MovTV
I am reviewing the English version of Bandai release. This is not Fox Kids release.Escaflowne is remembered by most anime fans who viewed the show as a great series. However if we look closely at this anime, we find that the diamond does have a lot of cracks.Plot: Escaflowne is a typical rabbit in the hole story of animes. Hitomi, the main character of the anime, ends up on a world called Gaia with Vahn, a boy king of a country in this world. Hitomi haves a strange psychic link with her tarot cards. Whatever fortune she gets from the cards comes true. With this, Hitomi is made a target of a evil empire who wants to use her powers for their own means. To get rid of this threat, Vahn and Hitomi travel to a mystic city to get aid.Now the bad: Escaflowne does try to add mysteries to the story to make it interesting. The main mysteries is what is Hitomi's grandmother's connection to Gaia and what happened to Allen's sister. At first, viewers think that both are connected somehow. The writers do give red herrings in order to add twists to the plot to keep the viewers guessing what wil happen next. But the results of twists are performed badly, are way left field, and make the characters look more undesirable and hypocritical to viewers than they should be (ex. Allen---daddy issues mixed with weird love affairs)To make the flaws of the anime worse, a major plot hole was lefted to confuse the intelligent viewers even more. The hole begins with Hitomi finding a CD for sale. Gaia does not have the technology to produce a CD. Hitomi thinks (which is a good possibility) that someone else from Earth came here to Gaia. However the only two people, as revealed in the story, that came to Gaia are the grandmother and Issac Newton (the main villain!!!-Huh I am not joking. It's real <_<). However Netwon and the grandmother came from eras that didn't have CDs. The story makes us assume that Netwon, with his genius, made the CD. However if you think logically, Netwon could not be so advance in his knowledge to have produced a CD since he came fromt the 17th century. In matter of fact when you think about it, Newton couldn't have been able to develop the high technology of the empire without complex modern science and math. Some might claim magic or new learning caused Newton's knowledge to expand to that level but I think that is stenching the believability in a senseable story and makes it wackier than it should. If a fourth Earther was methods or hinted, the fatal flaw may have been ignored easily.To top it off, Escaflowne haves some of the worst character designs in anime. "Doonsbury" noses on every character on the show!!!. It wouldn't be so bad if three characters had it but everyone seems to have one. Didn't the artist know how to draw different noses and actually make them cute besides that one!?. It becomes distracting if its ugliness and makes you less focused on the anime (if you haven't turned out from the bad plot by then). However mechas and monsters were good in design especially the dragon in the first episode. The skin was odd with its early CG skin which wasn't really not that bad. It looks impressive and fresh in design for an anime.Music: The another good and possibly the only good thing about this anime was the music. From its Gregorian chant battle music to its poppy 90s ending music to its shojo opening, the music is actually good to listen to. Vocals were done correctly and made you feel part of the story. If only the writing should have done that for the overall anime.Overall, Escaflowne is not good anime to me. It is watchable till the end but it made me disappointed that a highly budgeted anime of its time would allow all the flaws it did to happen, and highly intellect people (cough the director and producers) would prove the scripts and character designs when the writers and the artist would have fired on the spot for their sloppy and poor work. If you have to watch a old-school anime adventure, try SDF Macross or Outlaw Star first then try Escaflowne (but be prepared to watch a bad anime).
Ganon-Dwarf
The Vision of Esaflowne is probably one of the best animes I've ever watched. I'd highly recommend at least renting it, if not out-and-out buying it. Of course, I'll need to say why this is so, so on to the particulars: Plot: The story in Escaflowne is quite good. It's not outstanding, it doesn't deconstruct the genre as Neon Genesis Evangelion did, it's not full of incredible twists, it's not going to make you change your world-view. It is, however, quite solid, very few of the events make no sense (though the one, and only, filler episode really doesn't work with the rest of the series plot-wise, this is somewhat minor.), the characters are all believable, and the show never contradicts itself. So the plot receives a solid 8/10.It is worth noting that if you dislike love triangles then you probably won't like the plot much, but I won't say more since I don't want to spoil anything.Animation: The quality of the animation in Escaflowne was, for the time, astounding, even now it's roughly on-par with most of the anime shows being produced. Escaflowne also was one of the shows to pioneer using CGI, but it doesn't go over-the-top, the computer effects all fit really well, and add to the believability of the animation, unlike quite a bit of CGI that just screams "fake!" Quite a few people have complained about the noses in Escaflowne, saying that they stand out far too much and, in a few cases, that they ruined the show. I have to disagree. The noses are not standard anime noses, this is true, they're big, they're really pointy, in fact, they're probably the most noticeable thing about someone's face. However, for all that, after the first episode I stopped noticing them at all.So, the animation receives a perfect 10/10 from me. If you adjust it for current standards an 8/10 would probably be closer.Music: Yoko Kanno composed most of the music for Escaflowne, and, as always, did a superb job. The music has a distinctly European flavour (which fits quite well with the setting), and features plenty of choir vocals. The end effect is astounding, it sounds more like the track to a movie than a show. So, without any question, a perfect score here. 10/10 (In fact, I'd say that the music alone is almost sufficient reason to buy this.) Dub: The version of Escaflowne that I own is the Anime Legends Complete Collection. (Just in case another version with a different dub is ever released.) I, personally, cannot stand dubs. English voice actors rarely fit the characters as well as the Japanese ones, and they just tend to grate on my nerves. As such I'm not going to give a score for the dub. The little bit I listened to struck me as almost, but not quite, there. The characters sounded almost, but not quite, right. Their mood was almost, but not quite, what it should've been, etc. This puts it in a sort of auditory "uncanny valley", where it's so close to being right that it's actually bad. However, other people have noted no such thing and have, in fact, said that it's one of the best dubs they've ever heard. So your millage will certainly vary.Sub: The subtitling of my copy was beyond compare. The subtitles all make sense, avoid Japanese idioms, and tell the plot perfectly. This is one of the better subs I've seen, so full marks here 10/10.I noted a few people complaining about their copy of the Anime Legends Complete Collection edition, saying that their disks were damaged or wouldn't play. I've had no such trouble, despite watching everything but the trailers on every disk. Presumably that was only an issue in the first print-run.So, in conclusion, I highly recommend this series to anyone who likes giant mechas, a solid cast, astounding music, and love triangles that put Shakespeare to shame.
KaJin
After the intro with Amano and Yukari on Earth, with Van's arrival the series seems definitely kind of suspicious, and even after the first four episodes you don't get everything because all is mixed up with almost ordinary but still weird love-confusion of Hitomi. But the series has got 26 episodes. After the short uncommon introduction you can't get your eyes off it because the whole idea slowly becomes clear with the characters evolving and telling their tale. Every character, at first presented powerful and heroic, surprises with emotional weaknesses almost too well known, with their biographies told a bit further in every single episode. Therefore even the 'bad guys' soon turn out to be not just objects to fight against, but complex characters not just to be hated. Additionally, the soundtrack is just awesome, thanks to Yoko Kanno.Gaia is more than just a fictional world just to show some Guymelefs, it binds dreams and tragic with the sense of destiny and how to change (or not?) the fates of destined friendships. Those of you who've watched Neon Genesis Evangelion while still having a romantic understanding of certain things may experience an even more inspiring anime.
Gwuinivyre1486
I saw Escaflowne originally on Fox Kids. I was a little confused, but then I went online and read how the story was, and I stopped watching it. I then was contacted by a friend who told me she bought the dvd edition three disc set with all 26 episodes on it off of Ebay. I went over to her house the very next day and watched it. I was shocked with how much they took out from the fox kids version. I instantly fell in love with the story. And especially Folken and Allen, but my first crush was on the adorable Gaddess. Anyways (getting off track ^_^)When we got through watching the whole thing I couldnt believe it. I then went out and spent the money on the 3 disc set and I was so excited. I almost toppled the UPS man when he brought it to the door I was so excited. I have to say to everyone that Escaflowne is the best damn anime there is. Well, besides DB/Z/GT. But I loved it. The animation was beautiful. The storyline exellent. the characters were enjoyable. And the music was totally breath taking. Such songs such as "Shadow of a Doubt" (more associated with Folken.) and "Chain" (the altering fate machine theme) have to be the most wonderfully done peices of music I have heard in a long time.In all I give this a 10/10 in ratings. I would go higher then a 10, but I want to make it reasonable. Hell. A 100/10.
