[ TV Series ]

Reviewer : Kylara

Gaea - a world of destruction, peace, and love. In its sky hangs our Earth and moon, Gaea's double moons - but we cannot see Gaea. In the kingdom of Fanelia, a young boy, Van Fanel, is to be king - but must kill a dragon. Unfortunately, he is transported to Earth in a great beam of light, knocking right into sixteen-year-old Kanzaki Hitomi, who is running a race to gain a kiss from the boy she loves most. Hitomi is a simple, regular girl, who possesses one odd talent - that of reading fortunes with tarot cards. The dragon follows, and suddenly, Hitomi's powers multiply - she has a full-out vision that saves Van's life. When he returns to his world, Hitomi is caught in the glow, and taken to this mysterious planet of Gaea. Van, king of Fanelia, pilots the magnificent guymelef [mecha], Escaflowne - and Hitomi seems 'destined' to help him. But here in Gaea, destiny is not always what it seems - the nation of Zaibach, poised to take over the world, is determined to prove that. Through multiple coincidences, Hitomi and Van are both brought together and brought apart, as well as with many other souls. However, coincidences, and destiny, are two very different things.

It is amazingly refreshing to watch a show free from infamous "filler" episodes; it is even more so to watch a show that so completely has the essence of life in it, such as Tenkuu no Escaflowne. This is not a story revolving only around two characters - it brings in the lives of all they affect, from someone they might have scarcely cast a glance at to their dearest love. The plot is original, dramatic, action-packed, and sweetly romantic all at the same time. Such a mix of genres and types were brought together, along with fantastic music (which I don't judge it by but it's wonderful all the same). The plot has no extra ties hanging off - the greatest amount of plot happens before the spectacular, all-bars-off ending, where everything happened. There are few shows that I have seen - and I mean out of all shows, not just anime - with such a great balance of angst, romance, humor, action scenes, and amazingly enough - normalcy. Despite everything, with Van being a king, Millerna being a princess, Hitomi being a normal schoolgirl, and everyone else being just everything, they all have an incredibly human balance, despite the fact that not everyone is quite human. It is the realism that strikes you; in the middle of this fantasy world, with the walls tumbling around, they have the most human, real emotions: bravery, devotion, cowardice, and plain stupidity. The plot's only clichéd part is wrapping in the legend of Atlantis, but I do not think you can call it 'old' or 'used' the way they tied it in. Atlantis is brought alive through their eyes, from carnage to the sweetest love of mother to child. Yet, it is not completely a drama - as I said before, this is not without its humorous moments, from things as innocent as a young boy blushing because his female companion happens to look pretty cute in a dress, to a cat-girl stealing Hitomi's beloved necklace and having Hitomi chase after her, screeching like a banshee. However, it does not seem out of place, not with its perfect transitions and moments.

Hitomi is fairly immature at the beginning of this show, which is certainly reasonable. She is a fairly sheltered sixteen-year-old who honestly thinks that the worse thing in her life is the crush-of-her-life moving away. Yet, you cannot help liking her - she is so incredibly honest and innocent, with a bright smile and an unwillingness to see the bad in 'evil people'. Yet, unlike Sailor Moon, who completely places blind faith in the hands of her enemies, or like characters, [EN: @.o] Hitomi is her own person, a cheerful girl who adjusts well from living in a peaceful city to being thrown into the middle of a war - and then, caught in crossfire from both sides. From peace to war, kindness to harshness, this causes her to become from a little girl, into the lady she always would have been. With her, other characters change, some molding to fit her, others who originally did growing apart. [I can only emphasize on Hitomi for time's sake, for if I were to go into how all the characters change, I'd have a twenty-page summary here.] Episode twenty-six is essentially a great moment of understanding between Van and Hitomi, fitting them together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Yet, characters are not forgotten; from Van to Hitomi, Hitomi to Allan, Allan to Millerna, Millerna to Eries, Eries to Allan, and Allan back to Van - this show covered all the tracks, even doing a few extra laps for our entertainment.

I have noticed that many of the shows I love best have spectacular endings - not exactly in action or splashy effects, but in how the endings bring together all the bright points of light, dotted throughout the show, into a brilliant super-nova. It is not coincidence, but mainly one point of a fantastic show. Although, of course, an ending of that sort is not needed for every show (Kare-Kano!), it was done for Tenkuu no Escaflowne, and done majestically.

[ Escaflowne: A Girl in Gaea (Movie) ]

Reviewer : Kylara

A parallel story to the television series, Vision of Escaflowne: A Girl in Gaea is a re-telling of the original story. This movie had a good plot, mediocre-yet-interesting characters, and very unique character designs. For this movie, most of the characters from the anime (and their accompanying voice actors) were used, but were re-designed. All of the characters went through a complete physical and mental re-vamp - the only real similarities between the casts of the movie and show are the most basic features, i.e. green eyes and brown hair.

Coming out sometime after its anime counterpart ended, the design seems to take a tip from the manga. Much more violent, darker, and not as pretty as the anime, the theme is also much more depressing - in a few parts, a bit generic. This does not take place anywhere in the timeline of the Escaflowne television series, before or after, and also takes place in a world with a different history and situation.

I had an interesting time reviewing this; I kept comparing this movie to the show, and I adored the show, while I'm not half as fond of the movie. Hitomi Kanzaki herself, the brave, optimistic girl with visions of the future, is gone, and replaced by a Hitomi who believes that she is alone in the world. She contemplates suicide all the time - she quit everything that had 'false meaning' to her. However, one day, after she completely tromps over her best friend's (yes, Yukari, from the show) feelings, she hears a voice singing to her, calling her over… she sees a dark, brooding man, who speaks to her… [Folken, the very twisted cynical version]. When her eyes open, she is inside of the god of war, Escaflowne - a living, killing monster of a guymelef.

All of the characters have been very changed, as I mentioned before. Now, their 'unique' noses are gone, but they are far darker, far more brooding, and far harder to like than before. Allan Schezar, formerly a Knight of Heaven, is part of a group of people, the 'Abaharaki', whose countries were destroyed by the Black Dragon Clan, and therefore have devoted their lives to fighting them. The lovely blonde and delicate Princess Millerna from the show is part of this 'Abaharaki' group in the movie - she has red hair and wears a skimpy outfit. (She doesn't act like anything like her former princess-self, either.) The characters in this show are all very dark, very sad, and rather cynical. They don't have half the depth that they did in the anime. Folken, the loving older brother who only wanted peace for Van, is very twisted, dark, and gloomy - I really hated him in the movie! A stereotypical plot twist - he hated Van because Van was heir to the throne, not him. In fact, the only character who was the same (mentally) is Merle, and she plays a very minor role.

The plot was reminiscent of the show's plot, only scrunched up in two hours. It had a good deal of the major milestones that the anime has, only presented in a different way. Since the movie was using such a long plotline, some things seemed very rushed - for instance, Hitomi's falling in love with Van was incredibly fast - he tries to kill her one moment and the next he's a kind, loving soul. She changes her viewpoints in life quickly, as well - and I really have no idea why, because I think those events that she experiences would make her more determined to kill herself. Aside from that problem, the movie also seemed to want to stuff in as many characters from the anime as possible - I do believe I saw Dryden for all of four minutes, as well as many other characters. It bloated the movie needlessly, when it could have used that time adding depth to existing characters. Instead of having real roles, these appearances were more like cameos. It didn't help the movie at all, other than getting the chance to see those beloved characters. However, if you haven't seen the show and wish to start off with the movie, I wouldn't. The two themes of the anime and show are as different as you could possibly imagine, and I highly prefer the show.