Seraph of the End: Vampire Reign

Episodes 1-2

Seraph of the End: Vampire Reign shows that you don't have to be smart to be entertaining.

The first two episodes can easily be divided by theme, based on the word each one keeps using over and over. The first is FAMILY while the second is FRIEND. Protagonist Yu Hyakuya was abandoned by his parents when he was a child. Despite his initial reticence, he forms a new FAMILY with the other children at the orphanage. When vampires release a plague that kills everyone over the age of 13, Yu buckles down with his FAMILY to cope with their new position as livestock. However, Yu's new FAMILY – including his best friend Mikaela – are killed during an escape attempt. The boy, wandering desolate through the wilderness, swears eternal vengeance on the vampire overlords. Fortunately, he's picked up by a friendly troupe of human vampire hunters, who immediately declare him the prophesied chosen one who they will use to DEFEAT THE VAMPIRES. Yeah, it's that type of show.

The show's Achilles' Hell is its dialogue. It hits the appropriate emotional beats, but the characters always sound like they're reciting bullet points on the episode's outline rather than anything an actual human would say. “I hate people who can't work on a team,” says this show's Roy Mustang equivalent. “But you are the one who has the most trouble working on a team,” retorts another character. Captain Smirkface, decimated by this accurate summation of his character flaws, sulks away.

So Seraph of the End immediately abandons its potentially intriguing kid society premise to place Yu in a more standard school setting and special teen narrative. It turns out that substantial portions of humanity survived the disease for yet unknown reasons, and are actively repelling the vampire threat. Still, it's not as bad as it could have been. He's still a member of the Japanese Imperial Demon Army, and nothing too obnoxious in terms of Anime School Comedy has happened yet. Besides its visuals, Seraph of the End benefits most from its snappy pacing. Nothing lasts long enough to get boring, which is good because “not boring” is pretty much all that this show has going for it so far.

The series isn't even trying to pretend that Mikaela won't show up again on the vampires's side, to the point where it's kind of hilarious. He's all over the opening and the promotional materials. I wonder how many episodes they're going to delay this reveal? They're clearly going for shonen rivalry bromance ala Naruto/Sasuke from Naruto and Lelouch/Suzaku from Code Geass, but with the character designs slightly prettified for the ladies. Yu's most prominent character trait is that he's irrationally angry all of the time, but so far I just find it amusing. The vampires in general are super fey. Ferid Bathory looks like a Castlevania villain, and they haven't yet been skeevy about the underage-looking female vampires. I'd prefer that this doesn't go all Dance of the Vampire Bund on me.

I think that this will be a hit – Seraph of the End is a very conventional show, but it's just stylish and entertaining enough to stand out from the crowd. Visually, it's excellent. The painted backgrounds give the show a lot of character and are surprisingly compatible with the character models. The character designs are subtly expressive and look great in action without being overdesigned. The series' direction does a lot to elevate the material. Quite a bit of characterization comes through in how characters are framed, like in the way Yu bangs his head against the window while trapped in class or how he throws himself into his rescuer's arms after escaping. These details do more to endear him to me than any number of hackneyed lines about FRIENDS and FAMILY. This is Daisuke Tokudo's first turn directing a series, and I look forward to seeing more from him in the future. For fans of polished animation, there's also plenty of that, with Yu's fight against the escaped vampire at the end of the second episode being the standout sequence.

I also like this show because it's so easy to pretend that it's a Shin Megami Tensei anime. Look at that opening. An army of caped teens who use a variety of weapons to hunt demons in post-apocalyptic Japan? I'd play the heck out of that JRPG. In fact, I think I have.

Grade: B

Seraph of the End: Vampire Reign is currently streaming on Funimation.

Gabriella Ekens studies film and literature at a US university. Follow her on twitter.