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Nov 09 2005

Categories: anime, belldandy, episodic review
Tagged: belldandy

1 Comment »

When I first saw the series last year, I was very disappoointed. One of the joys of the manga and the predecessor anime is the art style, and I felt they really dropped the ball in this regard. I’m not sure if it is because of budget or timing, but the TV series really looked bad at the time… poor framing, poor continuity of art, poor range of motion, and I just couldn’t watch anymore. When I heard that the DVDs were anamorphic widescreen with improved art, I decided to wait. The DVD does dramatically improve the framing as I could quickly tell that it was always meant to be shown in widescreen– a lot of the scenes that were bland suddenly look full and majestic. The continuity of art and range of motion, though, are still problematic as, for instance, Belldandy’s necklace design changes from scene to scene (note how the dip disappears and reappears), and the characters still only have their lips move and animated during some conversation scenes (very apparent, for some odd reason, for every Sayoko scene). The CG work doesn’t approach the level of the movie, and the CG backgrounds looks pretty bad compared to the work done for Initial D 4th Stage. Nevertheless, the DVD version, if only for the widescreen, is a nice improvement, but, for this fanboy, I’m kinda picky for this series.

I’m even pickier about the music. I don’t hate Open Your Mind— I think it’s a good mood song for Riverdance. But… HOW CAN THERE BE AN ああっ女神さまっ SERIES WITHOUT THE GFC SINGING?!? It’s like having a Gundam series without some masked villian… or a Ken Akatmatsu series without underaged fanservice… or a GAINAX series without a crappy ending… or a Hanaukyo series without triplets. Yes, all of those things could happen, but does it mean they should? And, frankly, I’d rather not find out.

It’s hard to think about the original OVA without thinking about My Heart 言い出せない, Your Heart 確かめたい or Belldandy’s cake song. There’s just no equivalent for the 2004 series. Sigh. Anyway, the story at least stays true to its roots and continues on the manga’s story path and properly explains how K1 and Bell got their temple. I always have liked this chapter as a lot of people think Western religions when they think of Bell (angels and such), but she’s very non-denominational and can easily span many cultures. I think warmth is universally understood. As for angels, I’m glad Media Blasters is calling her, “Holy Bell” as opposed to Dark Horse’s “Blessed Bell,” but I think it is still too early to debut her as the angel introduction storyline in the manga was a good one. I’m just hoping Media Blasters continue the trend and properly name the rest of the angels and not translate Peorth’s lines into French.

Also, this episode marks the first time Bell changes her clothes, which is always a good typical harem moment for K1. (Though, my favorite occurence is still the movie where she changed into that seifuku with Skuld screaming in the background.)

Last, for people who noticed by now, the ああっ女神さまっ posts sport the old sba news post style. My little omake for the old gang.