Escaflowne

[silverthunder]

I finished this series a while back and never posted my thoughts on it. Since I'm at work and it's not that busy, I thought I'd write that up now.


So, I heard of this series when it first came on Canadian TV, because deitysend and boo_spot were watching it. I taped the last episode for boo_spot and watched the last two or three minutes, so I knew how it ended (sort of). Then I watched the movie. And I figured I wasn't interested in going any further than that.

But, several people (most notably illianaka) recommended it very highly, so I thought it might be worth giving it a try. Especially since I heard it was not much like the movie. The movie was kind of annoying. Yeah.

Anyway.

So, I watched it, in Japanese with subtitles. First of all, I love the opening sequence. The song is pretty, the visuals are nice, the character designs... take a little getting used to. What's with their noses? Oh well, I don't care. It's more or less pretty.

I remember thinking, back in the days of American TV commercials and the dub opening theme, that Hitomi was there as Van's love interest. I didn't know she was the main character and he was HER love interest. That's how little I knew about this show (before seeing the movie, obviously). I also had no idea that there was a typically shoujo-ish love triangle thing going on. I watched this series immediately after sitting through Peach Girl, which had the same thing going on. Sort of.

This story has a good romance to it. It's full of sci-fi and fantasy aspects, and the plot is fairly complex. There's a lot going on. But what I mainly got from Escaflowne was a series of character studies. The plot seemed designed to lead us through the growth and development of its characters. Which is certainly nice.

Hitomi and Van's slow realization that they love each other was not even very overt, but it feels natural. They were a well balanced pair. The romance was nicely paced and sweet for its simplicity. By the time it comes to Hitomi's realization at the end, the audience is already well aware that it is coming, but it still managed to evoke the emotions it was intended to.

A lot of people said that the last few episodes seemed cramped and rushed. The series was intended to be about 10 episodes longer than it actually was. For the most part it seemed all right to me, with the exception of the Dilandau-as-Allen's-sister thing, which came out of nowhere and seemed kinda of tacked on. The rest of it was all right. I didn't have any problems following along.

In any case, despite how disorganized my thoughts seem here, I liked this series. It had a lot going for it, and it definitely never failed to be entertaining. Also, the music was gorgeous.


I feel like watching some kind of romance/comedy/drama series. I'm tempted to break out Onegai Teacher or Onegai Twins. Not sure yet, though, and I'll be too busy until Boxing Day anyway.

Comments

[kasra-c.livejournal.com]

Escaflowne was one of my first anime series, and still holds a special place in my heart. It's good that you didn't watch it when it was on television because there was an edited version they showed that hacked the poor series to pieces (think Cardcaptors, only worse). It's a lovely series and one of these days the hubby and I are going to sit down and re-watch it - probably after we catch up with the huge pile of anime we've gotten behind on in the past year since Erik arrived. ^^;

[silverthunder]

There's something worse than Cardcaptors? Worse than taking chunks of various episodes and patching them together into a completely different episode?

What the heck did they do to it that made it worse than that? I don't understand how this is even possible...

[ice-is-blue.livejournal.com]

It's been years since I've watched Esca. Have the whole series on DVD... Hmmm....

You've seen Ouran High School Host Club, yes? *likes it for the lulz*

[silverthunder]

Yes, I've seen Ouran - it's a funny series. I haven't watched the last few episodes yet, though...

[illianaka.livejournal.com]

Yay!

[castor.livejournal.com]

For some reason, Escaflowne has always been at the top of my list as far as anime goes. It was one of the earlier ones I saw in my anime viewings and it just sort of stuck with me.

I agree, the music is so gorgeous. One of the best things of the series. ♥