One Hell of a Butler (Black Butler Season 1 Review)

 

*This Review Contains Spoilers*

    More than a year ago, I sat down in an almost empty classroom with no more than 15 anime fans for one of my first anime club meetings. My school's anime club, now defunct, was a sort of melting pot for all sorts of anime fans. Like most american anime fans, a lot of them ranged from the quite anti social kid sitting at the far end of the room, or the severely autistic anime fan girl barking at any and all sorts of fan service imaginable. The club itself didn't last longer than two years due to the lack of a teacher to sponsor us, and the fact that most of the students in attendance were much louder than they needed to be so no teacher would take us. Eventually I stopped going to meetings due to these reasons, and the club fell apart shortly after my departure. I will say that I learned something from the select meetings I went to. Its that the reason people look down on Japanese Animation and their fans is because of the way their fans act. It would be one thing is the vast majority of fans could act relevantly normal in social settings but a lot of these people tend to act less than normal especially out in public. When you gawk at half shirtless anime guys, people are going to laugh and point. Its just the way things are. I'm not saying that getting turned on by an attractive anime character is a bad thing. But please, do so behind closed doors or with like minded people. Its so much easier that way. The first time I was exposed to this behavior however was during an episode of "Kuroshitsuji" or "Black Butler."

    Black Butler was something that I wanted to stay away from. It seemed to be the newest anime craze in the vein of DeathNote by inspiring damaged emo kids with daddy issues to dress up and act more oddly than they already do by wearing more eyeliner, crouching in seats like L, etc. I knew a kid who brought an actual DeathNote he got from a con and when the teachers found out he was writing people's names in it he was supsended for a few days. The Black Butler craze didn't hit my school hard, but when it did the people it influenced made me want to stay away from it like the plague. To me it was all just fan service and a yaoi fan's dream anime. In a way I was sort of right. But when a few close friends roped me into watching it I found it was more than that. Although I don't regret keeping myself from watching it, I did enjoy my time watching it very much.

    "Kuroshitsuji" was created by Yana Toboso. Like most anime it was based on a popular manga series in 2006 and the anime followed shortly after in 2008. The tale of "Black Butler" is about a young boy Who happens to be the Earl of House Phantomhive. The boy makes a deal with a demon to help him avenge the death of his parents by making him take a human form and serve him as his butler. The first 24 episodes touch mainly on the story of the journey to avenge his parents' murder. Along the way though, we are introduced to a slew of colorful characters and dreadful enemies. Each character seems to have their place, and seems to have an over all genuine purpose. The relationship between Ciel and his butler Sebastian sometimes made me believe that Sebastian actually somewhat adored Ciel. Not in any sexual way. But as an actual butler would to their master. Sebastian was a good sinister character and Ciel was cold and emotionless throughout the series. Usually i'm put off by emotionless characters because it seems that they have to reason to be the way they are, much like Sauske in Naruto. But Ciel actually had legitimate reason to be an cold heartless person. Knowing that your soul will eventually belong to the person protecting you would certainly make me like that. They did a good job by making those two characters believable and interesting.

    Although I did enjoy the side characters I thought the roles of Bardroy, Finnian, Mey-Rin, and Tanaka were kinda pointless. They provided enough comic relieve to the over all dark atmosphere of the series. But near the end of the series they have almost an entire episode dedicated to them protecting the mansion from people coming to kill Ciel, with tacked on explanations as to why they're jumping around, shooting guns with superb precision, and hurling things twice their size at people that outnumber them three to one. They of course succeed which doesn't make much sense since they're left to die in the final episode. Why have them risk their lives in a dire situation like that and live when you're just going to discard them in the final episode. Doesn't make much sense to me. Another character who I had a problem with was Pluto, the demon hound. I just didn't see why they felt the need to have this giant bad ass demon dog turn into a human for no reason. I personally think it was just so they would have a naked man running around to please fan girls, but that's just me. Overall the characters in "Black Butler" were memorable and fit well in the story. Even a good amount of the characters introduced at the beginning of the series played a huge part later in the series. That was a good job on the writer's part. It didn't seemed forced or overly contrived which seems to be hard to do in most anime I've seen.

    This will be a small part in my review, but I think that it should be addressed. I know that fan service is a bit of a main state in most anime. The use or giant breasts or two attractive males getting into any sexual situation can make people's noses bleed and all of that. But it shouldn't be thrown in for no reason. There is a scene in one of the middle episodes where Sebastian has sex with this nun for no reason. Just no reason at all. For all the things in the show that were done right, that was one thing I really was put off by. I don't mind a little fan service if you're going to do it. But that didn't need to happen. Not at all. There were also points where the series pandered to the yaoi fans by making the relationship between Ciel and Sebastian seem more homoerotic than anything. This only really happened in the earlier episodes, but I was still put off by it because of the true nature of their relationship.

   One thing I will give this anime a tip of the hat for is the English voice acting. Bravo. A lot of anime that I've seen has pretty poor translation and voice acting. But the voice actors in "Black Butler" gave award winning performances. The accents seemed real and the characters came to life through their unique voices. I don't think I can give enough praise for the voice acting in this. Superb and a prime example of what anime voice acting should be.

    I went into Black Butler expecting something less than what I got. My expectations of yaoi fan service were quickly blown out of the water by the engaging plot, colorful characters, superb voice acting, and dark atmosphere. I would recommend Black Butler to anybody with a taste for anime and tell them to ignore the preconceived notions of homoeroticism and leave them behind them so they can enjoy a true piece of anime gold. I know that there is a second season of "Black Butler" which I'm going to start watching as soon as this review is finished. But I feel that the series didn't need a second season since the first one ended so perfectly. But we'll have to see how the second season fairs in regards to this one.

*Black Butler Gets Five Demon Butlers out of Five*

That's it? (My Review of Trigun)

    

*This Review Contains Spoilers*

    Trigun is an amine created by Yasuhiro Nightow which was released in the Spring of 1998 and ended in the fall of the same year. Like most anime, Trigun was based of a highly popular manga series of the same name which ran from February of 1996 and ended in the February of the following year. The series has drawn in a large fan base worldwide and spawned a movie in 2010. Needless to say that Trigun is an anime that many people love and recommend to fans of Japanese animation alike. I on the other hand, can't share the same feelings that many people do when it comes to Trigun.

    Trigun is about an outlaw by the name of Vash the Stampede a man with a bounty on his head worth 60 Billion Double Dollars (why they couldn't just uses dollars puzzles me, but it's nothing that takes away from the show) who for all intensive purposes, is wanted for blowing up a town. In his journey he is followed by two women (Meryl Stryfe and Milly Thompson) who are hired by an insurance company to follow the outlaw and make sure that his penchant for destruction is kept to a minimum, and a wandering priest (Nicholas Wolfwood). For an anime series spanning 26 episodes, I didn't expect the kind of longevity that you would get with shows like DBZ, Bleach, Naruto, or One Piece; and going into Trigun I didn't know what to expect from it. But as I finished the final episode I realized that even though I didn't know what to expect, I expected more from this series. A mixture of poor interactions between characters, rushed action sequences, and overly contrived solutions to problems plagued what otherwise could have been an exhilarating thrill ride.

    I felt like the relationships that were made during the show didn't feel real enough. Everything seemed to be poorly pieced together just so it could fit properly and force the relationships upon the viewer. Vash and Meryl were fine examples of this; as was the relationship between Milly and Nicholas Wolfwood. Meryl, who obviously had feelings for Vash was a classic case of, "I like the main character of this anime so i'll act like I can't stand him, even though everybody know I like him except for him." Which became somewhat annoying as the series came to an end. Even though everything is going to hell and more than a handful of people die in each episode; Meryl can't seem to tell Vash anything. Then when things get to "real" for her, she will find ways to get out of the situation, mainly by hitting Vash over the head. I have the same feelings about the relationship between Milly and the priest Wolfwood. In the show they have about three of four scenes of interaction between them and the scenes themselves aren't long an meaningful conversations that would produce some sort of love between the two characters. Its not until one of the last episodes when they shove a ton plot and back story in your face, that the two actually begin to show actual romantic feelings. Then shortly after this, they sleep together. It isn't shown explicitly, but it's implied. I understand that 26 episodes isn't a lot of time to flush out long lasting and hard hitting character development. But I thought that characters who were in the show for all 26 episodes could have had better and more meaningful interactions with each other.

    As far as the characters go, I will say that although their interactions leave more to be desired, I liked each character and grew somewhat attached to them. All the characters are unique in their own way and the show provides enough back story to shed light on their motives and why they handle certain situations the way they do. Although Vash is a caricature of every male anime character ever. (Eats a lot, innocent but kicks ass when he needs to, etc.) You can't help but like him, he's a likable character who lightens up some of the darker parts of the series. His back story is only given one episode to fully explain why he's here and why he is the way he is. Which is kind of sad because he is a very tortured character and his story isn't fully explained until the last episode. That makes sense I guess, but I wasn't sitting on the edge of my seat wondering where he come from or anything like that. I just wanted things to speed along and hurry up. Which isn't a good thing because a lot of the episodes are essentially filler, and in a 26 episode series that's not something that should happen often.

    Milly and Meryl are...well... They're just kind of there. I like them, don't get my wrong. They provide a bit of comic relief and give other characters love interests. But they aren't very essential to the plot as a whole. It seems like if you took them out of the story, nothing would really change. In the beginning of the series they're able to handle themselves. Milly uses her giant rail gun thing, and Meryl uses her dozens of pistols hidden in her clothes to dispatch enemies. But as the series progresses, they become the cannon fodder that Vash has to save in every episode by getting caught by bad guys and held hostage. They could have done a lot more with them, but I think they fell short of their goal in this series.
 
    Now, the last "main character" I'm going to talk about is also my favorite. Nicholas D. Wolfwood is by far the most interesting and  most dynamic character in the show. Although he fits the "guy with a dark past" motif, I think that he was done well. He struggles with moral choices as well as his past throughout the show. He is as good as Vash when it comes to gun play, and his weapon (A giant gun-cross) makes him seem like a gun slinging bad ass, more so than the character we're supposed to be saying that about, Vash. His back story is touched upon in more than one episode and more things start to unravel up until the moment he is killed in one of the last episodes. Out of all the characters introduced, big or small. Wolfwood in my opinion was the most developed and meaningful character in the series.

    This anime is based around violence and action. But the action in this show isn't anything to write home about. There are some cool ideas like the Gung-Ho Guns, Knives (Vash's Brother), and Vash himself that don't hit their mark. As a matter of fact, the villains in the show aren't all that great. Some of them are built up through their designated episode; some of them over an arc of episodes. They're built up only to fall, however. They raise hell and destruction at around the middle of each episode and are quickly dispatched in the last three minutes of it. Almost none of the Gung-Ho Guns last more than one episode. That might be to how much of a bad ass Vash is but it all seems rushed to me. Every conflict seems to be solved within a set time frame. There are a few episodes in which a conflict takes more than one episode to end, but those are few and far between. Every conflict starts the same way (Lets kill Vash) and ends the same way (Vash beats them) It's not an original way to handle things. Although in the last ten or so episodes each villain they fight kills a good amount of people, the people they kill aren't characters we've grown attached to. I'm not saying to go all "Game of Thrones" and kill every main character. I'm saying that to have some sort of long lasting impression on the view, you are going to have to do more than kill an entire village that was introduced within the first five minutes of an episode. That's all I'm saying.

    Even though I have a lot of grips with this anime, I did enjoy it. The ideas that they tried didn't completely come to fruition, and some of the character interaction was a bit flat. I did enjoy the characters themselves and the charm they brought to the series. I think that perhaps if there were a few more episodes dedicated to character interaction, I would have liked it a little bit more I believe. Trigun, despite it's flaws is okay. Not perfect, not bad, just okay.

*Trigun Gets Three Double Dollars out of Five*

Trigun

Darker Than Black

Black Butler

Elfen Lied

Outlaw Star

Full Metal Panic

Trinity Blood

Eden of the East

D. Grey Man

Burst Angel

Mushi-Shi

Ouran High School Host Club

Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne

Neon Genesis: Evangelion 

Kiddy Grade

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex

Phantom: Requiem for the Phantom

Gunslinger Girl

WitchBlade

Monster

Tokyo Majin

Hero Tales

Ah, My Goddess

School Rumble

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya

High School of the Dead

Baccano

Desert Punk

 Fooly Cooly

Gurren Lagann

The Road to Hell... (It's Paved With Good Intentions)

    June 5th is the day that my short 18 years on this earth will enter a new era; I will graduate from high school. Friends will go their separate ways, the real world will be crashing on my doorstep, and time spent wasting away during summer will come to an end. Ever since I started high school, I was looking forward to graduation more than anything in the world. Getting out of school was my highest priority. But time has escaped me and the long sought after ending of school has become something I'm dreading. And I feel like irrationally clinging to things that remind me of my youth will somehow make time slow down enough for me to catch up with it.

    My time as a kid will end the day I graduate and I feel the need to commemorate that with a "summer-long personal anime marathon." In which I will delve into the world of the Japanese animation that I enjoyed so much growing up. Immersing myself in an almost endless number of series' that I will try to burn through until my last summer before college ends. This is a personal challenge of the highest caliber, a challenge I'm not taking lightly. This blog will be the outlet I have to speak about the anime I watch. Some i'm looking forward too and have been putting off for a while. Others will be ones that I have tried to avoid. No anime will be discarded as I believe that everything should be given a try before you decide if it's utter garbage or not. 

    As of now, I am on the tale end of an anime series made in 1998 called "Trigun" That is the first one I'll be discussing upon completion. The following list of anime will be viewed in no particular order and I will go ahead and say that the list will probably get longer as time progresses and I begin to go through each series. I may not always write about each series as I finish, but do them in bulks of two or three. With roughly 30 series' to go through, I will have my work cut out for me. 

1) Trigun

2) Darker Than Black

3) Black Butler

4) Elfen Lied

5) Outlaw Star

6) Full Metal Panic

7) Trinity Blood

8) Eden of the East

9) D. Grey Man

10) Burst Angel

11) Mushi-Shi

12) Ouran High School Host Club

13) Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne

14) Neon Genesis: Evangelion 

15) Kiddy Grade

16) Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex

17) Phantom: Requiem for the Phantom

18) Gunslinger Girl

19) WitchBlade

20) Monster

21) Tokyo Majin

22) Hero Tales

23) Ah, My Goddess

24) School Rumble

25) The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya

26) High School of the Dead

27) Baccano

28) Desert Punk

29) Fooly Cooly

30) Gurren Lagann

This is what I have so far. If anybody would happen to have any suggestions, comment on this particular post and I will be sure to consider what is recommended to me. I hope I have a bit of support on this. Wish me luck!