Genma Wars Collection

Rating:
Summary: Blech!!!
Review: I bought this after hearing reviews on how bad a show it was and I just had to check it out for myself. Well this was the worst anime I have seen yet.
To start the animation looked as if the show had only enough budget for 3 or 4 eps instead of 13. I figured that someone knew how bad this show was going to be that they cut funding for it right away. The character designs looked like the ones that were popular in the 60's. When computer animation was used in many of the scenes it looked out of place and did not mesh well with the other scenery which was not good to begin with.
The animation wasn't the biggest thing wrong with this show though. A good story can overcome that, but the plot is so dumb, that you could spend millions on the animation and this show would still suck. By 2nd episode I was wishing all the characters would just die and leave the last 11 eps to show a test pattern. Yet I managed to watch the whole series( It only took me about 3 weeks to do it).
I can say the voice acting wasn't that good either but given the actors/actresses had poor material to work with and that they have to work to pay bills too, I'll let that slide.
Ok so here's the plot in a nutshell. In the far future, an evil wizard king(baboon looking) guy gets pure innocent peasant girl pregnant. Girl gives birth to twin boys(who are wizards), boys seperated at birth, grow up, are reunited, meet about a hundred side characters that have little or nada to do with the plot, fight some demons, ape men and lizard guys to find their destiny and save mankind.

Rating:
Summary: Genma Taisen is a timeless story.
Review: Yup I gave this 5 stars, deal with it. Yes, this show has horrible animation. Very bad, I agree completely, especially considering when it was produced. However, the I felt was one of the most wonderfully complex and multi-layered stories I have come across in an anime. I've never put too much emphasis animation, although I do enjoy great animation direction, but I can overlook it in some cases including this one. I wish more anime fans could do that instead of being obsessed with how technically advanced the animation is. Obviously this isn't for your run of the mill, immature anime fan who just wants an instant pay-off with flashy animation, instantly relatable characters, and spoon-fed plots. This anime I felt is good because its based on very good source material, and that is why I give it 5 stars. These 5 stars I give less for the producers of the anime and more for Shotaro Ishinomori and Kazumu Hirai who were two of the most brilliant and creative minds that crafted some of the most wonderful stories in fiction. Ishinomori, in particular I consider one of the 3 most important manga-ka in history. This anime is based on Ishinomori's interpretation of Kazum Hirai's Genma Taisen novels. I'm not sure which ones though, since no information is available on them in English. The Genma Taisen series of novels is reportedly incredibly long, having started in the 60's and still ongoing today. The story is said to be one of the most complex and multi-layered sagas ever put to word. This anime relates one of the chapters it this story that follows the lives of the twins, Loof and Jin. I won't go into spoiling the story for you, but subtitle of Eve of Mythology is a good one, because I do believe this is a grand story of mythic proportions. Obviously though, this wasn't the best execution of this story possible with the very badly executed animation, but I still appreciate it much. Perhaps, they had very little budget for animation, but I am grateful I got to witness this story because the Genma Taisan novels and manga probably have a very small chance of making it over the US any time soon. You could defiantly argue it wasn't great, but giving it one star and completely writing it off is just immature and disrespectful. I also feel complaining about the style of the character designs is utterly idiotic. These are the original style of the character designs from Ishinomori's manga. Ishinomori was an apprentice under Osamu Tezuka and his character designs are very similar to Tezuka's. This is the style that all other character designs, including your favorite shows, evolved from. Despite the flawed animation, I enjoyed this show a lot. I suggest picking up this cheap 4 disc collection, which at some places can be found for as low as $23. Also check out Harmageddon which was based on the same series of novels and manga that Genma Wars is based on. However, Harmageddon may be more to the liking of most otaku due to the brilliant animation direction of Rintaro.

Rating:
Summary: Genma Taisen is a timeless story.
Review: Yup I gave this 5 stars, deal with it. Yes, this show has horrible animation. Very bad, I agree completely, especially considering when it was produced. However, the I felt was one of the most wonderfully complex and multi-layered stories I have come across in an anime. I've never put too much emphasis animation, although I do enjoy great animation direction, but I can overlook it in some cases including this one. I wish more anime fans could do that instead of being obsessed with how technically advanced the animation is. Obviously this isn't for your run of the mill, immature anime fan who just wants an instant pay-off with flashy animation, instantly relatable characters, and spoon-fed plots. This anime I felt is good because its based on very good source material, and that is why I give it 5 stars. These 5 stars I give less for the producers of the anime and more for Shotaro Ishinomori and Kazumu Hirai who were two of the most brilliant and creative minds that crafted some of the most wonderful stories in fiction. Ishinomori, in particular I consider one of the 3 most important manga-ka in history. This anime is based on Ishinomori's interpretation of Kazum Hirai's Genma Taisen novels. I'm not sure which ones though, since no information is available on them in English. The Genma Taisen series of novels is reportedly incredibly long, having started in the 60's and still ongoing today. The story is said to be one of the most complex and multi-layered sagas ever put to word. This anime relates one of the chapters it this story that follows the lives of the twins, Loof and Jin. I won't go into spoiling the story for you, but subtitle of Eve of Mythology is a good one, because I do believe this is a grand story of mythic proportions. Obviously though, this wasn't the best execution of this story possible with the very badly executed animation, but I still appreciate it much. Perhaps, they had very little budget for animation, but I am grateful I got to witness this story because the Genma Taisan novels and manga probably have a very small chance of making it over the US any time soon. You could defiantly argue it wasn't great, but giving it one star and completely writing it off is just immature and disrespectful. I also feel complaining about the style of the character designs is utterly idiotic. These are the original style of the character designs from Ishinomori's manga. Ishinomori was an apprentice under Osamu Tezuka and his character designs are very similar to Tezuka's. This is the style that all other character designs, including your favorite shows, evolved from. Despite the flawed animation, I enjoyed this show a lot. I suggest picking up this cheap collection, which at some places can be found for as low as $23. Also check out Harmageddon which was based on the same series of novels and manga that Genma Wars is based on. However, Harmageddon may be more to the liking of most otaku due to the brilliant animation direction of Rintaro.