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Chaos;Head Collection – Review

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Chaos;Head Collection - Review 1Title: Chaos;Head Collection
Encompasses: Complete Series
Published by: Madman Entertainment (Australia/New Zealand), Funimation (North America)
Based on: Visual novel series by 5pb and Nitroplus
Genre: Psychological, Sci-fi, Supernatural, Thriller
Audio: English and Japanese Dubs
Subtitles: English
Aspect Ratio: 1080p High Definition (16:9)
Runtime: 300 Minutes
Classification: M for Animated Violence and Sexual References
Cost: $59.95
Special Thanks: Madman Entertainment for kindly providing me with a copy of this title for review

I have liked to keep the variety of anime I watch open, so on this site you will expect to see everything from anime all about fantasy-action to fan-service. While these series do not always target the widest variety of anime fans, I do have a soft spot for the “Da Vinci Code” sort of anime series, one that focus more on developing a show you will constantly need to use your brain in order to understand and keep track of. Perhaps the most memorable that comes to mind is of Ghost Hound, released by Siren Visual in the ANZ region which worked well as a psychological thriller and with the exception of the ending, proved to be an intellectually stimulating watch. The Chaos;Head anime series, based off the visual novel series by NitroPlus and 5pb is another such one but takes a different approach to most. So… does this “different approach” contribute or hinder the enjoyability of this series? Does the visual novel to anime port succeed or fail? Read my review to find out!

Chaos;Head Collection - Review 2

Takumi is an anime-obsessed recluse with a fetish for two-dimensional girls. His dirty little cyber secrets land him in real-life trouble after a chat room encounter with the mysterious General leads him to the scene of a gruesome murder. In the blink of an eye, Takumi goes from a caffeine-addicted gamer to a paranoid murder suspect caught up in something called the New Generation madness. Between the police and a gang of girls with giant holographic swords, someone is watching his every move. As the world constructed around him begins to unravel, Takumi will discover that nothing – not even his own life – is what it appears to be. Welcome to Chaos Head. Can you survive reality?

So yes, the big twist about this more intellectual series is that it features your common male protagonist (Takumi), who skips school, has bad grades, spends all days playing games BUT seems to have numerous female characters flocking to him which results in many potential romances from an early stage – not all of which fortunately results in girls fighting over the one guy. The thing that sets him apart is that he suffers from frequent delusions, often resulting from harmless things such as his favourite anime character resuming humanoid form and interacting/flirting with him to much worse later in the show. Despite his stereotypical traits, he is infact the most interesting character of the show and does have a lot to offer in regards to the storyline.

Chaos;Head Collection - Review 3

So the storyline follows Takumi as he becomes involved in a series of “New Gen” murders through a mysterious website link showing him a photo of the murders taking place days prior to the event. Having actually witnessed one of these events occurring – involving a rather gruesome stabbing of a man with spikes, he notices a pink-haired girl standing next to the corpse covered in blood. The next day he finds that she is a classmate and not only that but she has been best friends with him for many years. From there the mystery continues as there is a larger scheme than just the murders, with detectives after him, fellow school students wielding invisible swords that cannot be seen…. and perhaps there is more to the delusions than what was shown at first glance.

The core storyline itself is pretty good but it is evident that content was condensed and/or lost when it came to the visual novel to anime porting, as going from the length of Nitroplus titles I have actually read, they are sufficiently long. In this regard, while the storyline is very ambitious and actually enjoyable if you spend the effort in fully embracing the story. Alas, the concepts rushed by so fast I found myself re-watching full episodes due to lack of time spent properly explaining the concepts in (what I would consider) a suitable manner.

Chaos;Head Collection - Review 4

Despite the interesting protagonists, the same cannot be said for the other female characters, most of which have an air of mystery to them which is never really lifted by the end of the series. The main female character in this show is Rimi Sakihata who is the “pink-haired mystery girl” and receives decent character development throughout the series and every time they feed you a little bit of information on her, it makes you want to find out more. Unfortunately the other five girls are present and just fill their roles while leaving more questions than answers. You first meet Yua Kusunoki and Nanami Nishijou in the earlier episodes and after events they sort of drop out of the plot until the end, and even then their inclusion is not fully purposeful like the others. The other three Ayase Kishimoto, Sena Aoi and Kozue Orihara hold more weighting to the second half of the show, and while they provide incite to the plot… their background stories felt really tacked on and could have been worked with a lot better.

I would be interested in reading the original source visual novel, which I believe may be released by Jast USA in the future as the plot itself shows much promise, but perhaps due to the episode limit they were only able to deliver a somewhat above average viewing experience that given time to span out character development and the storyline itself could have made it one of the better anime series I have watched so far this year. To put it simply, the core storyline and concepts were thumbs up, actual implementation was so-so and character development was unfortunately a thumbs down.

Chaos;Head Collection - Review 5

I was fortunate enough to get my hands on the Blu-ray edition of the series and while it was nothing stellar I was more than pleased with the design and animation quality presented to me. The design studio was Madhouse which has been behind several other “uniquely” designed titles including The Tatami Galaxy and Chaos;Head and delivered something respective of the original visual novel source – in terms of both environment and character designs. The character designs might not be to everyones tastes, but I was satisfied with them – alongside the environment aesthetics which alternated between being sufficiently details and barren corridors – for which more work could have been put into them on the studios part.

The show comes with a creative soundtrack that is sizable and able to reflect the ever changing moods and delusions the series throws at the viewer. The shows opening sequence titled F.D.D by Kanako Ito provides a J-Rock inspired track that suits the tone of the series and while coupled with some more basic animation, had that enjoyable visual effect to it. On the other hand and disappointingly, the ending sequence entitled Super Special by Seira Kagami contains only basic and bland animation, coupled with a song that does not suit the rest of the show.

Funimation who originally released this series to the North American market also provided a full-English dub alongside the Japanese one, and while having listened to both I am unable to make up my mind on personal preference HOWEVER given the complexity of the plot I would strongly advise at least trying the English dub first unless you are proficient in Japanese. The English dub has some good cast members – most notable being Todd Haberkorn who came to my attention in The Tower of Druaga and provided a voice that fit well to the role of Takumi, Brittney Karbowski as Nanami and Carrie Savage as Rimi Sakihata. The quality was of a consistent standard but in this case I believe would be a matter of both preference and functionality.

Chaos;Head Collection - Review 6

We all like little bonus features in our anime collections, and usually Funimation-released (In North America) series usually throw in some great goodies including artwork, interviews or commentary tracks. Unfortunately there wasn’t anything special in this set, only consisting of  clean opening and ending sequences and trailers for a number of Funimation Entertainment anime series (In the DVD version, these are Madman Entertainment trailers). Given the nature of the series, I would have been interested in hearing the thoughts of the voice cast.

Chaos;Head was to me an interesting and enjoyable anime to watch, however in the end did fall short in a number of areas due to either source material or lack of episodes to give a complete scope of the storyline. I would be very interested in getting my hands on the visual novel and seeing how it shapes up in comparison. Overall though, this is a series you will either enjoy or drop after a few episodes. While developed by a different studio and from memory, a different team entirely – another Nitroplus + 5pb visual novel (Steins;Gate) which takes place in the same universe has since been released in Japan over 24 episodes and has also been acquired for English distribution by the same companies. Alongside reading the visual novel for Chaos;Head, I would be interested in seeing if Steins;Gate fared any better.

Final Score
Storyline / Character Development: B
Design: B-
Music/Voice Acting: B
Personal Preference: B+
Extra Content: C
Overall Score: B

Sam
Sam
Founder of The Otaku's Study. I have been exploring this labyrinth of fandom these last fifteen years, and still nowhere close to the exit yet. Probably searching for a long time to come.
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