|
|
||||||||||
 |
| Episode Details | |
|---|---|
| 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26 | |
| |
| Overall | Art | Animation | Character Design | Music | Series Story | Episode Story | Reviewer | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ||||||||
| Buy | 8 | 4 | 10 | 7 | 9 | 10 | Devil Doll | # |
[Score: 84%, Top 5 as Romantic Comedy]
Especially the realism is what's so much better than most other romance series: These 16-year-old youths make horrible mistakes now and then but that's just how they're doing at this age. The staff indicates the typical light-hearted high-school romance, full of elements we know already:
As for the Art you can see the nice faces of all characters - but the Animation quality is extremely unstable from episode to episode (they show nice high jump movements but during episode 3 and 7 the faces looked really awkward, and in episodes 17 & 19 it gets really annoying), almost as if they used two animation teams of very different skill levels! Never before have I given that low a rating for Animation for a show I like so much... they should really have been given a larger production budget. Not much spectacular Music either, rather few patterns repeated frequently - but strangely I cannot ever get enough of listening to the OP and the first ED song at the start resp. end of each episode (while I consider the second ED song with the Asahina highlights just boring), albeit they're probably average J-Pop material. Somehow they're exactly what the series needs at these places: A cheerful tune for the beginning of each episode, a fast & powerful song for the sequence of the episode's highlight scenes at the end for the first half of the series, and a soft ending song for the second half when the ice is slowly beginning to melt. If you remove the upper layer of the Story and focus on character analysis this series has a lot in common with Love Hina (just without most of the overhead): Yamato (Keitaro, with a little more spine) has immediately fallen for capricious Asahina (Naru, with a verbal "Naru punch" this time) who will have a hard time to understand that she likes this irresponsible guy as well. With a ladies' guy and the fellow athlete trying to help them becoming a couple, and a lovely, shy, caring Honoka (an older version of Shinobu) as Suzuka's potential rival, the stage is set - let the drama begin! Despite the story being focussed on the lead couple (both of which undergo drastic changes of popularity level in the eyes of the audience, rest assured) some of the Side Characters are shining more brightly. Hattori and Miki set the standard for the leads who have to develop significantly as to reach their level. Megumi and Saotome are horribly irritating but used sparingly (thank god...), Miho-chan has nice appearances now and then. And Honoka-chan... rooting for her makes this series an emotional roller coaster as so many of her efforts go to waste. But her time will come... she's so much more than just another Shinobu-chan! The miko is my favourite character of this show, and she'll be at her top performance when you least expect her to. But actually the best aspect of this show is that the audience will automatically lead heated debates about which girl is the best and who deserves whom... which means the author designer did a perfect job making the fans get involved in the story! You'll be longing for every forthcoming episode, and many of these episodes end with a sensational bang, earning Episode Story the highest possible rating. Last updated Saturday, March 22 2008. | ||||||||
| ||||||||
| Unevaluated | Forbin | # | ||||||
|
Drama : Low 3 Episodes Watched I will call this Love Hina Light. It's in a hotel with many rooms (And only 3 tenants) who are all girls. There is the blond who is like Kitsune, the Mega Nekko who is like an Old Shinobu, and of course Suzuka who is like Naru on Ritlin. While I liked Shuffle more, this was good. More after I see more. Boy is Suzuka a BITCH! This is Maison Ikkoku with Naru as the Manager. Last updated Tuesday, July 26 2005. | ||||||||
| ||||||||
| Unevaluated | Jan-Chan | # | ||||||
|
Episode 2 has been released as a fansub, in this very fun high school romance story. I am looking forward to the next episode.
Last updated Monday, July 18 2005. | ||||||||
| ||||||||
Other Sites
| Name | URL |
|---|---|
| Official Japanese Series Web Site | http://www.suzuka-anime.com/ |
| Lunar Subforum for Suzuka | http://www.lunarforums.org/viewforum.php?f=54 |
| Series Forum of the Lunar Fansubbing Group | |
| AnimeSuki Subforum for Suzuka | http://forums.animesuki.com/showthread.php?t=36029 |
| Series Forum at AnimeSuki, with lots of discussions about the characters' development | |
| Memento: Suzuka Archives | http://www.designchronicle.com/memento/archives/suzuka/ |
| Mentar's insightful episode reviews and comparisons between anime and manga | |
| Lunar Heights | http://lunar-heights.blogspot.com/ |
| Personal Blog by random_ray, the Suzuka translator for Lunar, with comments on his episode translations | |
| Random Curiosity: Suzuka | http://randomc.animeblogger.net/category/suzuka/ |
| Episode reviews with TONS of screen captures. | |
| DEL REY manga series (English language) | http://www.randomhouse.com/delrey/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780345486318 |
| |
