RPG LAND

[Sethimothy]

So my friends and I sat down and watched this entire series in bits and pieces throughout the last week and a half, poking fun of it as we went. Then I wrote a review of it. It's a solid reminder of why I shouldn't write reviews. I'm still posting it here though. fuck you all.

Rosario + Vampire, Season 1
Subtitled by: Ayako-Bakawolf
Episodes: 13
Final Verdict: Bad

I'm a 25 year old man, so harem anime is lost on me. If I wanted to see women's panties, I'd look up softcore porn on Youtube; if I wanted devout followers, I'd start up an all-female cult on the internet. Japanese people, especially Japanese teenagers, haven't devised such cunning methods, which is the only reason I can conceive of why harem anime continues to do well. Rosario + Vampire goes one step further from the norm of this subgenre of anime by promising lots of fan service. That's right, the significant pull to this series is that it relies on a diversion tactic utilized by shows with less substance. Oh man, I can't see how this can be bad, can you?



Tsukune Aono is a high school student who risks repeating a grade in his current school until his drunken father brings home papers admitting his son to a another school of dubious origins. This is both a gift and a curse; Tsukune doesn't have to repeat a grade, but unbeknownst to him the school he has enrolled in is meant for monsters to train in so that they can blend in better with the human world.

His first day, he meets fellow student Moka Akashiya. She's a vampire whose darkest powers are contained by a Rosario, the titular cross-like pendant that hangs from her neck. It is eventually revealed that Tsukune can remove the pendant, releasing the S-Class Vampire side of Moka. This turns out to be a great thing for Tsukune, because every damn episode finds him fighting some sort of monster of the week, and by "him fighting" I actually mean "him getting his ass kicked for a bit before Moka steps in."

Along the way, other members of the harem are introduced. Kurumu is a succubus who wants to seduce Tsukune to further her race, Yukari is an 11 year old Witch who acts much more like the stereotypical magical girl crossed with what I'd argue is the stereotypical pagan (she's a tree-hugging bisexual, for fuck's sake), Mizore is some sort of Japanese ice elemental monster who is a mix between candy raver and emo, and Ruby is some sort of raven witch introduced in the later half of the series. The character concepts seem really neat, but they're all exceptionally cardboard and rather easily predictable; of the five, only Ruby has any significant character growth.

Tuskune goes from episode to episode trying to not die and trying to hide the fact he is human (a task made easier by the fact that the school code requires all monsters to stay in human form.) It's a comedy of errors that makes up for its lack of comedic moments by having lots of panty shots. And I do mean a LOT of panty shots. Episode 2 had an average of one every 35 seconds, I counted.

The fights are mostly unmemorable. The fights often last less than two minutes, and with rare exception involve Moka saving the day in what is arguable Deus ex Machina. Only in two battles of the 13-odd did the characters ever face any form of danger that Moka herself couldn't overcome. There's this bat that's somehow tied to Moka that likes to brag about how quick the battles ended, as if a battle ended with one or two swift kicks is somehow a good thing. But hey, lots of panty shots!

That said, there's some novelty in the bosses themselves; I lost five bucks to the friends I watched this tripe with incorrectly guessing what monster the Math Teacher, Ririko, was. I was certain she was a Naga; my friend Cory, however, correctly guessed she was a Lamia. That's how predictable the monsters, for all of their schemes, are in their human forms; if you know much about any sort of mythical lore, especially Japanese, you'll have little trouble being in the right ballpark.

Ultimately, as the members of the harem become members of the Newspaper Club and cross paths with the Public Safety Commission (who are best described as Hall Monitors gone Blackwater) they come face to face with some sort of furry anthro Kitsune named Kuyou. God, how I wish I could be making this up. As is to be expected, after a notably more lengthy fight in which everyone comes together, Moka saves the day again. Panty shots ensue.

The animation looks pretty, until it is watched. There's a lot of still pictures panned over and a number of repeated clips shown throughout the series, and all the decent shading in the world can't save the use of action lines to depict movement in some battles because someone couldn't be bothered to pay the money to fully animate the disposable antagonists. The fight against Ruby, before she joins the harem, is arguably an exception to this; however, it is but the exception to the rule.

The theme that is prevalent throughout the series is that need for outcasts to find some sense of belonging; this is obvious by how it is brought up painstakingly in every damn episode, towards the end very arbitrarily. Will Tsukune be able to survive as a human in this dark corrupt world of monsters? Spoilers: of course not. He'll be killed, then brought back to life and ghouled. And then there will be lots of laughter and panty shots. Wait, what?

Overall, the target demographic for this series is going to be either male high school students who don't know about better series of this type, and perhaps older men who haven't discovered real porn on the internet. The concept is neat but quickly abused, the story sucks more ass than the Venezuelan prostitute in the snuff film I'm torrenting as I write this, and all the panty shots in the world can't distract from the budget cutting animation that finds itself littering the series. Overall, I give this series a rating of "Bad" (with minor points for the catgirl teacher, because I can) and would encourage everyone to stay far, far away.

[LiQuid!]

I honestly can't imagine watching any anime at all with my friends, aside from maybe just some cheesy fighting anime like DBZ or Inu Yasha. I would honestly be embarrassed to tell anyone I've even seen a show like this, must less write a novella of a forum post about it. This is the most ill conceived thread I've seen in quite some time.
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[Sethimothy]