. Frieza had a nice amount of arrogance to him and his final form just looks so great. It’s very easy to see why he is such a threat and his theme song in this film is amazing. There’s really not much to say about his personality as it stays very true to his manga counterpart. It’s also nice to see that he was dedicated enough to train to surpass Goku, making him look much better than the average villain. His banter with Goku is one of the better parts of the film and he’s deceptively intelligent at times.

Gohan looks pretty bad as expected since he doesn’t train at all anymore. He really doesn’t care about fighting and just wants to live his life as a normal dude. He doesn’t even arrive to the fight in his full uniform. I do appreciate the fact that the film still showed him to be a bit of a pacifist though as he makes sure to take down all of the minions without actually destroying any of them. That shows a lot of control on his part and also hints at his true power level. If only he could have had more of a fight against Frieza. Since I consider the new films to be the Goku and Vegeta adventures, I’m not sure if this will change anytime soon, but maybe at some point. Gohan getting SSJ God mode as well would be pretty awesome. As a character, he’s certainly still likable.

Piccolo is also a good character and he actually gets his own fight. The only side character to pull that off! He’s still confident in battle while being a nice guy despite his gruff exterior. Unfortunately, he’s the only character who doesn’t use his trademarked attack (Special Beam Cannon) unless I’m missing something. He just uses generic energy blasts against the opponents unless it was supposed to look like his Hell Grenade technique. It’s also possible that he used it in his fight against Tagoma. That was a really enjoyable fight and it was cool to see Piccolo really have to put some effort into his match.

Krillin has a nice role here. He’s now a respectable cop and he even went back to his iconic bald look. Krillin does a good job of weeding out the enemy troops and his confidence is always nice to see. He’s certainly a good supporting character. Jaco got to make his animated debut here and his character was also pretty amusing. His ray gun’s delayed effect is as potent as ever and he’s brutally honest about how he will only help the heroes a little. He’s a nice guy, but he just doesn’t want to mess with someone like Frieza. He would get destroyed in an instant so you can’t blame him there.

Master Roshi got a good role for the first time in DBZ history, which is fantastic for his fans. It’s safe to say that he had quite a few as people cheered and laughed for his scenes. Beerus is still a character that I don’t like. He simply gives himself way too much hype and I can’t stand how everyone is afraid of him and gives the guy so much respect. It’s honestly completely out of character for Goku and even Frieza’s scene will make you wince a little on the inside. Beerus blowing up a planet with a sneeze was cool though as more feats is always a good thing! I could have done without Goku saying that the blast would have destroyed him though. We don’t want anti-feats…granted, he wasn’t in his final form yet. Once Goku and Vegeta inevitably surpass him, that should make things better. That being said…have they already surpassed him. If you remember, God Goku was able to give Beerus a decent fight and SSJ God Goku would likely be 50X stronger thanks to the power boost. That means…Goku should be much stronger, and by extension, Vegeta as well. Good Game Beerus!

Whis also gets a lot of hype, but he’s more likable than Beerus and never tries to get people to fear him. He doesn’t bother with empty threats as he just has fun eating all the desserts that he can stomach. Whis not noticing that he had a phone message was a little….intriguing since his scepter should have let him know immediately, but I’ll assume that he was trolling. He’s not exactly the hero type and just does whatever he feels like doing. His unique ability is certainly handy in a fight although it has more limitations than most other characters who have this kind of technique. Thanks to his high level of hand to hand combat and speed, he should definitely be fine in a fight. It’s hinted that he’s stronger than Beerus and the heroes certainly shouldn’t trust him as I could see the guy ultimately become a villain.

Sourbet is one of the new villains and he’s essentially a Babidi kind of character. He can’t really fight, but he makes plans and gets things done. He’s not a bad villain and I applaud the fact that he went to Earth himself, but he’s not my kind of bad guy. Some more feats would have helped him tremendously. That being said, while his plan worked, it was still a bad plan as it shouldn’t have succeeded. The heroes should have been able to stop him as soon as Shenron appeared thanks to their incredible speed. Ah well, more on plot hax later.

Tagoma is the power hitter of the group and he ends up going against Piccolo in the film. While I think he should have been crushed immediately since that kind of feat would put him on second form Cell, it’s good that at least one of Frieza’s henchmen could really fight. His name is a lot easier to remember than the underlings and as a result, I’ll definitely remember him as the films go by. He made for a good mid-film boss, but I am glad that Piccolo never went down. Had the fight gone on, I’m confident that Piccolo could have made a comeback. (The Gohan fan to the left was panicking during the fight as he thought that Piccolo should clobber the guy so when the fight started to go south, the guy was really going crazy in his chair!)

Shisami had a much smaller role as he got on Frieza’s bad side. It’s safe to say that everyone knew he was doomed from the start once he questioned Frieza. You simply don’t do that! Shenron looked nice and fierce, which is an improvement from his scared days in older films. (As recent as Battle of Gods!) Bulma also got a good role as she assembled the heroes and talked tough to Frieza. Tien’s mostly a nonfactor, but it was still nice to see him contribute to the fight. Pilaf’s crew weren’t even that annoying and they actually did well this time. It’s a little on the plot hax side that the Z Fighters just leave the Dragon Balls lying about, but it works out well for Pilaf. Those 3 were certainly more likable than in Battle of Gods and they even tried to put up a fight!

The audience was certainly very enthusiastic for this film and I’m tempted to say that it was more intense than the Avengers, beating it out for second place. DBZ is a lot shorter than Avengers so the latter had more time for cheers, but DBZ had constant yells and cheers throughout the film. It was great to see the dedicated DBZ fanbase attending the new film. This must have been what it was like in the early 2000’s when DBZ was at its height. People were yelling and making one liners as the film was starting and then yelled a lot with anticipation and tension during the fight scenes. Everyone especially liked Goku’s Ryu inspired backfist hit. It was good to see Goku use an actual advanced martial arts move in that moment!

I have to give a lot of credit to the guy sitting towards the left of the row that I was on. He was really on point for just about every inconsistent power level moment. He was a big fan of Gohan so I knew that he would be pretty upset by the time the film was over since it was already a known fact that he wouldn’t look so good. None of the other Z fighters will ever be acknowledged as a tough fighter who can help out Goku and Vegeta anymore unless something drastic changes. Gohan has a slight chance of improving, but I think that DBZ will just become the Goku and Vegeta adventures for the foreseeable future. The guy had to say “I”m done” about 10 times because Gohan kept underwhelming him with lines like “I can’t win!” or getting one shotted by Frieza in the guy’s first form before Gohan could even turn Super Saiyan.

The thing is, the whole film is built around a plot hole in terms of power levels. Frieza is revived and trains for 6 months. Somehow, this is enough for him to go from being pre Arc 2 SSJ1 level to post Battle of Gods Super Saiyan God mode tier? Seriously? Let’s put this into perspective for a second. Frieza’s final form was on par with Goku’s SSJ1 form and par is a strong word since Goku was clearly stronger at that point. Super Saiyan 2 is around 2-3 times stronger than SSJ1 and SSJ3 is 4x stronger than that. So, if SSJ1 was a 1, SSJ3 Goku is a 8-12 star fighter. After that, we have God mode Goku. Considering that SSJ3 Goku couldn’t last a second against Beerus and God Goku gave him a good fight, let’s say it’s a power boost of about 10x. Then, we have SSJG Goku from this movie, which amps up his strength another 50x. That’s not even counting all of the various zenkai boosts like Base Goku from Battle of Gods easily being stronger than SSJ2 Goku from the older days and maybe even SSJ3. Frieza passed all of that in a mere 6 months? He couldn’t do that if he had 60 years! He is literally making himself hundreds of times stronger just like that. He’s no Saiyan, that’s just not possible. Even for a Saiyan it would be impossible. Remember, Goku had to use the Time Chamber, which turned one year into a day. That’s already more time that he spent training than Frieza.

So, considering that the plot was a power level inconsistency, I figured that there would be plenty more in the film. This doesn’t affect the score in the slightest as the stronger a character gets, the more plot hax there will be, but it’s still worth noting. After all, if there was no plot hax, the planet would have blown up many times over from the intensity of the battles. Goku getting pierced by a random ray gun is also complete plot hax. Granted, Goku let his guard down according to Whis, but even so, in SSJ God form, Goku’s ki should have deflected the blast with ease. There’s no way that it would do any damage to him.

Gohan pretty much deserves his own paragraph. He should be able to wipe the floor with the entire cast. Losing to Frieza in an instant was embarrassing. Now, we can overlook this by saying that Frieza is on Goku’s level now, but then why was Gohan not fighting at full power at that point? Also, if Master Roshi, with a power level of 139 could stand up to dozens of Frieza’s soldiers, then Gohan, Krillin, Tien, and Piccolo should look far more impressive than they did. The fact of the matter is that Roshi should have died instantly when the fight started. Even Frieza’s henchmen aren’t that weak. Saibamen are vastly stronger than Roshi.

There’s no way that the henchmen are that weak. We had one good scene where Gohan moves so fast that it looks like everyone is frozen. The problem is that this should be how things look for the Z fighters the entire time. That’s how wide the power gap is at this point. The minions simply looked too impressive even though they were being crushed the entire time. The heroes should really not need any effort to defeat them. Frieza states that Gohan could take out the entire army if he wanted too…and that’s what should have happened. The gap between the talking and the on screen action was considerable.

It’s interesting to note that Majin Buu doesn’t get to appear even though he was mentioned. That was just really odd and I’m assuming that he’ll be in some kind of Director’s cut. Still, it doesn’t make any sense that he would be out of the picture. This was his chance to shine after all and he blew it! Hercule would have been nice to have as well. At least Shenron finally gets his props here as the villains start to fear him again. He’s probably gotten much stronger since his last fight. It’s a missed opportunity here as the wish should have been to make Frieza stronger than Goku. While that would have to mean that Shenron would be stronger than Goku, it would have involved less plot hax.

One last note on the plot hax side. Aside from Buu not appearing, Yamcha, Chiaotzu, and Android 18 didn’t join the fight either. (Although at least 18 got a cameo) Where’s Android 17 as well? All of these guys should have joined the fight considering what a threat this was and it would have been cool to see the gang fighting. Considering that Roshi could beat the minions, the other fighters wouldn’t have a problem. If you think about it, Android 18 is stronger than quite a few of the fighters who did go to fight Frieza. (Krillin, Tien) It goes without saying that Majin Buu would have been helpful and what about Goten and Trunks? With their SSJ3 Gotenks form, they would have really done well and without power level inconsistencies, they could have probably defeated Frieza. The reasoning for keeping all of these characters out was pretty bad.

So, where did this film rank in the overall DBZ franchise? It goes without saying that it clobbered Battle of Gods and that film was in my top 5! Well, I would actually probably put this as the second best film. It was close, but it barely nudged Super Android 13 out of the spot. After all, Roshi was still being a little dicey here. This film really had no such negatives. Broly will always be the best DBZ film though as I still think that it has the best fight scenes in the series. You want a film where the stakes are real (No Whis and Beerus to keep things light) and the fights emphasize speed as well as power? Broly’s the film to see. While the animation may technically be better in this film on the whole, Broly had more of a theatrical feel to it. The animation just seemed to be on a higher level in that regard and didn’t use any CGI tricks to help itself. I can only imagine how intense seeing that one in theaters would be! It’ll be hard for any film to pass Broly, but if Broly really does return in the next film, that could present a challenge to the classic!

Overall, This was an incredible DBZ movie for sure. It had a lot of great action scenes and a dynamite soundtrack as well. The writing was good and while Beerus annoyed me, the movie did a good job of making almost everyone likable. Even Master Roshi actually acts like a good character, which impressed me. I’m definitely ready for more movies in this series and it’ll be great to see Gogeta appear again as it was certainly hinted at as well as a normal Goku and Vegeta tag team. Considering that they’re both able to fight at such a high level now, it’s easy to see why they would overwhelm any opponent when it is two against one.

Overall 9/10

Puella Magi Madoka Magica Review

Posted on June 28, 2015 by dreager1

At this point, who hasn’t heard of this show right? It became a pretty popular title back in the day and I’m sure that the fanbase is still strong right now. I had heard of the show and knew that it was supposed to have been very different from the average magical girl title because there were some dark twists. This did worry me to an extent especially when I saw one of the big names behind the show, but Madoka Magica actually ended up being a fantastic show and one of the greatest anime of all time. It’s not something that I had expected (To put it mildly) but it just goes to show that any show has the potential to be great if it plays its cards right. The show starts off with a bang and never lets up!

Madoka wakes up one day to witness the end of the world as a magical girl fights against a powerful deity. The girl appears to be losing and a creature asks Madoka if she wants to help change this fate by becoming a magical girl. Madoka thinks long and hard about this and then wakes up from her dream. Was it really a dream though? In the real world, she has had a perfect life. She never lies or does anything wrong and is essentially as good a person as one can be. The girl from her dream appears one day along with the creature and the Witches start appearing. Magical Girls must hunt and destroy the Witches to keep people safe and the creature is really determined for Madoka to become a magical girl although everyone else tries to stop Madoka from making such a decision. What could possibly be wrong with becoming a magical girl?

I’ve mentioned in the past that a few shows have managed to really feel like movie quality titles with a great soundtrack, writing, and animation staff. Unfortunately, the three shows that pulled this off all ended up being pretty bad by the end. (Attack on Titan, Fate/Zero, and Sword Art Online) Aside from those three shows I can’t say that any other title has ever had that big budget movie effect for me. Even shows that I love like Yugioh GX and Digimon Data Squad while they are amazing, still felt like classic anime and not necessarily that mainstream theater effect. Well, now I can finally say that I’ve found a great show which pulled it off. If you can imagine how I enjoyed the overall development of the previously mentioned shows when they didn’t end up turning out well, you can imagine just how great this was for such a good show.

First of all, Madoka Magica has the greatest opening in anime history. Not the opening in terms of music, but the opening scene. Within the first 2 minutes, the world is already on the brink of destruction and we see a big budget fight between a deity and a magical girl. I have to quickly pat myself on the back here as I knew that the magical girl in that scene would be my favorite character in the series immediately. One glance at her and I knew that this was a character who wasn’t going to mess around and who would be a deadly fighter. I’m glad to say that my instincts paid off and she was definitely a shining point of the show although the writing was so good that virtually every single character was great so she did have some steep competition. (Never a doubt though)

When your first scene is that epic, you know that the show is going to go places. Seriously, name a better opening scene to an anime. There is none and I doubt that there will ever be a better one although it is always possible. (Like an opening scene to a new Megaman EXE show where Bass is fighting someone with a high budget. That would be amazing) Immediately you can tell that this isn’t going to be the next Sailor Moon. Sailor Moon’s a fun show, but this one destroys it in an instant. This show is a better Sailor Moon than Sailor Moon, a better Fate/Zero than Fate/Zero and a better Serial Experiments Lain than Serial Experiments Lain.

Why did I pick those three shows in particular? Sailor Moon is self explanatory as they are both magical girl shows where the heroes fight villains with their powers. Fate/Zero tries to be really deep and philosophical with a lot of dark themes like Madoka, but Madoka pulls them all off so much better without going overboard. Finally, Madoka can also be very abstract at times like Lain, but it’s far more interesting. You could make a case for Madoka being the greatest anime of all time, but Yugioh GX still holds that honor. However, it’s impressive in and of itself that Madoka could be so great in only 12 episodes while GX had 180. If GX had ended after the first 12 episodes, it’s safe to say that Madoka would win. No other 12 episode start to a series can match up to this title.

I’ll start to actually discuss the show and the characters in a minute, but let’s cover the rest of the technical information. The soundtrack is incredible and easily a 10/10 for the show. The opening theme song is the only weak part and the actual music is still really good. The images just aren’t that exciting and while that is the point, I could do without the metaphysical Madoka meeting herself as that was a little on the fanservicey side even if it was all meta, which I am slightly more lenient with. It’s still not really needed. Beyond that, look to the ending theme as it is one of the greatest pieces of music in all of anime. It’s a great opera styled theme that is similar to what you would hear in Tsubasa and it really sets the tone for the battles. There are also many more opera themes as well as fight themes, which makes for a very epic soundtrack. It doesn’t get much better than this and the end theme will probably be my favorite theme to listen to for the next year or so until I find another really cool theme. I never keep a favorite theme forever due to a mix of hearing it extremely often so that I am ready for a new theme and the fact that there are always new themes to listen too.

As you would expect, the writing is impeccable and the series wouldn’t have been able to have been as thought provoking or interesting if the writing was not as good. The characters are all typically polite or politely rude (Think of it as being passively aggressive in their manner of speaking) so they don’t resort to swearing. The logical loops and deep thinking will make you think as well and you’ll have to choose a side many times since the characters disagree with each other. It’s all handled very well and you will definitely be engaged at all times.

There is only one moment when the writing falters and it is to make a point about how the Earth may not be worth saving. Several characters come to this conclusion and I’ll go into that more in a moment as some of the points are fairly valid. Still, you should SKIP THE SCENE. It’s really the only bad scene in the entire anime and while it is trying to prove a point, you can still skip it and you won’t miss much. Just have the remote ready when Madoka’s friend Sayaka is on the train and you hear two guys talking. They essentially try to cram in as many swear words as possible in that minute and it’s a pretty terrible scene. They are cut off before they can say that dreaded f word and they presumably don’t live through the experience, but you don’t need to hear their dialogue. They’re just being generally gruesome and skipping the scene will allow you to enjoy the episode a lot more. It’s only about a minute or two so you seriously aren’t missing anything.

The animation can be a little hit or miss depending on what style you prefer While the characters are not in combat, the animation can be a little abstract and the characters always have lines in their eyes. It’s odd and the characters feel like they are in a sketch half the time, but I quickly grew to enjoy the style. It’s not something that will fit with all titles, but this one pulled it off. I wouldn’t call the animation amazing though as it is simply good. However, once the fights starts, the animation quickly rises up to epic levels of awesomeness. I would call the animation amazing during the battle scenes. They are very fast paced and trying to keep up with the action is one of the fun parts about watching the show. The heroes seem to have limitless variations on how they can use their abilities, which fits the abstract style. Their abilities are certainly great and I’ll talk about their powers more later as the series is definitely fairly high tier.

The abstract scenes are always fairly interesting. Usually, it’s just a bunch of unrelated images that hit the screen and if there’s some kind of meaning to them, you likely won’t get it. It does make for a lot of very interesting backgrounds and minions though. Everything just looks so crazy and insane that you’ll feel like it’s all in some kind of acid dream. If handled poorly, this could have been bad, but it’s very interesting to see what the animators can think of. It’s not overdone and it does show how chaotic the Witches are. Between the creepy laughs and the cotton balls with mustaches, there is always something to capture your attention.

Madoka is the main character of the show and she’s certainly the most innocent of the bunch. She’s essentially led a perfect life as she has never lied or really done anything wrong. Not literally of course as she has likely made mistakes, but she has always made sure to do what is right and never lost sight of that. Once she finds out about the other magical girls being hurt, she wants to become one and help out, but everyone gives her a tough time about it. Let’s just say that her becoming a magical girl would present a dangerous situation for everyone. Also, it would mean breaking her ties with family and friends since there are a lot of circumstances that would be tough to explain in her situation and her life would certainly be changed. It would also force Madoka to make a lot of tough choices. She tries to please everyone, but that is impossible due to how everyone wants something different.

She does a lot of crying during the show as a result, but it’s a lot more genuine than the average lead. Madoka does a great job of fulfilling the lead role. She doesn’t actually get her powers for the majority of the show so if you’re waiting for that, it will be quite the wait even though the theme song spoils what her costume looks like as well as all of the posters. Her final decision in the show is great and she really thought it through on all angles, which shows how intelligent she is. Her ending can be seen as sad depending on who looks at it and you need to have strong emotions and believe that what you are doing is right if you don’t want to fall into despair. Madoka had complete confidence in what she did so the ending turned out to be a happy one for her. You don’t come across a main character like this very often. I would mention Madoka’s abilities, but they mostly don’t come until the end. I can say that she fired pink arrows, which are fairly powerful. Her main powers are tougher to describe and while I could give you the general idea, I don’t want to spoil them because it could hint at her overall wish. You’ll need to watch the show if you want to figure it out!

Sayaka is Madoka’s best friend and she gets a fairly large role in this adventure. She ends up getting super speed as her main ability along with unlimited swords at her disposal. She has less raw attack power than the other members, but she makes up for this with her high speed regeneration. She ends up being the weak link on the team for sure, but she means well. Unfortunately, she decides to use her wish to help someone else anonymously. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but she ultimately starts to realize that this may have not necessarily changed her life for the better and that’s when the doubts start to come through. Her ending isn’t quite as happy as the other characters, but she still got closure and she meant well. She was a good friend for Madoka and her strength allowed the lead to make it so far through the adventure. Sayaka was very outgoing and always ready for a fight.

Homura is easily the best character in the show and it’s not even close. As I mentioned earlier, I knew that she would be the best before 2 minutes had even passed by in the show. First impressions are important and Homura started out strongly with her first fight scene. She ended up being one of the strongest characters in the series as the only one who can really hope to challenge her from the heroes is Madoka. Most of the villains are child’s play for her except for the ultimate evil. Homura’s ability isn’t revealed for quite a while so I’m a little hesitant to say exactly what it is like with Madoka’s. Needless to say, she can control one of the elements of reality, which allows her to put up a good fight against anyone. Thanks to the extent to which she can control this, there is literally no other super power in this show that can counter her. Homura could defeat the rest of the magical girls in an instant thanks to this and the whole show is essentially a constant reminder of her strength.

Watching Homura mop the floor with the rest of the cast is always very satisfying and even the ending is fairly accurate. I can safely say that there is no plot hax in the ending as the villain being too powerful makes sense. Homura’s ability is great, but the one thing that she is lacking is offensive power. If something is strong enough to block all forms of conventional weaponry, then there is nothing that Homura can do. That is essentially her limit and while she can still outclass most of the opponents that she fights, there will be some that even she cannot defeat. Homura is very powerful, but she’s not insanely overpowered and that’s always a good mix. (Although I like overpowered characters as well.)

From all of the characters, you could argue that Homura has the toughest road. It’s even sadder than Madoka’s as Homura has a very tragic history. She is always trying to help out a friend through her actions, but the task proves to be nearly impossible. Despite all of this, Homura manages to resist the feeling of despair for quite a while and ends up helping a lot of people along the way although she acts reluctant about it. For her purposes, Homura must put on a mask of coldness so that others will find her to be calculating and unfeeling. In reality, Homura cares a lot about what is happening. Still, she is not Madoka. She does not care about what happens to the world, she simply wants to protect her friend. Homura is a very deep and interesting character. She’s certainly one of the best characters that I have seen in a while.

Mami is my least favorite member of the magical girls. She has the least amount of willpower and she is quick to take drastic measures that never help out the situation. She has mastery over strings and also has unlimited guns. From all of the members, she seemed to have the widest arrange of techniques and it was fun to watch her take down whole armies with a single combo. She was certainly powerful and while she wouldn’t be a match for Homura or Madoka, it’s safe to say that she could beat Sayaka and Kyoko. As a villain, she’s a good character, but I’m not crazy about her as a hero. Her latter scenes really destroyed the character even if Mami meant well. Mami just didn’t know all that much about the contract so she was mostly just leading the other characters astray unintentionally. Mami is not necessarily the kind of friend that you want to have by your side although it was definitely happy for her that Madoka showed up as fighting alone for eternity definitely does not sound like a fun thing to do.

Kyoko is the tough member of the group and she uses a spear. Her abilities were probably the most limited as she was mainly just good at slashing at high speeds. She’s quick and still proved to be more than a match for Sayaka, but she never looked overly impressive. It’s safe to say that Homura would have crushed her had the battle kept going. Kyoko’s personality shifts the most from the members as she goes from being a cold blooded killer to remembering what it means to truly be a magical girl. Her character got a lot of development and by the end it’s safe to say that she even passed the main character for me. She was really likable at the end and she was certainly willing to risk her life to save Sayaka. Things may not have turned out so well, but Kyoko never backed down and stood by her beliefs. I also like her policy about not wasting food and her wish was pretty selfless. Unfortunately, the people affected by the wish did not respond very well to it.

As for the Witches, a lot of them have names, but you won’t remember just about any of them since they come up so quickly. It doesn’t matter as it’s not a big deal, but the designs are still fun to watch. Typically, the Witches just get curbstomped as the heroes open up a clinic of combos onto them. The exception is the final boss, Walpurgisnacht. Walpurgisnacht is an incredibly powerful Witch who is immune to all methods of conventional weaponry and her attacks come in very quickly. Given how many minions are available to Walpurgisnacht, it is said that no single magical girl can defeat her. It’s safe to say that this is true for the most part and that’s why the Witch makes for a great final boss. She’s even got a really cool evil laugh that you’ll want to watch out for.

The new villains who replace the Witches aren’t quite exciting. They are the Wraiths and as far as we know, they all look more or less the same. They may appear in the film or maybe they just won’t be a focus anymore. They appear to be very slow, but there are thousands of them so their quantity helps to overshadow their lack of quality. I don’t see any of them being as powerful as Walpurgisnacht, but maybe they’ll surprise me. Either way, their designs aren’t bad as far as minions are concerned.

Even the supporting characters are fairly likable in this show. Hitomi is another friend of Madoka’s, but she is not chosen to be a magical girl. As a result, she is typically only around for the slice of life scenes, but I like to think of her as the Fluttershy of the series. As polite and sincere as Madoka is, Hitomi is even nicer typically. She does end up stealing someone’s potential boyfriend, but she does it in a fairly nice way. Hitomi never lets up with her polite lines and she’s a good friend to the other girls. You would typically expect at least one bad influence as most shows have a classmate who’s terrible, but not this time. Madoka’s mom is also very nice and she was an entertaining side character as she tried to rise to the top of her business. She gave Madoka encouraging words whenever the situation called for it and she opted to trust Madoka up to the very end. Madoka’s father got less of a role, but he seemed to be a nice guy as well. The only supporting character who wasn’t that good was the love interest for Sayaka and he still wasn’t as bad as I expected. He’s the kind of character who overreacts a lot and never seems grateful, but even he apologized for his behavior later on, which is something that you usually wouldn’t expect. A little more gratitude would have been great, but this is better than nothing.

Kyubei is a very deep character and a fun mascot for the series. Upon first glance he seems like a very innocent creature who’s just looking out for the heroines, but you quickly find out that he has some ulterior motives. He needs energy to save the universe and that’s where he starts to come to odds with the humans. He is essentially just using them and he knows that they will ultimately be destroyed and their souls will forever be lost. He knows this, but he doesn’t really care as he is the embodiment of a population which can feel no emotions. As a result, if each life that is lost can save another thousand, it is certainly worth it in his book and the final death will save an entire universe. Looking at it that way, his motives make sense. Many of the characters dislike him by the end and they feel hurt by his choices, but I never actually disliked him.

See, most of his points actually made a lot of sense. Now, I’m not justifying his decisions and saying that he is a hero because he is not. Kyubei still did not tell the main characters all of the details, but I do agree with him about the fact that he told them enough. Kyubei did warn that making a contract with him means that your life will be at an end, but you could gain whatever wish you desire. In a sense, he is asking if any wish is worth losing your soul and living the rest of your life in nonstop battles against Witches. This is a deal that is naturally not worth taking no matter how you look at it. Trading your life for a wish is an interesting matter and one that could work. If you knew that you could save your family or a friend in exchange for your life, a lot of people would be willing to do it.

Your soul is another matter. Luckily, we don’t have to worry about that in the real world as no one can snatch your soul away from God provided that you have given your life to him. Only you can choose to take your soul back and ultimately lose your right to Heaven. Still, you can redirect the example. Would you be willing to go to a dark path in order to keep a friend or relationship? Hopefully you won’t make the wrong choice there and the characters are forced to make some tough choices. Luckily, there are themes of redemption and second chances here and Madoka helps the other characters to have a happy ending although they all go through some tough battles with despair. In short, one’s soul is infinitely worth more than their life and you should be wary of making any sort of deal with it here.

Still, Kyubei did make sure that the terms of the deal were clear and he always gets the character’s permission before undergoing the contract. Kyubei is quite fair in this matter and he always talks very eloquently. He also got me when he brought up the classic animal debate. The sad part is that he is not wrong. He explains that he gives humans much more respect than they give their animals. This was the only part of the show where I was legitimately worried. For a moment there, I thought that the show was going to jump the shark with animal violence, but luckily the show narrowly avoided this as we got some abstract images and then some peaceful ones with animals. That being said, the point was valid.

Many animals are slaughtered each and every day in order for us to keep consuming meat. It’s why I’ve always had great respect for the vegan lifestyle as it does save many animals. If everyone were to live like that, many more animals would be alive. Unfortunately, it’s not something that will ever realistically happen and I do eat meat myself. I love animals so it may be a little hypocritical to eat meat and it’s a tough debate. Perhaps it seems futile to not eat it or I just like to hope in the back of my mind that the animals were at least ended in a humane way. I don’t think that I will ever stop eating meat, but I do feel bad about the consequences of such an act and recognize that it does hurt the animal race. Hopefully some day, there will be no need for animal violence in this world with technology. At least in Heaven I won’t have to worry about animals being hurt anymore. This argument nullified most of the points that the main characters brought up about them being tricked with the contract completely so I give Kyubei a lot of credit here.

I also thought that the main characters overreacted with some of the twists. What happens when their soul gems turn completely black felt a little obvious given that it is literally their souls. The plot twist about their bodies also wasn’t that major if you ask me. It was a twist all right, but it doesn’t actually change anything about what status their body is in. So, I understood Kyubei’s confusion at their reaction even if he doesn’t completely understand the concept of emotion.

Another concept that the show deals with is whether or not the human world deserves to be saved. Naturally, the heroines are magical girls who fight to save the humans and thus the world from the Witches. Many of them begin to wonder if the mission is something that they are interested in and most of them come up with different answers. Homura doesn’t care what happens to the world and she just wants to help her friend. It’s a bit of a natural response and one that makes a lot of sense. When you turn on the news each day, something terrible is constantly happening and you can easily understand the argument of how humans are plaguing the world. Acts of unspeakable cruelty are likely happening this instant and you wonder if we would all be better off if the world just blew up.

Kyoko just fights to help herself and it’s another attitude that many take. As long as you help yourself and get the best of life, your life will have been satisfying right? Of course, many people figure out the hard way that it just isn’t that simple and end up being unfulfilled. Others will end their lives thinking that is was great until they see what is in store for them next. Sayaka wants to help others, but when you fight your whole life just for the sake of helping someone once, you risk being depressed on the outcome. For example, if you work overtime for many hours to help the boss finish a project, but then get no recognition in the end, you may feel like the whole thing was just a waste of time. Helping others is always great, but you do have to think of yourself a little as well.

Naturally, Madoka does the best job with this. She essentially represents the purity of someone who just wants to help everyone have a better life and she is satisfied with doing so. She essentially gives everyone a second chance and they can hopefully find redemption. You can draw many similarities to the Cross and the death of Jesus. If I wasn’t a Christian, I would honestly just agree with Homura’s view. The world really can seem like a bad place at face value with terrorists everywhere and you are essentially living in a corrupt world. When you look at how our world is turning away from God and how so many people just believe that there is no God, it’s easy to wonder what the point is as many people will not be saved. Luckily, with the Bible and its teachings, we know that there is always a chance for redemption and you can never give up.

Redemption is one of my favorite themes in media. No matter what your past is, you can always turn things around as Jesus always gives you another chance. It’s not to say that you can abuse this by constantly sinning and going back since Jesus can sense what is in your heart, but if you generally want to turn your life around you can do so. You’re not saved by acts, but through submission and trust in the Lord. Madoka saw the world and instead of focusing on the bad, she saw the good parts of life and tried hard to help everyone. She definitely experienced a lot of sadness as you certainly will when you care about everyone so much, but she never lost faith in the fact that she could help everyone. Nobody is every beyond hope and so long as you believe that, you will be willing to keep on trying to help people. There are many people who will never be saved and who will keep on committing vicious acts, but you need to focus on the fact that you will be able to save others. Even if you only save one person during your journey, that is one person whose future has been rewritten and it will have made your life worth the journey.

Hope and Despair naturally play big roles in the show as well. Once you feel despair, it is all over and your soul is lost in the show. Homura was my favorite character and she tried to cling onto hope right until the end. She went through unimaginable hardships trying to help her friend as she relived the same month over and over again watching helplessly as the future kept on happening. Still, she tried and tried to save her and this showing of friendship and loyalty was very well done. Having a friend like that is certainly an amazing privilege. Even Homura began to feel despair towards the end and we’ve all gone through similar times of doubt and hopelessness, but so long as you remember the positive points of life you’ll be okay. Even at the very end of the show, a message plays stating that someone is always fighting for you so don’t give up hope. For us Christians, we know that God is standing by our side through tribulation and strife so we must never give up hope even when things look bleak.

It’s one of the reasons why the show probably has the best ending in anime history as well. While I can’t say that I am 100% positive of this like I am with the opening scene, I can’t think of an end scene that beats this one. That inspirational message at the end was great and the ending turned out to be happier than I would have guessed. Homura has not quite bought into the redemption message and still believes that the world is not worth saving, but she continues to fight for her friend. She is truly a loyal individual and I hope that she can see the world as Madoka sees it someday. After all, the second chance opportunity applies to her as well and she is such a great character that I’m hoping she will see the light. She is still fighting the villains so there is always a chance and we know that she will never give up.

One of the good things about the show is the fact that it manages to avoid the fanservice trap for the most part. There is a scene which you can describe as fanservice in the opening that I thought wasn’t needed even if it is trying to be meta as the main character meets herself. It then takes a break until the final episode (Unless you count transformation scenes like in Sailor Moon, but even then, most of them are simply skipped or pass by very quickly) where two characters meets each other on the astral planes. There bodies don’t have any defining features so it’s fairly safe, but it can still definitely be called fanservice. I’m slightly more lenient on the meta stuff, but it’s also a scene that didn’t really need to be handled like that. Still, it could have been much worse and was still not that bad. Actual fanservice would have forced me to have taken away a star from the show so I’m glad that it didn’t come to that.

I mentioned earlier that the series is pretty high tier so let’s talk about where it stacks up. Madoka vs Sailor Moon is certainly a classic debate and I’d say that the overall consensus is that Madoka has the slight edge. I would agree with this although I don’t think that it’s too slight. Most of the magical girls in this show could easily crush the whole team of Sailor Scouts and I can’t think of many magical girls who can oppose them. All of the heroes are incredibly fast and very durable. While they wouldn’t be able to overpower the opponents in titles like Naruto and Bleach, they are still skilled and stronger than I had been expecting. Homura and Madoka in particular were much more impressive than I could have thought. There’s also one character in the show who grows so powerful that she makes the One Above All from Marvel look like chump change by the end. She was basically able to alter the universe itself and perform time paradoxes with ease. This is power on a multiversal level and it’s safe to say that I hadn’t been expecting anything like that. It was a pleasant surprise and her meta feats were much better than the usual ones.

While Madoka Magica does deal with some dark themes, I would ultimately call it an inspirational story full of hope. While things look bleak many times, it also shows us how hope can always make a difference and we see many characters who have strong bonds with each other. The ending is a little on the uplifting side even if the memory plot is always a little sad. I prefer when everyone knows everything that has transpired. At least one character remains in the know which is more than I would have usually expected and that’s definitely a good thing. The character even gets a power up out of the deal, which is always a fair trade.

The show is also very mature with its themes, but it’s handled appropriately. We don’t get any gritty moments or overly violent scenes just for the lolz. It’s mature in the sense that the characters are dealing with serious problems, but the show is rather tame. In terms of violence, it’s less violent than the average shonen show and there are only some moments that have blood. None of it is excessive and it never gets bad. The romance plot that is around is also handled delicately and is nothing like what you would see in current films. The rival in the romance plot is even polite about the whole thing, which is fairly rare to see nowadays. This is just another check mark for Madoka Magica.

Overall, Puella Magi Madoka Magica was an incredible anime. Of course, you could probably tell that from how positive this review was. The show was very moving and every part of the anime was fantastic. From the soundtrack to the writing to the fights, Madoka Magica can hold its own against any show. All of the characters were very well developed and it’s amazing how the show could accomplish so much in 12 episodes. It accomplished quite a few things like having the best opening scene of all time, the best ending theme of all time, one of the best final scenes of all time, and just being one of the overall greatest anime of all time. I have a feeling that the movie won’t be able to match up to this show, but few things can. This is definitely one of the most unique anime titles out there and I highly recommend checking it out. Whether you are a fan of action, slice of life, or you just want to watch something thought provoking, this will fit the bill. You won’t have seen a show quite like this one.

Overall 9/10

Slayers Revolution Review

Posted on June 13, 2015 by dreager1

I’m closing in on the end of the Slayers franchise. It’s been a fun ride and this is certainly one of the definitive fantasy franchises out there. Revolution is certainly a lot newer than the other TV shows and you can tell as the animation is much brighter and more colorful compared to the old ones. Gone is the classic 90’s style and you can say hello to the 2000’s. The budget is consistently good for the animation and it is a lot of fun to see the classic cast return.

Slayers Revolution is only 13 episodes so that means that the plot can move at a much quicker pace than it usually would. A mysterious rabbit with hands for ears appears one day and starts destroying magical tanks. The cops believe that Lina Inverse is behind this so they hire special investigator Wizer Frayon so arrest her. To prove her innocence ~~and get vengeance on the rabbit~~ Lina and friends decide to find him. That being said, forces beyond what they may comprehend are also at play in the shadows. A kingdom which fell to a plague is involved and an evil kingdom is seeking the use the Zanaffar armor to make themselves a legitimate threat to the rest of the world. Finally, what does Zellos have to do with all of this?

While the series is only 13 episodes, it still makes time for some filler episodes. One of them involved a boulder contest as the heroes had to make the best golem possible to defeat the others and roll a ball up a legendary mountain. Pokota (The rabbit) decided to get involved as well for a fairly enjoyable one shot episode. Slayers has always been a series that had a lot of filler around to keep things from getting too serious with the main storyline. As far as the fillers go, they weren’t bad here and I at least did enjoy that one. The series is at its best when the show gets back to the plot though.

The beginning of the show is a little slow, but it starts to get more exciting as it shows up. Especially once the assassin, Zuuma, shows up. He’s fairly powerful for an opponent and then the heroes set sail for the evil kingdom to settle things once and for all. The final 5-6 episodes are essentially one long climax that takes a few pauses before continuing each time. The climax can certainly hold its own against any of the older titles. (It can’t win though, but it can hold its own) You’ll want to be ready for the giant monster at the end!

The series does a good job of mixing comedy with action as per usual. I’d say that Slayers has been modernized in a good way in that it is still similar to how it used to be in a nostalgic way. You could even make the case that Revolution feels more like a Shonen than the previous titles at times since the action was really nonstop for almost half of the series at the end. While Next still had some of the best fight scenes in the franchise, the sheer power of the animation keeps it close here.

As I mentioned earlier, the animation never lets up and it’s worlds beyond what we saw in the previous shows. One look at the theme song will show you that this series means business and that’s especially good news for all of the energy attacks, which have never looked so vibrant. As this is J.C. Staff, I’m not surprised since they are certainly one of the best animation companies on the block. I look forward to seeing how great the next show looks.

As for the humor, Slayers is typically funny and this series does a good job with that for the most part. The only downer in that area is the fact that the chest jokes are still present and more prevalent than ever as the villains always use this to taunt Lina before she blows them up. Still, while it is annoying, it’s probably the tamest form of fanservice that you can even have in a show and isn’t really enough to hurt the score. It also vanishes once we are around halfway through the series, which was certainly nice to see.

As always, Lina Inverse makes for a pretty great main character. She’s easily the strongest member from the main heroes and her Lord of Nightmare’s techniques really make her a threat for any opponent. She never uses the Giga Slave as the risks are probably too great, but she has many other spells at her disposal to tip the scales. While I would have liked for her to have beaten up Zellos to show how skilled she is, Lina always has a plan up her sleeve. It’s hard to find a more likable main character than Lina and I’m confident that she will always be a likable protagonist at this point. When I think of epic anime heroines, Lina is certainly near the top.

Gourry is true to form as you would expect. He’s still a fun character to root for and you’ll feel bad for him since he no longer has the Sword of Light. For most of the series, that does prevent him from being useful and he tends to be in the way during a fight scene. He tries hard, but it’s tough to manage when you have a sword that breaks over and over again. He gets a great fight scene at the end of the show to make up for this tough and he certainly outranks most of the supporting cast members.

Zelgadis used to be the intense rival character of the show, but he’s typically played for laughs in the current seasons. He has a lot of serious moments as well, but he’s so weak that you really can’t take him seriously. While teaming up with Amelia, he was barely able to beat a puppet. His skills have definitely stopped improving and they may have regressed over the years. At this point, he’s easily the weakest member of the main group, but I suppose that he means well.

Amelia is certainly a more likable character than Zelgadis and her search for peace and justice is one of the reasons why the character is so endearing. It’s also good to see a fighter using magic as a close combat type of attack instead of just shooting energy blasts all the time. She’s still not quite as strong as Lina, which we saw in the filler episode where the two fought, but Amelia has become a dependable fighter in her own right. Unlike Lina and her other pals, Amelia never allows herself to be corrupted and tries to help everyone that she can.

Zellos makes an appearance in this season and his role was actually a little larger than I would have guessed. He mostly sticks to the shadows, but actually gets to fight at one point when he challenges Lina and her friends. That was great since we haven’t seen him fight in a very long time. He easily overpowered them and showed why the main characters would always be outranked. Even if their spells can destroy him, they can never hit because of the large gap in speed. Zellos was a fun villain to have in this series and he’s certainly gone up since Next. The new voice an intriguing switch and I’ll have to get used to just about all of the new voices, but it’s not like I’ll have to get used to them for very long at this rate. I expect to see him in the next season as well.

Sylphiel appears briefly for the final fight, which will be cool for long time fans. As in the first show, she starts off with a very impressive scene as she blocks a blast from the legendary Zanaffar. After that, she quickly forgets how to be a fighter though and goes back to fainting and being in distress. It’s odd as the exact same thing happened in the first season. Maybe that’s just her gimmick. She obviously has a lot of combat potential, but it’ll likely never be explored. She’s a good character, but a longer action scene would have helped a lot.

Pokota is one of the new main characters for this season and it’s safe to say that he’s not holding back in terms of personality. It doesn’t really work for me even though the show was trying to go for the tough guy routine. I can’t take him seriously in his present form and his quest to destroy the magic tanks felt pretty futile since they can be manufactured so easily. He has a tragic past and a few twists as well, but he didn’t really add anything to the show. He’s great at running and somehow knows how to use the Dragon Slave, but he was never very helpful when actual villains arrived. It’s a classic example of a character who’s great against heroes, but bad against villains. Sort of like the police in your average super hero film. They can sometimes have the edge against Batman, but fail to stop random muggers. Pokota certainly didn’t do wonders for the cast, but he should be a little better in the next season since he’ll have mellowed out a little.

Duclis is one of the big villains and his plot ties into Pokota’s. Duclis wants to make the world pay for abandoning his people in their time of need and gets a giant monster ready to destroy everyone. Towards the end, he loses confidence in his goal and basically just decides to leave everything up to fate. He had a solid design and his light saber was cool, but he’s certainly not one of the more interesting villains around. I also wouldn’t say that he was a great threat power wise although he was a decent fighter. The show hyped up a fight between him and Lina, but it got interrupted before it could start, which was regrettable.

Gioconda was probably the worst villain here though as she was fairly generic. She just wanted to become richer and richer with every passing year. A noble goal, but when you’re already a multi billionaire…what use is more money? She already had her own kingdom, army, and castles. I just wonder why she would need more money or power, but goals don’t always have to make sense I suppose. She’s a decent fighter when she has a weapon, but I’m confident that Gourry would have had the edge if he had the Sword of Light. As it stands, he was holding back anyway. Gioconda’s android was much more memorable and she also seemed to be a better fighter as she could heal.

Zuuma is an assassin who really wants to destroy Lina Inverse. He is a human who knows quite a few good spells and his shadow magic can nullify all other spells. That’s definitely a very handy technique to have against someone like Lina since he would have the edge over her in a sword fight. He did a good job of handling the whole team and I have a feeling that he’s going to do quite well in the next season as well. He was certainly the best villain here and a great addition to the overall cast.

Zanaffar is the big monster who appears at the end of the show and works quite well as the final boss. He can actually talk, which was certainly a good thing and his abilities were impressive. He is impervious to most spells and he has a giant laser blast which can deal massive amounts of damage. I don’t think that he could be Shabranigdo, but he could give the other giant monsters a decent fight. His lack of speed is probably the main thing that holds him back, but that’s where his immunity to magic comes in. He’s a solid all around boss when you really think about it.

As I mentioned earlier, the best part of the series is the last 5-6 episodes, but the best episode of the batch would probably be the 3 on 3 fight in the Gladiator Ring. That was a lot of fun and we got to see how some of the fighters handle themselves individually. Because Lina is always surrounded by her friends, we rarely get to see her fight on her own. It’s why I was sad that she didn’t end up fighting Duclis. If that’s one thing that Slayers Revolution needed more of, it was one on one fights. Next actually had several of them and I suppose that it is one of the perks of being about double the size of this show. The pros easily outweigh the cons for long running series and I’d gladly take another 10 fillers if it meant that we would get 3 more episodes with some great fight scenes. A longer Gourry vs Zuuma fight would have been great as well since you could tell that it would be a really fun rivalry.

As for the soundtrack, Slayers Revolution certainly doesn’t disappoint there. The theme song is easily the best one in the franchise and the theme is quite catchy. It plays during the climax of the arc and certainly fits in quite well. The ending theme is also solid and the music that appears during the show is good as well. While not amazing, there were two themes during the episodes that I certainly liked. One was the danger approaching theme (Not the title, but that’s the best way to describe it) which occurred whenever things were looking bad for the heroes and the normal battle theme was also decently good. The theme song is what really helps the series as the soundtrack can be a little bland otherwise, but certainly still good and it fits for the series. It fits so well that a lot of the tunes have been present for the whole franchise.

Slayers also ends this season with a lot of cliffhangers to ideally be wrapped up in the next installment. The Android who helped Lina and friends seems to be part of a bigger scheme and the Rezo jars are still around the world. If they are all destroyed, Rezo will die as well. We also can’t forget the fact that the heroes need to find Rezo and fast if they are to awaken Pokota’s people. These plots and more, you can bet that the next show is going to have a lot of action and even Zuuma shall return if you saw the after credits scene. He has the jar and he has the power. The heroes barely stopped him last time and unless Gourry is able to keep on using the Sword of Light, the heroes could be outclassed.

Overall, Slayers Revolution was quite good and the 13 episode set up worked well for the series. One thing that hurt Slayers Try a little was the large amounts of filler that the series had, which kept you from getting too invested in the story. Part of the appeal of Slayers is the random adventures that they have, but I prefer to have all of the filler before the main plot or after it so that it isn’t interrupted too much. That rarely happens though and it still works out all right, but the short length of the series forced it to go at a rapid pace. Whether you have seen the other Slayer titles or not, this is a fun fantasy/action anime to check out. I would highly recommend still watching the other Slayers shows if you liked this one though as you will see their origin stories and learn a lot more about the universe as a whole. There are a lot of wink-wink moments to season 1 for the fans and it’s always fun to know the references. I’ll be checking out the next show soon and we’ll see if it can manage to top this one.

Overall 7/10

Future Card Buddyfight Review

Posted on June 5, 2015 by dreager1

Buddyfight really started out strong. It came out of the gate swinging and I liked the new battle style a lot. It didn’t revolutionize the card fighting genre like Cardfight, but it was a fun approach to the new style of play. The characters were likable, which made for some good intro duels. The middle of the series is where Buddyfight began to lose some of its steam as the show started to get a little repetitive. Luckily, the final tournament showed up and helped to break the cycle. We had a lot of fun duels towards the end, which was intense. Buddyfight ended as it started, a very fun show with lots of excitement.

Gao Mikado is the main character and one day he decides to start Buddy Fighting competitively when he draws a good Buddy. His Buddy is Drum and he comes from Dragon World. Let’s take a step back quickly and look at the universe. Drawing a Buddy opens a portal between dimensions and the monster inside of the card actually appears. Luckily, all monsters (for now) are friendly so this is safe for all people. Even villains enjoy having their buddies so that they can improve their abilities and really break the law. Gao and Drum bicker a lot, but they ultimately become close friends who help each other when the going gets tough.

The series starts off cautiously and Gao duels many opponents who become his friends and rivals. Then a tournament is announced and Gao decides to enter to show the world how great he is. The tournament will be tough to win as many new faces show up, but they don’t scare Gao. Gao thinks of himself as the Mighty Sunfighter so he never backs down from a fight or from a challenge.

Part 2 of the series is where the stakes start to get higher. A villain group known as Disaster has shown up and they want to rid the world of adults. By opening a portal to the dark part of the monster world, they can end everything! A betrayal also rocks Gao’s world and the heroes will never be the same again. Gao will have to brace himself as he tackles this overwhelming challenge!

Let’s start off with how to play the game. The gameplay is unique in the sense that it is all about offense. Each turn involves you attacking the other player and you don’t have to take time to defend. Each turn, you can summon monsters until their combined level is three. Then, you attack the other player and try to get his life down from 10 to 0. There are naturally spells and traps to augment the gameplay as well. It results in a very fast moving duel, which makes it difficult to stretch into multi parters. Even the final fight of the series is barely more than one part and if you cut out the subplots, it probably could be one episode.

The clan that you choose will determine what your fighting style is like. Gao uses a Dragon deck so he focuses on attacking until his opponents finally go down. Katana World is about misdirection and fooling your opponent and Magic World is totally for defense and gimmicks. Naturally, Dragon World is easily my favorite since offense is definitely my style, but they all have their merits and weaknesses.

Gao is the main character of the series and also one of the main highlights. He’s one of the better main characters as he is determined and always wins the right way. He doesn’t use any stall tactics or overpowered cards to win as he chooses to talk with his skills. He’s one of the only main characters to ever go from the premiere to the finale without losing once. I doubt that many characters could hope to pull that off and the series isn’t exactly short. There are over 50 episodes to be found in Buddyfight. “The strongest deck in history” is his catchphrase and it shows how tough he is. Gao’s modest at times, but he knows just how good he is.

His partner is Drum and they definitely had a lot of banter during the older episodes. Towards the end of the series, they definitely became close, but still had some banter at times. Drum’s not bad, but he’s surprisingly weak considering that he’s the classic partner of the series. Not a problem though, he has some super forms to help him out in that area. He’s not the best monster, but certainly not the worst one and at least Drum has character.

Zanya is the calm and collected member of the group. He uses ninja cards to defeat his enemies and he has a trap card, which can be used to stop just about any opponent when used correctly. While he is very tough and the characters always acknowledge that, he’s not quite as good as Gao or Tesuku. He’s better than guys like Tetsuya and Shido, but he still needs a game changer if he wants to be among the best. I’m confident that his skills will be at that level at some point and we just have to give the guy some time. The only thing stopping him from being a really cool character is his gimmick, which gets old quickly. Zanya is deathly afraid of girls and he can’t talk or duel when in front of them. You can see how this becomes a problem and it is brought up constantly. I still like Zanya a lot, but this does take away from his coolness factor. Zanya is a big believer in honor and justice so you can see why I like the guy. He has some pretty emotional duels during the series. His buddy has a really cool design, but is almost always silent so he doesn’t get to have much of a personality. Ah well, at least Zanya’s a cool fighter. The next ally of Gao’s is decidedly less quiet and fierce.

Tetsuya’s whole gimmick is that he loves dancing. His friends fear that it takes up too much of his time and that he’s not totally devoting his energy to Buddyfighting. They’re not wrong, but Tetsuya is still a good duelist. While he is decidedly weaker than Gao or Zanya, Tetsuya always gives it his all and comes through when the team needs him. His jingle is surprisingly catchy and you may find yourself dancing to the tune when he begins the duel. The fact that he mixes in Banana’s with his hair is brilliant and one of the reasons why you shouldn’t underestimate the guy. While he is rarely solemn, Tetsuya knows when it’s time to be serious. His buddy probably has more personality than all of the other monsters. The demon has his own TV show and actually does some undercover work to help the heroes find the location of the villain’s base. He is also a whole species in and of himself, which saves a lot of time for when he has to check out multiple locations at the same time.

Tasuku is the boy genius of the series and it feels like the show heavily considered making him the main character. The show’s endings are always about him and even the opening gave him a decently big role. The show may have also just been trying to make him a fan favorite from the start. It wasn’t hard since Tasuku is a great character from start to finish. He goes through a similar character arc that Kai went through in Cardfight. The series seems to really love using the redemption plot device as a character will get a taste of darkness and the terrifying power that comes with it, but ultimately returns to the light for good. This happened to Rouga, Kiri, and Tasuku in the show and I wouldn’t be surprised if it happens to more characters. (To a lesser extent, you could say the same for the final villain of the show)

Tasuku is a nice guy and he always has fun when he is in a Buddyfight. He helps Gao enjoy the game and encourages younger players as well. He gets frustrated when the police force is corrupted and goes too far in his attempts to make everything all right on his own. Luckily, that’s where his Buddy comes in. Jack is a dragon and like Drum, he gets a lot of development. Jack is a buddy who really cares about what is going on in the human world and he plays a pivotal role in getting Tasuku back to the side of the heroes and he refused to become a villain. Having a good friend is always important and the bond between Tasuku and Jack is a strong one. These two will certainly continue to be some of the highlights of the show and Tasuku is easily my favorite character aside from Gao.

Kiri was once one of Gao’s best friends until he changed. He was very timid and also weak when it came to Buddyfighting. As a result, Kiri got bullied all the time and decided that he needed more power. The villains were glad to give him that and now Kiri was able to use his powers in the real world like Rouga, Gao, and Tasuku. He instantly became one of the strongest fighters in the series and he was pretty hardcore as the Grim Reaper. To quickly specify, the monsters are already real for all of the players. The only difference with Disaster Force/Future Force is that you can also make spell and equip cards real. This is still really good as Kiri has his Winter Wonderland (Not the exact name) card that can make a blizzard appear out of the blue.

Kiri was a decent friend at first, but certainly not my kind of character and he was a lot like Syrus. I was glad to see his character go through a mini arc and he ultimately became a hero again. The only difference is that he now has a lot of power. I’m confident that he will be able to help Gao out a lot in future arcs. His power up certainly helped him as a character even if I don’t care for his buddy. He just doesn’t do anything for me at the moment and needs some more personality.

Shido is one of the worst villains in the series. Apparently, he is still one of the better duelists in the school, but I can’t take him seriously. He is typically used for comic relief and isn’t much of a threat to someone like Gao. He is constantly being humiliated and appears far too often if you ask me. His partner is Sofia and she is portrayed as the serious member of the group. The problem is that she’s not much better than Shido and I have not been impressed with her either. She gets nonstop hype, but the hype never seems to transform into something more than that. I feel like the writers really don’t know what to do with her at the moment and it shows. I’m sure that she will start fighting more at some point, but for now…she is simply biding her time.

Rouga was the first real villain to show up and he stays as a supporting character throughout the series. He goes from being a true villain to a misunderstood rival who is just looking out for his friend. The turnabout certainly is cheesy and he looks really bad when he lets the main villain get under his skin. When taken seriously, Rouga is a good opponent for Gao. The problem is that he doesn’t know whether he is a villain or a rival most of the time. It’s safe to say that he’ll just be a rival in the sequel series and that will mean that Gao has yet another on. Depending on how many guys you count (Tasuku, Noboru, Kazane, Zanya, Genma, Tasuku……) it’s a long list. I suppose that a lot of people will be gunning for you once you’re at the top. Rouga’s buddy is pretty cool as he is one of the only monsters to have a decent amount of personality and Cerberus never backs down from a fight.

He’s decently tough and doesn’t feel like an average monster, which is a good thing. I don’t think that Rouga has been handled particularly well in this series. I still like him as a rival for Gao, but he has certainly dropped in the ranks from his first appearance and it will take a while for me to be able to take him seriously. At this point, he just seems to be a little out of his league.

Genma is another rival of Gao…in a sense. He has less of a role than the others, but he’s a decently strong Buddyfighter. I’ve never been a huge fan of his though and he comes off as very arrogant at times. He also takes it very personally when his friend uses a counter card against his iconic monster. That would be like me getting upset if someone counter picked to Olimar to defeat my Captain Falcon in Smash Bros. It’s a strategically sound move so I can’t really agree with him here. Genma’s tough, but his whole strategy does revolve around his dragon so once it is defeated, he is essentially doomed. I do love his recycled footage yells though and he really gets fired up when dueling. He can certainly be better, but a lack of screen time probably didn’t help his case either.

Jin is a sneaky member who is always hard to pin down. Is he helping the heroes or on the side of the villains? The answers to these questions are eventually answered and he does play a decent role in the series, but he is a bit of a lightweight. I’ve never considered him to be very tough and he gets himself into some pretty tight pickles during the series. He needs a new deck as stealth doesn’t work out so well in this game. He’s not really my kind of supporting character, but he’s not bad.

Noboru is Goa’s original rival. At the very least, I would consider him to be Gao’s main rival as they actually got some trash talking in and Noboru really wants to defeat Gao. I don’t see that happening anytime soon as the gap between them continues to grow, but it’s still good that Noboru is trying to get on top of the situation. Surpassing Gao is just tricky for any opponent. Noboru’s buddy is a little on the dull side though as it is an old man who doesn’t have any cool special abilities. It’s impressive that Noboru can still win with his current deck as it is just a really watered down version of Gao’s. Nonetheless, I do really like Noboru’s character and he should go far in the series. He even gave Tasuku a good fight!

Terumi works for Disaster and she probably has the toughest time out of all the members since she starts to see the light and is quickly thrown out of the picture. The heroes never did give her a happy ending and it doesn’t seem like that is going to change in the sequel series. She was never a very likable character for me as she was infatuated with the leader of the villains even though she should know that he didn’t actually care for her. She was used from the start and never did anything about it.

Elf was another member of Disaster and he was not very good. Elf rarely ever fought and it was hard to gauge out good a fighter he was. It barely even mattered though since he was more interested in talking a good game than actually backing it up. His design was meant to be his whole gimmick and that will never be enough to actually be a very compelling villain. He also didn’t get any real character development unlike the other characters and I wonder if he will return soon.

Gremlin is one of the members of Disaster and he’s a decent fighter. While not quite as impressive as some of the other fighters, his legendary deck building skills are why he is feared by so many. He built the decks for all of the other fighters after all and that takes dedication. By the end, he has essentially seen the light and remembers how the game should be played. I can’t say that I really bought his sob story though as it seems like he just jumped off the deep end for the lolz.

Kazane was Gao’s final rival of the series and she just popped out from nowhere during one of the episodes. She helped Gao to remember what it was like to really enjoy the game and Kazane’s a fun character. She’s easy to root for and while her deck isn’t particularly impressive, her skills are certainly real. Her role has stayed small so far, but I’m sure that the writers have big plans for her at some point although she’s quickly fading away from being a main supporting character in the sequel series. Big plans or not, she’s a fun new rival for Gao to have. He certainly has a lot of them now!

Kemura is one of the weaker supporting characters, but I’m not too surprised since he debuted alongside a group of fighters who were essentially filler. His gimmick is that he’s constantly trying to eat his buddy and it is reused way too often. It wasn’t even funny the first time so you can imagine how tedious it gets by the 5th or 20th time. The only reason why the group was ultimately a good idea was because we got to meet one good character. Kirisame is a swordsman and his skills are about on par with Zanya’s. He’s a strong fighter all right and he even shows that he could give Gao a good challenge.

Kyoya is the big villain of the second arc and he is certainly powerful. He took out Tasuku when they fought and he actually stood up to Gao. Granted, Kyoya didn’t stand a chance against the world’s greatest Buddyfighter, but he still tried hard and gave it his all. His goals didn’t make all that much sense though and it is hard to relate to the guy. His voice also wasn’t that good, which may have helped to prevent me frombeing a fan of his. His super form looked cool though and he is a powerful villain. He just wasn’t very good or interesting.

Azi Dahaka got a ton of hype throughout the series and fans of his were likely disappointed that he was used as an after thought in the series. After being shown to be the big mastermind behind Disaster, he didn’t do anything until he was summoned and then Gao still managed to take him out in a single hit. He did have a very ominous speech where he mentioned how Gao and the others have sealed their fate by defeating him, but that hasn’t gone anywhere at the moment. Still, the hype is real and it’s safe to say that defeating him a second time will not be so easy.

Baku and Kuguru are essentially Gao’s best friends. Baku makes the decks for Gao while Kuguru gives him the necessary intel for the fights. It’s too bad that they never got into the game as they could have been good Buddyfighters. They aren’t bad characters and are all right I suppose, but they definitely don’t add much to the series. Baku had his subplot with the Gremlin, but that’s about it. They aren’t bad though and every hero has to have a few friends. They help Gao when he’s down.

Buddyfight’s animation is quite good. I remember thinking that it looked solid from the start and the sequel series managed to improve the series even more. This title can hold its own against just about any other show. It’s still not going to be in your top 3 of all time or anything like that, but the animation is still great. Certainly well above average to say the least. The fights certainly look good and likewise with the overall animation. It’s just like Cardfight Vanguard in that every part of the animation stays consistently bright and solid throughout. The character designs and backgrounds never falter.

The soundtrack doesn’t get overshadowed as it is also quite good. The villain theme is certainly my favorite piece of music in the series. It is definitely dramatic and does a good job of building up hype for a fight. The openings are pretty lackluster though and a little worse than average. Again, the sequel series managed to improve in that area. Still, the overall soundtrack is good. I won’t call it great like the animation, but you’ll enjoy the themes and the villain music really makes up for the rest of the tracks.

Buddyfight is a great series through and through. I remember being properly hyped for the fact that Cardfight was getting a spinoff. The Cardfight cast even appears for an episode as a little cameo before getting written out. I hope to see a crossover between these two series at some point. They are certainly some of the best anime titles to have come out in the last few years and have helped to bring card game shows into the light once again. With those two going on alongside Yugioh Arc V, it’s a good time to be a trading card fan. Now, we just need Buddyfight to get its first film.

Buddyfight is a very light toned show for the most part. For a while, there isn’t much danger so the characters just have fun dueling. As expected, things began to get serious during the second half of the series and Buddyfight was able to bring us some thrilling and emotional battles by the end. Some of the fights between Tasuku and Gao at the end were amazing along with Tasuku’s battle against the enemy. The scene where the Reverse Dragonic Punisher first appears is one that you won’t forget in a hurry and it was certainly one of the best animated scenes of the series. The show really had some good variety when it came time for the duels.

As I mentioned in the intro, the pacing can be a little iffy sometimes. Buddyfight is the kind of show that doesn’t mind having several rematches and seeing the same characters fight too often can take away from the excitement. It’s similar to how I never like to see someone duel twice in a row in Cardfight because we will have just seen the deck. That happens quite a bit here, but luckily the duels are so fast paced that it is typically okay. I think that the show slowed down considerably towards the middle of the series, but the strong beginning and ending kept it in the great category. Buddyfight 100 is starting to make the same mistake though except that it has a weak beginning so far. I’m confident that it will be able to get past this issue.

In the end though, where does Buddyfight rank among the other card shows? Welllll…it would have to be in last by default. It loses to Cardfight and all of the various Yugioh Series that I’ve seen. I’m confident that it would beat the original Yugioh though and if we count it, Capsule Monsters as well. Considering the fact that Buddyfight is still a great show, you can see how steep the competition is in this genre.

Overall, Buddyfight was a really fun watch from start to finish. Finally, we had another original franchise that was introduced to the market and ended up being a big success. It’s hard to state just how excited I was so see a new series on the air. I was confident from the start that it would be really good and I got to watch it weekly from day one thanks to the official Youtube site. Nowadays, it’s hard to create a new franchise out of the blue that still ends up being so good. Buddyfight was over 50 episodes, which gave it a lot of time to flesh out the characters and give us some good stories to go along with the fights. The animation was very good and the soundtrack was good enough to make sure that it was an epic anime in all categories. Even if Buddyfight temporarily faltered at some points, It’s a show that excelled so much that this is barely noticeable. The sequel will have a very tough time taking it down. I highly recommend this series to all fans and you won’t be disappointed upon checking it out!

Overall 8/10

Slayers Premium Review

Posted on May 16, 2015 by dreager1

I have gone through most of the Slayers franchise and have finally arrived at the last movie. The movies have typically been one of the best parts about the Slayers franchise as we clearly saw in the last installment. Unfortunately, this one is not able to keep up. For some reason, it’s only about 30-35 minutes in length so there’s not a lot of time for anything to happen. It simply feels like an episode. A decent episode, but not one that will rock your world. All right, let’s check out the Premium film!

Lina and Gourry are enjoying a nice Octopus dinner when Gourry starts to talk in gibberish. Apparently, the Octopus have all gone bad and anyone who eats them will talk in the creature’s native language. The effects start to spread and simply living puts you at risk of getting this illness. Lina must find the big boss behind this and put the creature to justice, but how can she win when she can’t even understand her friends? A wise mage may know a spell to stop this, but he is already infected with the curse. Luckily, Amelia and Zelgadis show up to help, but will their combined strength be enough to win?

As I mentioned, this movie is only half an hour so it really goes by in a flash. It’s a fun ride as always since Slayers typically does a good job of mixing humor and action. I’d say that it succeeded here as we still got a decent fight without the comedy going over the top and the atmosphere felt right. It’s similar to the Son Goku and Friends Return OVA while having a little more substance. The cast from the TV show is in this movie, which is a big change from the others, but the voices couldn’t come along with them. While Xellos may have an improved voice, I’m too used to the TV show versions to care for the others. Lina is the exception of course as I am already fairly used to her movie accent. She’s really toned down the Southern aspect of it though and I kinda miss that part. Ah well, she still takes charge and defends the world fairly well. Gourry is now more defensive of his meals, but Lina still manages to get the last laugh. As always, Lina never disappoints as the leader of the gang.

Gourry is back to being rather under average and it’s barely his fault this time. Speaking in Octopus distorts a person’s words, but they don’t hear the result. So, Gourry will hear himself say, “I’m awesome!” but to everyone else it may sound like “Larry!” As a result, Gourry says a lot of provacative things even though he means to say something else. So, technically, he is a good character here, but the gag ends up turning him into an unlikable one. At least he helps out against the villains.

None of the other heroes are able to do that. Xellos is around, but since when does he help the heroes? He mostly observes and has a good laugh at the heroes’ expense. Amelia may have been a fighter back in the day, but she is completely ineffective against the Octopus. She was really looking forward to eating them for dinner, but maybe that’s the problem. They certainly weren’t going to show her any mercy after they heard that! Amelia was a good character here. She may have been a little more strong willed than usual, but she almost felt like she could have been the main character if this was another show.

As for good ole Zelgadis, he also looks very bad against the Octopus minions. You would think that this could have been his big moment, but Lina had to save him like she did with everyone else. Gone are the days when he was known as a tough guy and he is really just a punching bag at this point. I can’t say that I’m a fan, but he didn’t look bad here. Just really weak. There was also a filler character who told Lina and the others about the plight, but as the movie was so short, her role was minimal. She technically plays a crucial role with her spells, but she’s just your average filler character.

The villains are all rather inconsequential as well. The main Octopus has a nifty hair style, but that’s about it for him. He wants revenge on the humans, but is doomed. The final boss is a giant Dragon/Sea Lord who hungers. Its energy blasts are able to destroy a tree, but it takes a few shots. He was your average giant monster. Cool design, but he ultimately went down very quickly when matched up with the boundless power of the Dragon Slave!

The ending is fairly tragic for the Octopus. They are reminded that the town’s economy really depends on eating them so the new agreement is that the Octopus will still be eaten, but only their tendrils since they can grow back. This way, there’s an endless supply of them to eat and the Octopus can keep their lives. It doesn’t sound like a very fair bet if you ask me. Meanwhile, Naga gets a very small cameo here. I guess we will probably never get to see her interact with the TV show cast. That would have certainly been interesting so that’s too bad, but in this case, it could be for the best that she didn’t get a real role. Sometimes, it simply isn’t worth the risk with her character.

Unfortunately, this movie dipped back into some of the negatives, which hurt the OVAs. We get the chest comments once again and that gag got old the first time that it ever showed up in the franchise. Seriously, at this point, it should just stay down. Also, Amelia of all characters is actually used for mild fanservice. It’s rather mild at least and it’s not as in your face as some of the other Slayer products, but it’s a little sad that Amelia is the victim here. She’s still just a kid so the whole situation doesn’t make sense. This keeps it from getting a solid seven like some of the other Slayer movies, but it’s not bad enough to cripple the score either.

With this movie, the animation is finally starting to look more modern. This is easily the best animation that we’ve seen from the franchise. Everything is really bright and vibrant. The character designs are all updated and the Dragon Slave really looks good. While the other Slayers products looked like the good ole 90’s style, this one is clearly from the 2000’s era. It just goes to show what a difference a few years can make.

As for the soundtrack, it’s a little on the uninspired side. The final theme for the credits isn’t that good and the animation in the background didn’t have much of a budget. Most of the other songs are also old or simply not memorable. Slayers is a franchise that really isn’t known for its music. Perhaps the staff in charge of the music will read this review and quickly decide to make a new movie just so they can show off some new tunes. That would certainly be epic.

Overall, Slayers Premium is a decent Slayers movie. It’s so short that you may as well just call it your average episode or an OVA. The animation is at its best and it is fun to see the TV show cast appear once again. The only design that is a little worse than the show’s would be Gourry’s sword of light. It looks way too thin if you ask me and comes off as a generic beam sword. The Sword of Light used to be a little more unique. While the film was not strong enough to match up to the other films, it was still a fairly fun ride. I recommend this to Slayer fans, but otherwise I recommend watching the Slayers film before this one if you want to see the franchise at its best. It’s been a long time since this film came out so I guess we really may not get another Slayers movie for quite some time. Once the fans are ready for some nostalgia in a few years, then I guess it’ll be time for a new one. I’ll certainly be ready for it and I still say that Lina Inverse is a better heroine for a series than Sailor Moon. Lina could be the very best female led protagonist in anime, but that’s a much trickier question to answer since there are quite a few. Off the top of my head she would certainly take the lead.

Overall 6/10

Slayers Gorgeous Review

Posted on May 9, 2015 by dreager1

Looks like it is time to check out the next Slayers movie! We are nearing the end of the franchise so let’s see if this film could hold its own. After the last OVA, I was ready for something to get the Slayers formula right this time. Luckily, I was not disappointed as this film is the best Slayers one yet and besides the shows, it is the best Slayers product. This is how you get the blend between comedy and action right. I hope that the writers are taking notes.

Lina and Naga head over to a peaceful looking town to have their next meal. The tacos/wraps in this place are really good and it seems like the heroes will finally have a peaceful time. This does not last for long though as the inhabitants of the town go indoors. There is a civil war going on in the city between the King and The Princess over a matter so serious and deadly that the heroes have no real response to the issue. Lina decides to help the King out, but her mission proves to be much more difficult than expected when Naga joins the Princess’ side! Why is Naga doing this? Can Lina still win!? That’s the basic premise of the film.

This may sound like the average Slayers plot so what makes this one so much better than the others? (Keep in mind that I did like the first film as well, but this film is simply the best one) For starters, the film wisely decided to let go of the fanservice problems that have plagued the two OVAs. Naga’s outfit is still fairly revealing, but the animators don’t pay special attention to it. It’s essentially reduced to a non factor. We have no random hot spring scenes to get us either so the film effectively solved the problem. There is no real fanservice here and that’s already a big advantage over the OVA.

Next up, the animation is much better than the OVA and it could be the best animation that we have seen in Slayers aside from Next and even that is debatable. Next had better animation for the overall character models, but this one gives it a run for its money when it comes to energy blasts. You could tell that the animators gave the battle between the princess and Lina their all as the animation was much better than the other scenes in the film. It really worked out well for the action scenes. The rest of the film looks good as well, but its the fights that take it out of the good range and into the greats!

The final big reason for why this film was an improvement ties into the animation somewhat. As I’ve mentioned before, the balance between comedy and action is a tricky one and Slayers does mess it up quite often. The important thing is that Slayers has been able to get it right and this is an example of just that. There’s a good amount of comedy here like why the Princess is in a war with her father, and numerous other scenes that I could mention throughout the film. Naga’s actions are almost all for crazy reasons that could be called comedy. This is the bets way to use comedy, crazy reasons and illogical motivations to do things may be the best way to use humor.

Then, still play their actions off seriously even if their reasons or not. That is what the film does and we do get more than one serious fight. This film had the best Lina vs Naga fight that we have seen and the battle with the princess was also really good. That’s 2 really good fights in one movie and 2 more than we saw in either OVA. Slayers typically doesn’t have any real fights for the spinoffs as Lina quickly dominates or comedy steals the fight. Not this time! That was great since watching a movie level fight is a good incentive for any film.

Slayers still uses a lot of retro tunes, but there are some remixes, which are present. That livens things up as I have been saying that Slayers needs a new soundtrack. Remixes aren’t completely new, but they are the next best thing so I suppose that they will do. The songs still sound good and my favorite one is easily the end song that plays during the end of all the movies. The final scene with the coin is always slightly altered, which is fun. The most satisfying ending was probably the second time as Lina got away with the coin. In this one, a bird jumps in to save the day. Good for the bird if you ask me!

As always, Lina is a very good main character. While not always heroic, she still does whatever’s necessary to earn her gold. It is sad for her since she never manages to get her gold coins in the end thanks to various circumstances. She may have been able to have gotten her reward money if she had stuck around during the ending, but chasing off The Princess was evidently more fun for her. Lina’s reputation continues to grow larger and larger. Whole armies of dragons back off at the sound of her name now, which is pretty neat. Her spells ensure that Lina is still the strongest fighter among the humans and she proves this on more than one occasion. While Sailor Moon may be the most popular main heroine for anime, I dare say that Lina could be the best one.

Naga is back to being a traitor, but she is an amusing one and doesn’t make a single bad joke this time. That means that her portrayal in this film was actually really good and she makes for a fun rival. Her laugh is certainly iconic and potentially one of the best ones of all time. Joining the enemies on a whim or just to help them laugh more effectively is pretty ingenious. You certainly can’t say that she is not an original character. While Naga will never be as powerful as Lina, her abilities still aren’t bad and she can land a decent amount of damage. If Naga could always look like this, I’d certainly be a fan of hers. Unfortunately, her portrayal is rarely this good. I don’t think that she’s ever looked this good to be honest.

The final Dragon Boss is very intense and fans should definitely like him. He’s very huge and his abilities are so great that he is able to block a Dragon Slave blast at point blank range. There is a big twist about him, which could affect how fans see him, but he still looked so good before the twist that I think we can excuse him a little. Learning about the twist should actually give you more respect for the character depending on how you look at it. The final boss really talks tough and isn’t someone that you will want to mess with.

As for the two main filler characters, they weren’t bad. The King was more reasonable than most of the others and an actual character. I could agree with his thought processes and the demands of the Princess were certainly a bit much. The King is fairly courageous and a good person deep down. The Princess is rather unreasonable with her demands and did attempt to destroy some people so I’d say that she was a loose cannon. That being said, she could actually fight, which was impressive. Of course, there is a plot twist, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that she is able to fight in close quarters and doesn’t back down after hearing Lina’s name. She gives us a proper fight and that’s a good thing.

Overall, Slayers Gorgeous finally presents us with the Slayers film that we’ve needed. This is exactly how a film should be handled and every part of it was satisfying. The fights were excellent and really got to show off some solid animation. The writing was at its best and all of the characters were fairly good. The humor was finally back on track as well. This film eliminated all of the negatives that I had for the franchise and that resulted in a film that had no negatives. Everything about it was good. That doesn’t mean that I am about to throw out a 10 or a 9 as other films still outrank it and thiss title was very short, but it is still much better than the average title. I highly recommend this if you are a Slayers fan and it is also a great way to get started with the franchise. You certainly don’t need to watch much else to get what is happening since Slayers doesn’t bother much with exposition in the films beyond what you need to know. The next film is going to have a very tough time keeping up with this one!

Overall 8/10

Slayers Excellent Review

Posted on May 8, 2015 by dreager1

Slayers has had some ups and downs as a franchise. Due to its unique mix of comedy and action in the main shows, it can be hit or miss. The shows are able to utilize this quite well and the movies have had success as well. For some reason, the OVAs are the ones that have a lot of problems. Just like the first OVA, this one was not very good. It focused way too much on the fanservice and comedy angle while neglecting the action that brought this series a lot of fame and fortune.

There are three episodes in this OVA. The first one involves the initial encounter between Naga and Lina, which is how their adventures ultimately began. Naga will stop at nothing to defeat Lina, which proves to be a thorn in the side of the main character. Naga may be decently powerful, but she’s also reckless and leaves a lot of damage and devastation in her wake. She claims to be Lina’s rival, but she’s really more of a tag along at this point.

It’s intriguing to see how these two met, but I can’t say that a whole lot came out of it. After the first few minutes, we are essentially back to the status quo except for the fact that Naga is trying really hard to surpass Lina when in the current days, she is already accepted as a rival. The episode had potential, but then the OVA decided to play up the fanservice angle. I’ll mostly talk about that towards the end of the review. Needless to say, of the three episodes, this was likely fell in the middle. I’m glad that Lina essentially proved that these two fighters aren’t even close, but more of a serious fight would have been nice.

The second episode involves a rich girl who has hired Lina to be her bodyguard. Lina accepts because of the huge sum of money that will be given to her as a reward, but this appears to be a rather large error in judgment. Lina has to pay for travel expenses and for the food so she quickly spends her reward. To teach the rich person a lesson, Lina arranges for some bandits to kidnap her, but this may backfire when real ones show up to take her!

The rich person seemed to be par for the course as far as these individuals tend to be in anime. Her laugh was very similar to Naga’s, which was eerie for Lina the whole time. Still, it wasn’t a bad segment at first, but the ending quickly drove it down to last place from the 3 episodes. It was simply terrible and an example of why mixing comedy with action is rarely done. Typically, the result is that both areas will fail and that’s what happens here. It’s one of those stories that was simply better off not happening.

Finally, we go to a village where two fashion designers argue about whether clothing should be classic or modern and risky. Lina and Naga naturally choose two different sides so then they argue about which one is better as they burn down each other’s bases. By the end, they start to learn the values of friendship, but I can’t say that it was a very entertaining episode. It’s actually tough to decide if this one actually beats the first episode or not, but I believe that I gave it a slight lead. At least Lina hesitates a little when asked to blow up the opponent’s base. Something that Naga certainly didn’t do!

All right, let’s look at the main reason why Slayers Excellent was doomed from the start. It all goes back to the fanservice angle. There isn’t a ton of it visually, but when you consider the chest insults directed at Lina, it gets to be a bit much. There was also a random hot springs scene thrown around and a lot of attention is given to Naga’s outfit. It’s seriously sad and I haven’t seen this much fanservice associated with Slayers since the first outfit. There’s nothing over the top, but it still happens enough to make me give it a thumbs down right away. This really just exposes the fact that the writers were not confident with their story so they felt like they had to add something to throw the viewers in at the expense of a few stars. A good Slayers story should always be a 7-8, but this one was not good.

At least the animation is decently good as can be expected. It’s rather old so J.C. Staff doesn’t look quite as good as they do nowadays. Right now, they are one of the best animation companies of all time. I would need to compare Slayers to other shows of this era to properly rank it, but it looks good enough. There aren’t many energy blasts after all so it’s a little harder to gauge. It has that 90’s feel, which is always a good nostalgia boost to any series. I consider DBZ to look great even though I have seen many say that it wasn’t very good even for its time.

Excellent’s soundtrack is decent although very generic at this point. The series needs to try and add in some new tunes at this point. Relying on the same classics is all well and good, but more variety is always a good thing. The new tunes may not be instant classics, but you’ll never know how good they can be if you didn’t give them a chance. These tunes are decent, but they certainly aren’t very thrilling or memorable at this point.

Lina is a good character as always. She may not be a hero, but you can still root for her as she typically only beats up opponents who get in her way. Getting rich is a noble goal and she typically doesn’t take any short cuts. Unfortunate things just tend to happen to her so that she never ends up with any money in the long run. She seriously has no luck when it comes to anything financial so it is a good thing that Lina is one of the strongest sorceresses on the planet.

Naga is really the only other recurring character and she still isn’t a good supporting character. She has some good traits like being overconfident and constantly trying to one up Lina, but that’s just not good enough to overshadow her negative qualities like the fanservice and chest comments. She also gets the duo into a lot of trouble by not thinking things through and just being very reckless. I like when characters are reckless, but when it is intentional, not accidental.

Overall, Slayers Excellent is a trilogy that you should just skip. It doesn’t add anything worthwhile to the Slayers mythos and you can essentially say that it is just poorly written filler. The actual filler in the series is better than these episodes, which really says something. The animation and soundtrack are decent, but that’s not enough to save this one. I’d advise you to skip this and just watch Slayers Next if you’re looking for a nice fantasy adventure. Slayers has a lot of different shows and movies so you just want to memorize the full titles. Next>>Try>>Gorgeous>>Whatever else the others were>>>Excellent. I do like the fact that all of the movie/OVA titles are basically synonyms. It’s a fun trend, even if the OVAs can’t live up to their titles.

Overall 4/10

Slayers Try Review

Posted on April 25, 2015 by dreager1

It has been a while, but I am finally back with a review for the third Slayers series! I enjoyed the first series and then the second upped the ante in just about every way. Slayers Next will likely be remembered as the pinnacle of the Slayers franchise, but there is still more to come. Slayers Try…tries a little too hard to be a mix of Slayers and Slayers Next by adding some powerful threats, but also trying to go back to the days of random adventures like in the first series. It is a mix that backfires quite a bit like GT, but still ends up being a good show.

Lina Inverse and her gang of heroic crooks are fairly happy about how their latest victory went. They decided to split up for a while and maybe they would bump into each other at some point in the future. Well, this happens sooner than they may have expected! Aside from Sylphiel, the gang meets up with Zelgadis who is still trying to learn the secret of how to transform himself. He’ll never accomplish this goal, but at least he is still trying. Zelgadis decides to stay with Lina and pals after they meet a mysterious figure who goes by the name, Filia.

Filia tells the heroes that they are destined to save the world! Lina refuses, but Filia explains that the heroes are her last hope as all of the best heroes don’t want to do this task. Lina and the gang are forced into accepting the quest under threat of imminent destruction (Lina’s sister is too powerful for them) and they must now….stop this threat. The problem is that they have no idea how to stop the danger that is approaching since the heroes don’t even know what kind of trouble to expect. They only have Filia’s guesses and intuition to guide them! I may as well say that the threat is caused by Overworlder’s (gods) who seek to change the status quo and unleash ultimate darkness across the world!

Typically, it only takes me one paragraph to describe the plot, but a lot has happened so two was necessary here. The lack of plot can be a little eerie, but it works into Try’s gameplan. It want to be episodic like the first series, but with serious stakes like the second one. This is still a dicey mix to achieve and I should explain why it doesn’t work out. The classic way to handle this would be to have the episodic parts for the first half and then to throw in a plot. This has worked in many shows like Trigun, Cardfight Vanguard, Digimon Savers, etc. The problem is that Try threw in the plot as early in as episode 1 and then ditches it towards the middle of the show. We get 6-15 filler episodes in the show.

All right, let’s not guess here. A quick Wikipedia search tells me that we have 7 “filler” episodes. The quotations are necessary as they technically have canon elements. We have a 2 part episode involving a holy grail weapon, which shows us that dark magic can be destroyed for the first time in the series. It is what inspires Lina’s final attack on the monster in the final episodes. 2-3 of the other filler episodes involve finding the characters after they failed in the fake climax, but I would still count them. That’s also not counting the episodes that were 15-18 minutes of filler with a plot heavy beginning/ending.

So, this really disrupted the pacing. The episodes where the heroes were on the boat were easily the worst ones. Slayers has always been a roller coaster series of ups and downs, but it has typically been more steady than this one. Try’s best episodes rank up there with the best of Next while the worst ones are some of the worst in the franchise. Not really because of anything relating to content, but they simply felt boring and unnecessary. Case in point, the two part episode about getting 2 Kingdoms to make peace with each other. I feel like we’ve seen this plot so many times already and I really didn’t understand what the point of it all was. It destroys whatever tension you had thanks to the villains showing up.

Luckily, that’s where the good episodes come into play. For just about the whole series, I was positive that this show was going to get a 6. Then we got the good climax, which made this more of a real battle. The fights in this series could take up a whole episode at times, which was great. The final batch of episodes is really one big fight that keeps on restarting and it is good to see the feats from both the heroes and the villains. There is no shortage of action and excitement in the climax of the series and we also got a nice batch of fights during the middle of the series as well. During these two high points, you would never be able to tell that this was the same series that we had started with.

Lina Inverse is the main character and she is once again leading the charges against those who would stand in her way. As a human, Lina is essentially the enemy of all other races so she needs to have a strong personality to combat these threats. Lina has also grown more powerful over the course of these adventures. While she used to not be able to deal any real damage to the big threats, now she has two aces up her sleeve. The Ragna Blade and the Giga Slave. These two attacks have been shown to work on almost any opponent with virtually no exceptions. It likely couldn’t completely KO a Dark Lord (The Blade anyway) but these attacks have allowed Lina to stay on the offensive. Her speed is not increased and I’ll mention that a little more towards the end of the review, but this is still a great improvement. Now, she can back up her tough talk!

Lina’s endearing personality is what makes her a great lead. She certainly won’t take any insults from someone without a fight. Whether it is an ally or an enemy, she will quickly unleash her full power. Lina is still not your average hero as she will occasionally blow up villages and mountains by mistake, but she does end up saving the world so hopefully it all balances out. Slayers wouldn’t be nearly as interesting without her in the lead.

Gourry is Lina’s partner and he’s always been a very interesting character to watch even if he is very unlikable. It is a bit of a tricky puzzle eh? The first episodes of this show continue to prove why he will never be likable, but at least he does provide the show with a lot of its humor. He never understands the gravity of a situation, but that doesn’t stop him from trying his best. Gourry always has his game face on and with his Sword of Light, he can deal some heavy damage to just about anyone. He did go up against Valgaav after all! He’s about the same from the past two series, which is good. If they made him likable, then that would be even better.

Amelia’s role here is certainly smaller than in the first two series. She is still a member of royalty, but she doesn’t get her own adventures this time. She’s simply tagging along for the ride like Zelgadis. She’s still a nice character and she gets her hits in at times. It’s hard to say who the weak link of the team is at this point as it is between her and Zelgadis. It is very close, but she tries her best and fills the team with optimism. They certainly need at least one hero on the team right?

Zelgadis continues to lose more and more of his dignity. I’d bet dollars to donuts that the writers for Try did not like him as a character. He is literally used as bait, an anchor, and simply tossed around when it is time for jokes. He may have been a decent character in the original series and almost decent in Next, but now he’s just a really bad character. I find it almost impossible to like him. It is too bad since he gets a lot of scenes that are supposed to make you say “Snap, this guy’s cool!” That is not my reaction to the scenes and I can’t think of a single moment where Zelgadis actually did a critical thing here. Not a single scene……his fans will not be pleased.

Filia is the new addition to the group and she ends up replacing Sylphiel. She is a gold dragon and her powers are impressive during her first appearance. As a gold dragon, her speed was so great that none of the main characters could land a hit on her. (An accurate depiction of speed…impossible!) Unfortunately, that’s where the buck stops as she is not really useful against any other opponents for the rest of the series. She evidently has some useful abilities like super strength and her spells, but the enemies are always one step ahead of her. It’s too bad as the exact same thing happened to Sylphiel.

As far as personality goes, she has a little Amelia in her. Filia thinks of herself as a bit of a hero so she is always dismayed when the heroes engage in criminal activities. She also does a lot of soul searching as the series goes on because of what her fellow golden dragons did. Perhaps she takes this a little too personally as she had nothing to do with most of their evil deeds. It is regrettable, but she doesn’t need to lose all hope over it. She nearly jeopardizes the final battle as she proved to be indecisive. Her rivalry with Xellos is fun though and while she is no match for him in a fight, perhaps she can defeat him in the battle of burns. (Burns=Insulting an opponent so well that you metaphysically burned them) As far as the main cast goes, it is: Lina>>Amelia>>Filia>>Sylphiel>>Zelgadis>>Gourry>>>>>>>Xellos. So, Filia’s rank isn’t all that bad. She could certainly better, but her personality fits in well with the team and doesn’t get old quite as quickly as Zelgadis’ gimmick. It’s also good to have a little more muscle power on the team.

Ah…now it’s time to talk about Xellos. A seriously disliked him from his very first appearance. While he will likely never look quite as bad as in Next, he’s still not my kind of character. For starters, he is constantly betraying the heroes to advance on his own goals. He is a monster through and through so he does remind the heroes that they should never trust him. Just because he makes that clear from the start, doesn’t make it any less sad when he betrays them again. Xellos has physically attacked the team during their scuffles and while he typically holds back so they aren’t very injured, he has come close to destroying the world. The heroes really need to treat him like a total enemy and stop pulling their punches. The sad thing is that Xellos could easily destroy the heroes in an instant if he so desires. He is really just toying with them and that can’t help the egos of the heroes all that much. As a villain, it can be fun to see Xellos act so smug and insult all of the other villains, but I wish that the show would totally keep him on the villain side. It would make him much more bearable. Still, it we’re just talking about this series, he is not that bad. I’ll never consider him as a villain though. How would the rankings change if we just counted this series? I suppose that he would jump over Gourry and Zelgadis. It’s possible that he could also pass Sylphiel, but it would be close.

All right, it is time to talk about the best villain in the show. He is also potentially the best character in the series as well. I’m talking about Valgaav! Valgaav is a mix of monster and dragon so his abilities are quite formidable. He is one of the only opponents to be on the winning side against Xellos and he takes on a good portion of the cast at once. That is before the final power up that he gets, which made him virtually unstoppable. He is a villain who had a tragic past and he loves jumping into peril. He’s simply my kind of villain and he acts like other all stars. (Grimmjow comes to mind) All of his fights are interesting and I’m glad that he didn’t decide to listen to Almayce like the average pawn. If Valgaav wanted to do something, then he would just go and do it! He had a nice blend of emotional moments as well as intense ones. Really, when it all boils down to it, Valgaav is probably the best character in the franchise. I thought about it for a bit and there is really no better character. It is a shame since he will likely never appear again, but at least he got a grand role in this series. Thanks to his final power up, you can definitely make the claim that he is the strongest character in the series. The Lord of Nightmares may contest that though. Valgaav got to prove that he was stronger than the other three villains, which is a good enough start for me! Maybe we’ll get a spinoff/prequel about him someday..maybe. (His origin isn’t exactly something that I’m very interested in though so I’d want it to take place right before Try) Valgaav also gave us the very first, big fight of Try so his debut was a very memorable one.

Almayce is the big villain for most of the series, but it is safe to say that he overestimated his power. He’s actually weaker than the other three big villains of the series although it seems like he could potentially still defeat Xellos. So, maybe he also outranks two of the other opponents, but it is hard to say. His design is great and he looked like a very menacing villain for a while. The problem is that he doesn’t know where he stands. On one hand, he is certainly a villain as he is constantly hurting people and endangering lives. On the other hand, he is trying to save the planet while getting rid of Dark Star…..I’ll just count him as a villain.

Because he is constantly switching sides, Almayce loses sight of what is happening and that’s when the villains make their move. Almayce went down rather easily even though he should have been expecting someone to destroy him. He was causing trouble for both the heroes and the other villains. It would have been cool to have seen him fight more, but he still made for a fun boss to oppose the heroes.

Erulogs joins the fray towards the end of the series along with Sirius. It was odd to see him join in as the series was already heading to a close, but the more villains the better right? I liked him more than Sirius, less than Valgaav, and slightly more than Almayce. His abilities were very impressive as the heroes could not hold a candle to his power. He felt like the average DBZ villain and that is always a good thing. It is too bad that he didn’t get more of a role.

It was still bigger than the role of Sirius though. Sirius is the more rational of the two villains and he wants to learn as much as he can. He also doesn’t mind sparing the Earth as long as it won’t hurt his chances of survival. He is a villain that the heroes can work with and his abilities are still impressive. He doesn’t seem to be as tough as Erulogs, but he is still tough enough to keep the heroes back. While his design was not too good, his personality made him a decent villain.

It is worth mentioning the Dragon King Elder because he is so terrible that it becomes laughable towards the end. Not literally as this guy did single handily bring two different species of dragons to their extinction. (Filia may be the only dragon in existence anymore. Certainly the only Gold one left and the ancient ones are gone as well) The Elder wants the gold dragons to rule over all, but his life comes first and foremost. He is defiant to the end as he dies while explaining that he regrets nothing and he would do it all over again. He betrays his heroes to the villains and doesn’t seem to have a whole lot of common sense. It is regrettable that he became the leader of the Golden Dragons since he definitely did not have their best interests at heart.

Dark Star is the big villain for this series and he lives up to the hype. It is always fun to meet another Dark Lord from the tree of power. Shabranigdo is still the most impressive beast, but Dark Star is no slouch in the power department. Simply by flapping his wings, he can bring the heroes to the verge of death and he can shoot a variety of energy blasts. Dark Star’s flight speed is incredible and he’s a known planet destroyer. Everything about this villain is cool and hie design is actually like the symbiote from Marvel. At least the face resembles Venom. Dark Star is virtually unstoppable and his only weakness are the legendary weapons of light. Without them, you can essentially confirm the destruction of your planet. Spells don’t hurt him because Dark Star’s soul is in another plane of existence so physical attacks are the only way to challenge him. Dark Star made for a great end boss to the series and he’s probably the second best monster villain behind Shabranigdo.

Aside from the serious villains, we also got some low ranking ones to mention. Jillas was mostly played for laughs, but he actually got a serious subplot towards and the end and it hit you right in the feels. (Feels=Emotions. So, if something hits you in the feels, it’s like metaphysically hitting your sad or happy emotion and triggering that feeling inside of you. That’s how I’ve always thought of it anyway.) He has to leave his family at the end to help defend the planet and he also decides to finally move away from his thoughts of revenge. While most of the characters in the series have magical abilities, Jillas is stuck with his sheer intelligence. He is good at making bombs, but that certainly won’t carry him very far against the kinds of villains that are present here. He was fairly likable though at times and he was much better than his partner.

Gravos is an ogre type of demon and he never becomes likable. The writers don’t even try to make him sympathetic aside from an incredibly brief origin story. He means well I suppose as he is just following orders, but he isn’t nearly as interesting as Jillas. At least Jillas has his motivations and desires to keep him going, but Gravos is more of a two dimensional villain. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it doesn’t exactly help me like his character either.

While the series is typically very light toned, there are a few moments of violence that clash with the rest of the series. The battle between Xellos and Valgaav was pretty brutal and likewise for the origin stories of Jillas and Gravos. This happened in the previous two Slayers series as well as everything would be very chipper until a sudden violent scene makes you take a double look. It’s nothing over the top though and it is typically quick so you don’t need to dwell on it, but the violence is certainly around. The dragons get extinct…twice, and they certainly don’t go down without a fight. Xellos vs Valgaav is still the one that will stick out the most simply because the show still plays Xellos off as a hero of sorts and this is certainly not heroic behavior. He is a monster and he is technically a villain, but the heroes barely treat him as such.

It is also about time for me to quickly address the plot hax that is present here. Now, this is a problem is virtually all forms of media and in almost all titles. Still, the plot hax is especially prevalent here as Lina and her friends are a group of humans who are trying to stop extremely powerful forces. No matter how many great spells they get like the Ragna Blade, there is no way that Lina and friends should last a minute against such powerful foes. Almost all of the high level monsters and gods are shown to move at hyper speeds. Lina is still a human and can’t run much faster than a normal one. At most, she is Captain America level in speed and power. She should still get speedblitzed at the beginning of every match.

The Slayers verse seems to place a lot of emphasis on physical power and none on speed, which is a little misguided. Raw power does not matter if you cannot hit the opponent and that’s my main problem with the title. Lina should be way too slow for any of her attacks to be useful here and she still manages to get in some good hits at times. It’s just a little odd and certainly unbelievable, but it is simply the route that the show has gone. Perhaps the writers feel that Lina and her pals would be less relatable if they had special powers aside from their spells. It’s their choice I suppose.

The animation is a step down from Next, but it still looks good. I’m assuming that the budget was likely reduced, but the series still has enough juice in it for some epic action scenes. The rest of the series is just a little more pale and dated than the vibrantly colorful Next. The fights are the important part though and the long action scenes are as good as you could have hoped for here. The heroes give it their all now that they can finally fight a little more: Gourry with his improved Sword of Light mastery, Lina with her Ragna Blade, Zelgadis with his sword, etc.

There’s not much to say about the soundtrack since it is the same as in the previous two shows. As for the theme song, it is all right, but it could be better. It is just not as exciting and moving as it could have been, but it is not a bad theme song either. Perhaps the end themes of the Slayers movies have simply spoiled me as they would certainly work better as a theme song than what we got here. The theme song is also a little misleading. As the overall soundtrack has not changed, Slayers Try sounds just as good as the first two installments.

Overall, Slayers Try is a good series. I was hesitant to give it the full 7 as it did have its share of issues with the pacing and just not being quite as fun as the first two series, but it comes very close to reaching that mark. The soundtrack has not changed and the animation has only dipped a little. The main team of Lina and Gourry is still one of the driving forces of the show. The ending certainly feels like it could have been the end of the franchise, but it still would have been a sad one as I disagreed with Gourry’s decision. We got to meet some more powerful beasts from the Slayers verse and I look forward to eventually seeing an ultimate confrontation between the humans, dragons, monsters, and gods. My money is certainly on the monsters, but it would be a good fight. The balance between humor and action can be awkward, especially when mixed. Xellos being defeated by a song towards the end was a little random, but I’ll assume that he is just trolling as per usual. Jumping from serious moments to comedy ones is a delicate art that is hard to master. Slayers Next probably did the best job, but Slayers Try gave it a fair effort. I recommend checking this series out if you want a good fantasy title and while you don’t need to watch the first two series first, I would still recommend doing so. At least, Slayers Next, since one of the main villains wants to destroy the heroes because of what happened there.

Overall 6/10

Slayers Great Review

Posted on April 11, 2015 by dreager1

Slayers has returned with its next film! The prequel series has certainly had its ups and downs in the past so I was hoping that this one would be able to survive with the classic Slayers atmosphere. It’s a fun adventure that manages to avoid most of the pitfalls that you may have been worried about. It’s a fun adventure that may be a little light on action, but ends up being a nice addition to the franchise.

Lina and Naga are walking through town as usual when a rampaging Golem nearly trampels over a young lady. They help her so that they can possibly win a free meal, but they don’t realize that they will now be involved in an even deeper threat than they could have realized! Two Kings are fighting for control of the land. Well…I guess, they’re more like dukes as the actual king is the one who tells them how to settle this like gentlemen. They must have a golem fight and the winner claims the land. The father of the girl that Lina saved asks her to help with his golem and Naga gets an offer from the man’s son who works for the other king. It looks like money has broken the bonds of friendship between Lina and Naga. Things get personal once Lina and Naga go inside golems shaped in their forms. Everything rides on this duel!

The film is certainly very short as it barely reaches an hour. That’s not a whole lot of time so the film has to try and keep the pace up. It does help to limit the amount of screen time for some of the filler characters as they could have certainly been a little dull. I highly doubt that you will find any of them likable by the end. The main heroine is constantly complaining about how her life sucks. If you think about it seriously, her current situation is pretty sad, but she doesn’t need to keep on reminding herself of that. Her brother is very self centered and he doesn’t play fair, which makes sure that he isn’t likable. Finally, the Dad can be a little inconsiderate and over confident at times. Considering that he’s supposed to be the greatest Golem maker in the city…he doesn’t really live up to the title.

Luckily, you don’t need filler characters to be likable when you have a good main character right? Lina is as good as always. She still does the right things for the wrong reasons so that she can end up being rich and famous. These things never work out for her in the end, but at least Lina gives it a fair try. She’s also very competitive in nature so once the Golem match starts, she gets ready to win it! She is still one of the best sorceresses out there. From all of the humans in the Slayers verse she’s the most powerful hands down. The film tries to show that Naga is almost as powerful as Lina (Not equal as Lina was winning the battle when we disregard the comedy shenanigans) but I don’t buy that for a second. Lina is more experienced and tactically sound.

Naga’s attacks are good as well, but she just strikes me as a little inexperienced. Her attire of choice still leaves much to be desired, but at least the film has the decency to not focus on it all that much. The golem actually gets more fanservice than her, which is good since rock can never actually be convincing fanservice. That certainly kept the film at a higher level than it would have been otherwise. Naga’s laugh is still iconic at this point and I’m unlikely to forget it anytime soon.

The fight scene between the two Golems was done very well. It’s not taken seriously as it is a comedy battle, but it is a well written comedy battle. It goes on for a long time, but it never actually drags on. You feel bad for the Lina statue because it looks much better than Naga’s, but it’s also a lot weaker. Lina’s statue is short and chibi because that’s how the builder wanted to make it, but it means that Lina has a hard time dealing any damage. Ignoring plot hax, Naga’s statue had the clear advantage. It ultimately bites off more than it can chew when Lina goes outside to tip the scales, but since that was basically against the rules, we can essentially say that Naga actually won this battle.

Lina and Naga had a short fight in their human forms before that. The actual animation was really good for the battle, but I didn’t like how it played out. I never like it when an anime has two characters use two versions of the same attack, which results in such a stalemate. Seriously, it’s like saying that they were simply not enthusiastic enough to think of a real battle. So, the battle wasn’t handled very well, but at least Lina was shown to be the big victor there so I suppose that I can be satisfied with that.

The animation is very good here. The movie certainly has a theatrical feel to it. It feels very similar to the Pokemon movies in that respect. The soundtracks are almost identical at some points and likewise with the animation. It’s just like the first Pokemon film and you can even contrast certain scenes in the Mewtwo vs Mew fight to the Lina vs Naga battle. That’s pretty neat and Pokemon has experience being in the theater so Slayers is taking a good approach. It’s still hard to describe what the “theatrical” effect is, but the colors are simply deeper, the energy attacks darker, and the music more operatic or grand. Beyond that, it’s really in the eye of the beholder. It’s like how Battle of Gods felt anything but theatrical while the Broly film embodied everything that I could have wanted in that style. It’s all in how you handle it I suppose.

Naturally, the only mild negative is that the film still loves to use chest insults. Naga is constantly insulting Lina’s and it can certainly get old. It’s much preferable to actual fanservice, but it’s still not the greatest running gag. The fanservice is almost entirely gone here. There is a statue that’s meant as fanservice, but it’s a statue so I don’t really count it all that much. Naga’s attire certainly counts, but as I mentioned before, there is no real attention drawn to it, which helps to mitigate almost all of the damage.

That probably helps to keep it from a 7. It’s certainly a fun film, but I feel like a 6 is more deserving in this case. It’s a fun experience, but at the same time, it’s simply lacking something. A little more action would probably have been all that it would have needed to reach the next level. Maybe even some kind of epic tune although we certainly did have some good ones. I always like the end themes on these prequels as the song is quite catchy and the finishing montage does give the appearance that you just finished watching some kind of really grand adventure.

Overall, SLayers Great is fun. It may not literally be great, but it’s a good experience that brings us some classic Slayers charm. I dare say that the humor is the most well done that I’ve seen since Slayers Next and it can be good to see the old cast as a change of pace. I still think that Lina’s accent is quite brilliant and it helps you to contrast the old Lina from the current one. If you’re a Slayers fan then it goes without saying that you should watch this one. If you’re looking for a fun fantasy film to watch, then this is a good bet for you as well. You don’t need any prior knowledge of the Slayers universe to enjoy this film so just hop on and get ready for some fun.

Overall 6/10

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