Anime: Blue Seed 4a2061

An unsung hero of the early 90's.

Blue Seed happens to be a rather cliché anime, loaded with the big explosions, monsters, and cheesy romance that often showed its face in early 90's anime (Sailor Moon, for example).

However, this particular anime has one aspect that sets it apart: unpredictability. I honestly thought, being an experienced watcher that this series was bound to follow an absolutely unoriginal route. For the sake of the reader, I will not explain as to whether or not my intuitions were right.

However, I will say that Blue Seed impressed me beyond it's typical theme, and I find a much greater respect for older animes than before because of it.

The fate of the Kushinada.

The Aragami are a group of malicious creatures which had invaded Earth in the long past. According to legend, the great princess Kushinada, through her own sacrifice is capable of wiping out the entire race of Aragami.

Of course, that is all in the distant past, since now Momiji, the youngest female successor to the Kushinada family wants to live her life like a typical teenage girl. Well it turns out, after an attack on her in her hometown, that she can't! The Aragami are back, and a special division of Tokyo anti-Aragami peacekeepers now defend Earth's last trump card against the giant enemies.

This synopsis covers relatively half the plot. Let's not forget the necessary love conflict, a lot of plot twists concerning the Kushinada, and future of world in the hands of a teenage girl once again. We've all seen this theme before; but I can say that this anime proves to be one of those few times where the theme keeps up well, and the story remains interesting the whole way through!

I should say that the beginning is somewhat boring, but around episode 3 or so getting addicted isn't much of a task. Later on, an ease of pace ensues, and then a bit of silliness interjects into the story to keep it going till the end of the season. Seriously, 3 or 4 episodes could have been left out to make things better, but overall I wouldn't want to manhandle it to my liking alone. That's the producer's decision, after all.

Limited characters.

Words like "flat" and/or "boring" can't quite fit these characters. Flat, in my opinion, suggests that they lack a maturity, or rather, a sense of reality. I don't think this series is intended for that sort of feeling, though. I'd say it's a bit more like "impulsive." While the story is unpredictable, the characters by no means are difficult to read. What someone is going to say or do, they pretty much do. Whatever seems right, is right. One can argue that this anime abuses this concept, but I feel that it is one of the few things that kept the characters consistent and meaningul. Without it they all would be better off as Happy Lesson clones, in my opinion.

I claim Momiji to be the most sufficient character in the series. Momiji's development sures that of everyone else - of course being the main character - but even to a point where she seems like the only one worth understanding. Kusanagi fails to reach this sort of level, since his "asshole" routine becomes tiresome and endless as the anime draws towards its serious moments. Meanwhile, other characters, such as Kome and Yaegashi really balance out the atmosphere between Momiji and Kusanagi. They also add a bit of comedy and action to the fight against the Aragami.

I feel the most useless character to be Sakura. Her presence; even her own episode in this whole series proved to be absolutely meaningless when it comes to the story's overall point. I can understand filler episodes, but her portion proved to be "useless fillers." I still suggest giving her a chance though, since despite her awful attitude and crude personality, she s the main cast with her abilities and sense of humor.

Ecchi in the animation? Too old, looks...wrong.

There seems to be some sort of fetish for Momiji's childish pantsu, since almost every episode contains shameless pantsu shots of her! I can't complain much about it, except that it looks completely unappealing in this style of animation! Traditional style. Big eyes, sharp hair, pointed bony structures in the face - this series really takes on the effects of the 90's animation style. I found it to be too retro and frustrating at first, but after some time, I grew to enjoy it. I suppose it might be the flashy colors that get on my nerves.

Horrible OP. Decent ED. Great seiyuu!

The OP, Mysterious Tokyo doesn't really cut it for me. It doesn't make sense, the singing is really too flashy, and the style sounds like something one would hear out of K9 cop or G.I. Joe. I love 90's music, but this style has always gotten on my nerves.
The ED is somewhat better, since it was a BoA III nomination, and also sung by Megumi Hayashibara!

As for Hayashibara, she has always proven herself to do phenomenal seiyuu work. I loved her as Lina from Slayers. Her work as Momiji is superb, and colors her character fully to the extent that it could be. I'm sure she is what makes sense of this whole series overall.

I'd recommend it to a few and the proud - it's really worth it.

If you find yourself interested in older titles, this would be a superb choice. I would also suggest this if you like to see shameless pantsu shots; like the idea of monsters invading Tokyo; adore the thought of women firing huge weapons at these monsters; you have a thing for Megumi Hayashibara. It's not exactly an anime to pin down to a certain group of people, but I might also point this title out to Sci-Fi anime lovers.

Can a newbie watch this? Probably not. Like I said, unless they liked the concept art and style of Japan's 90's animes, they will find Blue Seed to be childish and "flat." I would check to make sure they have seen other titles like it before deciding to even look into this one.

Anyways, the most important part of all this is to enjoy the moment. Blue Seed is definitely an anime that leaves a "moment" feeling with you. It's unpopularity and low rating are really quite deceiving, making it a series that proves that rating isn't everything.

Is Blue Seed yet another "End of the world" anime? The answer to this question isn't quite obvious. Actually, the answer would be yes... and no...

Blue Seed it pretty poor on the eyecandy side, that is, neither the art nor the animation is outstanding. While comparing to today standards, the art is pretty poor, Blue Seed was made more than 10 years ago, and was probably one of the best in its time. The art is exactly what you'd expect from a mid 90's anime. The animation, is usually pretty smooth, and only gets choppy (or suffers the of the teleportation syndrome) during fast action sequences . For example, Kusanagi's movements during battles are very rarely fully animated and suffer from this very teleportation syndrome. Other than that, the aragamis are pretty well drawn, however, they retain the typical monster of the mid 90's style.

The voice acting is well done, all of the voices fit to the characters very well. The music of this anime was all too forgetable (and was nearly immediately forgotten, by the way ;) ). Neither the opening nor the ending song sounded particularily good, so I skipped them most of the time, mostly because I was glued to the story too much.

And what a story, I might add! The first 15 or episodes of Blue Seed follow the monster-of-the-week plotline quite strictly. The last episodes however bring a whole new dimension to the story, everything gets clearer and clearer, everybody's roles in the big picture start shaping up, and the true purpose of the Aragami is slowly revealed. At this point in the anime, you'll find yourself longing to know more, and watch yet another episode. The ending was, in my opinion, very good and very touching, the whole feeling beeing backed by a powerful children sung music. The story also conveys somewhat of an environmental message (impersonated by Kaede), which climaxes during the ending. This message isn't openly brought forward, you'll have to do some thinking to extract it (here are some hints: next generation, nature, pollution... you see where I'm heading to now, dont' you?)

Blue Seed's characters are probably it's weakest point. While most characters have a distinct and very likeable personality, most of them feel pretty cliché. None of the characters get a proper background, actually most of them don't get any background at all. Their personalities also seem to be set in stone from the beginning of the anime until the end. The only characters that evolve somewhat would be Momiji and Yaegashi, they start up shy and week, and tend to get more courageous towards the end of the show. Kusanagi is also somewhat in the sense that you never really get to know what he trully thinks or feels, Leaving those facts to your interpretation. This helps you to sympathise with Momiji, and I wouldn't be too surprised if you were shocked by Kusanagi's behavior towards her a few times during the anime.

Blue Seed is a pretty long anime, and you need quite an extraordinary anime to go all over a 26 episodes anime again. I would say that Blue Seed probably isn't one of those animes wou'd want to rewatch each and every episode. But the good news is you don't really have to, should you watch the first two episodes as well as the last 10, you'd still grasp pretty much the whole story, without having to rewatch all of the Aragami getting killed.

For some reason, I really enjoyed this anime, especially the last few episode which kept me craving for more (oh boy... nights can get quite short these days...). Momiji's personality is probably also reponsible for a good deal of the enjoyment, since it's always interesting to find out how she copes with the hardships she encounters.

Blue Seed, even if geared towards boys, is probably one of those shows that would appeal to just about anyone and would make a pretty good introduction to anime.

Blue Seed is an anime about a young girl and her lost twin who are destined to save the whole world from the giant plants. It has big monsters and slaying, a red head with a gun fetish who ends up in love with the token geek, and a japanese school girl with animal print panties. There are panty shots and violence for the guys and a heartfelt love story along with a female lead who overcomes her own destiny to save the world and still get the guy. In genral this anime is a must see for all newbs, just as it was my personal second anime in my career of otaku-ness.