Kita ze Inbou! - キタぜ陰謀!

Series Information

ANN Encyclopedia | AniDB | AnimeNfo
OP: “resonance” by T.M.Revolution
ED: “I Wanna Be” by STANCE PUNKS
Production: BONES

[ Episode 1: Resonance of the Soul ～ Soul = Eater, Becoming a Death Scythe？～ ]

When it all boils down to it, only your SOUL matters. Or something like that.

OP Sequence

OP: [resonance] by T.M.Revolution
Listen to the OP: Mirror 1 | Mirror 2

Soul. Eater. Is. Absolute. AWESOME.

Dear lord. That was the best introductory episode of the season next to R2. I can’t tell you how much I was “oo’ing” and “wowing” during the episode but I do know I wanted to cry. Why? The art. The animation. The music. The characters. Maka. Blair. Soul. Shinigami-sama. Maka’s dad. The hilarious interactions. My goodness, I was absolutely blown away by Soul Eater. Prior to the start of the season I had pretty much invested a lot of excitement and anticipation into Soul Eater along with a few obvious others I’ve mentioned before. It’s needless to say that I wasn’t disappointed one bit. The episode delivered everything in large doses and I took them all in stride. I have fallen in love with this show from the very start.

BONES really outdid themselves with this one. The last show I saw from them was Darker than Black exactly a year ago. Now they return with something even more ambitious and epic. That something is Soul Eater. Soul Eater is serialized in Monthly Shounen Gangan published by none other than Square Enix (one of my all-time favorite gaming companies) and is authored by Atsuhi Okubo. At the moment, BONES has pretty much five years worth of material to work with and seems to be more than enough to satisfy the 51-episode length. Knowing that it will be on for a year is like a dream come true after witnessing such an amazing first episode. Hell, we haven’t even been introduced to all of the characters as yet and Maka and Soul have to start their soul collecting over again. 99 souls doesn’t seem to be a simple goal to obtain so I’m pretty sure we’re in for a lot of epic battles in the future involving Maka and Soul as well as the other characters to come.

Speaking of the characters, they were all just amazingly done. Maka has definitely won a place in my heart. She’s a mixture of adorable and badass. Her fighting is fierce and her skills with a scythe are some of the most amazing I’ve seen. I find her voice to be very fitting for her character as well. Though I’ve been hearing some complaints about it and the seiyuu’s voice acting (Omigawa Chiaki). I really like it so I don’t really understand. Soul is pretty cool though I didn’t really expect him to be the kind of guy that is turned out to be. That is, he’s extremely weak to the sexy bodies of females like Blair. Though I suppose I can’t really blame him for losing to her four times in a row. Blair is awesome. I found it hilarious that she wasn’t a witch but rather a cat with really good magic abilities. I can’t even begin to imagine what her role will be in series but I’m guessing she’ll cause Soul to have a lot more bloody noses in the future. Shinigami-sama and Maka’s dad are both freaking hilarious. Shinigami-sama has a weird voice that makes me laugh from just hearing it but when he interacts with Maka’s dad in ways such as chopping him in the head and getting pissed, I can’t stop myself from laughing even louder and longer. Hopefully more of their antics will be present throughout the series. There’s a new kid introduced briefly at the very end of the episode who we’ll get to see in the second episode. His name is Black Star. He doesn’t really look to be as capable as he sounds and appears but looks can be deceiving…even if he is dancing around like he doesn’t know what he’s doing lol.

Oh yeah. The OP and ED are really good and among the best this season. T.M.Revolution really brings it hard in the OP and gets the adrenaline rushing. I can hardly wait for the single. STANCE PUNK’s song, I Wanna Be, took me by surprise. The last thing I heard from them was NO BOY NO CRY and I must say they have improved since then. It really had me doing some air guitar and it felt really nice.

Soul Eater is destined to be all the rage this season and based on the first episode, it deserves to be. Yeah it’s shounen but it sure isn’t your typical shounen. Even if it is shounen, what does it matter? It’s still a great series and the animated version shows a ton of potential and I doubt it’ll go to waste with BONES backing it, Iwasaki Taku composing the music, and great seiyuu cast with newcomers and veterans all giving their best. Soul Eater isn’t going to let anything steal it’s spotlight and is even giving Code Geass R2 a run for its money now.

Now If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be going to watch the episode. Again. And then another time. And another. And another…^__^

We’ve got a winner here. Plain and simple, SOUL EATER ROCKS YOUR SOUL! Oh wait, that’s not right. Anyways, I loved loved loved the premiere. Every second of it I couldn’t dare blink for I’d most likely miss the animation, which is by far the best I’ve seen yet. Otsu, Bones. You guys rock. I especially love the entire animation as resonance is playing, a wicked awesome new song from T.M.Revolution that clearly fits the theme of the show and also the “resonance” that we’ll see later on. Read into the lyrics and you’ll know what I mean.

There’s not a lot to complain about because throughout the whole thing I was impressed at how fluid and detailed every scene looked. One of my favorite thing about SE is Ookubo’s art style. From the characters to even the damn awesome laughing sun and moon, it’s quite appealing. I’m sure everyone’s said the same thing, that it’s like Nightmare Before Christmas, but you know what, they’re absolutely right.

The sound is another great factor, of course. Great soundtrack so far. It gives off a very urban, subcultural vibe, similar to what you hear in WEWY, and thats just awesome. The series is more or less Western-influenced so I think it matches quite well. Heck, I find the ED theme pretty good, and I’m not a fan of STANCE PUNKS. In fact, you can say that I totally think No Boy, No Cry is lame for many reasons. But, yeah, I like the ED song because it doesn’t sound bad. Moving on from the music, we go onto one of my favorites: seiyuu. Now, here’s the dealie. I can see this is the debut for Maka’s seiyuu, Omigawa Chiaki, which kinda irked me because hearing her lines come out wasn’t all too outstanding. The main problem I hear is the execution of the lines and the tone. Sometimes it’s more than necessary, other times it’s less than what’s necessary and I think those are what hurt the most. I’ve nothing against the voice itself. It’s distinct and clear, but it means squat if it’s not done right. After rewatching the episode so many times, I already got used to it, but I’m not exactly convinced yet until she gets better.

On that note, it’s extremely great to see that we’re getting a great show this season (and the entire year), thanks to the staff behind it. I’m pretty sure this will gain a huge crapload of fans following and popularity will be bigger than Blair’s bust. But speaking of Blair… I’m just too freakin’ ecstatic to hear Emiri in a prominent role again. Pump-Pumpkin! My other favorites are Death Scythe (MAAKAAAAA~!!!!!) and Kid (whom we’ll see later). Other than that, I’m just stoked that we’ll be enjoying this for a long while, so expect more awesomeness to ensue.

Trivia: During the next day when Maka and Soul go to Blair’s, in the manga, Soul says “Kita ze!” instead of “Yatsu da,” like in the anime.

When I came into Soul Eater, I expected nothing special than a regular Shounen show. Just a minute into the first episode, even before the OP, just looking at the visual style, my mouth was agape. It’s clearly something I have never seen before, and that ALONE is a good reason to watch the show. Now that’s before the OP, so you can imagine yourself how much I love this show. I won’t beat around the bush too much, it’s my favorite show this spring so far.

I want to start, though, with the only thing I didn’t like about Soul Eater, the premise. Maka, a weapon meister, is collecting souls in order for her living weapon, Soul Eater, become a worthy enough weapon to be wielded by the grim reaper himself, the marshmallow-like Shinigami sama. It sounds well and all, but to collect 99 of those souls? I don’t mind having cool battles like the ones we had in the show, but at least add more depth to killing 99 monsters, but I heard the manga deviates rather quickly from this, so my mind is at peace for now.

Now on to the good stuff: Studio Bones is my favorite animation studio, mainly for creating my two most favorite anime: Fullmetal Alchemist and Eureka Seven. The animation in this episode alone though has surpassed the quality of those two, especially Fullmetal which lacked fighting scenes. The battles in Soul Eater are beautifully choreographed I am not going to be surprised if after a month from now I’m going to see tons of AMV featuring it. What’s amazing is that even the quiet more subtle scenes are beautifully animated, like the conversation between Soul and Maka during their battle against Blair. If BONES can retain that quality for 50 episodes, I will be in awe. It’s one thing to animate great battles for one episode, but what I love to see is consistency.

The characters are already unique and it’s barely the first episode. Soul Eater is the protagonist of the show, and while he may seem like an inconsiderate punk, he is just a cool guy with a good heart… that loves big breasts (I can’t blame him). Maka, his weapon meister, acts like a regular teenage girl, and her voice fits her well. It may be grating for those who watch anime frequently and are used to hear seiyuu more like Ami Koshimizu or Aya Hirano, but I think her seiyuu did a great job giving her a tomboyish attitude that is refreshing as it is like Soul says, cool. We also have Shinigami-sama, the goofy chairman voiced by the multi-talented Rikiya Koyama (Kogarashi from Kamen no Maid Guy and Captain Yamato from Naruto Shippuuden). He likes to talk in a playful tone, but he can attack furiously with his “Direct Shinigami Noggin Chop” whenever Death Scythe spouts something stupid. Speaking of which, Death Scythe is Maka’s naughty dad, and he is the comic relief of the show, so far at least. Blair? Just one word: ME-OW!

The soundtrack of Soul Eater is great thus far, featuring the same composer of the Gurren-Lagann soundtrack. I especially liked when Blair is revealed, what is played in the background can only be described as young kids who suck at playing the flute. On the more serious side of things, I love the music they used when they introduced Black Star before the ED theme. Nice transition! Themes! I am not a big fan of T.M. Revolution since I prefer his works under Abingdon Boys School, but that being said the OP for Soul Eater is okay, if too standard for T.M’s style. The ED is made by STANCE PUNKS, and while it still detestable like their Naruto OP, I can at least watch it now that it features a sweet animation. Moreover, considering the overall rebellious feel of Soul Eater, it makes sense to add STANCE PUNKS and it fits, but I would rather hear a theme by Captain Straydum, especially if they do anything like their Ayakashi Ayashi OP. Captain Straydum for a Soul Eater OP? Make it so, BONES!

Overall, I love Soul Eater. The visual style of the world seems like it’s taken from a Tim Burton movie, with the crazy house designs and the sadistic smiles on the sun and the moon. The visual style alone should be a reason enough to watch Soul Eater, but add in great characters, a distinctive soundtrack and the best animation I have seen in a long time and you have one of the best potential in a Shounen show ever established, and if you watched the preview at the end of the uncut episode, you know it can only go up from here, and I’m excited to see how it’ll accomplish that.

Omae no Tamashi, Itadakeyo!

9.5/10

ED Sequence

OP: [I Wanna Be] by STANCE PUNKS
Listen to the ED: Mirror 1 | Mirror 2