Well I recently posted this review on anime-planet and was wondering what other people thought of it (it being the anime and review). Enjoy.

Burst Angel Review

I'm writing this because I heavily disagree with the site's review and was wondering how the site would like my style of writing to begin with so that maybe in the future I could actually do site reviews, but enough small-talk, let's get reviewing.

Story 3.6:

Burst Angel is an mecha anime set in Tokyo in the future, where a bunch of street gangs and thugs who own the streets. Then there's the police or R.A.P.T. who are very stubborn about the laws of the city to the point where they are depicted as an authoritarian dictatorship. You follow, Kyohei Tachibana, a local boy who is studying to come a world famous pastry chef, only that's a lie, because most of the time you follow these mercenary chicks named Jo and Meg. Kyohei quickly becomes the chef to the mercenaries listed above, which then the story solely leaves him behind in an attempt to develop the other characters. This is where the story takes a few curves and u-turns in a blind try to make suspense for its audience, but it quickly gets in the way of the enjoyment of watching and Burst Angel becomes the great pain that it is to watch. You see, the first half of the series contains nothing but a bunch of short stories that really have no interconnectedness towards any driving plot line at all. Then, when the second half of the series comes along, the viewer is hit with a ton of flashbacks to the first half in a horrible try to see if the actual plot development can be linked with the first thirteen episodes that the viewer boringly endures. There's nothing redeemable in watching the first thirteen episodes then, because then generally don't cause any real plot twists and just basically serve the purpose of name memorization. Then there's the horrible ending:

SPOILER (click to view)

In the ending there's yet another episode where you could clock anywhere from thirteen to fourteen minutes of it are nothing but pointless flashbacks, with is another huge problem for the series. The series uses massive flashback sequences to make it feel like everything you've seen has been important, when all it does is waste time. Allow me to expand on this. There was a two-part storyline arch, if you will, with Jo fighting an underground kind of haunting ghost mech like thing that essentially needed two episodes to make. Jo meets this dead samurai who is constantly haunting by this old memory of his townsfolk getting killed and with him vowing for revenge. There really was no need to make it a two episode arch, because the entire second episode devotes ten minutes to flashbacks of the previous ones. This leaves the question of why the anime developers would flashback to an episode they just saw, but not for some plot-effecting one liner, bu instead of a bunch of sequences that saw Jo getting mopped across town by the mech creature. The last few episodes repeat this feat, with only the second-to-last using the flashbacks as needed in actually making Meg pout and cry like she was six years younger than she actually was, about losing Jo in the final showdown against R.A.P.T and the clan turning, back stabbing organization that is back by R.A.P.T. This use was then quickly put to waste when Jo just slaps the gas-filled complaint beg Meg and leaves her on the beach for the rest of the series. It left a very empty feeling, not so much in the fact that you knew Jo would win her battle, but in the fact that it was easily anti-climatic in the way it happened. Jo just goes to the organization beats everyone in the process with the four main chick of the group, Meg, Jo, Sei, and Amy either leaving or 'supposedly' dying off. The whole ending just seemed to prove the fact that if you just make pretty anime women to look at, people will buy the product, as there is no interconnecting sotryline, just whole bunch of dead-end episodes, then some huge fights in the middle of the anime, and a random ending that leaves you angered at how wasteful the producers used the twenty-four episodes they alloted for the series.

Visuals: 8.0

Now as much as the Burst Angel storyline is worse than a car wreck in the middle of downtown Manhattan in the middle of rush-hour, the visual effects are really well done. The 3D CGI is very well animated and all the characters have his/her own defining features about them. The animation for the most part is crisp and smooth, despite the occasional gravity-defining cleavage bounce, but for the most part the sequences where the 3d CGI is used is transitioned in and out of nice. Another key note is the fact that Burst Angel does not break the golden rule of painting 2D on a 3D scene, which is a mistake a lot of developers are still making. Painting 2D character animations onto 3D scenes and motions doesn't blend well at all, and it is rather nice to say that Burst Angel does follow the rule with great loyalty. The amount of detail into the 3D scenes is also very compelling, but it only makes you wonder if they blew all of the money for the anime on the animation and skipped out on some actual plot writers.

Audio: 4.0

The four the audio receives can be somewhat biased, as the series all together is ok in this department, but there do come times when the subtitled voice acting get annoying, particularly when Meg complains about being kidnapped for the random triple digit time. The dub however does not stand up and is letting someone tinkle on your ear drums before they remove them with a crowbar and ice pick and then set them afire in huge blaze that the dubbers then cook barbecue hamburgers over while mixing Hersey's chocolate to make smores. Then there's the opening and ending themes to enjoy, or at least try to in the small amount of time they run, but is not helped by the fact that they are the worst pieces of music ever composed for an anime.

Characters: 0.8

The characters were somewhat respectable three episodes in, with Kyohei being easily likable in a sense. This tone quickly changed when the anime stopped focusing on him and more on Meg in the early to middle stages of the anime. This is because Meg is one of the most unlikable characters you can think of, with a flurry of complaints and pouts that make her look like she got left a sack full of coal for Christmas. She whines more in the anime you would think she was in a constant state of PMS or something, which is not nice to say, but then neither is it nice for an anime to consumer the time of its viewers without a care. Jo is probably one of the harder characters to understand as well, even after the devotion to her past the story will give to her, but she's constantly undermined by the clueless idiot she tugs around or rather yet would be tugging around if she did not get captured every two episodes in Meg. Sei is the only real character that you can honestly respect, but she gets the least amount of screen time out of the 4 girls, with only Kyohei being below her in camera appeal. The characters personalities only make the show more painful to get through in the fact that the two characters that get the most on-screen time are also the ones you would wish would get the least amount.

Overall: 4.1

In conclusion I must say that I hated Burst Angel with a passion. The story was more of a painful job than an enjoyment roller-coaster at bat with its fair share of curves and sliders. Instead Burst Angel just decided to try throw all fastballs away and low which allowed me to lay-off and yawn as I walked to first base on a four pitch walk. Maybe baseball was not the best analogy, but all that is needed to know is that Burst Angel tries to lure the viewer into enjoyment with a little fan-service, then tries to keep them in the room with a compelling story, only to have to story look like it was a torn piece of paper put back together with duct tape instead of scotch. The story is broken, the characters are annoying, and the music is lack luster. The animation is top-notch, but the series is hardly worth buying for that as anyone could easily and equally trade Burst Angels animation with say, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and get a better story to eat with as the main course. All in all there are a lot of good mecha out in the market, and Burst Angel falls well short of being one of them, with nothing to really offer to drag the reader into.

I can't say I hated it, but I didn't like it at all. The first thing I noticed is some kind of Evangelion wannabe, the skinny shy kid, the angry red-head and the girl with short hair and no personality, but of course without the developed story and psychology of every character that evangelion does have.
But i don't know what to say about your review I mean, I didn't really payed much attentionto the story I only watched it 'cause I didn't have internet and it was the only echhi thing i could watch in the crappy anime channel here.
Btw is it me or the boobs sizes varies from one episode to another, for example a regular episode and the beach episode.

I like that example, never really looked at it from an evangelion point of view.
I've always compared the anime more to Trigun, but a female version.
Sure there's action, a super woman with guns, in the future fighting evil, solving cases is good, and all.
But lacks a good plot, ending, and originality.
Probably without the mecha it would have been better. I mean it's like watching power rangers, or transformers, every time her robot is out for a run.
Very much improbable situations, even for a fantasy, and worst of all it actually had good music.
I'd rate it a 5, half way from a 10, only because of the music, and some great action scenes, and visuals, when rockets confront bullets, and more.
Otherwise I didn't even bother to see the anime through to the end, but skipped through it.

irove

The first thing I noticed is some kind of Evangelion wannabe, the skinny shy kid, the angry red-head and the girl with short hair and no personality, but of course without the developed story and psychology of every character that evangelion does have.

This may sound like a paradox but I whole-heartedly agree, yet in wanting to review it I quickly through this thought out the window during viewing so I could be more objective. Looking back now yes I can agree.

irov

Btw is it me or the boobs sizes varies from one episode to another, for example a regular episode and the beach episode

It seemed like it varied too, depending on if the characters had taken their Flintstones chew-able vitamins or not.

I had just bought the series and I cannot thank you enough. This saves me a great deal of time and suffering as well. I saw a few fan subs awhile back, but never got to see any more than it, so I didn't know if the series got better as it progressed or not. I bought it for incredibly cheap (4.50 per dvd, complete dvds) but even now I feel as if I was ripped off. Thankfully, I can still return it! Thanks, Spudsy!

Crimson

Thankfully, I can still return it! Thanks, Spudsy!

No problem, I am still waiting to see if anyone from the Anime-Planet website takes any interest to the review though. I don't know what I'm going to do next, maybe Kino's Journey since we need a topic of discussion for that wonderful anime.

I won't say this is a terrible anime cos I definitely seen worse. What I really like about the series is perhaps the settings. And the very possible premise that law enforcement may be contracted out in the future.

The characters are not terribly inspiring but I have not complaints on the fan service provided by Gonzo.

The overall plot isn't that bad and the action sequences are rather nice too. But I don't really like the western-inspired theme and the introduction of the mecha in the show was unnecessary. I think the show may be better without all those mech fights. And of cos after Jo got kidnapped for the 1001th times, it got tiring. But credit to her, she was not exactly the helpless females we see in many other animes.

lonewolf

And of cos after Jo got kidnapped for the 1001th times, it got tiring. But credit to her, she was not exactly the helpless females we see in many other animes.

You mean Meg getting captured every other episode? You sure you watched all of this cause I mean the mech parts weren't few and far in between but like every episode, and in saying they shouldn't be there comes off a little too biased against mecha type anime.

I've seen the series and its not that bad since the fight scenes are quite nice especially the action scenes featuring Jo. Although I have to admit the storyline is not its strong point at all.

This series' first episode was quite the good one, but the rest was a huge disillusion. Crappy anime if you don't consider the well-drawn characters and the fan service and some little yuri content.
Really when I saw the first episode I was so happy about it...what a lay-down...
Recently I also watched the ova...I deleted it after some second.

But I have to say that with some time passed from when I watched the series, I find myself listening to the opening with so much pleasure! In summer vacation, when with my friends we go to the sea on the ferry boat, I go out on the bridge, light a cigarillo and turn on full-volume that song on my mp3, with the strong wind that flap my shirt and a cool grin on my face!
Yeah, quite a coll scene!