Soul Eater - Part 1
Soul Eater – Part 1 DVD (Manga Entertainment)
A crazy, bonkers and random gothic anime, welcome to Death Weapon Meister Academy where people are truly out for your soul. The pupils are paired in to teams – one a human weapon bearer and the other a death scythe able to transform in to a weapon –and they are out to consume 99 souls and on their one hundredth a witch soul in order to become a weapon good enough for Death himself to wield. Absolute tosh obviously but an easy principle to set up and maintain with -no doubt- adventures a plenty to be dragged out over the next ten years or however long this series manages to run. And I’ll be following it keenly the whole way as after a single episode I’m hooked. It’s not too dissimilar to other anime concepts but its individuality is where this series gains the most respect. The artwork is very different with its vivid chunky art, cell-shaded 3D locations and abstract bright colours, comparable to the modern interpretations of the Gorrilaz visuals (again stolen from manga and anime in the first place by sources too numerous to list, James Hewitt you rascal you!). Soul Eater also has a keener sense of humour than most, cartoonish but not too broad, but with occasional boob-covered-by-soap-studs nudity, rather saucy jokes and stark and vivid violence this certainly puts a distance between itself and other Naruto types. It’s not all perfect. The English dub voices are miscast horrifically so the Japanese dub with sub titles is highly recommended. Also it is fundamentally just for fun, so don’t expect a brain twister or a deep and meaningful exchange to come out of this, just enjoy the scenery. Alex
