Escaflowne
Reviewed by Dan Peterson |
| Synopsis |
| You know you’ve always wondered what would happen if you gave the characters in a fantasy world giant mechas. Well, here’s the anime for you! In Escaflowne, a normal girl named Hitomi is pulled out of her world and placed in Gaea, a dying world, along side Van Fanel, Prince of Fanelia. His country is under attack by the evil Emperor Dornkirk and his Zaibach Empire, forcing Van and Hitomi to run around in Van’s mecha god Escaflowne to gather help so that he can fight off this evil force and save his planet from annihilation. |
| PLOT: 90% |
| It starts out simple enough, but the tension escalates as our characters are thrown in increasingly perilous situations. Van and Hitomi meet up with a cast of friends along the way (of course, how could they not?) who help them in their journey, and there is generally about a battle per episode. Some of the episodes have rather forced plots (Hitomi is captured AGAIN?), but in general the overall storyline is fun and engaging. Escaflowne creates a real, tangible world that draws you in and makes you stay for the whole 26 episode long ride. |
| CHARACTERS: 90% |
| Escaflowne's characters are definitely the heart and soul of the show. There’s the arrogant Van who undergoes a wonderful transformation throughout the show that takes him from a pompous jerk you can hardly stand to a true hero. Allen, an noble knight of the “Knights Caeli” order, in a great man with a rather dark secret and past, especially when it comes to his love life. And with bad guys like the crazed and frightening Dilandau and the cool and punk rock Folken, the cast of fun characters doesn’t seem to stop. However, the show does drag a bit any time Merle, the half-cat friend of Van’s, or Hitomi, takes too much precedence in a plot. Overall, though, the characters are well-defined, strong, and fun. |
| ART: 75% |
| It’s an older show, so you have to give it a little bit of credit, but the art is sometimes annoying to the point it’s distracting. Many anime stereotypes are used here on the characters, which is a bit annoying, but the mechas and dragons are drawn quite well. The shading and colors seem a bit off, but then so do most in animes that came out over ten years ago, so I won’t hold too much against it. |
| SOUNDTRACK: 60% |
| I really must say that I don’t like the soundtrack to this show. It’s not particularly grand, fun, enjoyable, or anything other than bland and mediocre. A great show deserves better songs than this! Still, I suppose it could be worse. |
| CONCLUSION: 81% Overall |
| Definitely worth your time. |
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