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Forum - View topicREVIEW: My-Otome DVD 2
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Unholy_Nny
 Posts: 622 |
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Mai-HiME is one of my favorite anime, but I've only seen an episode or two of Otome.
I plan on picking it up, though, even if it isn't as good. Maybe just because I really like the artbox that comes with the first DVD. (I'm glad I didn't get the ugly box that came with the first HiME DVD and waited for the last DVD's artbox) (Had an arguement with my sister at best buy, she was like "Joooosh, they have a different my-hime artbox than you have, this one is blue!" and I was like "No, that's My-Otome.", "but it says 'My-Hime'!", "No, it says 'My-Hime Z', AKA, My-Otome" and it ended with her shouting "WHATEVER! It's still a different My-Hime box than you have!" and then stomping off to someplace else in the store.) |
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Raven Shinobi
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Haruka has been one of my favorite characters since HiME and was one of the few saving graces of the lacking first volume of Otome, Shizuru is quite cool, but I might be one of the few people who prefer Haruka over her, be it Suzushiro or her other self Armitage. It's sad to hear that the series doesn't get any better in this volume, I love HiME and was looking forward to Otome, but man... The setting is pretty interesting and I love the idea of an alternate universe with returning characters from HiME, but that's what makes the series passable for the most part. The Arika/Nina/Mashiro trio pale in comparison to the Mai/Natsuki/Mikoto one; Arika is cliche and reminds me of Son Gokuu from the original DB with her amazement at every sign of technology and her "grandpa said this" and "grandpa said that" and Nina is bitchy and didn't have any redeeming factors like Natsuki to make her likeable and I hate her character design, and Mashiro, while her personality transformation from what we were used to in HiME was amusing at first, she ended up being more obnoxious than funny, it would've been better if she kept her character from HiME. The music was, so far, the worst of Kajiura's works, I ordered the first soundtrack CD and there were like three songs worth listening to over and over. Hope things will finally get better in the third volume, or else I'm saving the rest for a good bargain price. |
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nkaze
Posts: 30 |
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It get's better. It will shift dramatically in the later volumes, but in a very different fashion than Mai-Hime. The soundtrack also gets a lot better as the series progresses.
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Strephon
Posts: 177 |
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Or "My-Zhime," if you go by Amazon's listing. (To be fair, I can see how you could read it that way if you weren't familiar with the naming convention.) |
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Brians9824
Posts: 281 |
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The show definitely acts like the review thinks it will gradually becoming much darker just like the progression in My-Hime. It takes a bit longer to get to the darkest point then it did in My-Hime though if i recall.
I'm curious to see how the later volumes get reviewed when all is revealed |
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S0litaire
 Posts: 26 Location: Canada |
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Music does improve a lot during the later half, but it's already astounding from the start imo. It is the best aspect of the show for me, although I still enjoyed HiME better in that department too.
The series does take a bit longer to get to the dark part, but that for me was still pretty lousy. I think I was expecting too much, but I still enjoyed the series a lot overall. I think there were just lots of missed opportunities during the series. There were so many times where the mood was just set for something bad to happen, and well ... nothing happened. Episode spoiler[18 (the episode featuring Mashiro / Aoi) was really the only sad episode for me. I thought it was really well done, compared to 17 which tried to be sad - yet felt completely rushed. The writing in episode 18 was amazing as well. ] Am I the only one who didn't really enjoy most of the fights either? Episode 7,10 and the final two were great, but I found the rest lackluster. Not that there was much action in the first place. I can forgive this though, since the fights in Zwei were pretty much awesome. |
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Zalis116
Moderator
 Posts: 6902 Location: Kazune City |
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I also think that things improve in this series right around the episode 8-9 mark (as in, right after this volume), but I don't disagree with the criticism in this review. My-Otome didn't impress me at the start nearly as much as My-Hime did, and I remember "shelving" the series for weeks at a time while this group of episodes was being aired. Some things, particularly the tentacle monster bit, were just so
 -ing that it sapped my will to continue. But I'm glad I did; depending on one's view of how Hime handled certain things, Otome may wind up as the better series. But I also felt like "This is My-Hime Lite, just a cheap cash-in attempt by Sunrise to build a franchise of the My-Hime characters' popularity" at the beginning.
I just had the first 2 DVDs roll in from TRSI, so I haven't had the chance to check out the English dub--still, the Ocean cast grew on me during Hime, so I'm glad to see them back. Interesting that they've got a relative unknown playing Arika. Well, relatively unknown to anyone who didn't see Doki Doki School Hours, anyway. |
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HitokiriShadow
 Posts: 6251 |
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Good call. The early portion of the series was kind of fun, but the latter portion of the show, when it tries to be taken seriously, isn't nearly as good. It's at its best when its just silly and lighthearted. It just doesn't have a good enough cast (or at least not lead characters) to pull things off and even if they did, the later episodes prove that the creators are lacking the skill to pull it off.
Mashiro gets the tiniest of improvements by the end but not nearly enough, she's still a brat. Arika remains the same, there really isn't any change at all; she's just a lousy main character. Nina's character actually takes a turn for the worse as the series progresses. Any progress she makes in the first half of the series is killed in the latter half. In short, the new leads are horrible. There are some decent secondary characters, but they never get the screentime they really deserve.
You might as well stop now, even if there is a tiny bit of improvement in the third volume it goes to hell after that. There was one really good moment in the latter portion of the series (the one S0litaire mentions) but its not nearly enough. Mai Otome is, at best, guilty pleasure fanservice for HiME fans. |
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Randall Miyashiro
 Posts: 2451 Location: A block away from Golden Gate Park |
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Okay Zalis you convinced me to continue collecting this series despite how disappointed I've been with the first two volumes. I considered shelving this series as well since the first few episodes seemed much weaker than Hime's intro. I completely agree with the less than gripping new characters compared to the dynamics that the core three girls had going in the beginning of Hime. |
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Brians9824
Posts: 281 |
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The series definitely isn't as strong as My-Hime but i still enjoyed it quite a bit. Partially due the fact it has a much bigger sci-fi feel to it which i tend to enjoy alot.
The show definitely picks up at the 3rd and 4th disc but they dump ALOT on you at the very end which is its weakest point. I'd highly suggest anyone on the fence with this to simply rent it and check out the 1st 3 discs. You can always sign up for free netflix trial and have more then enough time to watch 3-4 discs of this series. |
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