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| Overall | Art | Animation | Character Design | Music | Series Story | Episode Story | Reviewer | |
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| Watch | 7 | 7 | 7 | 6 | 7 | 7 |
 Dreamer
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[series:1984#2279] |
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Reading the synopsis is what caught my interest in this one. After watching it however... Art, Animation & Character Designs For being an older production, the artwork wasn't too bad. At times, it would be minimalistic, at other times, it seemed to hold far more details in background and characters. Overall, it was marginally good and acceptable. Music The OP sounded like a tribal piece.... reminds of something from the amazons. Somehow it seemed to fit the series as a whole. The rest of the soundtrack isn't worth noting. Actually, getting back to the "tribal" music, after a while (short while), it really got annoying. I think it was overdone. Series and Episode Story It started off pretty good. However, it sorta dragged on after the first 1 or 2 episodes. It wasn't really that involving... barely held my interest. It wasn't until sometime half way through that it actually got a "bit" interesting. Another thing that got pretty old and honestly quite cheesy was the Godzilla-like battles over cities. At first, I got a good chuckle out of it and found it somewhat amusing. But after the first few battles, it really got cheesy, especially the various horribly horrid B-rated monsters. Good lord! Overall, it barely held my interest. I found myself almost wanting to skip a few episodes but withheld "just" incase I might miss something. In the end, I didn't miss much. Move on to greener pastures. Last updated Tuesday, October 26 2010. Created Tuesday, October 26 2010. | ||||||||
| Rent | 8 | 7 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 6 |
 Ggultra2764
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[series:1984#1552] |
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(Thoughts after 4 episodes, 4 years ago) The opening sequence and promotional art for this series is quite deceptive. What comes across as three sisters with a warrior nature controlling a god in the form of a giant monster from the two mentioned sources is actually three sisters living in Tokyo while living a poor lifestyle and facing complications in living their life as a result of inheriting said god from their dead brother. The revealing warrior garb and weaponery was nowhere to be found in the four episodes I've seen of this series. The main focus of these episodes featured the Shimabara sisters trying to deal with Neo Ranga's recent presence in Tokyo as the god marches in towards them since he is now under their commands. The three sisters have their own individual personalities with the middle sister taking on heroic traits, the youngest being pampered by admirers, and the oldest struggling to get a career that pays well. However, no further depth is given to the sisters beyond these attributes to their personalities. What's noteworthy about Neo Ranga is the tribal theme of its opening sequence. While that tone isn't found too much in three of the four episodes, it really stood out for me as it made me wonder just how this series could have been. There was high energy in the opening song that would get you pumped for what was to come. At the moment, I'm not feeling interested in watching the series. I may come back to watching it if I can't find any other anime titles that sway my interest since the 15 minute lengths of Neo Ranga's episodes make it a quick watch. But be warned, what this series supposedly gives you from its promos is not all as it seems. Thoughts After Completing Show Final Rating: Rent-/ Watch+ Yeah, I can see why this doesn't get much fanfare after seeing it years later when I bought it for my collection. Pretty much, Neo Ranga is focused on how the presence of Ranga makes the lives of the Shimabara sisters turn upside-down when they inherit a kingdom from their dead brother. The first half of the series is mostly a mix of social satire and slice-of-life comedy focused on how Ranga's presence effects the neighborhood in which the Shimabaras live in and how this invites figures like crooked politicians, the mass media, yakuza and the military to get entangled in the hijinks. From how I interpreted things, Neo Ranga was apparently poking fun of the cultural divide between those embracing Western influences and those trying to uphold the older traditions of Japan's past. While the humor was a bit hit or miss for me, the show's first half was structured well enough where it knew what it wished to focus on and things appeared to be getting interesting when the secret society called the Kyoshin Council made their move to gain influence in Japan. Sadly, the second half to Neo Ranga takes a big hit in quality as the show got too experimental for its own good in what it wanted to focus on. The focus seemed to have shifted on the tensions between the Shimabaras and the Kyoshin Council at first, but the series decided to return to its slice-of-life/ social satire mix for a bit with the addition of "monster of the day" plot setups compliments of the Kyoshin Council as this mixture was a bit of a miss. Some of the themes focused on with Christmas and filming for TV specials were quite outlandish compared to the first half's focus on poking fun of more influential elements of Japanese society. The series then decides to go back to being more serious for the show's final episodes with the actions of the Kyoshin Council, a third faction that gets poorly introduced and hardly any depth and attempting to philosophize the worth of freedom and worship of gods. However with the sloppy handling of these developments and not being consistent with the tone of Neo Ranga's first half, these elements for the show's finale lack the punch they could have delivered if consistently delivered throughout the title's complete run. Another area that Neo Ranga tends to be weak in is character depth. The series tacked on many of its prominent character with simple personalities such as Yuuhi being rebellious and pampered, Ushio being the heroic tomboy and Minami their stressed-out surrogate mother/ sister. While the simplicity was fine for much of the show's first half, Neo Ranga's attempts to incorporate more serious plot development and complex themes required more depth for these characters introduced. With exception to a few notable characters whose roles are expanded upon from the first half, the Shimabara sisters and most other characters don't get much depth given to their characters and their characters don't evolve too much throughout the show's run. Visual-wise, Neo Ranga does make use of cel-shaded animation in the designs of scenery and character designs which looked solid to a great extent throughout the show's run as many shots featured a great amount of detail put into the designs of scenery and monster designs. The animation isn't the title's best highlight, but it gets the job done in depicting character movement and battle scenes. Overall, I'm not really sure what drew my mind to come back to this show when I put it on hold years ago. Neo Ranga was seemingly experimenting with differing ways in which to explore its themes as its first half had a solid focus with its mix of slice-of-life and social satire while the second half became quite a mess in its overall focus. While it explores some interesting themes related to Japanese society at large, the series didn't seem to be sure how it wanted to implement them effectively while maintaining a consistent focus and tone. I suppose your mileage could vary on how well you enjoy Neo Ranga. Last updated Saturday, September 22 2012. Created Sunday, November 09 2008. | ||||||||
