Another review, another anime series based on a light novel series. It would be so easy to just go “ho hum,” right? Light novels have almost supplanted manga as source material for anime adaptations, and while there might be any number of reasons why the format is so appealing, it is a trend that feels like it is approaching saturation to me. I can only wonder how much longer it can continue before all light novel adaptations simply look and feel the same, especially considering how by-the-numbers the adaptations tend to be. Fortunately, Tokyo Ravens is not by-the-numbers. It actually surprised me by being pretty good. Fantastic in spots. A sense of passion and love for the source material is clear throughout the show, and the extra amount of effort pushes Tokyo Ravens into the upper echelon of anime released this decade.
The setup feels like a cross between the demon-obsessed urban fantasies of 1990’s-era anime, Harry Potter, and a young adult version of The Dresden Files. It takes place in an alternate universe where World War II Japan, on the verge of defeat, desperately turned to Yakou Tsuchimikado, an onmyouji (Onmyo Mage in the dub) in order to stop the approaching Allied forces. However, Yakou’s efforts caused something called “The Spirit Disaster,” which threw Japan into chaos as it was besieged by spirits.
In the modern day, Japan is forced to employ onmyoujis to try to keep spirits in check before they have a chance to cause similar devastation. The Tsuchimikado family continues to play a central role in these efforts, but Harutora Tsuchimikado, the main character, wants no part of it. He has no magical powers and he doesn’t like studying, so he likes living his ordinary life with his best friends Touji and Hokuto (though Hokuto has a single-minded obsession with pushing Harutora to becoming an onmyouji). Harutora is happy just to let distant relative (and childhood friend) Natsume be the heir to the family leadership instead, although his lackadaisical attitude has caused a rift between him and Natsume. However, that changes one night when Suzuka Dairenji, one of the Twelve Divine Generals (Japan’s top onmyoujis) and its youngest, shows up in town to cause trouble. What happens from there creates great personal grief for Harutora, enough that he tracks Natsume down and fulfills a childhood promise to become Natsume’s familiar. Together, they team up to try to stop Suzuka before she makes a terrible mistake.
From there, Harutora finds himself and Touji enrolled in Onmyo Prep Academy, where all onmyoujis are trained. His father sends him a childlike fox familiar, Kon, to protect him. Natsume, for her part, has to pretend to be a guy in order to uphold family tradition, which would be bad enough, except she is constantly under attack from people believing she is the reincarnation of Yakou Tsuchimikado. Thankfully, Harutora is able to make friends with fellow onmyojis Kyoko Kurahashi and Tenma Momoe, forming a solid core group of friends as he struggles through his studies and finds himself in multiple life-and-death battles.
This would seem pretty generic if not for the execution. Admirably, the first episode of Tokyo Ravens does not attempt to rush into the action. The first twenty minutes are devoted almost entirely to establishing and then developing Harutora’s character (and, to a lesser extent’s, Touji’s, Hokuto’s, and Natsume’s), showing us how he lives his life and how he interacts with his friends. It’s easy to call this approach “boring,” but this turns out to be a rather shrewd decision, because the next two episodes are absolutely action-packed and would be much flatter if Harutora and his supporting cast weren’t already so fleshed out. While there are comedic moments, most of the dialogue is frank and honest, as Harutora resists the pressure of those around him to step up and become an onmyouji. It’s a refreshing break from so many other series that go out of their ways to throw action at you or be overly wacky from the get-go. Even the second episode takes its time to show that Suzuka Dairenji is not a typical psychotic villain in spite of her behavior in the first episode, but someone driven mad (to the point of suicidal intent) in order to revive her little brother.
The rest of the episodes progress the same way, starting off slow and diverting before gradually ratcheting up the tension until intense violence and emotion explode out and dominate. The pacing is brisk, with no sign that the series is going to stall or draw on unnecessary filler to stretch out the events. Making the pacing easy to track from a meta-perspective is that the episode titles contain the title of the specific novel being adapted (for example, the first three episodes reference “SHAMAN*CLAN”, the first Tokyo Ravens light novel). By the end of the 12th and final episode on the set, four light novels have already been adapted, which is an absolutely stunning total considering that a show like Highschool DXD will adapt half that number in the same amount of episodes.
Even more shocking is that in-spite of the quicker pacing, there is no sense of characterization being lost, or that comedy hijinks are being sacrificed. On the characterization front, one episode deals almost exclusively with Harutora and Touji’s friendship as the latter is going through a rough patch because of how he is affected by spirit miasma (it is revealed to be much more than that). Comedically, the eleventh episode deals with Kon not being able to use her invisibility powers, triggering hilarious chaos on the Onmyo Academy campus. Want to know what happens when you summon a dragon in your bedroom? This show gives you the answer. Overall, the scope of this show just feels like a bigger, more fleshed-out world than a lot of its ilk, with the plentiful scheming by the adult characters being icing on the cake.
A lot of this has been done before in previous anime, but what makes Tokyo Ravens stand out from the pack is the execution. The writing (led by Hideyuki Kurata, who almost exclusively writes all of the episodes on his own) is better, the characters are memorable and likable, the many mysterious adult figures are legitimately so, and Harutora lives up to his “Tora-baka”/”Stupid Tora!” nickname without being an absolute moron. It goes to show that perhaps the issue with light novel adaptations may not be the source material, but the competence of the staff hired to make the show happen.
The animation should be credited with helping the sense of immersion. While the CGI frequently leaves a lot to be desired, the 2D animation is consistently fluid and the backgrounds are just plain beautiful, with the sense of a painter’s touch in several shots. Takaomi Kanasaki has not directed many shows before, but he is clearly enamored with the source material, judging by the inspired action cuts, character expressions, and camera angles. Strong writing and strong directing go hand in hand with elevating material into the A-grade level, and Kanasaki gels with Kurata to give the show an organic feel that not many anime have. Fanservice is restricted to Suzuka provocatively eating a sweet in the first episode and a mid-season incident where Harutora hangs on to Natsume’s chest for dear life while they’re on a possessed motorcycle. This is for the best, since excess fanservice would have disrupted the atmosphere that makes Tokyo Ravens stand out.
The show’s quality also extends to the stellar opener “X-encounter” by Maon Kurosaki. Clearly written with the show in mind (the lyric “Fly, ravens!” drives the point home with the subtlety of a sledgehammer), the upbeat electronic/rock combo of the backing instruments and Kurosaki’s passionate, urgent singing powers the song into earworm status. The visuals are painstakingly timed to the song, with rapid-fire cuts to match the beats and guitar riffs, as well as tonal changes to the song. The ending, “Kimi ga Emu Yuugure” by Yoshino Nanjou, uses real-life pictures with dramatic red splashes, with cels of the characters standing among these pictures to get an evocative feel. The song itself is melodic and pleasant, and while it doesn’t make its purpose as obvious as “X-encounter,” it also ultimate fits the anime quite well.
This is the third time in 2015 that I’ve reviewed a show that has background music by Maiko Iuchi. The music he composed for Tokyo Ravens is worlds above what he has done for A Certain Magical Index and A Certain Scientific Railgun, showing growth and maturity that caught me off guard. While a significant portion of the soundtrack is indeed Iuchi’s typical electronic ambiance and beats with overdubbed electric guitar, the majority of the music is piano-driven with a strong orchestral accompaniment. Piano, acoustic guitar, and woodwinds gently ease you into the story in the first episode, and continue to pop up over the course of the series to enhance school scenes and emotional moments. Many action scenes are driven by horns and strings, with Iuchi’s beats and guitar riffs only an occasional supporting layer in those tracks. The music lends a sense of grandeur that wouldn’t exist if it was just Iuchi’s synthesizer and samples. Even the suspense scenes tend to be scored with a gentle piano and plucked strings in lieu of ambient numbers as per Iuchi’s modus operandi. The result is Maiko Iuchi’s magnum opus; by far his best work, and it is definitely worthy of an independent listen.
The sense of respect for the work extends to the English dub of the show as well. Jamie Marchi (does this woman ever rest?) handles the dub scripts here, with sporadic assistance from Tyson Rinehart, but the dialogue onscreen is not typical Marchi at all. The typical Marchi-isms (punched-up comedy, prolific profanity, and frequent slang) are almost entirely absent. This is Marchi’s tightest script work since Blood-C, rewritten just enough for the lines to sound natural in English, with a few “likes” and sentences ending in “so” being thrown in to make the teenage characters sound like teenagers. The lack of profanity is especially a surprise; one might guess that FUNimation decided to market the show more towards a young adult market or for TV, or that Marchi decided her usual amounts of profane dialogue would have been a distraction. Whatever the case, the resulting scripts are strong, natural, and faithful, making it hard for even a hardcore sub fan to find fault with.
The natural feel extends to Colleen Clinkenbeard’s dub as well. Relative newcomer Clifford Chapin (Harutora) is surrounded by veterans Ian Sinclair (a surprising but well-fitting choice for Touji), Caitlin Glass (Natsume), Josh Grelle (Tenma), the always-versatile Leah Clark (Kyoko), and Monica Rial (to be honest, the only realistic choice for Kon). All of these actors do a superb job with their characters, sounding like the close-knit group of friends that their characters become, a commendable task. Jad Saxton proves to be a superb choice for Suzuka in her scattered appearances, and J. Michael Tatum acquaints himself the best out of the adult roles with his excellent, sly Jin Ohtomo, though Jarred Greene’s tough, battle-crazed Reiji Kagami is a close second. Caitlin Glass in particular deserves a shout-out for basically having to to do two different voices for Natsume (Natsume’s actual voice and the boyish voice she puts on at school) and pulling both off really well.
The Japanese track is staffed with many veteran voice actors, including Hana Kazazawa as Natsume, Eri Kitamura as Kyoko, and Ryohei Kimura as Toji, surrounding newer voice actor Kaito Ishikawa as Harutora. As one would expect of such a seasoned cast, they sound quite good at what they do. Hana Kazazawa’s Natsume hits a far different tonal range than Caitlin Glass, so some aspects of the sub (or the other way around) may require some getting used to. Overall, while the dub is strong, those who would prefer an undubbed experience will find plenty to enjoy about the Japanese version.
My screener copy was the Limited Edition, which doesn’t contain any differences from the standard except for a really sweet-looking artbox that contains space for the second set. On-disc, we have commentaries for episodes 5, 7, and 12 (episode 7 is a video commentary), clean opener and closer, and a couple of Kon-centric shorts that explain some of the “rules” behind magic and spirits in the series (all unfortunately undubbed). Fairly standard, although episode 7 has some interesting moments and, if you thought Caitlin Glass just sounded naturally like Winry Rockbell considering her resume (including Natsume), the episode 12 commentary will shock you. The Blu-rays have a great appearance audio and visual-wise, but the DVDs come across pretty clean as well.
Overall, Tokyo Ravens proves that that the execution is the deciding factor even if you don’t have the most original concept. How many magical school shows are there, East and West? Tokyo Ravens is exceptionally well-executed on all fronts, and is willing to take risks in subtle ways that other, lesser, productions might not do. Most interesting is how this set does not end in a cliffhanger. Just as its beginning, Tokyo Ravens concludes this set gently, with Suzuka well on her way into transforming into a heroic character, showcasing the rudimentary skills of the students, and Harutora finally realizing something about Natsume that he should have figured out ages ago. The decision not to throw in a last-minute action sequence or some cryptic dialogue should not be as original as it feels here, but that likely says more about the quality of current material than it says about Tokyo Ravens. Sometimes, it is worthwhile to have more substance than flash, and if you’re willing to tolerate the slower moments, Tokyo Ravens has plenty to reward you with.
The post Review: “Tokyo Ravens” Season One Part One – Taking Flight appeared first on ToonZone News.