Forum - View topicNoir vs. Madlax vs. Cazador.
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lhernan02
Posts: 196 |
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While some of this ground was covered in the earlier Noir thread, since that dealt primarily with Noir and Madlax, I thought it would be interesting to see what people who had seen all of Bee-Train's Girls with Guns Trilogy though of them.
Personally I rank them: Noir, Cazador, Madlax Noir just clicked, it was a fun action romp (with some rather heavy, but fitting, moments thrown in). The characters were likeable and well developed by the end, the action, while impossible, was fun, and the show as a whole moved at a very good pace. While it does have some flaws it is still worth watching again and unlike some people I think the episodic nature of the early episodes serves it well (but I actually prefer the episodic beginning of Kiddy Grade to the more coherent ending episodes, so take my view with a grain of salt). Cazador, while highly derivative of the two earlier series and sharing some of Madlax's weaknesses, was still fun and kept you wanting to stick with the girls on their quest, the side characters in this series were the best, and most developed, of the three (although I found L.A.'s speech pattern very annoying), and the ending, while flawed, was in character. Madlax, just did not do anything for me. I found it trying too hard to be heavy and deep, and the Deus Ex Machina ending just killed it for me spoiler[I hate reset endings since I think they are an artistic cop out and Madlax did not change my opinion], although it did prepare me for the more fantasy aspecs of Cazador. As far as the comments made in the earlier thread about animation quality, since I have been an animation fan for most of my life and have seen animation from over a dozen countries dating back to the 30's I am rather forgiving of quality and none of these series are bad enough to warrant me knocking them down for it (I didn't even register a quality difference between the three). |
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Thanatos01s2
 Posts: 231 |
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I just made a similar topic to this, you should check it out:
animenewsnetwork.com/bbs/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=50534 |
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HitokiriShadow
 Posts: 6251 |
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He said he already read that and this was based on that thread. Still, I think the existing thread would be better for this discussion and either the OP or a MOD can change the title to reflect it. Or not. |
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chicoandkirara
Posts: 20 |
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i do think this is similar to the other thread (which i have read thru) and OP acknowledges that. HOWEVER, old threads usually get bogged down and off topic... i don't understand this website's obsession with over moderating. i get that without some rules there would be a bunch of idiots posting "anime is gay" or something unclever 30 times a day. but the moderating on this site is borderline censorship. the OP put out an idea and explained his/her thoughts clearly and asked for others' input. since when is that a crime?!? i am fairly new to anime and was hoping to find a community where i could comfortably ask questions and talk to others with similar interests. whenever i find a topic of interest, i find that the thread has usually gone way off topic and people are absorbed in their own conversations at that point and ignore whatever newcomers have to say (unless it is to ridicule them). i have thought about starting new threads so i can talk with people about the anime i enjoy. but never do because i figure i will just be berated for not having gone through a year's worth of old topics first! 
anyways, sorry for that rant. but this site has been such a disappointment to me. |
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chicoandkirara
Posts: 20 |
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i dont troll, thanks though. and i do care about intelligence. i don't care if one liner threads get locked. but this thread was totally coherent and informative. i know i jumped the gun here, but over the last few weeks i have seen plenty to be annoyed with and threads i was interested be redirected to places i didn't want to go. i just think it's stupid. anyhoo i wont add any more here so that maybe for once a thread stays on topic. to the OP: sorry, didn't mean to hijack your thread! i actually opened this thread because i am halfway through Noir, and thoroughly enjoying it! i hope your thread doesnt get locked or redirected to the other thread on this, because i would love to read more about people's opinions of Madlax and Cazador, which i know nothing about. if someone likes one of the three, would you recommend they see them all? i think the music in Noir is amazing. Do Madlax and Cazador follow suit? [EDIT: Do NOT double-post; use the edit button if you wish to add something to the last post in the thread. ~Zalis] |
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ShadowTrader
 Posts: 231 Location: NJ |
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Really? I'm half way through Noir as well, and its just not doing it for me, I feel like giving up and just going on to something better. If Noir is the best of the three, as is suggested, then I really don't have an incentive to watch the other two. What really bothers me about this anime, is that I just can't make a connection to any of the characters, I believe they are too rigid, and the anime tries too hard to be mysterious and takes too long to get any depth. spoiler[ I don't undesrtand what motivates Chloe to help Noir? ] For me anyway, the characters are just too underdeveloped. |
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Veoryn87
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Noir was enjoyable most of the time for me. I thought the last several episodes were the best part of the series. I'll agree that the soundtrack is amazing. I especially love Canta Per Me and Salva Nos. I haven't seen Madlax unfortunately. I saw the first four episodes of El Cazador, but I didn't like them so I stopped. I guess I just didn't like the light-heartedness. I also think my problem was that I was expecting an action series when I didn't get one at all. It seemed like an action scene was going to pop up at any time...... But none ever came, and the ones that were there didn't impress me. I probably should have continued, but too late now.
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Keonyn
 Subscriber Posts: 5567 Location: Coon Rapids, MN |
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Well, I would hate to be accused of censorship or taking the role of the man to push everyone down or whatever accusations seem to be directed my way as a mod, but I'm going to have to put a stop to this one. If you want to bring up concerns regarding the moderating on this site then please do so in the technical forum where such concerns regarding the site are supposed to go. If you need to apologize to the original poster then you've already gone too far. There was no need to drag this post in to the mud like this.
Sorry, but I'm going to have to clean this one up. I guess I'm representing the evil empire or something due to that, but I'm sure the OP would appreciate having his thread back. If you do have concerns regarding the moderating on the site then feel free to express that concern on the technical forum or even send me a PM directly with your specific concerns and I'll be happy to address them. We're not looking to censor people and, believe it or not, we don't log on everyday just salivating at the thought of locking threads. Now, further discussion on this matter should be directed to the appropriate forum or through private channels with myself or another mod or one of the admins. Thanks. Now, here's your thread back lhernan02, heh, enjoy. |
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lhernan02
Posts: 196 |
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@Keonyn: Thanks, I was actually going to request a thread clean up.
@Veoryn87: I recommend you give Cazador a second look, the action is not as hot and heavy as the other two, but when it arrives it is quite good. I'll leave it to others to recommend you watch Madlax, I won't. @ShadowTrader: If you consider this a flaw then it is one all three series share, you won't get any decent backstory until about the last third of each series. I personally found Noir and Cazador enjoyable enough to wait for the eventual developent. @chicoandkirara: Of the three Noir's music is still my favorite. Cazador ranks second with a similar classical-techno groove (although in this case favoring latin guitar). I honestly don't remember Madlax's music, but in the other thread it was highly spoken of. |
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HitokiriShadow
Posts: 6251 |
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Okay, so I guess we're sticking with this topic. That's fine, I just thought it seemed a bit redundant.
I rank them Madlax = El Cazador >> Noir I'm going to have to strongly disagree with the OP that Madlax's ending was spoiler[a deus ex machina and a reset. The supernatural elements were all present and provided a perfectly valid reason for what happened. And it was not a reset. That isn't even a matter of opinion, you are simply wrong there. A reset means everything went back to how it was before. But it didn't. A number of characters remained dead, the surviving characters remembered everything and were changed people, and the books were either gone or back where they belonged, I don't recall which. That is not a reset by any stretch.] I really enjoyed Madlax's story and thought it had a strong secondary cast, even if the two main characters left something to be desired. On the flip side, El Cazador had a strong primary cast and a decent secondary cast but a weak and poorly executed plot. El Cazador's leads were by far the strongest of the three Bee Train series. Ellis and Nadie had the best chemistry and were the most entertaining to watch and it depresses me that no one was seconded them in the Best Duo thread. L.A. was an interesting nemesis and I thought they handled him pretty well, but they didn't do as much with Blue Eyes as I would have liked while Ricardo was generic and dull and Livio or whateve her name was cute but that was about it. The villain... ugh. He was on his way to being the best of the Bee Train villains (not a hard job; Noir's villain was barely present and Madlax's was just silly) but I hated what they did with him right at the end. The actual story was decent for the most part, but the handling was just really sloppy. On the positive side, the flashbacks were almost non-existent. Noir was okay. Decent characters, decent story, solid soundtrack (particularly Canta Per Me and Salve Nos) and visuals aside from the annoying lack of blood. It was a decent series, but nothing more.
Er, is this referring to some of the deleted posts? Because that's more than a bit of an overreaction to my post. |
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Boomer
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If Noir is not doing it for you in the first half, rest assured that it is not going to in the second either. However, you do have an incentive to watch Madlax because it is far better than Noir, especially in the area of character development. Don't listen to its critics, go ahead and watch it. You may be pleasantly surprised. |
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Veoryn87
Posts: 808 |
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I disagree. I think the second half is the best part of the series. The story and action really heats up. I know quite a few people who thought Noir was kinda bleh in the beginning, but had a good end. |
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Kruszer
 Posts: 7988 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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Agreed that Noir second half is better but the show had me completely hooked with the running gun battle in the construction site in the first episode so it's hard to come up with an adjective that denotes something that is better than "awesome".
 Spectacular maybe?
So yeah Noir is still the undefeated champ in these matches. Madlax was only just an extremely little bit less enjoyable due to being a little more rooted in the supernatural. The action was more frequent and intense but lacked some of the inventiveness of Noir's Kirika and how she could find a way to kill a man with just about any object known to man and overcome her injuries in order to do the job. El Cazador de la Bruja on the other hand is rather unremarkable aside from the good two main characters. The story is rather dull, there was too much humor, the action didn't blow me away like the other two, and the conclusion was rather disappointing. It was worth a watch but nowhere near as good as the other two and I don't think I'd ever rewatch it. So in conclusion it would be: Noir > Madlax > El Cazador de la Bruja Last edited by Kruszer on Fri Mar 23, 2012 2:35 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Raftina
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Taking a somewhat different approach to the largely plot-based comparisons in the preceding posts:
One thing that really leads me to prefer the later BeeTrain girls with guns titles is the different main characters' characterization. More specifically, the later titles main characters are more conventionally likable, whereas the earlier titles are more... out there. Take the tougher, more normal girl of the duo: Mireille is a cold, calculating assassin for hire. The missions she takes are little pastiches that pass her life by, with her sometimes happening to take a sort of academic interest as she completes her assignment. Madlax is also a mercenary for hire. However, she takes a more personal interest in the missions, often going out of her way to help her client. The story also plays up the angle where she is a product of her environment, whereas Mireille lives in the shadows of an otherwise normal society. Madlax also has a more dreamy and neutral outlook rather than Mireille's jaded coldness. As for Nadie, she tends to refuse to kill. She goes out of her way to help strangers. Whereas even Madlax is often detached, Nadie connects quite well to the people she encounters. As for personality, Nadie can be downright goofy, and she likes to make sarcastic asides--it's someone that a person might even want to befriend in real life. Then we come to Daisy-023. Granted that there's only a single episode, so she isn't nearly as developed as the other three. However, what we do see would place her as a straight hero and a good comrade--the sort of protagonist you'd see in much more idealistic shows. Now take the quieter, more dreamy member: Kirika is a cold, emotionless killer who seems to exist for the sole purpose of killing a lot of men in suits and sunglasses. Margaret is a relatively normal girl living in a relatively normal society. However, her constantly spaced out demeanor makes her difficult to scrutinize and approach. It is nevertheless a great progression toward the conventionally likable like an almost robotic killer like Kirika. Then we have Ellis. Ellis gets into verbal spars with Nadie right from the start. She does have the same dreamy outlook from time to time, but she reacts to her surroundings in a much more relatable way. It feels like she is a real, if somewhat strange, girl rather than a soulless automaton like Kirika and sometimes even Margaret. Lastly, we have Daisy's clone. Again, she has much less screen time compared to the other three because of the title's limitations. From what we can see, she shares the dreamy outlook of the other three, but we get the excuse that she is physically frail rather than mysterious circumstances. Otherwise, she is a perfectly normal girl. I sometimes like to watch strange characters, but most of the time, I prefer more conventionally likable protagonists. Noir crosses the line far too much with a pair of thoroughly cold-blooded assassins for hire. It is by far my least favorite--actually, I disliked it so much that I dropped it. Madlax was strange and difficult to get into. Cazador, however, draws me right in with protagonists whose tale immediately sparks my interest, even if the initial premise is as mysterious as the other two. As for the Homecoming, well, it's only a less than thirty minute commitment, and I already knew much of the background. |
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Megiddo
 Posts: 8360 Location: IL |
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For me, I would put Noir on top, Madlax in the middle, and El Cazador waaaaaaaaaay down below those two. For reference, that's the same order that I watched them in.
The reason why I would rate El Cazador down so much is that there are very few episodes where important stuff happens. Almost the entirety of the series is episodic with Ellis and Nadie roaming into a town, fighting some people (or getting a creepy scene with the gray haired kid), possibly working for Amigo Tacos, and then they continue heading south. Literally 90% of the episodes can be summed up in that fashion. There was so little plot movement that I just couldn't take it any more midway through the series. Madlax fares a bit better in that regard. While there are certainly episodes of episodic nature, I never really felt as irritated with the lack of progression like I did with El Cazador. I personally didn't like the ending at all, and it's possible that if the last couple of episodes were a strong finish then I could have placed it above Noir. Meanwhile in Noir almost every episode seems to put Mirelle and Kirika one step closer to the Soldats organization and towards uncovering the secrets of the past. I also feel that Noir had the strongest ending of the three and also had the better choreographed gunfights. I also felt that Noir had the most vibrant setting, laying out the beauty of France and Sicily. And I'm pretty sure it goes without saying that Noir has the best OST as well. |
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