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Xenjin's Excel Saga Tv Review

Excel Saga

Excel Saga tv Review

The world is corrupt! It is filled with inequality, the health care system is falling apart, education is terrible, and society as a whole needs reform! At least, that's what the members of ACROSS believe. Led by Lord Il Palazzo, the three person (+1 Emergency Food Ration) team sets out to take over the world, starting with one city. Excel and Hayatt set out to gather information and spread the word of the great Il Palazzo and wreck plenty of havoc along the way. Who will they convert? How many buildings will they destroy? How much blood does Hayatt have in her body? These questions and more will probably not be answered!

Description: kawaiiguy

Story & Characters

Have you ever heard of experimental Wackanimé? No? Well now you have. Excel Saga is the first (and quite likely the ONLY) anime series in this subgenre. Excel Saga is pure satire, sometimes played for laughs to the point where it becomes utterly unbearable. I'm actually surprised I was able to survive this painful 26 episode ordeal.

Excel Saga covers the wacked out servitude of a young girl named Excel (another example of Japanese animators naming characters based on abstract english nouns) to an underground "organisation" called Across (yet another example of....well... you get the idea), who along with her sidekick, a beautiful brunette called "Hyatt" and an obnoxious boss named "Ilpallazzo" (don't ask), is hell bent on... wait for it.... (drumroll) ....taking over the world. As to how an organisation of 3 people would rule the world is beyond me. But let's not get into that, since the animé avoids logic like the plague.

The story has no direction whatsoever. The anime series serves merely to poke fun at common clichés in everyday life, exploiting every concept from Japanimé to blockbuster movies to politics and every topic in between just to squeeze out a few more laughs. As to how often you can laugh at the same joke depends on your resilience. If you can do that for 26 episodes, then it's likely you either have the memory span of a housefly (a whole 5 seconds) or you wrote the script for this anime yourself. Each episode serves no other purpose than to exploit an idea (even PowerRangers™ are made fun of) under the guise of taking over the world. Ofcourse, each episode ends in miserable failure right up until the 24th episode, where things get really weird, and something strange happens. I won't divulge that here. You have to see it for yourself.

...well actually, come to think of it, you really don't have to.

Since each episode doesn't contribute to a whole story, (indeed, each episode is like an episode of your favourite sitcom), so don't expect anything deep or even remotely profound or interesting. The anime tries so hard to make one laugh, it literally falls flat on its face in many places, and then makes fun of its failed attempt at trying to make you laugh (apparently in case you didn't laugh the first time around). Make no mistake, Excel Saga is extremely funny in the beginning, but you can tell the same joke to the same audience only so often, before they begin to think you're lame.

Rating: 1

Art

Excel Saga uses caricatures throughout the entire series. It uses caricatures because not only is the script trying to be funny, but the appearances of characters as well (and sometimes it works). For those of you who don't know what a caricature is, it's merely a warped artistic impression of a character - with larger than natural features, over accentuated bodily faculties, or in the case of japanimé, artwork that reflects the emotion of the character in a literal sense, and not the character itself.

The caricatures are used wantonly and indiscriminately. There are times when the characters are literally reduced to smilies (or in some cases, emoji). The artwork is abused so frequently, that there were times I genuinely believed that some sequences involved doodles. I kid you not. There is a significant abuse of the appearance of people from different races and cultural backgrounds (checkout the afro on some of the characters) - again, I suppose, all in the name of laughs. There is even some sci-fi and horror elements thrown in - like a badly drawn version of the xenomorph from the Alien franchise. There is one episode where the artist shows his true skill when we see lots of females in 2-piece bikinis. Lots of curvaceous ecchi there. However, it seems highly out of place with the main characters being caricatures regardless. The artwork is too ad-hoc for my taste.

The artists here are in no wise trying to deliver even standard issue anime art. It's caricatures from the first frame of the first episode, right back to the last frame of the 26th. Expect nothing more.

Rating: 4

Sound

The Excel Saga soundtrack has a lot to be desired. It uses the same OP and ED for all 26 episodes. There are absolutely NO licensed J-pop tracks in this one. None. Not ONE. If the artists were anymore creative than that, I might have taken notice. But since the anime was not intended to impress in any way shape or form, just to make one laugh (clearly), the OP and ED sequences do enough to show you how completely wack the anime is before you actually get into the meat of the matter. At least they warn you.

The ED sequence is quite likely my favourite of the two, with their dog singing about how he doesn't want to be eaten. (The dog is threatened many times through the series with being eaten by Excel - a grim reminder of how some asian territories eat the domesticated animals). It's only funny because the dog is genuinely VERY cute (perhaps the only non-caricature character in the anime). Furthermore, the dog is actually "singing" in puppy-like coos, while a translator in the bottom right corner of the screen translates the dog-talk into nihongo. Again, another ploy at making one laugh. It's gut-bustingly funny the first 5 or so times you hear a puppy sing in coos. But believe me, after seeing the same ED up to the 20th episode, you realise it gets real tired REAL fast.

The voice overs are decent. Nothing terribly special there either. But it's interesting to hear seiyuus trying to take on a portuguese accent while still speaking nihongo. Maybe some people might find this amusing - but I don't think it was intended to be. It just sounds ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. Especially if Japanese is not your first language. If you are from Brazil, you will NOT be amused.

The seiyuu for Excel has got real talent blurting out her lines as fast as she does (Excel talks in paragraphs at a time without missing a beat or stopping for air). Maybe they actually just pre-record the voice and speed it up. But I don't think this is funny the first time, nor the umpteen thousandth time it occurs. All of the voice overs are quite silly. Then again, these characters have no intention of being serious about anything. Even when they are crying. I had a terribly hard time catching up with the characters when they spoke because of the frequent noise that is generated when several of them talk simultaneously, and in a mad hurry - as though they heard that they were going to all loose their tongues. It is highly frustrating (you can't understand what they're saying sometimes) and even when subtitled, the speech passes by so quickly, you had to watch the scene multiple times to get what was said. Very, VERY annoying.

Otherwise, the presentation is just adequate.

Rating: 5

Presentation

There is no sequentialism. Almost every episode can stand on its own. You can watch almost any given episode of Excel Saga and be guaranteed to not have missed anything. Don't expect story continuity or cohesiveness here. The anime has one intention and that is to make you laugh. It is all about slapstick humor and extreme dark comedy - all while trying to take over the world. Everything else is sacrificed to this end.

You can watch Excel Saga without thinking about what you are watching and still be moderately entertained. It wasn't designed to engage the audience, or cause them to feel empathy or identify with any of its characters. In fact, the anime is so emotionally disengaged, that if you don't find yourself laughing hysterically at the utter nonsense parading on your screen throughout the series, there is a very good chance that you may loose your cool. That's the problem here. It tries so hard to make you laugh, that there are times the anime tries to be something else, and it annoys you to tears, because it is not good at being anything else. Think of the 3 stooges trying to make The Matrix, and you will get the idea.

After braving through 26 episodes of utter, absolute and pure madness, I promptly got rid of the media. Personally, I wouldn't recommend Excel Saga to anyone, unless you really loved watching The Warner Bros.' Animaniacs. So if Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny cartoons are your thing, this is the Japanese answer to that genre. Just make sure you only watch it up to the 13th episode. The other 13 episodes are essentially the same thing. Have fun.

Rating: 4

Final Verdict

3.1667 (poor)

Reviewed by Xenjin, Oct 21, 2004

Comments

  1. Mant Nov 02, 2004

    You have not understood the purpose of this anime.

    The words "completely crazy animations" are not for random.

    If u wanted something deep, you failed the anime to see.

    But dont blame it if u dont liked it.

  2. Xenjin Nov 06, 2004

    I haven't failed to understand the purpose of the anime. I've seen lots of wackanime that remain fresh and original throughout their 26 episode stint. But there comes a point where it looses its originality and it keeps on playing on the same elements repeatedly to squeeze out the same laughs. When anime story writers run out of funny juice, that's when the anime series begins to suffer.

    i gave Excel Saga a low rating because it failed to maintain the originality for its humor - which is practically the only thing that carried it in the first place. How many times can you laugh at the same joke for 26 episodes? That sounds to me like a poorly planned story and script. It got to a point where the anime started to make fun of itself and it's inability to be funny - that's a classic sign of writer's block.

    Have you watched the American series calld "Animaniacs"? There's a good example of a wacky animation series that constantly reinvents itself and never gets old. It had a pretty decent run, and rarely failed to be truly and originally funny. So I perfectly understand that wackanime doesn't need to be deep. But it defeats its own purpose if it fails to remain original and funny. That's where Excel Saga fell down.

  3. flaskis Nov 09, 2004

    Xenjin, Excel Saga isn't a normal anime, as I know you know. But for what it seems, you haven't really understood the purpose of this anime. Each episode shows some parodies from different popular animes (like Sailor Moon or Dragonball Z). And if you have seen these, then you'll have a fun time watching this anime.

    Though I personally haven't seen either Sailor Moon or Dragonball Z (and I don't intend on doing so), I also have to say that this isn't an anime worth spending time on.

  4. carsonnt Nov 11, 2004

    You need to look at the underlying points, and trust me they are there. For one thing, the dog in the end, it is the end sequence, like every other show, it is the same. I am sure if you saw such shows as "Monty Python's search for the Holy Grail," or "Blazing Saddles," you may have a bit more desire to watch this show. It is not meant to be too mind provoking, it is meant to be a show that you can relax with. Also if you saw "Comic Party" you may appriciate this a lot more, the connections between seven cultures and a thousand parodies. You really need to be on your feet to make all the connections. Personally that is why I liked it, to understand it you must think a hundred miles an hour, and you need to make obscure and remote connections in a split second. If you were wondering about Exel's voice, it was recorded and then sped up, so when they translated it they had to slow it downl, translate, voice over, and then speed back up. It's the kind of humor that you can enjoy when you want to take over the world, one city at a time.

  5. miroku79 Dec 24, 2004

    i totally disagree with the review. I've found Excel Saga a wonderful anime, with lot of humor and cameo (like lum of uruseiyatsura). In this type of anime the story do not count.

  6. Xenjin Dec 26, 2004

    Thanks for your opinions. I see your points and they are well taken. However, my major criticism of the series is really its inability to remain fresh. I don't like the idea of watching an anime series and getting to a point where I want it to end - regardless of the genre. I will give you credit for your criticisms though, because there does exist a possibility that I may require additional social approximation from various cultures to fully appreciate the series in its entirety - as much as I sincerely doubt it.

    Remember, I did like the series on the outset - but the animators spent too much time rehashing the same joke over and over and over again. One has to have the attention span of a housefly to laugh at the same joke for 26 episodes! That's a real marathon in my book. I've seen far funnier works, so I rated accordingly. What would be a good thing to do, is if one of you guys could review the same anime. I would love to read your opinions and open my mind. Perhaps one of you gentlefolks could offer me a more detailed and expansive perspective. I'm always open to correction. ;)

  7. soujiokita Mar 31, 2005

    Excel Saga is a wonderful anime, I can't understand why you gave it such a low rating. :(

  8. akari-chan Mar 31, 2005

    I don't think Excel Saga is a wonderful anime, but I do think it deserves a better rating. Although it is stupid, but funny.

  9. eonir Dec 29, 2005

    Excel Saga was created to be a MEGASTUPID baka Experiment.

    The list of the anime, movies, books, etc. paroded by Ex Sa is HUGE!
    And is makes me Rotfl & Lol
    The rating should be unique.... 6.66

  10. JC206 Jan 16, 2006

    Excel Saga was pretty funny and interesting...it should've been a lil higher though....

  11. Sethimothy Feb 10, 2006

    I would have given the "Story & Characters" section higher than a mere 1. While I understand the writer's problems with the show, and to an extent can agree with them, he gives a series with several noteworthy characters the lowest of the low. His arguements suggest a 3, not a 1.

  12. nedved11 Oct 21, 2006

    Umilintza

  13. komrov Oct 21, 2006

    You obviousily didn't understand any tiny bit of the true meaning of this series...try not to watch it as a shallow picture slideshow and maybe u'll see it's not that bad...

  14. nedved11 Oct 21, 2006

    dont listen that sicko "komrov" hes bluffin

  15. nainoi Sep 27, 2009

    Oh! very poor score. T T

  16. Baraka-Senpai Jul 05, 2011

    THANKS FOR THIS!

  17. kevin10133 Sep 28, 2011

    i can see why you got that rating XD the art isn't that good, the story is almost non-existing, and the presentation lacks quite a bit. but for some reason i will always love this anime maybe since it was just made to be a full out comedy some of that stuff wasn't needed.

  18. NodokaLife17 Sep 30, 2011

    Excel Saga is AWESOME! fail if you didn't understand it...

  19. back07 Sep 24, 2012

    thanks for the nice review
    :)

  20. KoolCartoons Mar 09, 2014

    Poor review.

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