Claymore’s apparently scheduled for 50 episodes, and I’m torn on whether to follow something that doesn’t suck in theory, but doesn’t really do anything for me either, in practice. I’ve heard that it gets better as the manga goes on, but fifty? With a chance that it might get better because they didn’t want to get you into the plot at the very beginning? It’s a pity, but I guess it can’t be helped given the number of volumes they’ve got to adapt.

An issue I have with Claymore is that it reeks of a certain vampire anime some time ago, that had a major failure of an ending due to the writer of the light novels dying, God bless his soul — the medieval setting only makes it worse because while the amalgam of steampunk and post-apocalypse tech in Trinity Blood was at least made refreshing since there was a power balance, medieval just cries out SHOUNEN DYNAMICS due to the sole dependence on physical power, which means a lot of fighting, losing, training, and then winning before losing again to a new challenger. Rinse, repeat.

The most annoying part’s how the system clashes internally. Like Trinity Blood with their anti-vampires, we’ve got the anti-Yomas here. And like Trinity Blood, the power difference between a Claymore and a Yoma’s so disparate, there really isn’t any need for training, which is the anti-thesis of the shounen creed that the protagonist must be be a weakling that later trains to kick ass. Is this new shounen as we know it? When I used to like watching the old, generic shounen, I actually took sadistic pleasure in watching Luffy getting cuffed around, seeing Goku getting heart attacks at crucial moments, and Ichigo losing numerous battles.

This also breed predictability. I guessed Abel would be eventually battling someone of his own kind, like Cain and not a super final mega boss vampire since Abel seem to rip through every one he saw, nevermind the allusions to the names that matched. After seeing how Clare disposed of the Yoma with ridiculous speed I decided to look up what happens in the manga, and hey, what’d you know, she actually starts fighting her own kind later on! Who could’ve guessed?

On the other hand, I’m happy I’ve the rest of the season’s selection down pat — Lucky Star, Bokurano, Nanoha StrikerS, and Darker than Black are definitely in. Especially Darker than Black, which, after watching episode 2, has sealed it as The Next Best Thing for me. I don’t know when it was during The Vision of Escaflowne that I realised “this is several levels of awesome”, or during the numerous scenes of Honey & Clover where I’d be laughing one moment and crying the next, but for Darker than Black that was definitely it. Assuming the high standards of episode 2’s upheld for the entire series, I guess it’d be safe to say that we’ve definitely found a winner this season.

this is delicious flower, I must eat it.

Darker than Black happens to be the epitome of the creative writing rule “Show not tell”, a rare case where the rule’s taken to new extremes. Ever heard of it? It’s one of the crucial things that separates the bad writing from good — now, I’ve never touched a Dan Brown book, being the elitist snob I am; however, I’m familiar with China Mi�ville, who’s been nominated for and won all manner of sci-fi awards like the Nebula, Hugo, Arthur C. Clarke, and World Fantasy. Here’s an parody of the rule — imagine that pivotal scene of Ayu’s from Kanon.

Dan Brown would go:

“Please forget everything about me,” Ayu cried. The sunset behind was blinding, but made her look angel-like.

China Mi�ville on the other hand, might do something like:

“Please forget everything about me,” Ayu said, tears rolling down her cheeks. She choked on the words, rather than saying them, and in that breath I heard pain — through the trembling of her voice, the forced smile and half-closed eyes, those mittened, tiny hands of hers clasped together in entreaty, or prayer. The sun on its descent behind her blinded me with its angle, as if she was, literally, a sight for sore eyes. Warm light wreathed a halo around her hair in that moment.

That’s how it is with Darker than Black where things are shown rather than told, and maybe the reason why I didn’t like Claymore so much. You know how it is like in fantasy and sci-fi settings, where they have to explain to you practically every single bit of the world’s mechanics in the first few episodes and hold your hand by talking endlessly about it through the characters? I didn’t find that in episode 2 of Darker than Black; Claymore, however, had this by-the-book RPG-format feel to it, which irked me no end.

hint: the number before it = significance

Who got the clues throughout? It was great to have all that hints being dropped — how that flower-eating weirdo was probably fulfilling his contract; Hei going “she was alive” because the clone saved his life (which would hint at some consciousness beyond what was thought of dolls); Jean dying in the water from what seems to be Hei’s power over electricity of some sort; the door having the final focus before the credits and why the police officer was staring. Stuff like these were already there from the first episode but I only noticed them after the second viewing — quite refreshing to have an anime not explain things for once, because aside from it being good scripting, it also makes you feel smarter, which is totally win.

Probably going to stop downloading Claymore for the moment till it picks up. Oh, and get Shinsen’s subs if you’re convinced Darker than Black’s the anime for you after reading this. I watched both Mishicorp and Shinsen’s versions of episode 1 and it felt like two different anime — Japanese syntax, lousy translation plague Mishicorp’s, and I’m guessing the same goes out to every other subbing group doing it, seeing how no one gives a damn about translation accuracy anyway.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 19th, 2007 at 4:09 am and is filed under Anime. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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