(L) Star Driver: Kagayaki no Takuto

[j0x]

Originally Posted by Tenchi Hou Take

Lol did you just state that all mecha shows run on ass pulls then go on to state only super robot shows? You do realise the definition of a super robot show is a robot that runs off of your emotion, so your point is essentially nulled. That's like stating all cheese is blue and then going on to state only different types of blue cheese.

Anyway normal mecha shows are more popular and well known in Japan e.g Gundam don't work that way, while they do have their ass pulls like all shows do, the show isn't litterally run off the stuff for example setsuna in 00 got his ass handed more than a fair few times despite the fact in season 1 he actually had a superior robot..

err i do not get what your denying on my explanation, i gave examples of Super Robot Shows and Star Driver is a Super Robot show that will feature asspulls too you know

[Guido]

Our Apprivoise

For sci-fi anime year 2010 became unproductive for me due that any sci-fi titles that came with the span of the previous year did not either catch my interest or was busy with other shows that I gave priority to.

That's why I told myself for the autumn 2010 season was to add a sci-fi shows to my list of most want to watch show, and then I narrowed down my selections between two possible candidates: STAR DRIVER or Super Robot Wars OG.

Immediately, I made my choice with Star Driver having investigated beforehand that Bones was involved with production.

Star Driver exudes with adolescence and youth vigor. It's a perfect setting to remind us those past our early youth days, how was life full of uncertainties and yet fun & thrilling to explore everyday.

Even without the sci-fi elements, the school-life and youth fun-drama at the island perfectly meshed with the story's scope and theme.

The allegorical interpretations surrounding Head's ambition to mastermind Samekh's conquest are meant to symbolize his forceful ways to end adolescence and the naivety of childhood, that is to torn and rob the protagonist's of their innocence.

Life is beautiful, as Takuto tried over and over with success at the end at reminding his fellows and peers.

The battles, sci-finess, and Glittering Crux were a magnificient surreal parade of Utena-esque delicacies: I mean just taking a look at the elaborated sequence involving the Crux launched their Cybodies while freezing in Zero-Time, as the current miko was performing her theme song, that's an indication.

Only things left hangings were that the marks and Head's partner were left unresolved with scarce explanations without trying to venture into a deep, philosophical territory.

What I like the best about the unresolved issues was that there was no definite winner regarding who Wako chose over whom whether was Takuto or Sugata, because leaving that conclusion open doesn't risk the overall mood and scope within the plot at gravitating towards becoming a more clichéd romance story with dazzling, sci-fi elements playing a pivotal role.

Also, since the last episode ended the story without an epilogue, it left in me with a transient but powerful feeling of closed satisfaction and did not evoked within me a sense of nostalgia, longing or imagine for a second season.

While the end-of-the-world climax battle and the subsequent feature-film conclusion cannot be called to be a match in par with Gainax's story standards, nonetheless, Star Driver made Takuto to conclude things with a tour de-force saying that everything is possible to be reached, just you have to see and stretch your hands towards it.

This was the last show I concluded for the autumn 2010 anime season.

[Kaioshin Sama]

I have to wonder why they would insist on even having a love triangle in this show if they weren't going to do anything conclusive with it or even really do much of anything with it for that matter. My only conclusion is that they threw it in there like most other plot elements appeared to be just thrown in their because fans were expecting it or whatever. I mean it's far from the only plot thread that was introduced in this show only to be dropped before the end, but it's one of the few you would think they might have bothered to conclude since the main trio aspect was a pretty big part of the show....or so it seemed.

Jeez, it's like every time I look back at this show my opinion of it drops even further. I can't remember the last time I saw a show introduced so many potentially interesting elements only to pretty much capitalize on and conclude none of them.

You know what, I'm no longer giving out bonus points or props to shows for having above average animation. It's either have good animation and moderately functioning plot and characters and get the full praise for it or get nothing at all out of me. Calling it the Star Driver Clause.

Originally Posted by roriconfan

Who thinks this show has very little replay value? (I do)

Well considering the above and that there's plenty of mecha shows that have great animation (about the only thing this show had going for it in the end) and actually bother to be somewhat conclusive about their plot, have fleshed out characters and not waste precious time, I'd pretty much leap to stop my friends who might be going to watch this and recommend something else instead, let alone consider the idea of a replay.

[Blue-kun]

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

I have to wonder why they would insist on even having a love triangle in this show if they weren't going to do anything conclusive with it or even really do much of anything with it for that matter. My only conclusion is that they threw it in there like most other plot elements appeared to be just thrown in their because fans were expecting it or whatever. I mean it's far from the only plot thread that was introduced in this show only to be dropped before the end, but it's one of the few you would think they might have bothered to conclude since the main trio aspect was a pretty big part of the show....or so it seemed.

It was, and the way I see it that is precisely why they did not have Wako pick one of the two. Before being a girl who loved two guys and two guys who loved the same girl, they're just a trio of amazingly good friends, with a terrific friendship that was reinforced countless times throughout the story. For a show which always emphasized how precious a time youth is, forcing a young girl torn between both guys - who were ready to risk their lives not only for her, but for their friendship - to pick one of them right after the events of the finale sounds quite cruel, in particular if you consider all the doubts and uncertainity that arose when this subject was touched before. For now, those three's tenacity was able to change the bleak future that expected them, so they should be able to live the best period of their lives and enjoy their friendship without having to worry over themes which are best left to the adults.

[sagematt]

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

I have to wonder why they would insist on even having a love triangle in this show if they weren't going to do anything conclusive with it or even really do much of anything with it for that matter. My only conclusion is that they threw it in there like most other plot elements appeared to be just thrown in their because fans were expecting it or whatever. I mean it's far from the only plot thread that was introduced in this show only to be dropped before the end, but it's one of the few you would think they might have bothered to conclude since the main trio aspect was a pretty big part of the show....or so it seemed.

There was never any love triangle in first place. There was no actual "competition". Sugata was always trying to push for Wako x Takuto, and Takuto always wanted to preserve the friendship between all three of them.

I do admit feeling kinda annoyed by the lack of epilogue in the final episode, but after my feelings about it settled down and I looked back, I can't be mad at the show. Having Wako choose any of them would have been unfair to the audience and unfair to the relation they had been building up.

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

Jeez, it's like every time I look back at this show my opinion of it drops even further. I can't remember the last time I saw a show introduced so many potentially interesting elements only to pretty much capitalize on and conclude none of them.

My opinion of the show could never drop, but there were indeed a few unresolved plot points (like, for example, the drama club's president's and vicepresident's identities and motives, or whatever Kanako's husband knew and intended to do), not to mention characters that were Put On A Bus (Mizuno/Marino).

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

You know what, I'm no longer giving out bonus points or props to shows for having above average animation. It's either have good animation and moderately functioning plot and characters and get the full praise for it or get nothing at all out of me. Calling it the Star Driver Clause.

OH MY GOD POOR SHOWS.
THEY'LL FOREVER MISS OUT ON THE GREAT KAIOSHIN'S PRAISE.
AND IT'S ALL OR NOTHING NOW. ONE MISTAKE AND THEY LOSE IT FOREVER!

...That's ridiculous. Quit being so elitist you stuck-up poseur.

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

Well considering the above and that there's plenty of mecha shows that have great animation (about the only thing this show had going for it in the end) and actually bother to be somewhat conclusive about their plot, have fleshed out characters and not waste precious time, I'd pretty much leap to stop my friends who might be going to watch this and recommend something else instead, let alone consider the idea of a replay.

Oh well. Can't always please everybody. Though I'd have to find a show extremely repugnant to stop a friend from watching it. Most of the time I just tell them my opinion about it but admit that in the end it's just my opinion and that they might see the show in a different perspective.

Back when the final episode aired, I was really hopìng for an epilogue, and right now I still do, but not having a complete closure to every plot thread in the form of an special or something is not going to haunt me forever. I'll live.

[Haak]

I was thinking that it was clever that they actually subverted resolving the main love triangle rather than avert it. When Sugata was about to take down Samehk along with himself I was ready to scream Death of the Hypnotuse, but that's not what happened.

[roriconfan]

Who thinks the show would be a hundred times better with just 12 episodes and an epilogue. And I never said to take out any minor Crux characters; just take out all the repeated transformations and useless one-minute battles.

These are after all the reasons I consider this show as less than average in overall and think it will be forgotten in a few months.

[Nobodyman9]

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

I have to wonder why they would insist on even having a love triangle in this show if they weren't going to do anything conclusive with it or even really do much of anything with it for that matter. My only conclusion is that they threw it in there like most other plot elements appeared to be just thrown in their because fans were expecting it or whatever. I mean it's far from the only plot thread that was introduced in this show only to be dropped before the end, but it's one of the few you would think they might have bothered to conclude since the main trio aspect was a pretty big part of the show....or so it seemed.

Speaking of which, anyone else notice how the whole love triangle is the most soulless fangirl-bait ever?

Also, anyone else notice how Sugata is a cardboard cutout bishie with absolutely zero personality?

Oh, and I guess they could've had an epilogue, but instead they had to devote that time to showcase Keito singing for 3 minutes.

You know what, I'm no longer giving out bonus points or props to shows for having above average animation. It's either have good animation and moderately functioning plot and characters and get the full praise for it or get nothing at all out of me. Calling it the Star Driver Clause.

Well, as Aristotle's Six Elements of Drama states, spectacle really is the least important element.

[Wakan Tanka]

For some BG information:

http://ninteenpointzerofour.wordpres...tion-excerpts/

[Nobodyman9]

Anyone else notice how every character on the show (every single goddamn one of them!) acts like they're from fucking Mars? There is literally no one to relate to.

Originally Posted by Voinic

For some BG information:

http://ninteenpointzerofour.wordpres...tion-excerpts/

I love that.

Actually, there is a secret piece of background information [1] that “Galactic Pretty Boys can’t sleep,” but Takuto, the True Galactic Pretty Boy, Sugata, the owner of the King’s mark, and the women who posses the Maiden marks are special, even though they have marks they can sleep. On the other hand, since all of the other mark bearers can’t sleep, you’ll never see them sleeping in the show. Head’s, “I can’t sleep, tell me a story” line to fish girl was hinting at that piece of background.

Yeah. Too bad that had absolutely zero impact on the story.

The play was a retelling of the Cybodies’ history in dramatic form. In addition to the fact that they’re robots from the/a Ancient Galactic Civilization, we had to include some explanation as to what the Cybodies are. But, explaining it directly seems to alienate the audience, so I thought of having Takuto and the others act out an indirect explanation and that’s how it ended up.

..........Wow...........that's just.....wow.

So apparently actually explaining the history of the cybodies would be too weird for the audience, so instead they opted for a symbolic play whose parallels with the actual history are barely visible. You know, maybe I'm just stupid, but I can't see how that play explained a damn thing unless you know what you're looking for. Please, someone explain it to me.

[Wakan Tanka]

Originally Posted by Nobodyman9

..........Wow...........that's just.....wow.

So apparently actually explaining the history of the cybodies would be too weird for the audience, so instead they opted for a symbolic play whose parallels with the actual history are barely visible. You know, maybe I'm just stupid, but I can't see how that play explained a damn thing unless you know what you're looking for. Please, someone explain it to me.

Do you remember the episode of Ergo Proxy..., where Vincet Law was asked several questions on T.V that are related to the main plot...but the questions & answers are crystal clear and you don't have to exert your brain cells to understand what's going...still the play is vague for many viewers, "young" viewers hate roundabout methods to explain things related to the main plot, IMO..

[roriconfan]

Originally Posted by Voinic

"young" viewers hate roundabout methods to explain things related to the main plot, IMO..

I am not young or newb and yet I didn't like all this shallow mystisism. I doubt many like to be kept in the dark around things that don't mater in the longrun. And Ergo Proxy rulz!

[j0x]

lol the makers of star driver are writers dudes, ever heard of literary art like poetry? where the meaning is hidden?

[cyoti]

Too complicated for some people.

[j0x]

Originally Posted by cyoti

Too complicated for some people.

i got more hard time deciphering the messages from Shakespeare's literary arts than Star Driver though

well for those who are ranting about further easy to comprehend explanations then good news for you all

They don’t think a continuation is likely, but they don’t think it’s good to leave things unfinished and worry about that. If there is something, they’d cleanly end it all and move on to the next thing. {uhh idk what to make of that}

more explanations here -> http://ninteenpointzerofour.wordpres...mmary-i-think/

EDIT:

for those who do not think that quote is making sense then it might imply BONES studio will do specials/ova/movie for Star Driver to make things more easy to understand

[Dark Wing]

Originally Posted by Voinic

For some BG information:

http://ninteenpointzerofour.wordpres...tion-excerpts/

I called it! Special DVD/BD bonus material revels all I kinda figured that Bones would pull this.

[Kaioshin Sama]

Originally Posted by Nobodyman9

Speaking of which, anyone else notice how the whole love triangle is the most soulless fangirl-bait ever?

Also, anyone else notice how Sugata is a cardboard cutout bishie with absolutely zero personality?

Oh, and I guess they could've had an epilogue, but instead they had to devote that time to showcase Keito singing for 3 minutes.

I don't know, I actually still kind of liked Sugata and felt he was overall the best dealt with character in the main trio. It's not his fault that a lot of his potential character development was quashed on account of being tied to the likes of Keito, but I at least understood where Sugata was coming from.

He'd basically been forced into his role as King and thus was stuck living on the island for what he assumed was the rest of his life. This was a source of frustration for him and he feels like he's saddled with this role alone. He tries to cope by putting up a friendly exterior, but eventually Takuto finds out the truth and their relationship grows stronger to the point where Sugata starts training Takuto in kendo.

If there's one decision of his I don't really get though it's his decision to go with Keito to seal Samekh who seemed way off kilter in the final episode instead of the people he knows he can trust in Takuto, Wako and his maid servants there. The only reason I can come up with for why he did this the way he did is the writers had to force a conclusion since time was running out and had to find a quick way to do it.

Sugata got probably by far the least of the brunt of this shows tendency to waste time though. Why Takuto couldn't have been more fleshed out as the main character though I'll never know. If it's anyone that's a blank slate bishounen with a simplistic personality it's him.

Yeah though, the Keito singing for 3 minutes was completely unnecessary and didn't even have much of anything to do with her character or what I got of her character at least. Only reason I can see that happening is that directors love to throw random dancing and singing segments now cause otaku go bonkers for it. It's like a guaranteed way to boost the popularity of a character without actually having to have them do anything significant to the plot.

Originally Posted by cyoti

Too complicated for some people.

More like not enough actual content to derive anything from with regard to character and plot. At least not anything memorable.

It seems like there's a hang up in communication here between the people that didn't think the show was all that good and people who loved it and I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of it had to do with some people being cool with a lot of time being spent on "kissing through the glass" and other school stuff like that and others wishing more time was spent on stuff that was actually going to matter to the whole Cybody/Glittering Crux plot line as the show went along.

Originally Posted by roriconfan

Who thinks the show would be a hundred times better with just 12 episodes and an epilogue. And I never said to take out any minor Crux characters; just take out all the repeated transformations and useless one-minute battles.

These are after all the reasons I consider this show as less than average in overall and think it will be forgotten in a few months.

It probably couldn't have hurt to streamline the show if it was going to have this much fluff attached to it, but I'd rather they have taken out a good chunk of the school stuff and replaced it with a more in depth look at some of the characters (instead of just Simone who now I don't know why they spent an entire episode on her backstory) and in fleshing out the whole Cybody backstory a bit more. Specifically if I had known that Sarina Endo was going to become that seemingly important an exposition character I would have introduced her origin earlier and then gotten to fleshing it out a little more and probably included her in the final episode in some capacity.

[Nobodyman9]

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

I don't know, I actually still kind of liked Sugata and felt he was overall the best dealt with character in the main trio. It's not his fault that a lot of his potential character development was quashed on account of being tied to the likes of Keito, but I at least understood where Sugata was coming from.

He'd basically been forced into his role as King and thus was stuck living on the island for what he assumed was the rest of his life. This was a source of frustration for him and he feels like he's saddled with this role alone. He tries to cope by putting up a friendly exterior, but eventually Takuto finds out the truth and their relationship grows stronger to the point where Sugata starts training Takuto in kendo.

If there's one decision of his I don't really get though it's his decision to go with Keito to seal Samekh who seemed way off kilter in the final episode instead of the people he knows he can trust in Takuto, Wako and his maid servants there. The only reason I can come up with for why he did this the way he did is the writers had to force a conclusion since time was running out and had to find a quick way to do it.

Sugata got probably by far the least of the brunt of this shows tendency to waste time though. Why Takuto couldn't have been more fleshed out as the main character though I'll never know. If it's anyone that's a blank slate bishounen with a simplistic personality it's him.

These are just things that happen to him. It doesn't change the fact that he's an emotionless bishie who is impossible to relate to.

Yeah though, the Keito singing for 3 minutes was completely unnecessary and didn't even have much of anything to do with her character or what I got of her character at least. Only reason I can see that happening is that directors love to throw random dancing and singing segments now cause otaku go bonkers for it. It's like a guaranteed way to boost the popularity of a character without actually having to have them do anything significant to the plot.

Sometimes female VAs use their roles to showcase their singing abilities. In this case it was really blatant.

[Haak]

Originally Posted by Nobodyman9

These are just things that happen to him. It doesn't change the fact that he's an emotionless bishie who is impossible to relate to.

You see that KaioshinSama? Sugata is simply impossible to relate to. You must've just been hallucinating the whole thing. Derp. =P

[Kaioshin Sama]

Originally Posted by Nobodyman9

These are just things that happen to him. It doesn't change the fact that he's an emotionless bishie who is impossible to relate to.

Could be argued, though if that's the case I think it's telling that he's arguably one of the better handled characters and people could still have trouble relating to him. I still had no problem because at least his character felt consistent compared to say...Keito. In some ways he actually felt more like a main character than Takuto.

Sometimes female VAs use their roles to showcase their singing abilities. In this case it was really blatant.

You know it had sort of slipped my mind that she was one of the maidens and thus would have a song to sing. Perhaps it was just her overall character development and the fact that singing in a karaoke bar is such a school anime cliche AND that it was pretty much a music video insert that made it irksome.

I don't know, but I'm kind of getting tired of anime appearing to have insert pop song segments for the sake of insert pop song segments. I almost feel the need to send a bulk e-mail out to the anime production studios telling them that it's okay if they don't include an insert singing sequence in their next show, I'll forgive them.

I'll probably end up joking with my buddies on MSN at some point today about starting a petition regarding this.