i look from your review, so...
did you like Final Fantasy Game series?
^^
Final Fantasy Unlimited tv Review
The gateway to another world appears suddenly one day, and with it comes the awakening of two mysterious beasts with astonishing power. When the beasts apear to destroy each other, they vanish leaving behind only the inexplicable pillar of darkness and unanswered questions. Twelve years later the twins, Ai and Yu, of two scientists that disappeared on the so-called Day Of Conjunction board a phantom subway and begin a quest to find their lost parents. As the train travels they meet a enigmatic woman named Lisa and a brooding stranger Kaze with a demon-summoning gun. Soon arriving in the chaotic world of amazing beauty and thrilling danger called Wonderland they twins set out on a dangerous mission to rescue their missing parents. With Lisa there to help protect the them they travel through Wonderfuland while trying to avoid attacks by the Earl Tyrant and his henchmen. Along the way they meet numerous allies including Cid, a brilliant inventor, and Lou, a flighty girl who can turn into a werewolf when she looks into a mirror. Join Ai, Yu, and all their friends and discover the wonder and adventure of Wonderland as they go to discover how to stop Earl Tryant and find Ai and Yu's parents.
By: RavenSilverRose
Story & Characters
Hmm... well let me just start by saying that I am a final fantasy fan. I played through 7,8,9, Tactics, and am halfway through 5 and 6. That being said, you could say i was excited to see what squaresoft could come up with in the animation field. I've heard rumours about the dud that was Final Fantasy: Legend of The Crystals and was slightly dissapointed by Final Fantasy The Movie. I guess I was hoping that Squaresoft would somehow see the error of it's ways, and strive to make a decent anime series at least... however, the end product left a bittersweet taste in my mouth.
Story: It begins with 2 kids, Ai and Yu, who manage to end up in another dimension looking for their parents. They are aided by a lady in an orange tightsuit and a mysterious, masked, caped charater. And so, they go around looking for their parents. Oh, and a way out of this alternate dimension, of course. Oh, and if that's not bad enough, there are also many enigmatic baddies waiting to add these kids to their hit list for some mysteious reason or another. Sounds good? It's nothing heavy... in fact, the storyline is so barely there that I had to force myself to crawl through each disc...
Rating:
Art
As far as art goes, FFU toes the line between "artsy" and lame. The characters are stylishly drawn, thin lines are used, and everything is clean and vibrant. "artsy". However, as the series drags on, one will notice that it's actually not that big a deal. CG is used in many scenes, probably due to the artists' laziness... Bad guys are simple, uninspiring and poorly designed (goofy even). An few examples:
*SPOILER*
In the 1st episode, viewers are treated to a cool looking main character, a summoner with a demon-gun that fires, u
guessed it, summons. And the summons look really cool too. BUT, also in the first episode, viewers are subjected to
anime humiliation in the form of the resident baddie. A giant Mushroom with One Eye. Now, if the mushroom looked like
some kinda death-mushroom, or reaper-mushroom, well, it'll still look cool but squaresoft decided to take the easy
way out... Imagine Superman with a *huge* mushroom head and one eye dangling out of it, making supposedly
'scary' roars. Cool? no. "Lame"? ditto.
*END OF SPOILER*
In the later episodes, the viewer is treated to even more horribly designed baddies (more mushrooms, anyone?), Not to mention a furry handbag, a talking flower and large chillies. Even the trademark chocobo was given a poor workover, looking tired and distressed.
However, all is not lost. I had the feeling that Square felt bad for cheating the audience and future owners of the DVD and thus upped the ante in their last few episodes. The CG scenes (mostly the action scenes) were wonderfully done, as well the protagonist's summoning scene. Watching the same transformation scene again and again a la Power Rangers for almost every ep, however, was not fun.
Rating:
Sound
I don't have much to say about sound. The characters sound spot on in the japanese version, and the bg music rises and falls according to the mood. Nothing really special there. The OP and ED scenes were decent though they stuck through it the entire 24 episodes. Corny bg mars the series from time to time, but that isn't the only thing plaguing it. The only gripe I have about sound is that the female child tends to cry alot during the last episode. It took a lot of patience to put up with that kind of torture.
Rating:
Presentation
If you couldn't already tell, presentation was done quite poorly. The OP and ED songs/scenes were done well, catchy tunes and all. But the meat of the story has nothing to boast. It almost felt as if FFU was hastily written and marketed as a quick way to gain a buck. Humour was slapstick and mainly dealt out by the chocobo of the series. The many oppurtunities to flesh out the characters were shelved in an attempt to make the story tangible. For instance, we find out later that one of the main characters is actually from another world, being sent here after his was destroyed by the main baddie's subordinate. However the anime did not take any chance to explain why, how or when. It introduces an excuse for a battle and stumbles upon it. There are too many loose ends to this story. What is the baddie's main purpose? What about his hencemen? How did Kaze's Homeland get destroyed so quickly, seeing as to how they were a tribe of summoners and the attacker was a lone magic swordsman? What actually happened in the end? The series doesn't seem to want to answer these questions, leaving them instead to be a big question mark for the casual viewer.
If you are interested in watching this anyway, go ahead. Just don't say I didn't warn you.
Rating:
Final Verdict
4.0000 (below average)
Reviewed by kyoobi, Jan 18, 2005
Comments
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DragoonzDead Feb 15, 2005
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ChibiKareshi Jul 31, 2006
Just so you know, the reason for all the apparent plot holes lies in the fact that the series was never completed. Many things suddenly make sense when you read the continuation of the story.
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ChiekoKawabe Feb 20, 2009
.. I personally couldn't sit through the first episode. I found that you actually gave the art more than it should have had. This is a series from 2001. However, the characters look like they were drawn in the '80s. No matter how I look at it, that fact alone killed the show for me. Now if it was actually done in the '80s, I might been able to look that over, but the fact is that it wasn't. It was also lame that they mixed present-day animation with old animation because it seemed as if the characters didn't belong on-screen.
... I also scoffed when I saw such a wonderfully-written story on a box set turn to crap in five minutes.
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back07 Sep 24, 2012
thanks for the nice review
:)
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