Title: The Sacred Blacksmith
Alternative Title: ブラックスミス
Published by: Madman Entertainment (Australia and New Zealand), Funimation (US)
Based on: Light Novel series by Isao Miura
Audio: English and Japanese dubs
Subtitles: English
Aspect Ratio: Anamorphic Widescreen (16:9)
Runtime: 300 minutes
Cost: $59.95
Classification: This title has been rated M for Animated Violence, Sexual References and Nudity.
Blurb: It has been common place to have female protagonists as warriors who are more or less pathetic at battle and rely on their strong “prince” character to save them…. this is more or less the same situation…. althrough with surprisingly less nudity and sexual references then I expected. Whilst the story is lackluster, it makes up for it with some really good quality graphics and music, and a voice acting cast which is also rather good.
Special Thanks: Special thanks goes to the PR team at Madman Entertainment for providing me with a review sample of this title.
This title is a generic fighting anime with a few added twists into it, some of which work (such as people turning into swords) and some that do not (Introducing characters who seem to be main characters starting character development and then dropping them from the cast). However, despite the initial bad reviews when I chose to get this title as I thought it would be one that would have me questioning if the average review scores were correct. To see if I was right, then read on for my review of The Sacred Blacksmith.
Can a naive knight overcome the power of a devil sword?
Cecily is a blushing knight in shining armour. Unfortunately, it seems most battles end with her as the damsel in distress. Her lack of skill and distaste for violence make her an unlikely heroine – until the brooding blacksmith Luke comes to her aid, using his pwoerful magic to forge blades of supernatural strength. Cecily wields this sacred steel and charges forth to face a new threat. A cloaked fiend is unleashing demons upon the land, and though he lurks in shadows, the villain is much closer than Cecily can imagine.
This story takes place in a land where people can sign over their souls and make a demon contract, allowing them near infinite levels of power to wreak the havoc they desire and has been used in several wars and disagreements over the years. With the military unable to do much, they do the best they can, although some people have other ideas. Incomes Cecily, a young warrior who decided to follow her fathers path in the knighthood and witnesses a man in black wielding a sword that easily slices through her families blade. Incomes Luke, a dashing young blacksmith who weilds a blade that was stronger than hers by far. So what does she do? Stalk him for a new one!
Someone else who thinks the Broken Giant’s Knife from Zelda:OoT is an epic weapon
The plotline feels all over the place, and whilst there is the continual storyline of Cecily, Luke and Lisa, alongside the sword person Aria going up against people who have made the demon pacts and do threaten the livelihood of those in the area, there are also a number of just random filler plotlines which take up quite a few episodes. For example, there is one episode dedicated to Luke neglecting Lisa only have a heartwarming ending with him buying her a gift for the first time. The other major filler plot, taking two of the episodes, is when the gang gets attacked by girls wielding other demon swords and they fight and help them….. This would be fine for a storyline that is longer then 12 episodes, but I felt annoyed by the number of times they tried to escape the main plot.
Obligatory loli cutesy fanservice included
Despite the original impression the series gives off, the series isn’t that heavy in fanservice as a number of other similar titles have been the last couple of years. Okay, so you are given the boobage nudity from the start of the second episode, but besides that, there is nothing that I would consider too extreme. To be honest, I think more cutesy fanservice is placed on Lisa during the course of the series, as for the most part, she doesn’t have a major role except being there and acting cute (Okay, and summoning a big ball of fire to create katana’s).
The storyline isn’t bad in this series, but by no means is it good overall. If the story focused on the main plotline more instead of deviating I think this would have been a very interesting read with the whole demon contract storyline going on. The character development is pretty unique for some characters, however as well for the most part, the characters plots are usually generic and nothing too unique.
Despite the very average writing in the series, the design quality is actually rather good most of the time. Primarily it is the environment designs that are of main interest here as they are always vibrant and detailed. The best example of how good the backdrop design quality is, look at the first image right at the top of this review about the summary. When they do the katana formation, their magic circle and environment around it is extremely well done, especially with a lot of so called magic circles being done cheaply and quickly in a lot of series I have seen lately, it is good to see how much detail has been put into one scene. In terms of character designs, I would call them above average. Sadly, they didnt seem to realize that characters usually change clothes, so most characters with the exception of one or two scenes, will be wearing the same clothes that they started out with…. quite funny considering Cecily questions Lisa about her choice of clothes and she responds that she has three sets of the same clothes that she rotates…. give me a break.
Opening Theme
JUSTICE of LIGHT by Mayumi Gojo
This opening song is rather enjoyable. I do like how they have started out slow and progressively built up the tune to the song. Mayumi Gojo does a good job with the singing and suits the song well. The lyrics are also more then suitable to the series. The animation uses all unique animations, introduces the main characters well and is action packed.
Ending Theme
Miracle Happy Day by Aki Toyosaki
Well it is very easy to see within the first five seconds that this has a very loli motif with Lisa as the primary character in this sequence. The lyrics are sung by the Japanese voice actor for Lisa, Aki Toyosaki and features the cutesy tone and lyrics you would expect. Usually I would be indifferent to this ending, but after a wave of boring ending sequences, it was refreshing to see one that actually did something.
The music in this series is of a very good quality and adds to the mood of the series well. Music is present in most of the sequences and are varied in tones to suit the mood, which they do very well. Whilst you don’t usually notice the softer songs, in the times of fighting, the music is powerful and intense. I would have liked a few more fighting themes through, since the few they had were very good.
The voice acting in this series was fairly good. Blake Shepard, who I recall also voiced Akiyuki in Xam’d voices Luke and outdoes his performance in Xam’d. He has a cool and calm voice that is well suited to the personality of his respective character. Monica Rial who voices Lisa is starting to get a bit repetitive in the fact that almost every female child character I have seen in an anime lately seems to be voiced by her. Despite this, I still think her voice is well suited to the character. Anastasia Munoz who voices Aria took a while to grow on me, but her voice was acceptable for the character of her personality. Cherami Leigh who voices Cecily at least does a good job at pretending to be flustered without sounding too fake.
There are some extras included on the second disk, these include:
- Episode Previews……. cause it is beneficial having them once you have watched the episodes…. but they are at least enjoyable to watch.
- Textless Opening
- Textless Ending
- Trailers for Summer Wars, Escaflowne Collection, Scrapped Princess Collection, Fate/Stay Night Collection and Spice and Wolf Season 1
It is nothing that special, but the episode previews, despite how useless they are after watching the entire series are a rather fun watch with the characters babbling among themselves. There is also some rather cute artwork of the four main characters on the reverse of the DVD cover. Also included in at least my copy was a recent copy of Anime Update, Madman’s Anime Magazine.
I won’t say I didnt enjoy the series, cause I did in at least some parts of it, but the storyline needed a lot more done to it to make it full like an entire series. That being said, the graphics and music were very enjoyable. I will leave this up to you on this one, but if you are interestd in a very slightly fanservicey fighting series that is new on the anime market, this might be up your alley.
Final Score
Storyline: D+
Character Development: C
Design: B
Opening/Ending Themes: B+
Music: A-
Voice Acting: B
Extras: C+
Personal Opinion: C+
Final Score: C+
