Wow, got home just in time to catch the opening credits and wow, the quality of this animation is first class! No dodgey 1980s anime style here, this is cutting edge, flawless stuff going on here, however there are several aspects of both the opening and the ending clips that seemed a bit... cliched? Perhaps it's just all the running and fighting with the music, in fact it seems very similar in content to the .hack//SIGN anime series which was produced by the same studio. The ending clip especially looks like it was copied almost directly from the Emerald Green ending to .hack//Legend of the Twilight. Great music though, and an interesting watercolour feel to it that sets it apart, though very different in feel to the anime itself.
Man, this is sounding pretty negative isn't it? Well, don't worry, the anime itself rocked! Stunning music from the same composer involved in .hack//SIGN and Noir, the previously mentioned artwork which has copied the manga style
perfectly and a screenplay that almost sticks to the manga word for word, though admitedly adds a quick scene in here and there to fill out the first chapter ("You must save Sakura!" is the furthest this ep goes). One such scene is actually something I wasn't too fond of; Saoran and Sakura running from the palace guards. To me it just seemed an unoriginal anime cliched, especially when looking at Saoran's logic defying sprint while carrying Sakura. I'm sure we were supposed to be thinking "How cute!!!", but I was left with "How the Hell can he do that?" and "Wasn't this scene in Aladdin?".
When the anime sticks to the anime it rules. When it tries to add more, it seems to fall in to cliched homage, however it's still worth watching as the storyline is still in tact and the artwork smashing! This is seriously like watching the manga come to life!
4/5!
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