I'm writing a review because I came up with a mixed feelings after watching the first two and recently this one. This is a culmulative review of Saiyuuki, Saiyuuki Reload, and Saiyuuki Reload Gunlock.
It's peculiar the way this anime has went. It would be one of the best animes of all time if it just consisted of three - six OVAs.
I have no idea what they were thinking when they decided to strings this plot out over three 26 episode series (more then likely money). Starting out it had one of the best foundations I've seen in a anime series. The characters are unique, they have their abilities, and they even have decent backgrounds. Hell the plot is even good. Gods, devils and humans fighting for survival (mediocre but it was well developed).
However, what they did with this good firm foundation is pour sand on it. Each and every episode after the first ten was dumping sand upon their pile of sand. There was no plot development, no character development, and you can't even tell if they're doing anything remotely related to their journey.
Each episode ALWAYS includes the following things:
*Arguing, followed by Sanzo telling them to shutup and firing his gun randomly.
*Goku saying he is hungry atleast three times, triggering another argument.
*They come across some people in need of help, Sanzo tells them to ignore it, but they get involved anyway.
*There is always a women in distress.
*There is also always some emotional strife or atleast a attempt at it.
*Atleast one battle takes place.
*Goku makes his retarded "huhuhuhuhuh" noise atleast once.
*Gojyo goes "what did you say" atleast once.
*Sanzo says "shutup" atleast once.
*Hakkai says "now now" atleast once.
Why I'm so conflicted is because these awsome characters, with cool backgrounds, always end up in this cycle every single episode after the character building episodes are done.
The character building episodes and plot episodes were amazing. I would rate then 8 - 9, closer to 9. The cyclic filler episodes, however, would get about a 3 - 4. They're so incredibly and extremely predictable it's not even funny.
The characters and Story (plot) were the highlight of this series. This is only however in the character/plot building episodes. If I could remember the specific episodes I would recommend that people watch those and only those (similar to only watching Naruto up to 135). The series is great if you exclude all the filler, unfortunately thats about 8 episodes out of the 78.
9 for the builders and 3 for the fillers so a 6
It doesn't get any better though.
The sound is just about as redundant as the filler episodes and features the same sounds/music every single episode. It is very reptitive as well as being crappy. The voiceovers were nicely done though. A six in my book.
The animation has to be one of the most craptastic jobs I've ever seen. The characters are all nicely drawn. They're very artistic and have unique expression. However, the scenery sucks, the sky is mundane, too many shots were used over and over again, and they don't draw alot of things to keep from doing extra work.
The battles were horribly drawn as well. They usually involve the character doing one pose and his weapon flying all over the screen without actually seeing it do anything. After a few flips back and forth between all the characters you get a overview of the battlefield, which is all the opponents laying on the ground.
I actually think their goal was to do as little as possible while covering as much time as possible. After you see the jeep driving sideways across the screen and the squiglees on Sanzos scripture of INFINITE POWER change all the time you want to gouge out your eyes.
There is more actual animation in a episode of Teen Titans then there was in all three of these series combined.
Sooo a 8 for well drawn characters and a 1 for everything else. = 5
Enjoyment? I enjoyed the character and plot builders ALOT. They were very cool episodes and they made me want to watch more. So I'll be fair. I'll give the plot/character builders a nine and the rest of the series a 2.
So if we weigh the 8 episodes of plot/character builders against the 70 episodes of filler we end up with about 10% of the series being a 9, the rest being two. That will give me a weighted score of a three for enjoyment. You find yourself doing other things and not really caring whats going in those 70 episodes.
I'm sorry but I'm never going to watch these series ever again. Value gets a one.
This series could've been great had they done things right. The main female characters have the looks, the main characters have a dark and deep history, and the ability to pull out all the stops which each character has only done once over all 78 episodes. They have the plot and the villains, they even have gods playing in every once in awhile.
The foundation was there, but they never built anything on it, even at the end of the third series nothing has happened.
Small side note - This is yet another series that portrays angels as devils and devils as angels. I wonder if thats a misunderstanding or a cultural difference.
