General Anime/Manga/Otaku Thread

[Klonoa]

Now and Then, Here and Again is a beautiful and well crafted show that I just came back from finishing. Never boring and always engaging, this series has a very serious tone through the whole story of this ravaged earth teared apart by war and by the main antagonist, Hamdo. The execution and cinematography of the show is fantastic and makes the series worthwhile.

The characters are all likable, with the always optimistic Shu being the main protagonist who remains the hope and light for many of the other characters who have had terrible things happen to them. The rest of the cast consists of some soilders and villagers that appear in the second half, all who are a joy to watch. Of course, this also makes some of the scenes tear jerking worthy as you start to become attached to them and feel sympathy for everything they have had to go through.

At the same time, some of the characters are what hurts the series, or to be more specific, the lack of justification with some of the characters.

Spoiler

Why does everyone follow Hamdo exactly? Everyone around him from the solders to civilians detest the man. He's not particularly smart either and is quite a coward, to the point where he reminds me of a villain from old cartoons that I use to watch.

I feel the greatest problem lies within his right hand woman(?), Abelia. She's a likeable character by all means and is loyal to Hamdo. At the same time though, he greatly abuses her and you can see times where she begins to resent him.

So why? Why does she choose to follow him? He's not a strong man by any means and she's show to be more intelligent and physically stronger, so why does she deal with it?

A little backstory in this would have gone a long way and I can't help to feel that Hamdo hindered her character from becoming something more.

With such a serious and well executed show, you would believe there to be some sort of theme, right? Through the whole show, I never felt that the show was trying to tell me anything, and was just showing me the ugliness of war and the effect it could have on people and their rash actions. After finishing the last episode however, I believe I may have found something close. It's so simple and basic, yet I think it's something I can believe and something that doesn't hurt the the show.

Spoiler

Hope can go a long way. That's it.

With the show being as serious and balanced as it is, you would think it may be something a bit more, but the last conversation with Shu and Sarah made me believe this to be the case. Shu himself is a prime example of this as even though he was beaten and abused through the series, he never let his optimism fade until he had gone back home and have his happy ending.

Overall, fantastic show that's only 13 episodes and something that I could definitely recommend.

Hmm... I have never heard of that one before, I might have to try that one out!