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| Overall | Art | Animation | Character Design | Music | Series Story | Episode Story | Reviewer | |
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| Watch | 9 | 8 | 8 | 5 | 4 | 4 |
 Ggultra2764
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[series:2463#1552] |
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(Watch-/ Avoid+) Not sure if I should feel indifferent or confounded at how Blood-C tries to spin its tale. Being the second spinoff of Blood: The Last Vampire, Saya is this time a bespectacled high school girl who secretly slays demonic threats while living at her father's shrine. Early episodes mix around light-hearted high school slice-of-life with dark and violent survival action in its focus on Saya to show that things in her life aren't as they would seem, with later episodes dropping more hints that Saya isn't quite as human as she thinks and building up to what are supposed to be very shocking revelations about the life she thought she had. The major problem with all this was that it got hard for me to stay engaged thanks to the series not doing very well to flesh itself out and build up on many of the elements it wanted to reveal. Characters don't get much in the way of development and fleshing out, making their sudden mood changes when things get revealed about Saya's situation quite unnatural without hints dropped about their true natures. There isn't much we know about the demonic creatures Saya was hunting, with the final two episodes seeming more like a convenient excuse to dump all the information that the viewers should learn about piece by piece and forcing the series to shift to a desired point just to force the audience to be superficially shocked at what was revealed. Plus, it looked like this series seemed to get increasingly embellished in its graphic violence and depravity as various demons kill townsfolk and Saya's classmates in a number of gory ways just to become their food and the human mastermind behind Saya's situation having no qualms about who gets killed off. Looking past the shoddy plot and character developments, the visuals to the series are pleasing for the most part with beautifully detailed scenic shots, characters drawn by CLAMP sporting the mangaka team's notable beautifully drawn designs and fluid animation in many instances, particularly with Saya's battles with the various demons and their gory rampages. Otherwise, I'd find it really hard to recommend Blood-C thanks to how shoddy its developments felt and seeming to increasingly relish in its gory content as episodes progress. If you really want to get into a Blood title with Saya, look into Blood Plus. Last updated Friday, February 28 2014. Created Friday, February 28 2014. | ||||||||
| Unevaluated |
 Stretch
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[series:2463#628] | ||||||
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(Two episodes watched): What was going on here? The first half of the episode focuses on the goofy, clumsy Saya as her schoolmates see her. But it wasn't particularly funny--in fact, the humor largely fell flat. At times things would happen and I would wonder if they were supposed to be jokes, because that was anybody's guess. It was obvious from the OP sequence that there was a secret and serious side to Saya, and I was impatient for the show to get on with it. After the station break the mood of the show turns 180 degrees and Saya takes on a praying mantis-like creature. There was such a disconnect between the first and second halves that you would almost think that two different series were being made, namely a school comedy and an action adventure with Saya Kisaragi happening to play the main part in each. The fight is fairly interesting (though it's too dark to see much of what's going on), but Blood-C devotes so much time and trouble to fleshing out Saya's goofy side, and so little to explaining anything. The episode ends abruptly with a horde of questions left unanswered. Why did Saya need to fight instead of her father? Was her clumsiness just a joke, since it vanished during the battle? What was that bit about the strange look in her eye? Was that thing she fought a demon, or what? If a show can't make me laugh, can't explain what's going on, and isn't outstandingly exciting, what is there left? Is there any reason to watch any more of this? I did watch one more episode, but I didn't see much to reassure me that an interesting story would come together. In fact, I have a hard time remembering much about the second episode, which I watched perhaps two weeks ago. The bad guy monster thingees were given a strange name, but I have little or no interest in them or in Saya, or in the show in general. Last updated Sunday, July 31 2011. Created Monday, July 11 2011. | ||||||||
