Forum - View topicBirdy the Mighty Decode (TV).
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undeadben
 Posts: 1212 Location: West Texas |
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Birdy the Mighty Decode (TV) Genres: action, science fiction Themes: alien, body switching, space Plot Summary: Federation investigator Birdy chases the space criminal Geega through space to Earth, where he hides in the entertainment industry under a human disguise. Birdy goes undercover herself, posing as famous model “Arita Shion” that often uses a ‘space girl’ look. A male student, Senkawa, stumbles upon a fight between the two one night in an abandoned building only to be severed in half as he is used as a shield by Geega against Birdy. Birdy heals him from imminent death in some fashion- but Senkawas body, and life, are now changed and permanently linked to Birdy. ---------------------------------- This new show is the second anime adaptation of the Birdy the Mighty manga. The first one was a 4 episode OAV from 1996. Actually I hadn't heard of any of these, manga or anime, until I was browsing new anime fansubs and the title caught my attention. I watched the first episode of the new series and when I looked it up to enter it into My Anime is when I found that the show had a predecessor and is, according to the encyclopedia, an alternate retelling of the manga. So I looked for and found the OAV and watched it through, being a sucker for those old 80's and 90's cheesy sci-fi OAVs anyway, and I really liked it. I liked the look, the story and most importantly the characters. But of course short OAV series don't always tell the whole story and it did look like there was more to tell. The new series in one episode already looks like it will be vastly different from that old OAV and not just because it is an alternate retelling of the source. The character designs are made a bit more modern and it tells more; it takes the entire episode to get to more or less where the OAV was at after just 10 minutes. And it also has a lot of elements that were not present in the OAV; there are more characters and some of the existing characters have different aspects and more behind them. So far I enjoyed the humor and the pacing as well as the action and the sci-fi elements. It probably all won't make sense but hey, there are aliens involved, so it doesn't really have to. I also think I'll like the characters as much, and maybe more with a bit more room for character development. And it has just enough fanservice, well you can never have even enough, but meh. I'll definitely keep watching for now. Has anyone else watched the show? Or maybe the original OAV? Any thoughts? |
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Key
Moderator
 Posts: 18455 Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley) |
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I did see the original OVA on VOD a year or two back and rather liked it, so I'll probably eventually get around to checking this one out. (Though maybe not until it, presumably, gets licensed.) Sounds like they're doing with it pretty much what they did with Ah! My Goddess compared to its original OVAs - i.e. tell essentially the same story but in the much-expanded form that a proper TV series allows.
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undeadben
Posts: 1212 Location: West Texas |
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Yeah, that's kind of what it looks like. Right from the beginning you see a big difference. While in the OAV opening Birdy is already chasing after Geegar through the city, in the series they are having a spaceship chase and you actually get to see a couple of different aliens and the ships as well so that's pretty cool. And you get a lot more of what's behind it all than just a girl, in what looks like swim wear, chasing man down an alley who then turns into an alien without mention. Sort of how in the AMG series you get to know Keiichi a lot more and about his life as he does all sorts of things before finally dialing that fated wrong number instead of him just getting hungry and calling for take out, like in the OMG OAV. And if it does get licensed at some point I'll be looking forward to, presumably, a review. 
The first episode does show quite a bit of potential and having watched the OAV first, I can tell a bit more where that potential can be filled out. And it's quite fun too. And while the animation isn't incredible I'm also waiting for a group to start releasing it in 720p so I can get into the nifty action sequences a bit more. Last edited by undeadben on Mon Jul 07, 2008 2:17 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Jedi General
 Posts: 2485 Location: Tucson, AZ |
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I've never seen the original OVA, but I've been interested in it for some time. So, I decided to give the first episode of Decode a look. The animation was pretty good, but not great, and the character designs aren't half-bad either. I was enjoying the episode too, but after spoiler[the boy was killed] something happened. It felt like episode imploded on itself towards the end, as it all of a sudden become painfully boring and predictable. Losing interest before the first episode wasn't even over doesn't bode well as far as my continuing of this this series is concerned. But ... I do like Birdy. I think I'll give the series at least one more episode before I make my final decision. |
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Labbes
 Posts: 890 |
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Without having seen the OVA, I came to this series after reading the Star Crossed Anime Blog, where he listed it as his most anticipated show this season. Our tastes overlap a lot of times, so I went watching it.
Birdy isn't really deep, has meaning or whatever, but it's a fun show with great action sequences, beautiful (But not moe! Hurray!) character designs and some interesting concepts, even if you probably have seen all those "concepts" elsewhere before. I am really curious to where this will go, the first and second episodes were really good and show a lot of promise. Maybe I'm more lucky with the summer shows of my choice than with the spring shows of choice
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Kruszer
 Posts: 7994 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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I'm also following the show as well. I was a fan of the original OVA and so when I saw this had come out a a few weeks ago I was very happy. The show's animation style reminds me a lot of Noein.
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Dorcas_Aurelia
 Posts: 5344 Location: Philly |
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My friend showed me the first episode the other day. It looks like a very fun show. The one down side: the human form Birdy's partner was using reminds me of Leeron.
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Truered
 Posts: 515 Location: Uni |
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Me too 
I've never seen the original series or manga but I thought I'd give it a go. I watched the first two episodes in one sitting. Half way into the first episode I was thinking of it as "Witchblade lite"- less humour, less action, less cleavage  However it's a pretty fun show and I'm going to carry on watching it.
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undeadben
Posts: 1212 Location: West Texas |
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Yay, someone finally released episode 2 in a format other than a really badly encoded mp4.
Good episode. It slows down the pacing at the beginning allowing Senkawa some time to at least catch up to what is going on with him. Although it doesn't look like he's to the stage where he accepts or can even cope. Which is understandable, I mean not many will just accept, spoiler["I'm sorry we broke you're body and killed you, but in the mean time we put you in this girl's body, so you have to share until we fix the body we broke." ] So it slows down in that part, and while that is going on it also sets up a couple things and a couple names are mentioned that will be important later (you'll know the names if you're seen the OAV). That and we do get a bit of a fight near the end to add some action. Nothing special yet, but it does look like the show is setting up for some more interesting moments. I hope the show is subbed less sporadically from here on because this still looks to me like one of the more interesting shows of the ones currently running and I do want to keep watching it. |
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Kruszer
Posts: 7994 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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Question: Is this a TV series or an OVA? Because the subbers are sure taking their time between episodes and it's slightly annoying. If it was an OVA it would explain the delay at least.
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Courbet
Posts: 47 |
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TV series I am afraid, and yes they are taking their time, which is slightly irritating as I have been enjoying this series alot so far.
So much so that I have been tempted to watch the older OVA but I dont want to spoil anything for myself, so have managed (just) to resist
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abynormal
 Posts: 427 Location: Louisiana |
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Dang, they killed off a major character in the third episode? I wasn't expecting that. I seem to have underestimated this series.
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Vanthil
Posts: 1 |
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I watched the original OAV, mabye some two years back and absolutely loved it. Way back then there was only a whisper of a second series in the fall of 2008, many (though it didn't seem there were alot of fans then) thought it would never happen.
Since then i have been tracking it; finally it has returned and i can't wait to watch it. Because it is subbed very slowly i have decided to wait until i find all of the subbed episodes to sit down and enjoy it one free night of mine. As i said, in MY opinion i liked it alot, from what you all have said so far it presume the remake should be as good as the old one. I certainly hope so, i can't wait to see it re-vamped. |
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abynormal
Posts: 427 Location: Louisiana |
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I noticed in this episode how annoying Birdy sounds when she's playing Arita. If a real person started talking to me like that, I'd strangle them!
This series continues to surprise me. My first impression was a typical shonen action series with a fanservice-tastic action girl and a whiney loser male lead. While Tsutomu is a little bit of a dishrag, he's not the worst I've ever seen and he actually has a personality. Birdy's costume is skimpy as they come, but fanservicey shots are rare; the direction focuses on Birdy as an action hero rather than a skank. Even the supporting characters are memorable, even if it's just because of their species. |
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Thom_Serveaux
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The thing that nagged me about the OVA was that it seemed unfinished, with far to many unresolved polt elements. Especially concerning Ravi & Gomez. Granted Decode gave us much more background on Birdy's past, but it still seems kind of incomplete. I can only hope that they are planning a Decode 03 (and maybe 04, the way they are going) It certainly seems like they are angling for a sequel....
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