March 18, 2004
Tokyo Underground
Well, I enjoyed this one. Even though it basically was a rehash of every anime you've ever seen. Teenage boy, Rumina, is worrying about his first day in high school. He dreams of having a girlfriend. Of course, here enters the "princess". The princess and her female bodyguard escape from the clutches of these evil guys who rule this underground world. They meet Rumina. The princess imbues him with magical powers(Mahou Shounen?) and he fights off the bad guys. It looks like he's going to have the happy high school life he wishes for except more bad guys come and they kidnap the princess.
And, naturally, they spend the next 24 episodes journeying underground meeting tougher and tougher foes until they meet and defeat the big boss monster. After that, there's a dazzling final cut scene that would befit any Squaresoft RPG.
Just because this anime is so derivative doesn't mean you won't enjoy it. In fact, it is enjoyable because it does not fail to deliver exactly what you expect in an anime. The characters are cute and you care about them. Rumina simply wants to be the hero of the story. And he is. The handful of supporting characters all have interesting backstories and their own objectives which somehow align with "save the princess".
My biggest complaint is that the last 4 episodes feel rushed. My feeling was that they were enjoying making the anime until someone realized "Oh shit, we gotta end this soon. We better wrap this up and quick." And they did. The final boss battle, which in a normal anime could be stretched acrossed 10 episodes takes only 5 seconds.
But, then, I guess there's still enough room for another season. I could see the adventure continuing. Go find those torrents and watch 'em.
Posted by joel at March 18, 2004 09:57 PM