Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance is one of five anime adaptation of LN that was simultaneously announced by MF Bunko J. and for you who have watched many anime by synopsis alone you can see which direction this series will take. Yes, this is a harem romance comedy with a fantasy setting and dash of action. But, probably the best way to describe it is that it is a remake of Zero no Tsukaima with a few additional archetypes thrown in and a few intricacies removed.
Story
The story was as generic as it could be and was nothing but an obvious setup for a harem. It had a plot which only existed for empowerment of fantasy/wish fulfillment and nothing else also it did not do a good job of explaining its setting or conflict as Restia's back-story and motives were never explained so she fell flat as a villain. It was also never explained why Kamito was the only boy with powers, which actually made this show really weak as an empowerment fantasy. Also, from a story-telling perspective, I see no reason why any random boy couldn't also gain powers and get chicks, it's not like anything is stopping them! Thereby it made Kamito look ordinary and not unique. Hell, even Infinite Stratos gave a reason as to why the MC was special. Sure, it made no sense and was never explored, but at-least it was there! Now for the actual story-line, Only a pure maiden can have the privilege to contract with a spirit. In here, Areishia Spirit Academy, trained maidens of noble families are gathered and given an elite's education to become spirit contractors. A boy, Kamito, peeped by accident at a girl, Claire, while she was taking a bath and he ended up making a contract with the spirit she wanted. Yes, Kamito is an irregular boy spirit contractor whose existence was thought impossible until now. So, What will Kamito's destiny lead to!?
Characters
The most important part of an harem anime is it's characters and So, Up first is our MC, Kazahaya Kamito, he is your standard "bread and butter" copycat harem leader who is nice to everyone and gets all the chicks. Aside from a few fairly decent traits such as not being reluctant to see girls naked, being a generic pervert, and having some actually good funny moments, he's not really much in terms of actual character. He does have some good wit to him, but really, he's just your average harem protagonist. This however gets much worse in terms of overall characters as he is the most detailed and the most well-rounded character in this entire cast. Then we have Claire Rouge, our token flat-chested, fiery, and tiny main female. Plain and simple, this girl is your basic cardboard cutout tsundere who feels as though she "needs to get stronger." Literally, that's it. There's nothing more to her character aside from saying her catchphrase "burn in cinders!" over and over again till it gets old like a broken record! And then we have the rest of the female harem involving Rinslet and Ellis, both tsunderes, Fianna, the walking pair of breasts with a pension to get Kamito's D, and Est, the kuudere sword spirit who will sleep beside you with practically no clothes on and follow your EVERY command despite looking like an 11 year old. Then we have the biggest waste in the series which is the character known as Restia, she was the most mysterious character and was legitimately the most interesting character in this entire series. It was shown in this series that she had a connection to Kamito and I felt as though that was the most defining moment this series had as it delved a bit more into the story and it really made something in this series, regardless of how small it was, it shined. In the end though, we got a character that basically appears out of nowhere, titters, then leaves mysteriously. So, Apart from them, you have the supporting cast of random characters that I won't even bother mentioning since their appearances are so scarce and so varying that I feel as though there is no point to them even being mentioned.
Animation and Sound
The animation and artwork was fantastic and actually had a rather nice and aesthetically pleasing style. There was no real standout moments for the actual animation as it was pretty standard and consistent all the way through, though the color scheme and the overall look of the show was rather nice. But, While the art in general was nicely detailed and very nice-looking, there was one very big flaw that this series had, and that was it's ecchi. This show was very big on ecchi and basically stripped its girls naked just to reveal to you that "it was that kind of show." The ecchi for this show was quite extreme and they really don't hold back on flaunting their girls. So, if you don't really like echhi, this show is not for you!
For the sound, this was the only aspect for which I had absolutely no expectations on whatsoever, and sure as hell this was the real surprise of this show. The OST was just so damn catchy and I was really impressed with it as it had its own feel to it which was not particularly J-pop-esque, but rather gave me some East European or tribal vibes and I think "wild" might be a good word to describe it. Also, Note that I'm not just talking about the OP and the ED with this, but the soundtrack as a whole including the CD-only tracks that aren't in the anime itself are also fantastic and I'd recommend you to run to your nearest YouTube and check them out if you haven't.
Enjoyment
Since I'm a male teenager, I can't exactly say that I was bashing my head on the table while I was watching it. But, It was enjoyable for what it was and as long as you keep your expectations low, you won't be disappointed with it. Though, My main problem with it was that it was very generic and predictable. Also, I could hardly tell it apart from Seikoku no Dragonar which only came out one season before it.
Overall, Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance was a short, enjoyable romp through a rather basic setting with funny and interesting characters. Therefore, I'm not going to be one of those hypocrites who keep yelling stuff like "the source material is so much better, don't judge it by this anime" etc, because that was definitely not the case here. In fact, I think it was quite a respectable adaptation as a whole; not perfect but good enough. So, I would recommend this anime to you if you're not quite that hardcore and simply want to watch a show casually for plain fun!
3 STAR ANIME.
0 comments:
Post a Comment