Hi! I'm back to anime reviewing again and today I'm reviewing an anime I just recently finished watching and that just recently ended its run in Japan several months back. It’s D-Grayman.
D-Grayman is what we call a hybrid anime: It’s got action, comedy, fantasy, with a tad of the supernatural. I rate this series PG for some sensitive scenes involving demons. The series tells of Allen Walker, a 15 year old boy who’s part of a group of exorcists. And before I continue, no they’re not wearing priestly robes, carrying holy water and crucifixes. These exorcists fight demons with a substance in them called Innocence which they’re able to control and make weapons from swords to flying boots to plasma cannons – yeah right! The main villain here is the Millennium Earl who looks like a cross between the Joker and an oversized turkey. The Earl together with his associates, the Noah clan, plans to create a demon army and make hell on earth (as if it wasn’t already!) To make demons, the Millenium Earl pries on innocent victims who lost their loved ones through death. The Earl visits the victim, offers them the chance to meet their dearly departed by crafting a makeshift skeleton for them to call out. Unbeknownst to the bereaved, the departed becomes controlled by the Earl and once they’re called, they kill the poor victims and wear their bodies (yeah sounds more like body snatchers than demon possession right?). So these demons called “Akuma” (yeah I know the image isn’t right – I just couldn’t help it) roam the land and this is where Allen Walker comes in; he’s got this cursed left eye that allows him to see the demons thus making him an invaluable asset to the group of exorcists who call their fellowship the Dark Order.
What can I say? I am so disappointed about this series and let me tell you why. First the story. The story begins with Allen joining the Dark Order to fight the Millenium Earl. 103 episodes later and everything’s still the same: The Millenium Earl and his associates still roam the earth and are as powerful as ever. Meanwhile the good guys are nowhere near defeating the enemy. On top of that, the series relished on adding subplot after subplot after subplot in between. By the end of the series, there were a lot of unresolved plots turning D-Grayman into 1 big mess.
Then there were the characters. The major characters were by and large unoriginal and unappealing. On the contrary, the characters who were interesting had limited air time so to speak and were either written off the storyline or disappear without us knowing anything about them. The animation was good but there’s nothing original about it. And though the opening and closing themes were good, the background music in the series was bland and ugly.
If Dgrayman was a fanboy’s series then they didn’t give enough to make a fan out of me. So this is how I grade the series:
Story: D
Characterization: D
Art and Animation: B
Sound and Music: C
Final Grade: C
No comments:
Post a Comment