Witch Hunter Robin

"Witch Hunter: Robin" starts slowly as what seems to be a fairly unimportant Blade-ripoff and at first I thought I had wasted my money by buying all 26 episodes, but once I got to having seen a dozen episodes I slowly emerged into an intrigue that pulled me further and further into the story.

Labeled at Wikipedia as an "occult detective story", "Witch Hunter: Robin" is a thriller that gives you a believable world set in near future Japan where the Witch Hunts of the old days have continued up to the present by covert organizations. Our main character is a cute 15-year-old girl in a gorgeous dress with dormant magic power who joins such an organisation but ends up in the most dangerous and confusing situations as a consequence of it. The story is impelling, combination of CGI and hand drawn graphics works well and the film noir atmosphere at times is genuinely creepy while maintaining a sense of realism to it. There are few series I've ever seen that I find this enjoyable to watch and I therefor recommend everyone who's seen the first few episodes and got a little bored to at least continue watching until 15 because once they pass the first 12 episodes, the story should just suck you right in....

This series is good, but considering the direction it came from, I say it was a failed project. You've got a secret commando style governmental organization like Section 9 in the Ghost in the Shell SAC series, but they fight people that discover their "witch" powers and use them for bad purposes, kinda like in Hellsing. Leave it to the Japanese to make a show about Genome X :)

Anyway, the things that made the named series good are missing or trimmed in this one. The violence is completely censored, like it was supposed to be a children's show. The content, though, with people switching sides from one organization to another, with betrayals and complex decisions, are not suited for a child. So what's with the non-violence thing? The way everything seemed to crumble beneath a gigantic gray force of state, the thing that made anyone really scared in the last episodes of Ghost in the Shell, it's present here, but also trimmed down, as if the show was made for heart patients. They start one direction and when the tension gets high enough to get interesting, the whole thing stalls. The interesting dialogs and ideas from GITS are missing, the true threats from Hellsing are not there...

In conclusion, this could have been a great, even if a clone, series, but it's not. Somehow, somebody made the decision to strip it down to a minimum. Add to it the fact that the whole series ends when things get more interesting and you have a failure. Sorry.

I actually took the time to submit this series to IMDB.. though in retrospect I'm not sure why.

I sat through all 26 Episodes as they aired on the cartoon network, and barring some major stuff being edited out, this series suffers from some terrible pacing. The episodes aren't that hard to follow, even though the dialog is pretty darn weak at times, but it builds very little tension, and my interest in the charachters *which there really seemed to be a bit to many of* wasn't that high.

There were a couple of standout episodes, the one with the Shootout and Escape in the STNJ actually gave Robin and Amon some slight chemistry and also exhibited some good overall story and suspense. However episodes like that seemed few and far between.

While I don't think Witch Hunter Robin is a total waste of time, I wouldn't put it up in my must see category. More of the.. if its on I might watch it if nothing else holds my interest.

4 out of 10 bleh

The first 2 episodes are a bit slow as it creates the atmosphere and introduces the fine cast of characters. Stay with it and you will be rewarded. However, this is not intended to be an action show, nor will you find any "fan service". The animation is 2D, but gives the look of a night-time TV crime drama. For its genre, this is a fine, memorable show. It would be great if they remade it as a live-action series or movie.

The first half of the series focuses on investigations of "abnormal" crimes and the capture of "witches", people who have developed powers. Some of the people who hunt these witches also have powers but are labeled "craft users". You are either a hunter or the hunted. The hypocrisy is obvious.

The second half of the series focuses less on "captures" and more on investigating and revealing secrets about Robin and the agencies. Conflict develops between the agencies.

It has a good ending and leaves me wanting more.

Those of you who like "Cowboy Bebop" are sure to be pleased with "Witch Hunter Robin". I do believe that the same people who did "CB" also did "WHR". The animation is absolutely wonderful! It's dark, but nothing too graphic. The character designs are skillfully drawn and their scripts are written so well that it pulls the viewer into their world so we can't escape! The plot has depth and continues moving throughout all twenty-six episodes. The series does leave you hanging till the very end and even then there are still some questions, but all in all, it is a defenite show to see! The art is gorgeous and the story is great! If anything, see it once on television. I highly recommend it!