Monster Farm: Enbanseki no himitsu

Hm. This was one of my favourite shows. I honestly don't remember too much about it. I just remember that it had a HORRIBLE time slot, so I'd be up at 5:30 in the morning watching it...that's how much I liked it.

Genki is sucked into a video game where he meets a girl named Holly on a righteous quest to free the Pheonix and defeat the evil Moo (man...what a bad name). Along the way, they are joined by monsters who found it in their best interest to join this quest. I believe the monsters were Hare, Tiger of the Winds (I remember the episode where they met him...that was awesome), Suezo, Golem and Mochi.

The thing that really drew me to this show was the in-depth delving into the characters' minds. Don't get me wrong, I was all into Pokemon and Digimon too, but MR was by far my favourite. Like I said, it was the characters. Digimon and Pokemon are more about the fights, whereas MR was more about the characters. I think it was HIGHLY under-appreciated.

8/10 stars.

Most property based animated series basically just serve as half hour commercials for toys. "Monster Rancher," while it does serve that purpose, rises above what you'd expect given that. Unlike "Pokemon," which is insipid, and "Digimon," which is derivative of the latter, "Monster Rancher" rests its strengths in strong, character development scripts.

Except for a few stereotypes like "Star Wars" familial elements and the brooding, loner type with attitude, the majority of episodes have, thus far, been fine essays reaching into the minds of characters we would normally not care about. Whereas one would expect a character to be chosen from the video game to use as a plot device, the plot device is instead the motivation for the character, rather than motivation being revealed as an afterthought to spur on the plot.

So far, there's only one season of episodes. But, if there are more, and if the same attention to character detail is maintained, this series should prove to be quite enjoyable, despite a few minor stereotypes.

The "rip-off" trilogy, as I like to call it, consists of "Pokemon," "Digimon," and "Monster Rancher." I had seen the other two and decided, what the heck. This has turned out to be my favorite. I normally don't care for the way the dubbing is handled in shows like these, but here I think the voices work well. The animation in this show puts the other two to shame. There are some FANTASTIC monster creations here! My favorite character is probably Golem, the kind-hearted rock monster voiced by Richard Newman. He is peaceful, yet will fight if he has to. And I just love how he forgets to catch Suezo (the "eyeball monster") after he's been thrown up into the air. What really separates this one from the other series is the fact that our heroes cannot evolve. They are what they are, like it or not, and they must learn to accept each other as such. There are some nice stories in this series. Definitely worth watching.

I remember this show. I liked it. Compared to other anime out there, it may not seem like much, but I find it to be an entertaining adventure story nevertheless. At the time, I also liked Pokemon and Digimon, but I remember thinking this show was better than both of them. True, the monster designs are a lot more plain than either show, but I still liked this show the best for some reason. When it aired on FOX Family, I was disappointed to see that only 26 episodes were dubbed, but later on in the year they ended up being there, which made me very happy. What surprised me was that the show started out kind of kiddy, but it actually gets darker and more emotional as it goes on. My only regret is that I never got to see the third season. But, anyway, I'd recommend it.

My favorite characters were Hare and Suezo, they were funny, haha!

Genki is the Champ of Playstation's 'Monster Rancher' but finds the game more challanging when he's sucked inside of it. It seems the world within his game is in some serious trouble. The evil Moo has been unlocked from his disk and is slowly taking over their world. The only monster with the power to turn the bad monsters ("Baddies") back to "Goodies" is the legendary Phoenix, and Holly, with her power to control the magic stone points the way for Genki and their monster friends Tiger (a wolf out to save his brother), Moochi (a brave little guy), Golem (the giant rock monster afraid of water), Suezo (the eyeball who goes where Holly goes) and Hare (a tricky rabbit out to steal their golds.) But in order to unlock the Phoenix, Genki and his team will have to battle against Moo's Big Bad Four, black dino squads, the jells, and harsh land. Can they do it, and restore peace to the land...?