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| Overall | Art | Animation | Character Design | Music | Series Story | Episode Story | Reviewer | |
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| Watch | 7 | 7 | 7 | 5 | 6 | 6 |
 Ggultra2764
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[series:2889#1552] |
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This one's a mixed bag. Chaika the Coffin Princess offers up some interesting fantasy-based story elements in its focus on Toru and his sister aiding the mysterious Chaika in locating the remains of her dead father and coming to discover some shocking details to the titular character. The quest to gather said remains lead to several factions taking part in gathering or preventing the remains of Chaika's father from being discovered, creating moments of engaging twists in the direction of the plot. However, getting to these plot twists require putting up with the anime's not as engaging characters and subpar efforts at comedy as the majority of characters fall under typical popular character types of anime that often border on the obnoxious, particularly with its milking of the quirks of the characters for its failed attempts at comedy. In addition, the series is intentionally left open-ended for its later second half as Chaika is still tracking down pieces of her father's remains and there are still lingering mysteries about what purpose she has. Overall, I suppose I think this series has a bit of wasted potential as having a somewhat engaging plot isn't enough to hook me if the characters are too vanilla or obnoxious for me to give a hoot about them.
Last updated Thursday, March 03 2016. Created Thursday, March 03 2016. | ||||||||
| Unevaluated |
 Devil Doll
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[series:2889#752] | ||||||
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[3 episodes watched] Definitely an interesting story if you can handle the characters. It doesn't appear to have the same class but it gives me certain vibes of Seirei no Moribito as for the mystery of Chaika's role in this world and the competent and intelligent opponent party chasing them. Last updated Monday, April 28 2014. Created Monday, April 28 2014. | ||||||||
| Unevaluated |
 Stretch
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[series:2889#628] | ||||||
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(Six episodes watched): I have mixed feelings about this show; the characters of Toru and Chaika are fun, especially her--she seldom uses more than one or two words when she speaks, and has a definite charm to her. Yet she also carries a sort of magical anti-tank rifle in her 'coffin' and is a sorceress. Who is this odd girl, and what is she up to? Her speech impediment helps to keep her plausibly mysterious. She wants to acquire (steal) an important object (it's unclear what it is) from a nobleman's residence, and Toru and his domineering sister Yuko agree to help burgle the place. This show has a sort of chemistry among at least the two main characters, by virtue of them doing some talking and getting into a fairly cool fight scene (I'd never seen an evil unicorn before). It shows how much the characters count, and how magic can't be used as a substitute for likeable ones. I think the show is feeding us info at about the right rate to keep us intrigued and curious. On the other hand, the abuse that Yuko routinely heaps upon Toru, the shallow additional characters, and the loads of fancy terminology were less encouraging. I guess there is enough detail and plausibility to suspend disbelief and take the story seriously; most anime with 'magic' as a keyword can't or won't do that. Perhaps what we have here is a good magic anime, though it's too soon to be sure. There are touches of comedy to this show, and odd twists like other people pretending to be Princess Chaika. But I can't really say that I have much of an idea of where the main thrust of the plot is going. Something about memory loss--will some sort of conspiracy be uncovered? Why, again, was collecting all of the sets of remains of the previous emperor important? I forget, or it was never revealed. And is Chaika really who she says she is? We haven't learned all that much about her since episode one. Perhaps the novelty of the premise has worn off since then, and not enough new stuff has been added to keep me as engaged as I was. It seems to me that an anime is more fun if I understand exactly what the problem is, what's at stake, and have a good idea of what will need to be done to achieve a good resolution of the matter, and I can't really say that I do here. Still, the show is amusing and I don't mind watching--but I would look forward to episodes more if I had a better grasp of what's going on. One thing that bothers me is that it has become quite clear that the team that is pursuing Chaika and her friends will never harm her or be seriously harmed by her and her friends. In fact, the two groups will almost certainly wind up as allies at the climax of the series. Anybody who has watched a fair amount of anime could see that. Some other villain must emerge at some point, so that there's an opponent for the two groups to fight at the end. But the characters who are chasing Chaika are pretty drab, and since it's clear that nobody will get more than a cosmetic injury, the story is pretty dull at this point. The goal of recovering the dead emperor's remains isn't all that exciting, either. And the show being just 'amusing' isn't good enough--a show needs to offer more than mere amusement to be worth watching if nothing else holds my interest. As a result I have largely lost interest in this show and have decided to drop it altogether. Last updated Wednesday, September 10 2014. Created Tuesday, April 15 2014. | ||||||||
