Review: Gasaraki

Then on the battlefield he meets the mysterious Miharu, who seems to share the same abilities. Yushiro discovers that he is a Kai, one of a long line of people with strange powers. Later they meet again; as they struggle to understand their own natures, the Gowa play politics with hunger and Yushiro's TA team is called upon to defend against an attack by an erstwhile ally...

And in the end they must confront what it is to be a Kai.

The setting for Gasaraki is recognisably modern-day, barring the introduction of the TAs.

While Eva leans heavily on a pseudo-Judeo-Christian background, Gasaraki depends much more on Japanese history and culture. Gasaraki is rife with references to Japanese culture. For the most part it's set in the real world, with occasional fantastic elements and a large dob of science fiction to cover the TAs.

Gasaraki is decent series, with some depth to the characters - including many of the minor characters and an intricate plot based around a fairly realistic world. It's rare for any significant suspension of disbelief to be necessary. It doesn't portray conspiracies-within-conspiracies so much as it does clashing conspiracies - the global conglomerate Symbol, with connections at the Pentagon and pretty much everywhere else, versus the Gowa family who have perhaps a little too much influence with portions of the Japanese government.

Personally I found it a little depressing, mainly due to the unrelenting seriousness of it all, and the fantastic elements could have been removed with very little effect. The whole Kai sub-plot takes up a great deal of time but doesn't feel like it really matters very much. Whereas Eva evolves and builds up to a staggering conclusion (albeit one of dubious merit), Gasaraki tries to maintain a constant dramatic tension. Unfortunately that doesn't really work.

Gasaraki is certainly worth watching. It takes a different approach to Eva, and while I didn't enjoy it as much its more serious and realistic approach may suit other viewers better.

Animation is generally very good, with a fairly realistic feel. You won't see superdeformed characters or face faults here; while not all the character designs are entirely realistic, such exceptions are very rare. Backgrounds and incidental objects are also intricately rendered.

The English dub is pretty good. There's a decent range of emotional expression, from the highs of combat to the lows of imprisonment and through the middle ground of home life and military comradery. The voice actors all seem to fit their parts pretty well; there was nobody whose voice stuck out as violently inapppropriate. It was mildly offputting to hear some of the voice actors from Nadesico in their new parts. :-)

I haven't yet watched the Japanese track. The sections I have heard were OK, but I haven't seen enough to form an informed opinion.

General audio is also quite good, with the TAs sounding the way you feel they should and gunfire and the assorted explosions also sounding believable. The "mystical" sections include suitably spooky music. In general, music is used well.

Packaging: Madman's standard DVD cases with butterfly hub clips and translucent cases. Covers feature key characters and items with colourful backgrounds. Inside covers mostly hold pictures of upcoming Madman releases.

Several of the "interviews" consist solely of someone turning the pages on a sketch pad while saying what's on each page. These are staggerly boring (and the picture quality doesn't show the sketches very well).