Anime: Blood+

Blood+ took me longer than usual for a 50 episode series. That is telling. I'll try and keep this review short, since there are already plenty of reviews on this one.

Art & Animation

6.5/10 (rounded to 6)
it was merely "ok". for a vampire-themed anime I was expecting something a lot darker, but apart from a few gothic touches here and there and some occasionally good (but no better) backdrops, there was nothing special about both the quality or the artstyle of this anime.

Sound

7/10
BGMs were ok, Diva's singing was beautiful, there were several OPs and EDs, but they all remained in the realm of "horrible j-crap", so no surprises there. I watched dubbed version and the actors were doing their job pretty well, but again, no real standouts.

Story & Character

blood+ is a character-centric drama, don't let anything else fool you, the politics and the few bits of intrigue just make up the backdrop for the characters to act out their love, hate, friendship, whatever. it is kind of a downer, thus, for the story doesn't really go much anywhere. things are always conveniently happening for the right character to intervene in the right moment, just to move the plot relationships along. many of the setting details go on unexplained (even if it was suggested that there was supposedly some more details) mostly, so what you're left with is the cast and their dramatic relationships, nothing beyond that.
to top it off, this anime is slow as fuuuuuuck. I do enjoy moody animes, but since the art section was kinda meh, the moody bits aren't impressive, and most of the time they don't even have mood, they're just prolonged exposure shots showing somebody standing still with camera slowly moving away or something. seriously, if they cut out,say, half of the time wasted on these no-action shots, this anime would lose, like, at least 5 episodes of its length. make the plot go a bit faster, and we're down a 10 or perhaps even more.

so what about the characters, whose tragedies we must witness so slowly? are they worth our time?
well, depends. and it's a bad start of this paragraph for a character-centric anime. most of the characters do get some considerable backdrop, main characters do even get some character development, which is pretty cool, however very little of this feels as something exceptional or even interesting. for a vampire-themed anime, once again, there was just so little darkness, just plain' ol' shallow evil and good ol' love conquers all and good ol' strong friendly fat dude and good ol' ... well, I did like the characters, but they and their story remained firmly in the realm of "meh".

story 6/10, characters 6/10

value

little. there're better vampire-themed shows out there. there're better dramas out there. there're better 50 episode series out there. it's ok for a time waster, but it's of no consequential value.
5/10

enjoyment

I enjoyed it enough to watch it all, but there's little to take away from here. got some few emotional spikes here and there, but they were no more than small blips on a radar. 6/10

Review
Blood+'s base idea is not something exactly promising. A young school girl, that is in fact a vampire, slashing monsters with a katana is something that would put anyone in alert for B-movie danger. There are, however, far more than that. Blood+ has a deeper story than most would think, some charming characters and a very interesting take on vampires and our real world. While it has many flaws and lack a bit of addicting value for its first half, the show is very well executed and can please those who watch it expecting a more serious and complex shounen experience.

Blood+'s story starts with Saya, a young girl with an apparently ordinary life. She only has memories of her last year, but her past is fated to return when she is attacked by a vicious supernatural beast and saved by a gallant man named Hagi. From there she moves to uncover her past, find her true origins, what her enemies are, and to know more about the ancient struggle between Chiropterans and the Red Shield organization.

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Weak Initial Impact - Complex and Deep Background
The premise is about a school girl slashing monsters with katanas, but Blood+ has a great depth in its plot and setting. Saya is in fact a vampire fighting a never-ending battle against her twin sister that have already lasted generations. This struggle takes place in a semi-realistic world, where the fight occurs in the shadows, mostly handled by the secret organization Red Shield, but also involving the army, government, powerful corporations, etc. Everything is given a slightly detailed background, creating room for nice bits of investigation, complexity, intrigues, and also giving a depth not expected from a show that starts with a high-schooler with a katana.

Different Vampires
The take on how vampire works here is somehow different, but quite interesting and original. It uses some of the known elements from vampires such as sucking blood and creating minions, but you don't see the dramatization on them, or anything that makes them look like "undead". This may displease those expecting traditional Dracula stuff and please those who dislike the ghotic take on vampires. Both sisters are surrounded by their selected minions (chevaliers), whom are infiltrated in the most important organizations for many years, and have their blood as mortal weapons against each other, thus the name of the show.

Shounen Fights, Intrigues, and Bishounens
The plot provides a good deal of dramatic moments besides fights, making intrigues and twists its main weapon to grab your attention besides the good fights and promises of some duels between the overpowerful chevaliers. The pace is not exactly consistent, rushing sometimes while taking careful steps at others, but as a whole is a good pace for a show with bits of drama and many bishounen characters surrounding the twins. It's perhaps too slow for those expecting more action and tension of a more typical shounen, but can suffice and please enough.

Saya & her bishounens
Saya, the protagonist, is perhaps the worst of the characters, as she is the very stereotypical school girl with hidden powers that fears to harm others or to accept her nature. The villain, however, can be very intriguing, being a typical mad girl but with some bursts of intelligence and tactical thinking slowly growing as the episodes progresses. The support cast succeeds in their mission when they play their roles, but there's too much wasted on making bishounens that many of them feel bland, especially Saya's chevalier, which at many times seems more like a walking convenient plot device than someone with a troubled past. Although he does grow throughout the episodes, the core of development here is left to Saya's family members and their changing view of the world as the chevaliers' fights become more and more intense.

It's one of a kind
I never saw anything exactly like Blood+. While using vampires is old-fashioned and the shounen-super power combats are not anything new, the take on these vampires and how they interact with the world is something extremely satisfying. The show, however, has a inconsistent pace with many episodes that would better if divided in two and others that could be done in 10 minutes, and because of that it looks harder to watch it a second time. The stereotypes are present, but they are never used in bad ways and most of the time make a good contribution to the show. A high production value, good soundtrack and the good setting makes Blood+ a show where you may find many more strong points than weakness.

It's can be exciting
All those fights between chevaliers are granted a boost as the stakes become higher, the human characters become more vulnerable, and the show smartly gives a dramatization before they happen. Treason, some light romance, and much more is fueled by outstanding soundtrack and themes. Production I.G also did a decent job when required, with a show that offers a fitting color palette, some intense action sequences, and an overall solid consistency. At many points, however, Blood+ can grow too quiet or there is an laziness in some movement scenes which can level down the experience, but not at a dangerous degree.

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Comments
Blood+ was very refreshing as I watched it my first time a few years ago. When I've watched it again in 2009 and then again in 2011 the show proved to lose some impact, but still captured my respect. The whole thing together is good, with an interesting plot, some good characters, good fights, good twists, and so on. Sadly there are very rare elements that surpass being "good", but this means that below average elements are also as rare.

I can't see weak points in the show besides some badly used stereotypes (which are few enough) and the inconstant pace that creates some boring moments amidst the action and twists of the show. If the show had a better pace or if Saya evolved more clearly like some of the support cast, this could certainly become a huge show. It's only fair to say the producers failed to create an exceptional protagonist and that was a huge blow to the show.

Those who are not vampire fans (like myself) can find a very good show if they surpass their hatred, but I think vampire fans will most likely hate the wildly different approach on vampires that makes them more like youkais and demons than blood-sucking creatures. Whatever you like, Blood+ is one of those show that has bits of everything in a good serious way and can please many even if it's not really extraordinary.

So some dudes made this short horror film titled Blood the Last Vampire which was instantly labeled cult. I don’t know why; it was probably the weird presentation of an otherwise simplistic premise. Some years later, some other dudes decide to make a series out of this and the result is Blood+. The tale of an apparently normal high school girl forced to take part in a sinister conspiracy that aims to make humanity food for vampire-like freaks.

To make a long story short, the series has a very good concept and interesting characters but its presentations lacks the stuff that would make it a masterpiece. Making yet again my infamous list of minuses I found in this, I hereby mention the following.

1) Long duration / Slow pacing. The show lasts twice as it should; it is 50 episodes long yet you can’t escape the feeling that it might as well be only 26. The reason is simple, many episodes feel like minor side quests or filler missions that in the longrun only manage to hinder the progress of the story with characters and storylines that lack excitement and tire the viewer. The first Full Metal Alchemist series for example had many fillers and minor side stories throughout its course, yet most of them were quite interesting and to the most part not boring. This is not the case here. We can always blame the directors of course, since one of them is responcible for the uber horrible “Persona: Trinity Soul”, and another one for the snoring “Loups=Garous”. How can you expect something good out of these failures of directing? What is even worse, is that you can’t remove those episodes either, because they are almost imposed by the personality of the main heroine.

2) Passive main character. … Who is a crybaby. A dynamic character would have done the same things in half the time instead of constantly doubting and holding back or crying in a corner. Although the basic motto of the series is to portrait a normal girl as she steadily becomes more decisive and active, that still didn’t leave the feeling that the main heroine is going around in circles. One moment she is trembling in fear, then she suddenly finds the strength to fight, then she reverts back to how she was… 20 times in a row. It gets REALLY bothersome. I mean, check out Hitomi, the main heroine of Escaflowne. She is still the average frail girl who keeps falling in love with every hunk she meets and does silly things all the time. She is not a fighter, and she is need of some guy to come and save her. Yet she is also dynamic enough to like her. She keeps taking risks, she is not afraid to speak her mind, she does some nice acrobatics like the athletic type she is and when she has second thoughts about something, you FEEL why she doubts. Saya in Blood doesn’t pass as such; she keeps flipping between kick-ass and crybaby with little justification other than being afraid to fight. Well it is excused the first few times but when it keeps happening over and over, then you are getting pissed with it.

3) Lack of focus on secondary characters. Saya and her nemesis get all the spotlight, leaving all the rest as almost unneeded background decorations. Although it is true that a great deal of characters are fleshed out throughout the series, none of them does something overly important to affect the story. Imagine an entire secret organization of supposed elite agents who in the entire series didn’t manage to beat the weakest monster, while Saya an otherwise simple-minded schoolgirl has slain a mountain of brutes. Why were they in the story then? Just to pay her traveling tickets and giving her a quest list? Nice NPCs they were… Her family ain’t better either. Her step brothers although keep interacting with her and even asking her to fight for her, by the end of the day don’t do anything active to affect the battles or the result of all this mess. Do you know how irritating it is to have epic level fighters who do nothing while the rookie squire kills the dragon?

4) Boring battles. Although there is a lot of action in the anime and most problems end up being resolved through fighting, almost none of the numerous duels and spars are exiting. Saya will just use her super blood to instant-kill any monster she cuts with her sword, after a simplistic battle choreography. And if she gets injured in the progress? Big deal; she immediately heals like Wolverine. In the meantime, all the rest of the supernatural people around her will be flying and shooting and blowing stuff up, usually with zero importance to the plot. And as I said, elite agents are completely useless at beating even the weakest of foes. Where is the interest in all this?

5) Huge mystery build up / disappointing revelation. For most of the show Saya will have amnesia (which is a bad trope on its own but I felt generous enough not making a different topic about it). She will keep traveling and fighting and investigating and having flashbacks in order to remember what had happened in her past. And we are kept teased with these vague images and hints and weird stuff, making us expect an amazing revelation. And when the revelation finally comes, you go all “WTF, after all this waiting that was all of it???” Seriously, the explanation of the grand mystery behind her past is simple as frakk, yet they make you think it will be something unimaginably epic.

6) Clean CGI. Although the animation is quite good and the sceneries are great to stare, the anime just doesn’t feel “dirty” enough to like it. What I mean is that the textures on objects like clothing or rocks will look sparkling clean, even when they should be worn-out from weather, bloodshed, dust, mud or generally affected by their surrounds. Even the wind blowing on the characters’ faces will feel more like a fan. It is as if the entire thing was shot with a blue screen and thus feels fake. Ok, maybe 3D effects weren’t as well developed back then. That still doesn’t excuse them looking more artificial than hand-drawn cells. Then again this is a studio I.G. Production; all its works feel equally plastic. It is fine when they were making sci-fi shows with robots and machines but when it comes to faces and people, they are simply bad.

7) Ever-present school uniform. Saya wears one most of the times, even when she is not going to school. Appealing to the otakus too much and you end up making it look too ridiculous to care about her personal drama.

8 ) Red lips. Saya has them. ALL THE TIME! They stand out. She is the only one with so much RED. They are annoying…

That’s pretty much all of it. The finale may also feel corny as frakk as well, but I am generous again and leave that alone. Corny doesn’t mean bad; just unimaginative. It is otherwise good corn quality.

And now the few things I have to praise about the anime

1) Gore. Buckets of blood and some deviant things here and there; nice albeit overdone.
2) Shadows. Good use of lighting by … not using it. Makes things pitch black and scary by being just black silhouettes with glowing red eyes.
3) Soundtrack. Exceptional use of violin and musical instruments in general; very good in building atmosphere. Too bad most is lost because of the boring plot and silly story. And the lyrics are to the most part ruining it as they are pop shitz. What in blazes is pop doing in a semi-horror anime? … Oh, right, it has a schoolgirl in it …

Blood+ is an interesting series. It has possibly the single most unusual take on vampires I've ever seen, and has some moments of brilliance. It's also twice as long as I'd like it to be, and tends to focus on entirely the wrong things.

Animation:
Technically speaking, it's well animated. On the other hand, I really don't care for the art style, and the character design tends towards the boring. Probably helps to like males though, as there's considerably more bishounen than bishoujo.

On a semi-related note, the third opening is visually fantastic.

Sound:
The sound is larglely good. You'll be hard-pressed to find someone that likes the fourth opening, though.

Story:
The story irritates me. Not because it's bad, which it's not, but because it much more time dropping hints than actually telling you what's going on. The times where they actually tell you what's happening, it's largely irrelevant. There's a fair amount of mysteries remaining at the end.

Character:
Blood+ spends most of the time focusing on the characters. Unfortunately, it tends to focus on the wrong ones. More specifically, the protaganists and the bit parts. While my reasons for complaining about the series' tendency to spend a couple of episodes focusing on characters that never show up after that should be self-explanitory, I doubt my reasons for complaining about characterizing the leads are. It's fairly simple. Even though they spend most of the series talking, none of it actually matters to the plot. Despite all of the growth they're supposed to go through, none of their roles actually change.

Conversely, there are characters in other groups that go through massive role/loyalty changes, and they usually don't have much to justify it.

Edit: Previously I had written a more negative review for Blood+, yet after having recently rewatched the entire series a 2nd time, my opinion on it has changed a bit and I am rewriting this review to reflect that.

From Production IG, Blood+ is a 50 episode anime loosely based around the original 45 minute BLood: The Last Vampire OVA. The director and others involved set out to make a series quite different from the OVA, so much so that comparisons are basically useless. Blood+ is a 50 episode series chronicling the main characters trek accross the world in pursuit of the menace known as Chyroptera, hideous monsters that feed off human blood. While one may expect the title of "Blood+" to imply the show is more focused as a gory action series, it is in fact more focused on the journey and lives of it's protagonists, their bonds as family and friends and their resolves. While Blood+ may have many other factors going for it, it's the journey that these characters go through and how they change that make it worth watching.

Animation:
The animation in Blood+ is overall decent, nothing spectacular. While Production IG has been responsible for uneven animation in many of it's series lately (see Chevalier for the latest), the fact that Blood+ is 50 episodes makes it probably one of it's more uneven. The whole of the series is mostly consistent, though with some obvious badly animated episodes here and there. Fight scenes are sometimes good looking, sometimes a bit too minimal, while you'd expect the action scenes to be all fantastically done considering that it is Production IG, the result is too uneven. Overall I was somewhat expecting better from the animation coming from IG, even if this was 50 episodes I thought we'd get at least a handfull of impressive looking episodes, but in the end it was essentially average from beginning to end. Solid but nothing special is the best way to describe the animation in Blood+. The original character designs for the series are quite good however, striking a fine balance between somewhat realistic, yet still unmistakenbly anime. They perfectly fit the modern day setting that the series has going for it.

However there is one place where the animation in blood+ really shines in Blood+ and that's in the 2nd and 3rd OPs. Wonderful animation, fantastic direction, absolute works of art. The 2nd and 3rd Openings of Blood+ are some of the best I've ever seen.

Sound:
The music in Blood+ is extremely good. Unlike almost any other anime, the music producers for Blood+ actually went to Hans Zimmer and Mark Mancina, 2 composers normally associated with hollywood movies, to produce the music. Mancina as the composer and Zimmer as the producer. The quality is very high and obviously reminiscent of many hollywood productions. However the amount of music for a 50 episode series is not that large so there is a lot of repetition, most likely due to the expensive nature of hiring these particular two. But what is there is used to full effect in supporting the animation and is wonerful.

The Opening and Ending songs are all good, and worth listening to. But for me the highlight was the 1st ending "Kataritsugu koto" by Chitose Hajime, which was just beautiful. One of the best EDs I'd heard recently. No complaints with the Voice Acting either, mostly established names so you know what to expect from their performances. Akiko Yajima is as lovely as always.

Story:
To make a short of summary, the basic gist of Blood+ is about Saya and her family and their trek accross countries hunting down the monsters known as Chyropteran. She is helped by the organization Red Shield and are set, no matter what, to eradicate the Chyropteran menace from earth. The story of Blood+ is spread out over 50 episodes, normally for the kind of plot that Blood+ has, 26 episodes should be more than enough, however the series makes full use of the year long format in order to craft its story as well as it can and really develop the characters. While slow to start, the slow plotting is assisted by the rather great character writing. You are willing to go through the slow progress of the story to see the way these characters were growing and how they would end up. Overall, the story is Blood+ is one that focuses not only on the present but on the past and many parts of the series will dwell on events of the past in order for the characters to again move foreward. Surprisingly there is also quite a bit of a political slant to the series as well, however what a viewer makes of it is entirely up to them, but the political opinions of the people making the show are quite clear. In any case, while the overall story is well plotted and executed, the real focus of the series is the character.

Characters:
For me, the high point of Blood+ was its characters. The majority of the characters go through quite a lot of chaneg and development over the 2 or so years that the series takes place over. Saya the main heroine must find her strength and confront and understand her past, as well as understanding her family. Her brother Kai also oes through fantastic development, maybe the most out of anyone as he struggles to find his own strength and purpose and how to take care of his brother and sister. While Saya, Kai and their other brother Riku may not be true blood relatives, their role as a true family is cemented many times, it is overall a very touching story about their family.

Most of the other characters are also well expanded upon and developped interstingly. Some a bit more obvious others while some in a bit more ironic fashion. The series' villains are also quite interesting and share great comple backstory and the shows main antagonist to Saya, Diva is also one of it's more interesting thanks to her origin and history.

Value and Enjoyment:
In terms of Value, Blood+ rates quite good. For a year long series it wonderfully displays how the characters change and grow over that time period and seeing the story play out is very satisfying. At the end you truly feel like you got to know it's characters and who they were, they made sitting through all 50 episodes worth it. The themes of the series, such as how family bonds aren't restricted to blood only and how to get past that, make it a relevant and mature story that can hit home for many people. The creators went at length to creating a well thought out series about people, society and growing up and that alone makes it worth watching. While slow paced, you will empathize with the characters and come to miss them when the story is over. A great work, perhaps I missed some of it's subtelty and detail the first time I watched it, but I am glad I gave it another chance and realised how truly good this series is. Highly Reccomended.

Blood: The Last Vampire was great anime. I've seen it for the first time at same time as Hellsing, and both of those animes were in same league for me - outstanding.

So, when I laid my hands on Blood+, I expected a great sequel: 50 episodes to go - it means either loads of action, either enough time skipping during the flow of time to see the characters growing old or at least getting more mature. Honestly, I expected to see Blood+ in style of Bleach or Hellsing.

Well, first 10 episodes were great: we see Saya as a schoolgirl(what is cliche, but still - it's anime, so there must be at least a glimpse of shool outfit),then we get to know her story as a sleeping vampire hunter as well we get introduced to all main characters of the Blood+.

But after watching to the middle I was already dissapointed, and in the end, I hated it. The reason is, that meanwhile individually taken plot, characters and music are good, the way everything is arranged is tragic. Pathetic character development is killing already not to strong plot,which is wrapped in loads of cliches and futile politizations. Trully great soundtrack is overused, because strongest themes are used in weak moments, making "dramatic" scenes to look pathetic. Summarizing I give it 3/10.