I was somewhat intrigued that the story started out with a much older man and not a teenager. For me, that was refreshing.
I also found the animation just fine, although the 3D CG really stood out and not all that integrated with the background. But it’s generally smooth.
The plot of the story also takes a route almost never seen in today’s anime – a fallen hero, given a second chance by the devil (perhaps). It’s not exactly a classic tale, but not bad either.
When I saw the devils, I thought “oh wow, the boomers from 2016 are back!” I mean, they fuse with machines, they look mechanical and they go wild and start destroying things. They’re nothing like the classic BGC boomers, who were based on replicants of Blade Runner, but more like technological nightmares. Nothing new to me.
I don’t know if the German references works well or not, time will tell.
I’d have to say though, by episode 2, the plot became hard to believe.
Gerd as a savior of the country? Because he turned into a boomer? Absurd. I didn’t see this version of Germany went through a WWI, and I didn’t see any Nazis running around, calling a certain group of people “rats”.
The worse problem is that there was no mastery in the transformation of people’s thoughts, just plain out somebody saying that “Gerd should be our savior!”
Yeah, right. I think I want to be saved by a bike rider.
So far, nothing really gels and I can’t say I”m super impressed. However, I don’t hate it and I think it’s not awful, just need a little bit more development.
One thing it could use, however, is a real main character. Who is the main character? Who knows? This seems to want to show the demise to insanity of a hero tempted and fallen for the devil, but that’s seemingly not done quite well. I mean, he’s already fallen and gone insane by episode 2. Then again, I”m still waiting to see what happens next.
There’s nothing particularly wrong with it, but than again, there isn’y anything particularly well with it either.
I do like the racing and the XAT team’s battles are fine. I heard that people in the bloggersphere hate it, but I only see this as a currently mediocre show. But again, always keep in mind if you’re reading my review that I”m cynical.
But don’t forget it’s got good animation and good seiyuus.
Mediocre is more-or-less my impression, though I quite like it simply on the grounds of bikes & guns & explosions.
@ IKnight – I just wish they handled the drama better. Alas most shows in a season, even with great CG animation, aren’t going to do that well. But the sounds are certainly nice.
It’s more or less so-so for me; the main thing that puts me off though, is the CG because practically half the episode is made of it. The flying motorbikes in the OP made me laugh pretty hard too, for some reason.
@ Zeroblade – the exciting parts of this show is made of CG and for a TV production, I feel there’s no need for that many, even though it doesn’t bother me that much. This made me recall Blue Submarine no.6.