Thoughts on Aldnoah Zero, Tokyo Ghoul and Terror in Resonance

This past summer anime season was the first in a while that I watched more than 4 airing shows at the same time. That was thanks mostly to the fact that some really good directors all had shows come out at the same time. Just to clarify I won't be covering all the shows I watched in this post cause Hunter X Hunter I'll cover in a long in depth post sometime down the line but I was following this list of shows:

• Aldnoah Zero
• Tokyo Ghoul
• Space Dandy
• Hunter X Hunter
• Terror in Resonance
• Akame ga Kill
• Sword Art Online 2
• Jojos Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders

Those were just the ones I was actively making sure to watch as soon as a new episode was out. Theres also One Piece and Naruto but I'm currently in a on off relationship with those 2 shows so my viewing was spotty at best. Now lets take a look at my final thoughts on the 3 shows name checked in the post title.

Aldnoah Zero

So Aldnoah was a bit of a bumpy ride in terms of writing. It had a pretty decent start but what became apparent about halfway through was that our lead Inaho was an emotionless black hole of charisma that sucked out all enjoyment of any scenes he was in. I've seen some folks online defending their wrong opinion stating seeing someone who just shuts up and gets things done in the fashion Inaho lumbers about the series is "refreshing" in a way. I would have thought the same if not for the fact that he is literally draining the competency of every adult around him somehow to make himself look like the smartest character in the show. In one scene our teenage robot hero is literally leading a strategy meeting with all the adults around listening in silence looking like drooling morons. Even PTSD-kun has nothing to say and if you've seen the show you'll know who I mean. The only character I was able to connect with was Slaine only because he had things going on with his portion of the story as well as something that resembled an arc. The events that take place at the end of the last episode left me elated and annoyed at the same time because I knew it would have worked a lot better if I cared for Black hole of Charisma-kun. Either way I'll be watching the next series just to get some sense of closure and see where the story goes.

On the technical side there was little to complain about. The animation was consistently good though never exceptional. The CG was quite good with good Mech models and nice rendering. There was some stiffness though that's understandable given the mechs are more real robot. The character designs were also nice though plot happenings didn't allow for a lot of opportunities to show a wide range of emotions overall. The sound effects were pretty decent though the sound of the mechs footsteps could have had a bit more presence given the size of the robots. Finally while really good,  I don't think Hiroyuki Sawano was a right fit for the soundtrack. His insert songs were intrusive, the music too bombastic and I generally think a slightly lighter sound would have worked better. There was also too much repetition of the same themes throughout so I think it did take away from the show. Overall its a solid 3/5 for the show. Its slightly above average but the formula has been executed a lot better elsewhere. The animation gets a rating of 3.5/5 for its quality overall but just shy of a 4/5 because of the lack of truly exceptional sequences.

Tokyo Ghoul

Tokyo Ghoul had one of the more interesting settings as it managed to create an interesting little community around our Lead Kaneki and even gave him a pretty satisfying character arc. Its biggest sin however is that it doesn't resolve any other characters story meaning this is one of those go read the manga endings. Luckily for me I didn't really care too much for the rest of the cast so I was left pretty happy. I know its not really fair but hey, when you just can't muster up the shits to give about generic old man character and generic tsundere heroine theres not much else you can do. It started off with Kaneki being hesitant to eat people after he gets turned into a ghoul and by the end we get a pretty definitive end to his arc in a very believable character transformation. It was pretty good and the assides only served to expand on the world around Kaneki because while he did befriend quite a few ghouls, he never really felt like one of them so thematically the ending does work though for those that do care I can totally see your point and its dully noted.

On the technical side the show was pretty decent. As a Pierrot production it didn't completely shit the bed. Hironori Tanaka was involved with some design work and Kazuhiro Miwa's character designs looked pretty nice. Shuhei Morita did excellent directing on the first and last episodes with the episodes in between being good but not quite living up to the quality of episodes1 and 12. The shows greatest asset was Morita as his distinct and creative direction of those episodes  kept things moving at a nice pace with lots of creative shots and sequences. The 2 standout animators were Hironori Tanaka and Atsuki Shimizu. Tanaka very rarely puts out boring scenes with his big scene in episode 8 being up to his usual standard albeit without his signature hair detail with that being toned down here for whatever reason.  Atsuki Shimizu (whose scenes you can see in my new Funk Sakuga video above) had a noticeable sense of style that somewhat evokes Yoh Yoshinari though I'm not sure if that's intentional. Shimizu had the opportunity of working on the best fight scenes and more than lived up to expectations. The timing and style may not be particularly unique but there is just a sense excitement one gets from watching the scenes. I was particularly impressed with Shimizu's scene in episode 12 which looked particularly well done with nice liquid and smoke effects. Overall the show gets a 3.5/5 from me. It was better than Aldnoah Zero but the lack of closure for secondary characters means not by much. The animation while having some exceptional scenes, skimped on decent enough character animation and was a tad stiff in the middle episodes so it gets the same score as Aldnoah Zero at  3.5/5.

Terror in Resonance

The final show I'm gonna cover is the one I was most excited about. Terror in Resonance is a bit of a mixed bag that rams you over the head with its message and lumbers for a large portion with a subplot that ultimately ends up being pointless. Our leads left a lot to be desired with no discernible character growth and a particularly badly used female lead in Lisa Mishima. The strongest character was Shibazaki who played a role similar to L from Death Note. His portion of the story was the most interesting and by the end even his story goes out on a bit of a whimper. The story involving white haired antagonist Five required a higher than should be expected suspension of disbelief and had a end that directly contradiced earlier established character motivations.

On the technical front it was a visual treat. Kazuto Nakazawa provided excellent character designs, the backgrounds were highly detailed and coloured in a very effective saturated style. The CG was almost seamlessly integrated thanks to CG house Orange. Direction was very well done with uses of a lot of subtle visual cues to tell the story along with the less expository dialogue. Explosion effects were nice with regular go to explosion animator Takashi Hashimoto making an appearance alongside guys like Tahahiro Shikami. It was a very good looking show to surmise. In the end it was let down by writing that just wasn't up to snuff. Director Shinichiro Watanabe has worked with some of the best writers working in anime and ultimately the writer on this project just didn't live up to their quality which will disappoint many. We do still have Space Dandy to thank Watanabe for this year so it wasn't a total loss. Overall the story the story gets a 2/5 while the animation gets a 4/5.

Next week before friday look forward to my Book 3 analysis as that is almost done alongside everything I'm working on right now. Thanks for reading and see you then.