This review will be split into two sections; the first, being brief and spoiler free, the second, being longer analyzing specifics where spoilers are unavoidable (this section will be clearly labeled).
Story: 6, Chaika has a story with a decent design, that is thought out, and makes sense, but ironically the major problem with Chaika's story is due to its characters--our ability to understand other people ultimately boils down to how well we understand what they want, and that is where this story fails. Tooru choosing to help Chaika in the first place is a great example, while there is the argument of, "he needs work", ... he is clearly overly attached to Chaika for no reason. These loose character motivations make the story (despite feeling well-planned) feel overly orchestrated and unrealistic--it seems like characters are walking down paths, not because they wanted to, but because it was necessary for the writer to get the ending they wanted. Lastly, the world of the story seems to have a rather unique lore, but not enough time is spent developing it.
Art: 8, The overall quality of the art is pretty good, and it manages to be consistent with that quality. There's a few scenes that are especially good. Also, this kinda ties into what I just mentioned about lore, but some characters have unique designs that you would think have some kind of lore-driven reasoning behind them (like the guy with the weird face tattoo/marking)
Sound: 6, None of the music was bad, but none of it was very noteworthy either. The main issue here was the English VA cast--most notably Fredrica and Akari, both of whom I wanted to gag.
Character: 4, This score is highly reflective of what I mentioned above (lose character motivations), but another massive problem here is that the majority of the cast members can't even be described without mentioning their appearance, because that's how little personality they have (the members of the Clemen agency are a great example of this--there are too many of them, and they have too little screen time to actually have complex personalities, or personalities at all in most of their cases).
Enjoyment: 8, You might be surprised with this, but I actually liked Chaika a fair bit, it was only when everything came to a conclusion that the problems with it became so obvious.
Overall: 7, Chaika is a story with a deliberate design, that unfortunately was overly concerned with its design, and not concerned enough with its characters' abilities to fit that design.
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--------------------------------SPOILER SECTION BELOW---------------------------
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First and foremost, let's address the well-designed story I mentioned before--ultimately, the entire purpose of everything that happens in this anime, is all apart of a machiavellian plan by Arthur Gaz to reincarnate into a stronger body, and honestly, I don't think this is bad. Gaz is shown to be truly obsessed with magic, to the point of doing countless inhumane experiments, so the idea that this guy would purposefully die in the exact way he did, so that his remains would become super-enriched with magic, that way when he reincarnated using parts of other creatures and his old remains, he would reach unforetold levels of strength that basically no one could stop. Up until this point, I think everything about Gaz makes sense, but then he did something that was so clearly just a way for the writer to kill Gaz--the writer added an insanely strong weapon that Gaz created (ya know, the kind of weapon that is of course strong enough to kill Gaz, but is completely unnecessary for him to have because he's already the most powerful living being). This is the first glimpse of the inconsistencies in character motives, and unfortunately it is merely the tip of the iceberg...
Let's rewind slightly to the beginning of the final arc of the anime--basically some nut job(one of the former heroes) decides to throw a massive death battle, with the prize being a piece of Gaz's remains, to use as bait to get the owners of the other pieces to come to him. I don't have an issue with this, what I have an issue with is the fact that the main characters (who possess the majority of the remains) decide to partake in this event... Why do I see this a problematic? If you know that there is a giant death-bout that ends with a winner walking away with the prize you want, what would you do? Go risk life and limb for that reward, or wait until after so you can steal it from the winner? (Also, let's not forget that the MCs aren't above stealing, and also have already tried to steal this specific reward before entering the competition). However this isn't the worst of it...
Remember how Gaz orchestrated everything? Yeah, so he's not actually Chaika's dad, and her entire identity is just a fabrication--which she learns, BEFORE the final arc. A guy, who worked for Gaz, literally tells her how they made countless Chaika's all who were given various reasons to attempt to gather the remains, but for some reason she presses on with finding the remains. The biggest problem here is that, ultimately what Chaika is told is "you're a tool for gathering the remains" and she insists that she isn't a tool, and how does she prove him wrong? By continuing to collect the remains... (I wish this was a joke). I will say, I'm not sure how the anime would've continued if she gave up on the remains, but it simply doesn't feel genuine in its current state.
Ultimately, Chaika was an anime whose narrative works well, and the ending makes sense. However, when analyzing the legitimacy of how genuine the characters act, it falls flat on its face. Despite this, I would recommend Chaika, simply for the interesting narrative, if nothing else.
Alternative Titles Synonyms: Hitsugi Hime no Chaika Japanese: 棺姫のチャイカ Information Type: TV Episodes: 12 Status: Finished Airing Aired: Apr 10, 2014 to Jun 26, 2014 Premiered: Spring 2014 Broadcast: Thursdays at 01:05 (JST) Licensors: Sentai Filmworks Studios: Bones Source: Light novel Duration: 24 min. per ep. Rating: R - 17+ (violence & profanity) Statistics Score: 7.221 (scored by 174,414 users) 1 indicates a . Ranked: #31992 2 based on the top anime page. Please note that 'Not yet aired' and 'R18+' titles are excluded. Popularity: #612 Members: 380,171 Favorites: 859 Available AtResources |
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