Allen Walker, betrayed by his allies very quickly.
For the first time in this blog short history, I will write a partial anime review for D.Gray-man. I thought the anime has finished at episode 65 and went ahead to watch it (I’ve downloaded them already but did not watched it). Only after watching about 30 episodes or so did I found out that the anime has not finished yet. So I went ahead to finish all 65 episodes and do this review anyway, and I promised myself I that check future titles that they have already ended before I start. BTW, as this is a 2006 anime, it will compete with Kiba The TV Animation for the Anime of the Year 2006 award.
Story:-
Allen Walker, the series protagonist that has lots of excess baggage with him, joined a mysterious organization in order to save the world from being destroyed by another mysterious organization. The members of the former mysterious organization possess the power of Innocence, which is used to destroy the Akuma created by the latter mysterious organization who wants to destroy the world.
This is your bog standard shounen anime, not that different from Bleach or Naruto. In fact I think Naruto minus the humongous filler episodes is better than this series. Saving the world from devastation is the main theme for this anime, and you and I know that this is an overused storyline in this genre. The series does not even made any efforts to try and being unique here.
With your standard average storyline, come the average protagonists which construct is similar to many other heroes in other average shounen titles. Here is where Kiba really shines, because the protagonist in it is so much better than Allen Walker and company. Speaking of character strength, I also wondered why all the interesting characters belong to the evil mysterious organization. The Earl of Millennium and a couple of the Noah’s family members has more substance and depth than any members of the forces of good. And the best character in this anime is a level 2 Akuma to boot.
The last moments of Mimi, the best character so far in this series.
Mimi may have only a few episodes of air time, but her character is very well developed in the limited time she has. When she eventually died, I clapped my hands in applause of the strongest character so far in this series. She is proof than the directors can indeed do good character developments, something that the Allen Walkers or the Lenalees or Lavies etc. can do more with.
The story also suffers with some pacing problems. Right after when Earl of Millennium declared that the ‘curtain is rising’, I have a feeling that the directors is doing all they can not to advance the main storyline, using several useless episodes that don’t even aid any character development whatsoever. I hope that there are no more of the bullsh*t episodes like these in the latter part of this anime.
Apply to many shounen anime out there too.
Character Design:-
The character design in this anime is good, despite the huge number of casts. More often than not, their individuality is retained. Black hair exists but in minuscule amounts.
Voice acting:-
Mixed bag at best. Some characters has great voice acting, like Mimi, Earl of Millennium and Yu Kanda but the main protagonist Allen Walker is just average. That sums up the vast cast of voice acting in this series.
If the Akuma reads the evil overlord list, this girl is a goner already.
Music:-
The OST is decent but no OP/ED themes have caught my attention yet.
Animation/Direction:-
This series has good animation quality even in fast-paced scenes. Choreography for action scenes is average with not-so-good fighting scenes. The directing is at best average with reasons outlined above.
Conclusion:-
Up to episode 65, 7 out of 10. Kiba The TV Animation (with 9 points) is still the best 2006 anime I have reviewed to date. This anime can still improve though if the storyline is made more unique and better character development is done for main characters.
A model of one of the Akuma, complete with -nya at every ending of a sentence.
