dance in the vampire bund 1
Categories: episodic review, vampire bund
Tagged: dance in the vampire bund
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“Prom Night.”
My original prediction: “If Bakemonogatari is Twilight, Tsukuyomi is Vampire Dairies, then Dance in the Vampire Bund should be True Blood.”
I should have added: “Mitigating factor: I can no longer play as Rachel in BlazBlue. She’s like the caffeine-free, diet version of Mina Tepes.”
Actually. Scratch all that. All bets are off. You know why? Keep reading.
So you’ve probably watched this first episode of Dance in the Vampire Bund by now. You’re probably thinking, “Wow, this is a Shaft series? Directed by Akiyuki Shinbo?! There’s like no crazy in-jokes or gravure models being stapled for no reason!” Some of you might be disappointed we don’t see Tri-Forces or Mesousa floating around in the background. Others might be thrilled that there’s a distinct lack of Shaft being Shaft.
Fine.
But.
Dance in the Vampire Bund‘s adaptation is handled by Hiroyuki Yoshino… yes… the mastermind of Mai Hime, Mai Otome, Mai Otome Zwei, Code Geass, Code Geass R2, Macross Frontier, and K-On! WWII Edition. Let that sink in for a second. Loli. Vampires. Shaft animation. Sunrise sensibilities.
So you’re probably not shocked if I tell you that this was not how the characters are introduced in the manga. This ridiculous talk show never happens. Instead, we’re treated to a magnificent vampire vs. human battle involving killer vampire meido, human meido assassins, copious loli vampire fanservice, and Akira being awesome. (He’s like the evolutionary Rock, but you can’t tell by this.) But, guess what, for the anime… we get none of that. We get a crappy talk show. Maybe the original introduction might happen, but it’ll feel watered down after this mess. I’m disappointed that they skipped the scene where Akira figures out who exactly is the Vampire Queen.
(If Shaft out-Kyoto’ed Kyoto with Bakemonogatari, let’s just say it’s very possible they’ll out-Sunrise’ed Sunrise with Dance in the Vampire Bund.)
In any case, I’m giddy. With a single episode, they reset all expectations I had for this series. I’m no longer wondering how they’re going to deal with the extreme violence or nakkidness or yuri but instead which characters are going to die and come back to life. Also taking bets on which character is going to get a fruit-related nickname. This anime is either going to be great (doubtful), horrible (doubtful), or horribly great train wreck (most probable).
(If Shaft did this series straight up and pulled an Elfen Lied with the violence/nakkidness, this could have been a great series. But, on the other hand, it’s been a while since I’ve watched a top notch train wreck.)
My favorite aspect of this series? Well, let’s just say I’m very giddy about vampire meido assassins.
Astraea’s Balance?
I prefer this kind of “Astraea’s Balance.”
Bounce… bounce… bounce… 3 seconds!
(I’m convinced that Vera is in Vampire Bund just to balance out Mina.)
I wish I could bet on prop bets like “which panelist is going to get sucked dry”. Gee. Is it going to be the old hag? The fat otaku? Or the hawt idol? Mmm… mmm… maybe this should be a question for Baka to Test to Shokanju.
(Really not much to write about this episode. I’m not very excited about talk shows. Now, if they did Jersey Shore as a premise, then I’d be a lot more excited. Anyway, if Sora no Otoshimono is the Snicker’s cheesecake of anime, this episode would be the oyster crackers of anime.)
If you’re going to change the story, you might as well go all the way and substitute (fuck, is this Nera? Nero? Nelly?) with Mikuru Prime. I’m highly disappointed that out of the three vampire meido, only one is dressed up as an actual meido.
21 Responses to “dance in the vampire bund 1”
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Well, as RIDICULOUS as Baka to Test is for it’s entertainment value, I’m actually enjoying the plot of this show, so I’m passing that as my entertainment value for this show since there’s a huge lack of stuff that was present in the manga.
And yeah, Rachel is like low low tier in BBCS, so you might as well drop her now before you realize that j.2c is literally unusable. Tsubaki FTW
I think the production quality of the show, or at the very least this first ep, is not up to SHAFT’s standards, or maybe Bakemonogatari has just spoiled me.
I haven’t read the manga, and even I know the talk show is horribly out of place. Hopefully they’ll step things up in the future.
About halfway through, I thought “If we can’t even have the appetizer battle, how will they handle Akira’s Crowning Moment of Awesome?”
I quite like this first eps it reminded me of of eps zero on Haruhi S1. It’s also nice and different. Since I never seen another else about this series this eps was good at building interest in the end. I really actually like this type of beginning where they build a baseline on how normal life was before a radical change from character or situation. Like how Higurashi, Tokyo Magnitude 8, and Gurren Lagann (although they did it a bit faster) began. It makes the later event seem more dramatic. Also like the Twilight zone where they always start and showcase normal life before they begin into the turning point. If they started out in a big epic battle you might think that it’s fairly normal in this universe that mythical creatures exist more readily and while normal people might not know about it, it’s not all that uncommon, than like this where you feel that all the people of this world has just gotten a major shock which will lead to panic and epic fighting.
My two cents.
I know nothing of this series, so I chalked up the talk show as a SHAFT moment. My only real complaint at this point was how dumb the geko/vampire/monster thingie looked. I was expecting to see a zipper on its back, or toy planes on fishing wire start flying around. I’ll wait for episode 1, err episode 2, to form an opinion on this show.
Shaft was on too good a roll. I had almost thought that they had learned to just stick to good source material. Guess I was being needlessly hopeful.
I wonder how people who got used to this will feel after the mood shifts to MURDERRAPEKILLMURDERMURDER and ‘don’t bother us because we paid off your debt, we exist, and bad neighbours die horribly… bitch’ along with Mina acting her age.
Or the examination scene. I’ll bet they’ll lose some viewers then, the ones expecting a light comedy which the first ep makes it appear to be.
Also, Nella is the tall one with the pixie cut hair a d that wave of bangs over one eye, Nero the long haired auburn with the bonnet, and Nelly the one with the long black hair and the heart-shaped face. There’s technically one more maid who is a megane type to be shown, though. And she’s only in omakes.
Oh. And for the record, Yuki compensates for Mina’s lack of development, while Vera serves Mina because Vera was in love with Mina’s mom. Who apparently felt enough of the same to… I’ll let the plot spoilers stop here.
I was actually going to avoid this show because I am not exactly interested in nekkid loli vampire action, but hearing about this atypical first episode I decided to check it out. I thought I knew what I would be getting myself into from the trailer and I am pleasently surprised that this went in a different direction. I think this show will set itself apart by taking risks like this rather than following the predictable (I was able to guess every “twist” in the first 3 chapters at least) source material. The concept of the entire show is just asking for a trainwreck, I can’t see it not heading fullspeed to lulu express.
I agree with Alice. In this case, I think not taking the source material seriously is the right approach.
“The fat otaku?”
Pretty much insulted the creator mangaka, yeah?
It’s not like Shaft hasn’t done it before. They did do that horrendous Negima adaption, after all.
The whole point of the manga is the action/horror parts of later… unless you really THINK the following is supposed to be funny and lighthearted:
Seriously, how is this supposed to be lighthearted?
By the way, Jason, can you spoiler that middle part, please?
I’m NOT a bit fan of fahking vampire shows…so I probably wont watch anymore of this than I have.
But DO let me know if Zero shows up…then I might tune in.
Like arnoldstrife, I was reminded of Haruhi episode 0 (though that actually had a place in the novels, this isn’t a part of the original source material).
One thing that impressed me, while watching this episode, was how well they caught the mannerisms of the washed-up celebrities that turn up on these shows. The vamping and clowning of the “old hag” especially.
I picked up the manga series because I heard this anime series was coming. I like it, well enough, but I think I’m going to like Shaft’s approach to the material, if this first episode is any indication of what’s coming.
I’m thinking that no one involved with this show actually read the manga, they were just handed the character designs and brief synopsis of the setting and told to run with it.
GHR: Sure feels that way, and the people who like ‘OMG! Another stupid anime just like the others who takes things in an original direction’ are having a heyday with this series. Heaven forbid that y’know… you actually ADAPT a story, and that people actually bring arguments which have some logic to them into a discussion.
Now that I’ve had a chance to see it with sub-titles, there actually are a number of in-jokes — various factions of the Vampire Bund are sponsoring the show, the evidently accidental appearance of Akira as a “man on the street”, the fact that Mina seems to have set the whole thing up (and been forced to improvise when things didn’t quite go as planned).
The cheesy chameleon vampire is very similar to the first shinma that appeared in the (inferior to the OAV) Vampire Princess Miyu TV series — it may even have had a similar fate.
And Haesslich, I disagree that the point of the manga is the action/horror that follows. The manga is about Akira and Mina’s relationship, the horror and action are mere stage dressing. And, um, the manga’s creator is responsible for the “Dance with the Vampire Maid” epilogues, so it wouldn’t surprise me if this approach has his blessing (especially since he has a cameo role as the manga-ka in the game show!).
I’m still worried about the direction we’re going – since part of the issue is the fact the relationship is the cause of some of the stressors which result in the action/violence; Mina’s desire to see what normal life looks like causing the incident at the end of Volume 2, for example… or the conflict that went on through Volumes 4-5. If they’re going to replace it with vampire-game-show style comedy and parodies.. well, it works for SZS, but I’m not sure how good a fit it is for this series.
Besides, it’s not the Vampire Bund that’s sponsoring all these things. Remember the setting and the conflicts which are causing the stressors on Akira and Mina’s relationship. Especially the incident in Volume 4 with the chair.