Claymore

I started watching 'Claymore' just out of curiosity. I never expected to be so hooked onto a show in my life. It's fair to say that I am addicted. Normally that doesn't happen with me but this one is too good to pass up. From the very first episode all the way to the climatic battle in the final one there is great action scenes, lots of dismemberment and decapitation, and lots of blood. But what really made the show were the characters. There are so many antagonists in the show it's almost impossible to count. But despite the countless antagonists, there are other great characters that make the show what it is. The only flaw in this show was the fact that shortly into the first season the episodes jump into the past, kind of like a flashback, but without exactly telling you what happened. It's sort of like something you have to find out on your own just simply by watching and thinking. But despite these flaws and the fact that many episodes drag out (especially the flashback ones) it doesn't even slightly make it a worse television series.

I rarely give any movies an excellent rating but this one did it. One day I was bored and decided to give Claymore (English dubbed) a try via Netflix. Oddly enough the plot and poster art were average at best. Almost instantly your hooked into a world of demons and female warriors (aka Claymores). But its not your typical anime with female sword wielding half human warriors.

Gone and are the zany/kid type humor and instead you get adult story lines and characters. I was soo hooked I watched 12 episodes straight. My only complaint is that sometimes its hard to distinguish the different Claymores since they all look alike. Its been a long time since I've been shocked by a film (or TV series) with such good quality. Only after a day of watching I can confidently say this is my #2 anime show/series of all time which was formally held by Robotech. Claymore is right below Transfomers G1 1980's stuff(not that Bay crap). In an odd way I'm nervous about watching the remaining episodes because at this pace its possible that Claymore could become #1 for me. Which is an odd feeling considering I've only watched half the season in one day and TF G1 I watched my entire childhood.

Update. Finally finished the series. Suffice to say it stayed at #2 of my list of all time best anime. The final couple of episodes kind of got repetitive and the final scene / resolution could've been better.

Claymore depicts a dark, cold, cruel, depressing and creepy world where happiness seems to be as rare and brief as the light of a shooting star. We follow the story of seemingly cold and distant but secretly burningly passionate beautiful characters who defy all difficulties and struggle to resist the monsters who could destroy everything good and pretty in existence at any moment. As the story develops, everything that we get attached to are instantly torn away from us again, and yet we are left with hope that it might all work out in the end. And to me, all of this is just magical.

Once I stop to think about it, I'm not really sure why I love Claymore so much. In fact, I'm pretty damn embarrassed by it. While I would objectively still rate it as good, there's a decent amount of cheese and cheap stuff in it which should prevent me from being utterly amazed by it. But it doesn't. I guess I just happen to have a soft spot for this kind of cold and depressing but beautiful atmosphere and Claymore has randomly found that soft spot and squeezed it to oblivion. Or maybe it has something to do with the fact that both times I watched it I had a high fever. Whatever it is, Claymore could have turned out to be one of the most wonderful screen experiences I've ever had.

That's right, *could've*. There is exactly one very big and obvious flaw with Claymore. As it is based on a portion of slowly advancing, still ongoing manga, staying faithful to manga would require the anime to have an abrupt ending. Because of this, the producers of the anime (apparently never intending to continue the anime series) have changed the last portion of the anime storyline in order to give it some feeling of closure. And... they have utterly, miserably failed at it. Not only is the ending just as abrupt, on top of that the last few episodes are now filled with nonsensical hysteria. It is so horrible it just makes me cry. It is not even my personal opinion, everyone else say the exact same thing.

I would have been more than happy to see the anime series remain faithful to manga all the way, even if it meant just leaving it hanging in the end. Were it to be continued in similar quality after several years, it would have been a perfect 10/10 and hands down my favourite anime and just one of my favourite things, ever. Even with those fatal flaws, I am still loving it. If everything was the way it should have been, it would have simply blown me away.

In the end, I have to call Claymore on its flaws and can't recommend it as a genuinely brilliant anime, only as a decent one. But if my rant about cold and depressing but beautiful atmosphere rung a bell, I suggest you give it maximum chances as maybe, just maybe it will find your soft spot just like it did mine.

I've always been a fan of anime series, my favourite being Berserk. I tend to focus a lot on the pacing and the built tension when I watch anime, and Berserk is The master of pacing. Another thing I tend to focus on is character development and overall sentimentality of the show. Many anime characters are quite over-the-top, a major let-down for me. As are many scenes in anime. Claymore succeeds on most levels. The pacing is some of the greatest I've ever seen, and the inclusion of ranked characters just adds to the excitement. It's always interesting to see who's got the higher rank. Furthermore, you really start caring for the characters and picking out your favorites (mine being no. 6, Miria). The show only fails on a few levels. You're in for a lot of melodramatic scenes, and the protagonist's male friend, Rocky, is just another annoying brat who cries more than good is. It's no worse than so many other animes and gets better halfway through. The second, and final, major letdown is the anti-climatic ending. There is an epic battle, but the way it ends after the battle is simply not good enough. It feels unfinished, ill and way too sentimental and moral for a show of this kind (it might have something to do with the continuing issues of the manga).

However, you're in for a treat. And you're not going to want to put this show down, before it's ended.

The last Anime I've really enjoyed must have been Death Note which impressed my with it's overall genius plot and the character development. Although Claymore clearly cannot reach this (well actually it's kinda cruel comparing 2 Animes of different categories), it sure has some really good moments as well. The main focus of this series lies, obviously, on good old sword combat mixed with some really impressive ideas on how to swing, slash and bash a Claymore-sword in almost every way possible. While the story seems to start slow, there is definitely a certain appeal, which I've missed on several other Anime series I've tried for the last two years. If you manage to stay with the story until the first twists and turns you start to get into the characters and what first seems to be another bad half-Hentai porn (just by judging the fact that the title is presented by full-laden blonde "girls" on the cover) turns out to be less sexistic and more action-laden like any other Anime you've watched for quite a long time.