ディアーズ / DearS

DearS was interesting for me because it’s an adaptation of a manga by Peach-Pit, two female mangaka also responsible for Rozen Maiden. At first glance, the two are extremely different, Rozen Maiden tinged with gothic romance, prettiness and elegance, and DearS so base and perverted it makes the similarly-themed Chobits look almost highbrow. It’s really the most vulgar kind of fanservice, but it has its redeeming points.

The story revolves around aliens called DearS (pronounced as ‘dears’, not ‘dear S’), manufactured slaves who have integrated into human society after their spaceship crashed and have been adapting well, until one defective product with no idea of how life on earth works decides to take an ordinary Japanese male high school student for her ‘master’. This may have some resemblance to how Jun and Shinku first meet, albeit almost inverted, but then there are so many things that just wouldn’t fit into Rozen Maiden – not least the ridiculous contrived nudity and fanservice, the promiscuous teacher who does nothing but make herself a sexual object for comedy, the loli in a cat outfit and the bondage queen leader of the DearS who just loves punishing the little boy who works for her. But then you remember that the Rozen Maiden manga is much more comic than the anime, you remember Nori thinking the dolls are for sex, and you start to see some of Suiseiseki’s tsundere in Miu, as well as the similar hair, and Souseiseki in the subjugated but loyal male DearS, and authorial fingerprints become recognisable.

It’s lucky, though, that mangaka tend to be given chances to develop, because if DearS were the last we ever saw of Peach-Pit, that would be a real shame. This juvenile piece of ephemera, pandering to adolescent male fantasy, is deeply inferior to Rozen Maiden, which taps similar lusts in a far more subtle and ultimately moving way.

Which is not to say that it does not amuse. DearS has its share of charming characters, funny situations and clever moments – but remains a distinctly mediocre anime.

(originally written 3.5.08)

ローゼンメイデン トロイメント/ Rozen Maiden Träumend

Twelve episodes simply weren’t enough for this wonderful series. The director has made comments suggesting that there won’t be any more, but given the show’s huge popularity and the fact that the ending left the plot wide open for a new series, possibly going back to the manga storyline, it seems likely there’ll be at least a little more animated, and I for one cannot wait!

Picking up where Rozen Maiden left off, Träumend restores Suigintou (for reasons still not quite lucid) and introduces the remaining dolls created by Rozen, a dollmaker able to bestow apparent life upon his creations. For all his skill, Rozen demands his creations fight until only one is left, each taking something from the last, in order that the last one standing will become ‘Alice’, the perfect girl.

But it is not the Mai-HiME/Battle Royale-style contest that drives this series. Indeed, the majority of the dolls take up a pacifist stance for most of the series, and cohabit with Jun, a human boy chosen as several of the dolls’ 'medium' – the source of their unearthly powers. This is why the somewhat kitsch concept works so well – the dolls all have distinct, amusing personalities, and their living together makes the tone of large parts of the series more akin to a sitcom than a combat-driven action story. Every one of the dolls, except the sociopathic Barasuishou, are extremely likeable, with their own distinct appeal and flaws. It’s the characters that make the story special; you really care what happens to them.

Aesthetically, it’s hard to fault. The dolls are designed in a fantasised Victorian style, with heavy influences from the mostly Japanese craze of Gothic Lolita, and they look can creepy, adorable, stylish and silly as their personalities, or even simply the situation demands. The music is great, from the unforgettable ALI Project opening to the generic but driving guitar rock of the battle scenes. Fight scenes were very over-the-top, but also undeniably cool.

Everything is wound up pretty quickly towards the end, but even if some of the twists are pretty much deus ex machina (one scene coming over as more of a Christian allegory than Narnia ever did!), they’re clever and unexpected enough for the near-reset ending to work well. The fake Barasuishou is destroyed, with one teasing glimpse of her real counterpart from the manga in the final montage again hinting at the possibility of a third series.

There hasn’t been a weak episode in the whole season. It moved at its own pace, with a simple but elegant overlying plot, and has provided more humour and more hard emotional hits than any other current anime. Highly recommended.

My only complaint is that I want more!

(originally written 30.1.06. In the event, there was an OVA released after this, Ouvertüre)

ローゼンメイデン / Rozen Maiden (season 1)

It may be slightly surprising, given that it was one of my favourite anime, but all I wrote after the first season of Rozen Maiden was, ‘I tell you this: it may only have been 12 episodes, but Rozen Maiden really was an excellent anime. I’ll have to read the manga. What seemed a childish premise bloomed (forgive the pun!) into a moving, sophisticated coming-of-age story, full of symbols of puberty and based on some great humour.’ But back then I wasn’t writing out full impressions.

Rozen Maiden was the first of Peach-Pit’s series I encountered, and I think it is by far their best – although Shugo Chara is an extremely good complement to this darker and more striking work, showing the duo’s versatility and great skill in balancing humour and drama. Rozen Maiden is iconic and instantly recognisable, and if it’s part of a fad that included the likes of Saint October, it managed to be sincere and affectionate in portraying the idealised tropes of the Lolita fashion subculture and contain some of the most striking characters, designs and magical abilities in all anime. Oh, and great music.

Jun is a ‘hikkikomori’, a shut-in who has become acutely socially withdrawn after problems at school. He amuses himself by ordering things with a trial period and then returning them before having to pay. At one point he finds a mysterious message asking him if he wishes to ‘wind’, and flippantly answers yes. He then receives a beautiful doll in Victorian-style clothing – who soon awakens and treats Jun as a servant. She is one of seven dolls striving to defeat one another to become the perfect daughter, but as apart from one they are all on one level or another very human and sympathetic – for dolls – it is not a simple case of undertaking a series of battles.

The seven sisters’ different personalities and appearances are perhaps the central draw of Rozen Maiden, and it deeply impresses me that the series could have so much character-based humour, and yet each and every one of those characters when serious can be formidable and impressive. Rozen Maiden has beautiful art, amazing performances, hilarious humour, moving drama, a gripping concept, some superb visuals – all it needs is a strong conclusion. Alas, Peach-Pit have yet to provide us with one of those, and their track record for providing one is…not spectacular.

The anime ended up taking its own direction anyway – but there is still the Rozen Maiden II manga to adapt…

しゅごキャラ/ Shugo Chara

I am genuinely quite saddened by what happened to Shugo Chara. The anime adaptation came out, really, far sooner than it ought to have, with the manga quite thin on the ground and only coming out monthly, but despite some iffy filler chapters, it actually managed to flesh out its characters in a likeable enough way that it actually stood alongside the original as more of a companion piece than a ropey adaptation. Original characters may not have been universally popular, but they were often likeable enough by the end and allowed for more development for the major characters. So it was saddening when after the series’ major plot arc, the producers seemingly decided to draw it out further, abandon the fanbase to go after a younger demographic. A very young demographic. The last series, Shugo Chara Party, incorporated fifteen minutes of anime, shifting focus to a young original character, while the other fifteen minutes was a hideous variety show. It had some omake mini-episodes in a cutout-like style, which were actually great, but the rest of it was some funny-looking little kids learning to dance, decorating their nails, doing stupid quizzes and pretending badly to be having a great time. Unsurprisingly, it got cancelled, the story had to be awkwardly concluded in two episodes and the ultimate end of the series was one of disgrace. Like so many others, it was an anime series that on the surface looked meant for little girls, but was actually made for older, geekier guys and girls old enough to want to follow the intricacies of a budding adolescent relationship or four.

The manga came from Peach-Pit, who are behind the likes of DearS and, of course, Rozen Maiden. There’s quite some crossover here: a young person who shows a false face to the outside world is gradually changed by small, quirky, secret little familiar-type companions. While Rozen Maiden was a darkly elegant, dreamlike and rather insular tale, Shugo Chara is completely different, dealing mostly with interaction between friends within a school and extremely upbeat. So while there are a lot of parallels between some key figures, Suu and Miki in particular sharing much with Suiseiseki and Souseiseki, in tone the series falls closer to Chicchana Yukitsukai Sugar – A Little Snow Fairy Sugar – especially without Peach-Pit’s distinctive and beautiful artwork. It’s a shame the manga ground to a halt, too.

But what sets it apart is really the romance. Romance doesn’t really matter in Rozen Maiden – there’s some scenes between Jun and Shinkuu, but they are more silly than affecting, and it is of course an impossibility. However, Shugo Chara protagonist Amu first has a big crush on the cute blonde pretty-boy in her school, but later is courted by the dark and mysterious older teen Ikuto, and the tension between the three brings about some of the best episodes in any anime I’ve seen – especially when capricious Ikuto thrusts himself into Amu’s life at his most vulnerable ebb.

There are so many characters I love in Shugo Chara, and more than any other series, it was adept at making me come to like characters I’d initially found annoying. It’s also impressive to think that the silliness here was written at the same time as some of the darker chapters of Rozen Maiden II: versatility with a distinctive voice is impressive.

I must confess I don’t find the ages of the characters a fit. Amu is 11-12 and Ikuto is around 16. This doesn’t fit at all, as Amu seems at least 14 and Ikuto more like 18-19. But that’s a minor qualm, and is probably only to broaden the audience. It doesn’t stand in the way of what is, ultimately, one of the only anime I’ve loved in recent years.