Review Statistics

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566

Comments

5

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Plot Synopsis

No plot synopsis or other information available for Ginban Kaleidoscope

Story & Characters

Story

Ginban Kaleidoscope, or its alternative title Skating Rink Kaleidoscope, is an anime about a 16-year-old Japanese girl who appears to be the Japanese Olympic figure skating candidate. GK was actually a light novel authored by Kaibara Rei and illustration done by Suzuhira Hiro during 2003, and the novel ended its run only in 2006. The light novel is then adapted into a manga with the same author but with different manga-ka Hasegawa Jun. In truth, the anime only span about only the first arc of the novels, so I guess that means lots of things happened after the ending in anime.

GK is a story revolving figure skating, as in, skating and performing graceful moves and dances on ice ring. And fortunately, our main character, Sakurano Tezusa, is just that girl you are looking for if you are somehow interested in figure skating.

But in my opinion, GK is not the best anime I have seen so far. At first, I thought there may be some figure skating moves that we can learn, or maybe the figure skaters might come out with one or two new tactics under their sleeves, but it seems like GK has disappointed me. With only 12 episodes to wrap everything up, I do not even think the character development was very well developed. For example, Pete Pumps is a Canadian ghost who involuntarily possessed Tazusa because they happened to have the same wave length at one point. And when Pete Pumps is inside her body, he is supposed to stay put in the body. But for some reason Pete Pumps in GK seems to be able to walk out from her body, and even kiss her during the figure skating tournament in Torino. How weird can you get? I am not sure about anyone else but to me, this story can get a little cheesy.

Characters

Sakurano Tazusa - Your beloved heroin for GK. A 16-year-old Japanese chick who has a very sharp tongue which she launches very much often during press conferences. She is a Japanese Olympic Figure Skating candidate to go for Torino and often gets compared with the media's choice, Shito Kyoko. Really detests Pete who is stuck in her body at first but soon she got used to it. The $10 Billion Dollar Beauty, self-proclaimed.

Pete Pumps - The hero in the story who somehow found himself stuck in Tazusa's body after he died in a stunt plane performance in Canada. He was supposed to be in Heaven by now but Heaven delayed his entrance and he had to return to Earth by possessing someone. He is a pretty nice looking guy with orange blonde, and he loves plane, since he was a stunt pilot before he was sent to meet his Maker. He is always seen encouraging or helping Tazusa, but sadly, his good deeds were not returned, not until very much later in the anime. He was given extra 100 days of living within the humans in his ghost form.

Rating

6 (average)

Art

I do not actually have much to say. Since Ginban Kaleidoscope is a shoujo manga, so you have all the big sparkly eyes, beautiful girls with very colourful and flashy hair, in their figure skating suit.

The character designs are okay, but I am particular interested in Dominique Miller, who was the American candidate with very antagonistic and, or should I say, cool and sexy attitude with a suitable skating suit to go with her?

And the other thing that caught my attention is the skating suits worn by the skaters. There are some nice suits out there, for example one of Tazusa's, which was a kimono, but her kimono was shorter and that one definitely has a very good taste. Another one would be Dominique Miller's.

Other than that, I think the art presentation is overall, an okay.

Rating

7 (above average)

Sound

The good stuff in Ginban Kaleidoscope can be seen in the OP and ED. The OP was presented by YeLLOW Generation with the song "Dual". Well I think this song is really nice, and it suits the anime quite well, or particularly Tazusa herself, since she was known by her stone face when she figure skates.

And the ED was done by Inoue Marina with the title "energy". The ED was really nice, and they kept the animation simple just using a kaleidoscope of floral patterns. Not very fancy but it looks good to the eyes.

As for the voice acting in the anime, truth be said, since I watched Animax, so I watched GK in English audio rather than the original Japanese audio. But there are times when I switch the Japanese audio and I kinda find Tazusa's voice actor, Kawasumi Ayako, does not seem to appear as aggressive as her attitude should be, for some reason. She did well in voicing Elie (Groove Adventure Rave) and Nodame (Nodame Cantabile) though.

Hiroyuki Yoshino did a better job in voicing Pete though. But the weirdest part is the voicing for Dominique. She's an American and her English was not that good during her screentime in the anime. I was thinking that it would be better if she sticks to Japanese with a little unique accent of her own.

Overall, sounds department is also just an okay.

Rating

6 (average)

Presentation

The overall presentation was not really that good, but the ending was touching though, although the actual story did not end there. The story is a little cheesy, and it seems like what we can only see in Ginban Kaleidoscope is Tazusa skating around and firing at the medias. Character development is not strong enough, I mean, from all the previous episodes right up to the later ones, it does not actually look like they have any improvement in their relationship. Plus Tazusa looks like a very defensive girl.

Overall, the presentation is not that interesting and satisfying. I'd choose the 12-episode Kamisama Kazoku over Ginban Kaleidoscope. Well, that is just my opinion on this anime. But if you are interested in figure skating or you simply love checking out animes you want to watch during your free time, be my guest. But definitely not the best or awesome anime so far.

Rating

6 (average)

Final Verdict

6.17 (average)

Reviewed by Ephemeral-Garden, 20wk 1d ago