The Nightlords arc deals with Caterina’s attempts to initiate diplomatic relations with the vampiric Empire. Abel and Esther (fresh from A-X training, with +5 to firearms and kung fu skillz) struggle to protect the ambassador from Rosenkreuz, the Inquisition, and traitors from all sides. They meet lots of new faces, journey to the heart of the Empire, are framed for mass murder, flee from numerous dangers, reunite with old friends,and come face to face with the Empress herself.

Sounds good, right? Well, not exactly. Because the writers are trying to squeeze a huge amount of information from the Trinity Blood novels into a small number of episodes, they had to skip all the intricacies that made the TB world fascinating. Important plot points are glossed over, events are rearranged, personalities are simplified. Whereas FS/N’s plot is moving at the pace of an rheumatic turtle, TB is zipping along far too quickly. There’s an incredible story underneath it all, what with massive empires on the brink of war, unknown factions manipulating events from the shadows, power stuggles within the Vatican, and the overriding mystery about how it all began in the past. Too bad it was watered down due to time constraints. As it stands, the Nightlords arc comes off as a decent adaptation, but never transcends the realms of mediocrity.

Maybe it’s just me, but Ion strongly reminds me of a male Cagalli. Angsty blonde boyish noble, anyone?

©2010 Sea Slugs! Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.

So I was thinking I should probably go back and finish some of those partially completed series I started blogging last year, and Trinity Blood happened to be nearby. Thus, a half-marathon was born, though this post only covers up to the first major arc.

As stated in previous Trinity posts, I found the show to be easy to digest and light on substance, at least for the initial one-shot episodes. However, there were several niggling flaws that only grew as the show went on.

Ep. 5 features Esther accompanying Abel back to Rome, where she enlists in the ranks of the A-X organization, known for putting on a great animanga convention every year. She meets the familiar bigwigs like Caterina, along with the other Enforcers. Aside from Abel and Tres, there’s William, the doctor we briefly met in episode 2, who’s a technological genius. Then there’s Havel, who has a cloaking ability, and Kate, the battleship commander whose ghostly holographic projection is used to communicate with people on land. And finally, there’s Noelle, who has psychic powers and needs to get more sun. She seems to have a thing for Abel, too. Say bye to Esther for now, as she doesn’t show up much until ep. 12.

Ep. 6 takes this large group out of the picture, and focuses on the Hughe, the Sword-Dancer enforcer. He’s a brooding blonde bishounen that lives only for vengeance against the vampires. Caterina sends him to Amsterdam (a Vampire territory) to investigate a series of blood sucking murders. This episode was actually quite cool, and exemplifies Trinity Blood’s penchant for excellent one-shots. The ending was unintentionally funny though, as Hughe kills a gazillion innocent vampires to avenge a fallen Sister, but she’s actually just unconscious. Ah well, at least it served as a good excuse to cut up some undead limbs!

Ep. 7 introduces Leon (codename: Dandelion!!), a strong fighter who’s working off his prison time by doing missions for A-X. Him and Abel go to an isolated island where a scientist was conducting experiments on the children in his orphanage. This episode was also well-done, though the whole Peter Pan theme was iffy. I wonder what Leon was imprisoned for in the first place; he seems like a good-natured guy. Anyone care to shed some light on this, or do we find out later on?

Ep. 8 features to start of a mini-arc. Noelle and Abel are sent to investigate some mysteriously collapsing buildings in Barcelona. They don’t find anything incriminating, so Noelle decided that they should spend the rest of their time sightseeing and having fun. Noelle’s maturity is a nice break from Esther’s scaredy-cat act, and I was totally rooting for her when she started making moves on Abel (with the aid of some wine, of course). However, duty calls when A-X picks up a tip that the nefarious Rozenkreuz is behind things again. Sadly enough, Noelle bites the dust in the course of the investigation, and Abel becomes depressed since he was unable to protect someone important to him. Noelle actually dies in an uncharacteristically abrupt way; the building she is in collapses, leaving no time for tearful farewell speeches. My sadness was further compounded in episode 22, whereupon I realized she had been the only interesting character thus far (;_;)

Ep. 9-10 concerns a plot by the Archbishop to destroy Rome with the aid of Rozenkreuz’s sound wave weapon that Noelle and Abel previously learned about. Through some political maneuvering, snap depression, and purple-squid battling, A-X manages to save the day in the end. This mini-arc was neat, as we finally get to see all the Enforcers in action, as well as some Church intrigue. Abel had to up his nanomachine percentage to beat the Rozenkreuz assassin this time too. Powah uppu!

Ep. 11 was a horrible, horrible episode featuring Abel’s east-meets-west teamup with Asta, a vampire agent. I’m still not sure who was supposed to be Jackie Chan or Chris Tucker though. The episode was incredibly rushed, and the plot made huge illogical jumps. Before I knew it, the dynamic duo had saved the universe from the vampire hegemony, Balle Masque, and ZAFT all in one fell swoop. Only near the end of the episode did they suddenly explain what the heck was going on, after 20 minutes of totally unrelated nonsense.

Up to this point, I had been seriously enjoying Trinity Blood, and was willing to tolerate its shortcomings. I can’t say the same about the next 10 episodes though – that’s when the first major arc begins, and it’s actually worse than the fillers. Inconceivable! But true.

A couple minor quibbles…

1. Get a real intro, sheesh. Gonzo does it again, choosing instead to recycle episode clips. There’s no original animation – zip, zero, zilch. That’s actually worse than the usual, as even Speed Grapher had some original stuff in its intro. On a complete tangent, I think the improved opening for Magikano absolutely rocks.

2. The character design and animation of Trinity Blood are quite good, especially for a Gonzo series. There’s some spectacular fights thrown in, but there’s also some real stinkers, in which the action consists of a quick black screen cut accompanied by slashing sounds, and the hero is then seen posing victoriously over the fallen foe.

3. The blur effect for the vampires is pretty nifty.

4. Abel’s goofiness is extremely irritating, even more so than Vash. He busts out the silly antics at the most inappropriate moments – it’s absolutely criminal. However, much like in Trigun, he gets really grim towards the end, and I expect the quality of the show to rise dramatically.

5. There’s just something about Caterina’s massive floppy hat thing…

Edit: Just finished the last episode. Goodness, I’m practically speechless. So many mixed feelings bubbling up in my head. It’ll take some time to get them sorted out….

©2010 Sea Slugs! Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.

So I wrote a complete spiel, but the computer crashed and I didn’t save it Time for the short version. Basically, Gyula hates the church and the Terrans because they killed his wife. Thus he plans to use his wife’s creation, an energy redirection satellite, as a Goldeneye style weapon. Unfortunately, Dietrich had secretly programmed in a rogue process which gives him control. It turns out he faked his death and was playing Esther and Gyula against each other all along. As part of Rosenkreuz, he plans to use the satellite to re-ignite the war between vampires and humans. He tells Esther the self destruct code for fun, knowing that Gyula won’t let her destroy his beloved wife’s creation (that sentimental fool!). Abel busts in and does his Kresnik act while Esther attempts to initiate the self destruct sequence. It doesn’t work initially, but Abel pulls some deus ex machina crap out of his butt and saves the day.

I really don’t know what to make of this series; while splendid production values abound, it has rather lame plot twists filled with a “been there, done that” feeling. In addition, the total lack of logic rivals Aquarion in magnitude. Gyula’s wife is a brilliant engineer who works in an evening gown? Abel can wipe the floor with a vampire’s ass but is powerless against a couple ropes tying him down? The inconsistencies boggle the mind, but it sure is easy on the eyes. It’s not a groundbreaker by any means, but Trinity Blood certainly is digestible entertainment. Hopefully the later episodes will feature meatier plots and development.

©2010 Sea Slugs! Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.

Looks like we’re approaching mini-arc territory, as the girl from the intro shows up. Abel was reassigned by the Vatican to the neutral city of Istavan, which sits on the border between the Vampire empire and the Terran terrain. In Istavan, the vampires and humans live in an uneasy peace under the rule of the vampire Gyula (as opposed to his basketball-playing cousin, Gyuma?), who agonizes over his deceased human wife. Abel has his work cut out for him; things are a bit of a mess due to the mysterious murder of the vampire Count Radcon, and behind the scenes Gyula is secretly plotting to attain a power greater than both the Empire and the Vatican. Abel, in his typical bumbling way, is penniless, hungry, and lost, but manages to be apprehended by the police as a “suspicious looking person”. Eventually he is picked up by Sister Esther, and over dinner the two discuss the circumstances surrounding the person whom Abel is filling in for. Apparently she was like a mother to Esther, but was arrested and executed for breaking the city “rules” (which we are still left in the dark about).

Later in the night Abel wakes up to get some grub, but overhears a midnight conversation between Esther and Dietrich, one of Gyula’s human workers. They had conspired to murder the Count Radcon, and now they aim to go after Gyula, against whom both have a grudge. Abel tries to stop them with some high-minded talk of forgiveness etc., but like the Gen-X brats they are, they pay him no heed. Dietrich dashes out of the church with gun in hand, only to find the police arrayed in firing formation and is riddled with bullets. Esther attempts to avenge him, but Abel stops her from certain suicide (although if she had just worn a cocktail gown, I’m sure she would have been invincible). Esther is arrested for the murder of the count, and Abel voluntarily is taken along with her.

Is it just me, or is Gonzo really crapping out on intros lately? Both Trinity Blood and Speed Grapher just reuse episode footage, and it’s sort of getting on my nerves. It’s done fairly well in Trinity Blood, but I would still like to see some original animation.

©2010 Sea Slugs! Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.

In typical anime fashion, Trinity Blood appears to be opening with a series of standalone episodes, and this time around we’re dropped in the middle of an investigation by Abel and the cyborg Tres (codename Gunslinger). A rash of grisly murders has the Vatican’s AX organization on their toes, but this time around it’s the vampires that are turning up dead. They duo find a small girl hiding at the crime scene, but she escapes Abel’s grasp by touching him on the forehead and sending him into a comatose state where he has a very vivid nightmare about a tragic event in his past. Tres, being a cyborg, is immune to such manipulation, and handily captures the young girl.

It turns out that the girl, Ellis, is a witch whose touch-telepathy ability allows her to control other beings, and is the cause behind all the recent deaths. Because of her ability, she led a life of persecution, but is also targeted by vampire organizations such as Rosenkreuz that wish to harness her powers. Though the interrogation process, Abel succeeds in gaining her trust by protecting her from Tres, who had orders to terminate her if she attempted to escape. Unfortunately as a result, Tres’s friend-or-foe indicator now labels Abel as target practice. Luckily, Abel manages to short circuit Tres and safely hand over Ellis to a nun of the St. Rachel convent.

Or rather, to the vampire pretending to be a nun. Come on Abel, isn’t it obvious that nuns don’t look like goth-chicks? As it happens, Abel’s superior (codename Professor) slipped a tracking device on Ellis during his rather pathetic interrogation attempt, and a rescue operation is set in motion. This operation consists solely of dropping Gunslinger from the sky into the vampire’s hideout and letting him terminate everything inside. Abel is also present though, and saves Tres from a surprise attack by the vampiress. He then goes Kresnik on her while Tres bring Ellis outside. Afterwards, Abel and Ellis have a happy reunion, until Tres points his gun at Abel and restates that he’s considered a dangerous element marked for elimination…but his firing chamber click empty, and Tres decides to save it for another day. At that moment, the severly mutated vampiress leaps out of the building and attacks with metal spikes fused into her arms, but Tres whips around and feeds her a hearty serving of lead. Looks like he just pretended to be out of ammo This wins Ellis’s approval, and she happily dashes after the silent Gunslinger.

I really like the classic pairing between the goofy but humanitarian Abel and the cold, emotionless Tres – you can feel the immense tension between the two powerful beings, and one can only wait in anticipation for the inevitable clash between them. Well, aside from the preliminary confrontation with the electric wires; that was just plain silly. Tres must have let Abel win, because it’s pretty hard to miss someone who runs straight into your gunfire, and Abel was still in human form. Plus, Tres missed quite a bit when spotting Ellis in the beginning; those didn’t all look like warning shots. But as evidenced by his actions at the end, there’s more in his head then just plain circuitry.

I also got a huge kick out of Tres’s pose-centric gun-kata, and his last action scene reminded me of a nearly identical scene in the movie Equilibrium.

©2010 Sea Slugs! Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.

Ahhh, so this is where Gonzo’s other funds have been directed. Yet another stylish-looking gothic series dealing with vampires, but this time around it looks to be more angst and less ass-kicking (compared to Hellsing, at any rate). We open with a short exposition on the future of Earth, where nuclear war has devastated the planet. However, the war is interrupted by the arrival of spacefaring vampires, who decided to take a rest stop here because they were really, really thirsty. Soon enough, it’s us versus them, and the vampires establish a permanent presence on Earth.

Onboard the ship Tristan, a penniless priest named Abel Nightroad chats up the flight attendant Jessica, who aspires to be a pilot someday. Jessica accidentally spills his sugar-laden order of milk tea, and promises to give him a sandwich in return when the bridge orders some coffee. On the bridge, Jessica manages to correct some of the navigator’s mistakes while she is serving him coffee, and the crew shares a few laughs, when a vampire bursts in. Helpless against his superior speed and power, the entire bridge is slaughtered save for Jessica, whom the vampire is saving for a nice snack. After he reprograms the ship to head to the Vatican, he prepares to suck Jessica’s blood. Unfortunately, the clumsy Abel has horrible timing and bursts in exactly when the vampire is in the classic “fangs about to puncture helpless maiden’s neck” pose, which naturally irritates the vampire to no end. As he zips towards Abel to exact his revenge, Abel “slips” and splashes some holy water across the room, paralyzing the vampire. Abel and Jessica escape to the backup bridge, where Abel performs some programming magic to change the ship’s path. Jessica is then given the opportunity to put her piloting skills to work, apprehensive as she may be.

Meanwhile at the Vatican, we learn that the vampire has demanded that his imprisoned comrades be released lest he crash the ship into the Vatican. The current Pope is a total wuss (“Nee-san…what should I do?”), and he’s being bullied into blasting the ship with a missile by one of his warmongering aides. The rather evil-looking aide argues that the Vatican can never negotiate with terrorist vampires, and the people on the ship would gladly die in the name of the Pope and God. His even-handed sister warns that such an action would have political repercussions since the ship belongs to another nation, but her plea falls on deaf ears. However, behind the scenes, she learns from one of her holy-sister cohorts that there’s a Kresnik on board the ship (kind of like Wesley Snipes in Blade I/II/III), and thus she sends “Gunslinger” to support him.

Meanwhile on the ship, the vampire catches up to Abel and Jessica (after first sucking the blood of all the other passengers) and faces off with Abel on the top of the ship. Here, it is revealed that Abel is a Kresnik, and he proceeds to mangle the vampire with his blood scythe in order to find out who’s behind the attack. He then uses some sort of power to compel the vampire to pull its own beating heart out and crush it with his own hands. Ouch. The problem of the incoming missile remains unsolved though, so Abel rushes back and advises Jessica to cut the engines so that the missile can’t track their heat signature. Fortunately, Gunslinger’s ship arrives just in time to blast the missile, and the day is saved.

Quite an awesome first episode all around! Abel is a likable main character, heavily reminiscent of Vash the Stampede from Trigun. The character designs are simply superb, especially the Pope’s sister Katerina, who simply oozes gothic. If you’ve seen the spectacular character art for the recent Castlevania games, it’s in a similar style. I can’t wait to see how this series turns out!

©2010 Sea Slugs! Anime Blog. All Rights Reserved.