~Simulcast~ Episodes 1 – 7 First Impressions
Simulcast by: Siren Visual (Australia and New Zealand)
Based On: Original Title
Director: Keiichi Satou
Produced by: Sunrise / Bandai Visual / MBS
Audio: Japanese Dubs
Subtitles: English
Quality: 360p, 480p and 720p (Subscribers Only)
Runtime: Approximately 24 minutes per episode.
Cost: For a higher quality viewing of this series, an ANN Australia subscription is required.
Classification: I have no classification data for this series.
Blurb: “I thought I had seen it all until I saw this series, the unique plot matched with some creative CGI designs that makes it an overall enjoyable and addictive watch. This series showed me there was still more for the Super Hero genre to offer.”
Special Thanks: Special thanks goes to Siren Visual for providing members of their Facebook group, including myself, with a 3 month beta account for their video services.
During the Victorian Supanova event, Siren Visual announced a first for the Australian public, their deal to simulcast anime series in collaboration with AnimeNewsNetwork Australia and Japanese anime publishers. As the pioneers for legimate and legal simulcast anime in Australia (Something that has been available in other countries for a while now), they evidently had to choose titles that would appeal to viewers. With that they chose two titles, [C]: Control: The Money and Soul of Possibility, a Noitamina title which I shall review at a later date, and Tiger & Bunny, a super hero series that takes the genre to a whole new level. Caught your interest? Read more to find out what Tiger & Bunny is about, alongside with my thoughts on the series.
Sternbild City is home to people called “Next,” who use their special abilities to protect the people as superheroes. These heroes solve cases and save lives so they can wear sponsor logos or acquire “hero points.” Their activities are documented on the popular program “Hero TV,” which picks the “King of Heroes” in a yearly ranking. The veteran hero Wild Tiger has always preferred to work alone, but now he’s been assigned the rookie Barnaby Brooks Jr., who has a different perspective on being a superhero. - Taken from ANN Synopsis
Whilst [C]: Control held quite a bit of interest for me initially, with Super Hero series being rather dry recently, I was extremely hesitant when I started watching this. Of course, within a few moments of watching this, it was evident that they have tried to warp the genre a bit, and instead made saving people into a TV show instead of the generic “Defeat arch nemesis” sort of plot-line. Even at one point in the first episode, they point out bluntly that the old style of super heroes are long gone.
The setup for this series is introduced in the first few minutes. The ‘Next’ take part in a game where they attempt to prevent crime in Sternbild City using their super human powers from increased stats to more magical oriented powers, more or less the works of at least one or two much beloved childrens superheroes each. As shown in the image above, capturing a criminal and saving people earns the superhero extra points, and as shown throughout the episodes, tasks such as getting to the scene first can net them extra points as well. As the synopsis above states, at the end of the season, highest points win. The interesting component in the storyline that is noticeable right from the opening is that the super heroes are also advertising revenue, with companies such as SoftBank, Bandai, Pepsi Max and so forth having advertising plastered all over them.
Introducing the main character, Wild Tiger (Kotetsu T. Kaburagi), with the power to increase his abilities 100x for five minutes, however he is now just a washed up hero who still carries out his sworn mission but does not have the fanbase he once had. To make matters worse, his company was no longer able to remain in business and his new company has placed him working alongside Barnaby, a new-age super hero who doesn’t hide his identity and has the same abilities as him. Other super heroes don’t play as big a role in the first episodes, however include an idol and the obvious inclusion of the Champion character. The relationship between Tiger and Barnaby is shown as strained, with Tiger holding more idealistic super hero beliefs of old (Hidden identity, people before strategy etc) whilst Barnaby, being new to the Hero TV, holds new-age beliefs such as a completely open identity, being over-analytical and serious. They personalities, whilst clashing, are very interesting to watch and do not feel like forced comedy.
The episodes are nothing overly complicated at the start, and act more to set the scene of the series. Episode 1 introduces the “Next”, “Hero TV” and the protagonists who at the end, find out that they must now work together. The next few episodes focus on the both of them with backstories, ideals and their dysfunctional nature when working together drawn to light. As the episodes progress, more heroes are brought to the attention of the viewer, and their backstories, however at the point of Episode 7, whilst no character is excluded from the storyline, only Blue Rose (Karina Lyle) and Fire Emblem (Nathan Seymore) have much of their storyline and personality revealed.
The storyline is a good mix of seriousness, battle scenes and what I perceive as slight humor. Most episodes have the heroes fighting against some threat, whether it be a bomb threat, hostage taking or other disasters, however the plot and character development unfolds during or more often, outside them. There are also some more light hearted episodes such as Episode 5 ~Go for broke!~ which as Tiger hunting for a birthday gift for Barnaby after misunderstanding his mood, but even then they do their best to add enough action to make it feel less of a filler episode and more in line with the super-hero theme of the storyline.
The storyline, despite perhaps having a slower start to actual plot development as I would have liked, with the first major storyline plot outside of the Hero TV battles starting at Episode 6 with a mysterious murder and a link to Barnaby’s past, the first seven episodes have proven to be an extremely enjoyable watch, and hopefully the plotline uncovered in Episodes 6 and 7 will lead to some interesting plots in future episodes. The character development will no doubt continue and I hope they will focus on other characters relatively soon, as some of the ones not covered to such an extent so far seem to be rather interesting.
The best way to describe the design quality of this episode would be with this emoticon “O_O”. The design quality in battles is less anime styled and more leaning towards a 3D animation with both Eastern and Western CGI styles, but obviously retaining its anime charm. The character designs when outside of the battle environment consist of high quality anime style graphics and are some of the best I have seen in a fair while. Almost all backdrops in this anime have some sort of 3D effect to them, however unlike the character designs in battle, they more or less retain their anime charm. I never thought I would say this for the first simulcast anime I would review, but I am actually disappointed that this is only available online. Personally at least, this is a series with design quality (At least evident from the quality I see on the web viewer) that I would have much rather had in my Blu-ray player watching it on the biggest TV I have. I will spare my final judgement for when the series is at its end, as series have been known to decrease in quality as it progresses, however the design quality I could see from the 720p viewing mode was excellent!
Opening Theme
Orion wo Nazoru by UNISON SQUARE GARDEN
The first few seconds let me know that this song was going to meet my high expectations. The song is of a good pace with decent lyrics and UNISON SQUARE GARDEN doing an absolutely great job singing. But what is even better is the animation. I will be honest, it didn’t meet all my usual criteria, but it had the feeling of a Super Hero series opening with all the characters super hero outfits and advertising being shown, but as well was the characters portraits appearing in the comic style.
Ending Theme
Hoshi no Sumika by Aobozu
As usual, the Ending theme falls to the shadow of the opening theme, but I will give credit where it is due and say that the song used is actually decent and almost up to the same standard as Orion wo Nazoru. It was well paced and had some good vocals from Aobozu. The issue was with the animation, and it still felt like another normal ending with Tiger and Barnaby walking towards the camera and shots of the city. It looks nice visually, but it is pretty lackluster in terms of making it stand out.
In terms of actual music in the series, there is a very nice set of music used throughout the episodes and it is not underpowered by the sound effects or voice acting. As a lot of the first seven episodes took part in more intense environments, it allowed the series to show off the strong and powerful songs they had at their disposal, and it worked well at setting the environment. In terms of voice acting, I am not as knowledgeable with Japanese voice actors/actresses as I am English ones, however as protagonists, both Hiroaki Hirata and Masakazu Morita do a very good job at voicing their roles, and most, if not all of the characters do well at adapting to the mood of the series and suiting their characters personalities.
Personally, I stand by my comment in the blurb….. this is a series that there is still more for the Super Hero genre to offer. I have never really been a big fan of Super Hero series to begin with, preferring a nice big manga volume over a slimmer comic magazine, however as any youth in Australia, I was exposed to the likes of Batman (I used to have a friend who was addicted to it), Superman and so forth. Whilst these were all good in their initial formats, they have been adapted into many spinoff series and movies that to me, have under performed and completely ruined my faith in it. Heck, last week one of the television stations was advertising a series that was going to be something along the lines of a real life ‘The Incredibles’! This series on the other hand as shown that there are still people in the world that can write unique super hero plots, even if some of the characters abilities are taken from other series, and make them stand out from the crowd.
I will be keeping an eye on this series, and be doing another review at the 2/3rds point in the series, so from now until then, I hope this series continues to impress me.
Final Score
Storyline: A
Character Development: B+
Design: A
OP/ED Themes: A
Music: A-
Voice Acting: A
Personal Opinion: A
Overall Score: A
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