Otakuism

One the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: seven GARO’s, six OH GAWDS YUNO IS MOE!, five ZERO!, four VOLTEKKA!, three PRIMAL SCREAMS OF HOT BLOODED FURY!, two(million) RONs!, and one GIGA DRILL BREAKER!

This is the seventh post in a series as I look at the twelve best anime moments of the year from shows I watched. Key there being watched, as a few of these moments are going to be from some pretty old stuff, but I think they’re damn good enough to talk about at any time. This is a joint ABC blogging project with other contributions from Roxas, CCYoshi, Orion, Owen S, Xerox, Nekoron, Martin, Michael Huang, usagijen, and Moogy. Yeah, there’s a lot of us. And if you haven’t seen GARO then go watch it now, as this post contains some ending spoilers.

I like GARO a lot, both because it’s a great action story and because it introduced me to the wonderful world of tokusatsu. It does have a pretty simple story, normal good vs. evil that’s been repeated ad nauseam, but with good characters and a lot of great action scenes. Almost every episode of GARO has a memorable action scene, but my favorite is from the final episode with the showdown between Kouga and Kiba. Both are fighting on a metal ring that’s hurtling towards the ground above Tokyo. It’s an intense fifteen minute smackdown. My favorite part is at the end when Kouga uses the strength of all the men who have borne the title of GARO as inspiration to deliver the final blow. It’s manly, melodramatic, and slightly cheesy, but I love it. I think it’s just as important that a show make me feel raw emotions like that as making me think. Which is why I love GARO.

Story:

A little while after the series ended, Kouga meets Makai Priestess-in-training Rin, who has been sent from Kantai with a message for him from Priest Amon. Kouga is understandingly skeptical, seeing as how Amon is dead, but begrudgingly drags her home. Rin summons up the spirit of Amon, who tells Kouga that Jabi, his childhood friend who was killed in the series proper, is not dead, but held captive in the Makai Forest. So Kouga sets out for the Makai Forest in Kantai with Rin in tow to rescue Jabi. Elsewhere, an incredibly old and powerful Horror known as Legules appears, his one mission to convert normal people into Horrors as part of his clan and cover the world in them. Rei, a fellow Makai Knight and friend of Kouga’s, is sent to Kantai also, to help in a ceremony that seals Legules.

In Kantai Kouga meets Tsubasa, the Makai Knight for that area and Rin’s brother. Also a royal ass to everyone around him and a useless fighter. Naturally, he and Kouga hate each other from the get go. After some fighting Tsubasa allows Kouga to enter the Makai Forest in search of Jabi. Inside, Kouga is forced to fight illusions of Kodoma, Barago, Rei, and even Kaoru. After defeating them he finds the tree where Jabi is held, and after defeating it escapes to the real world with Jabi’s body and soul, reviving her. With that out of the way, it’s time to deal with Legules. Every time Legules reappears, a ceremony is held to seal him away by piercing the eclipse with the phospherous arrow, but the arrow is too weak to do the job now, so Jabi has to fix it (part of the reason why Amon wanted to revive her). While she’s doing that, Legules and his Horrors attack. The Makai Knights fight them back, but not before Rin is struck by an attack from Legules. The poison slowly begins killing her, turning her into a Horror for Legules. Tsubasa wants to kill her, but Jabi decides to exchange her blood with her to cure it.

While she is doing this, Kouga talks to Tsubasa and forces him to admit how much he cares about Rin and that it’s not wrong for Makai Knights to have emotions. He agrees, and appears happy when Rin comes out healthy. Shortly afterwards however, Legules appears, having possessed Tsubasa’s madou ring Goruba, and kidnaps Rin and the phospherous arrow, prompting a chase by everyone after him. A not-so-epic battle ensues, culminating with most of the cast getting their asses kicked. Finally Kouga says enough of this, stabs himself with the Phosperous arrow, gains an awesome pair of wings and a spear, and basically impales Legules. Everyone’s happy; Jabi’s alive, Tsubasa loves his sister, and Rei continues to woo his madou ring. Kouga goes home to find Kaoru there, and the two share a tender embrace, ending the series on an “Aaah~” moment.

Impressions:

Beast of the White Night is basically a two-hour long special that aired last December, about half a year after the original series ended. It did a few things right, and a few things wrong. Overall enjoyable, bu lacking the basic epic moments of the series. First off, the good things. Jabi was revived, which was awesome. No priestess that sexy deserves to be dead for long. I wished she would of said something about if Kouga saved Kaoru or not, since she was something of a rival there. Rin was probably the only good new character introduced, managing to be somewhat cute and not overly annoying. GARO’s final form was also badass, and its two major fights, against the Makai Tree in the first episode and Legules in the second, were great.

Now for the bad things. First there’s the arrogant prick Tsubasa. Despite being useless and incredibly weak, he insisted that he was the best throughout and knew what do. Hello, your talking to the guy who not only killed the Dark Knight, but has also killed a hell of a lot more Horrors than you. I think he’d know something about what he was talking about. The fight scenes that didn’t involve Kouga weren’t that interesting, as Rei and Tsubasa mostly got beaten over again and again. Legules himself wasn’t such a great villian. He never even did anything evil, just showed up and started fighting. The whole thing felt underwhelming at best. At least the ending was good, with Kouga meeting Kaoru again, but I wished they would of kissed at least. Oh well, I guess any proper continuation of Garo would need a full series instead of a special.

Story:

In the world of GARO evil demons known as Horrors exist, and are hunted down by the noble Makai Knights. One such knight is Saejima Kouga, who in an encounter with a horror accidently splashes its blood on an innocent bystander, Mitsuki Kaoru. Those tainted with Horror blood are cursed to die, Kaoru no exception, and it is Kouga’s quest throughout the series to cure her, while at the same time using her as bait for more Horrors. Along the way he meets another Makai Knight, Suzumura Rei, also known as ZERO the Silver Fang, a vengeful knight who believes Kouga killed his lover and father. There’s also the Makai Priest Amon, friend of Kouga’s late father, and his hot apprentice Jabi, Kouga’s childhood friend. When Amon is mysteriously murdered, the blame is placed on Jabi whom Kouga is ordered to kill by the Eastern Watchdogs, the lords of the area who command Kouga. Jabi is in fact innocent, and was framed by the Watchdogs, who also manipulated Rei to kill Kouga. They have allied themselves with Barago, owner of the Dark Knight KIBA, and who is the true killer of Amon, Rei’s lover, and even Kouga’s father. He has been eating Horrors in order to release the Ultimate Horror Meshia, who will be free after he has consumed 1000 horrors.

Meanwhile, Kouga finally manages to free Kaoru of her curse, only to have her kidnapped by Barago. Turns out Barago marked Kauru when she was a child as a gate for Meshia to enter the human world through. Kouga and Rei begin a desperate final battle against Barago, the Three Watchdogs in their human host of GULM, and their servant Kodoma. Kodomo and GULM are both barely defeated by Kouga and Rei, but their best efforst are to no avail, as Meshia is still released. However, instead of granting Barago the power he desires, she eats him. Kouga journeys to the underworld to destroy Meshia before she can enter Kaoru, and battles a literal army of horrors. Through Kaoru’s help he gains the power to slay Meshia, but this also frees the Dark Knight KIBA, now seperate from Barago, who chases Kouga into the real world. A final battle begins on a piece of metal falling thousands of meters through the air, and using the strength of all the great men who have had the title of GARO, Kouga slays KIBA. While Kouga and Kaoru do not get together, they both head their seperate ways, supportive of the other’s dreams.

Acting, Special Effects, and Music:

GARO being a live-action tokusatsu show, there are several other areas where I must judge it. First is acting. While I’m no good judge of it, the perfomances were satisfactory all around. Kouga at some points came across as a bit too stoic, which made him just seem akward, but did great in his emotional scenes. Kaoru was a bit too much the cheery-genki actress, but fine overall. Kouga’s father, Taiga, was the only real standout performance, but maybe that’s because he was such an awesome character. The effects in GARO just blew me away. I never thought some of this stuff could look so good in live-action. All the Horror suits were incredibly detailed, unique while frightening at the same time. The GARO and ZERO armors were also great, especially the numerous special attacks. The CG could be a bit blatant at times, but mostly mixed very well, leading to some great scenes, like Kouga walking through a world of floating kanji characters. The music is flat out awesome. One of the best OST’s I have ever heard. A mixture of japanese folklore music with modern tastes. The OP, Saviour in the Dark by Jam Project, is one of the best songs Jam Project has done, and its many variations through the series are each perfect, evoking the right kind of heroic mood.

Impressions:

Now it’s time for me to be incredibly biased: GARO is one of the best series I have ever had the pleasure of watching. While the story is somewhat simple, the way it is handled is what makes it perfect. The many elements of the show were all mixed incredibly well. The disturbed individuals the Horros possess. The excellently choreographed fight scenes, transformations, and final attacks. The budding romance between Kouga and Kaoru, and the revenge dynamic of Rei. Taking the familiar elements of tokustatsu series and applying them to the adult world. What GARO lacks in an overall intricate plot, it makes up for in pure raw emotion. I almost want to compare it to a mecha show that lacks mecha, just because of all the hotblooded action that fills the show. GARO has a lot of those “Fuck Yeah!” moments that just get your adrenaline pumping. Hell, the OP alone can do it.

As I said earlier, the fight scenes are great. While ultimately the bad guy will be defeated by some kind of special attack, there’s a hell of a lot of fighting before that, always the martial arts, hand-to-hand kind. Always cool stuff. Then there’s a couple of incredibly epic fights, like Kouga vs. Rei, with both of them falling down twin skyscrapers while still trying to kill each other; or the aformentioned Kouga vs. KIBA fight, where they both literally fight on a metal circle with a hole in the center while falling through the sky. Berserk GARO rampaging was pretty cool also. It’s pretty simple for me to go on ranting about GARO, because I think it’s so great, but I know a lot of people don’t share my views on certain shows, especially the action kind. But if you’ve ever been interested in seeing any kind of tokusatsu show, skip Kamen Rider, Ultraman, and Super Sentai; go for the adult taste of GARO. It’s a damn good time that I doubt anyone could truly not enjoy. All of GARO is currently subbed by TV-Nihon.

Recently I was looking over Zero’s posts on tokusatsu (special effects live-action) series, which I admit sounded kind of cool. Since the winter season was disappointing as hell to me I needed something new to watch, and why not try a new medium all together? First I watched some of Kamen Rider Den-O, a pretty fun series btw, and then downloaded a less-known tokusatsu series, Garo. Garo was apparently a tokusatsu series made for adults, airing late at night and filled with more violence, and, hell, even some nudity. After watching the first two episodes of Garo, all I have to say is ‘ why didn’t someone tell me tokusatsu could be so awesomely badass? ‘

In the world of Garo there exists evil demons known as Horrors that possess and eat humans. Ever since the Horrors have existed there have been the Makai Knights who hunt them. Garo is about a particular Makai Knight, Saejima Kouga, your usual stoic badass kind of guy who can transform into a golden armor form to kick Horror ass. Reminds me of Soma Cruz from Dawn of Sorrow, just because he also wears a large, white pimp coat. Mitsuki Kaoru is a young struggling artist just opening her first exhibition. Too bad the gallery owner is possessed by a Horror who wants to rape and eat her. That’s when Kouga comes in to save the day. He uses his badass sword skills and final attack to kill the Horror, whose blood splashes all over Kaoru. Since the blood of the Horror has touched Kaoru, she is now tainted and marked for elimination. Kouga relents however, rationalizing that her tainted blood will draw more Horrors to her, making his job easier. Of course, he actually likes her, but he’s not going to admit it.

I’ve always been wary of tokusatsu series. I’m of the opinion that something that looks good in anime can’t possibly look good in real life. Garo has proved me wrong completely. It manages to have excellent fight scenes fitting a fantasy series, with jumps, charges, and many sword slashes. All the fights are top notch, looking like something Chow Yun Fat or Jet Li would do. There’s a liberal use of CG, of course, but it doesn’t look so out of place to detract from the show. It can look a little weird at times, especially when the Horrors are eating humans by sucking their skin, but there’s a certain amount of suspension of disbelief that has to go with tokusatsu I guess. There’s only a few characters right now, but they’re all pretty interesting. I’m not one to judge acting, but it all seems okay. Definately better than the acting in Kamen Rider Den-O. The show has a wonderful dark atmosphere, a sense of claustrophobia and lurking horror that comes across perfectly in the setting. The show reminds me a lot of Shana for some reason. There’s no loli, of course, but the whole hidden war in the shadows reminds me of it, and Kouga has a talking ring he talks to a lot, just like Alastor. Not that I’m saying there will be any melonpan eating tsundere in the show anytime soon.

Garo has taken all my expectations of what could be done in a live-action television series and completely blown them away. It’s story is interesting, the fight scenes are excellent, and the CG blends almost perfectly. It’s also only 25-episodes, so I don’t think it’s going to be a never-ending villian of the week thing like Kamen Rider. I’ve only watched two episodes so far, but I can’t wait to see the rest. If your at all curious about the tokusatsu genre then check out Garo. It’s a solid action series all around for anime and non-anime fans alike. It’s been subbed completely by TV-Nihon. Oh, and the OP is done by Jam Project, so you know it’s made of HOT BLOOD and AWESOME.