Supernatural: The Animation

Enjoyed immensely all 22 episodes of the 2011 "Supernatural" anime DVD, which is based on Seasons 1 and 2 of the live action series shown on The CW Network (USA). Not only is the animation superb, but it goes beyond the usual Japanese anime conventions into some really cool and gorgeous visual effects. Episodes are introduced by Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki, as a team or separately, depending on the episode. Jared does the voice of "Sam Winchester" for all 22 episodes; Jensen voices "Dean Winchester" in episodes 21 and 22 -- "All Hell Breaks Loose, Parts I and II." Although Andrew Farrar, who voices "Dean" in episodes 1 through 20, does a fine job (and on occasion does sound eerily like "Dean"), the episodes voiced by Jensen Ackles are "pure Dean" and superior because of his distinctive vocal gifts.

In addition the anime features a number of original-story episodes that fit well into the Season 1 and 2 canons. They are well written, absorbing, and really fun to watch. The graphics and animation are truly outstanding on two distinct levels: (1) a jaw-dropping feel of "bigness," complexity, angles of view, and scary gore; and (2) lyrically beautiful color/contrast, architecture, design, and appeal. Having a nightmarish monster lurking in front of a background as delicate as a Hiroshige drawing is breathtaking! The DVD also contains an extended interview with Eric Kripke as well as in-depth interviews with Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles (together and individually) that really explore how this unique "Supernatural" project developed, and what the principals think about it. Very interesting stuff, as is the back office look at the Mad House Team that put this wonderful project together and the diverse elements that went into it. The choice of a female director to do the emotional, sensitive story lines and a male director to do the gore-and-guts action sequences was quite interesting.

Buy the "Supernatural" anime DVD; as a fan of either live action or anime -- or both, you will love it!

Sure, it isn't Supernatural. But if you want more and some other point of views or a bit more back story...and if you like anime..then give it a shot.

It isn't 60 fps like other animes though, it is what I would call 'choppy' and the use of black/white a lot of the time and not being actually 'noir' might turn some people off, I found that bit of animation kinda cool. The fact Sam is actually voiced by the real Sam makes it a bonus and the voice actor for Dean sounds pretty spot on is good enough for me.

Don't expect to be blown away or anything but if you are a fan of SN and aren't going to judge harshly then definitely give this a try. If you like both than you will probably enjoy this show.

i have seen people saying watch this if you have not watched the live action i say it's the other way round due to all of the lore being there but it's not explained as much and relies on you watching the live action, the dub is okay like any dub it has it's problems but what makes supernatural great is there and it's one hell of a ride !

Sam and Dean look like they should and there are some really good re-imagining of some characters that i will not spoil here. I think it's a shame most people who reviewed this only watched the first episode as with most thing the quality increases drastically after the first episode especially the animation that was not bad to begin with.

the bottom line is if you like supernatural and wonder about if things happened a bit differently deferentially give it a watch just make sure you watch past the first episode before judging it i love it and i hope you do too

Most remakes are like big contradictions; they're made for fans of the original series looking for more, but as a fan you'll probably be expecting what's going to happen more often than not, and you'll inadvertently end up bummed out about it. A complete newcomer to the series on the other hand, unaware of the important events that shape the plot, may derive much greater pleasure from watching, but they are also much less likely to be drawn to the series since they haven't seen the original to begin with.

On comes Supernatural: The Animation, created by Madhouse Inc. animation studio, responsible for such fantastic animes as Death Note and Monster, with the likely intent to open the orient up to a great series that has garnered quite the cult following. By the time I'm reviewing this I have watched the entire first season of this anime, dubbed in English for the impending North American release and I have to say that I'm actually really impressed.

It should be understood that anime (and animation in general) is rather different from live action TV. Most western TV shows like Supernatural employ a 1-hour time slot, including commercial breaks, but a time slot for Japanese anime as well as most serialized western animation is 30 minutes. As a result, some of the episodes do seem rushed and incomplete. Certain plot points are glossed over to reach the conclusion more quickly. If you only watch the first few episodes you may feel that the series has been 'dumbed down', or a lot of detail and vibrancy has gone lost, and you'd be right. Part of what made the original Supernatural so effective and haunting is its firm foundation within reality. Special effects had always been subtle and elegantly simple, like the faint, static-like flicker of ghosts, the black smoke of demons against the darkness of night, or the way things always seem to appear or vanish just an inch off-screen, to the point that any phenomenon you see could be legitimately shrugged off as a play of light or an optical illusion. A lot of animation however goes in a different direction, where the artistic freedom bestowed by the animation genre allows for much more bombastic and impossible sights. Let it be clear that this is not the Supernatural you may know, but fortunately, the core of the original series - the relationship between the Winchester brothers - is also at the heart of the anime.

Contentwise, the first season of the anime (I'm not sure if further seasons are being planned or not) spans the main plot from the first two seasons of Supernatural. While some monster-of-the-week style Episodes that made up original Supernatural's first two seasons had been remade for the anime, there are also new and very entertaining ones that should drive even the most jaded fan to the edge of their seat, but where this anime really shines is the parts where it further expands the storyline of the main series, fleshing out events of the past and further exploring the history of the Winchesters. Some of it is a bit different, and some of it is new entirely, but if Kripke would declare it all canon I wouldn't have a single problem with it. Like the original series, it took me about a third of a season to really get hooked, but once you're hooked, you won't get unhooked.

Visually and aurally, this anime is artful and well-animated, but then again studio Madhouse has always had a thing for 'realistic' anime. The characters are drawn in authentic proportion, move well, and objects and people are animated with a proper sense of weight and mass. Character design is great for the most part, but Dean stands out in special. From the first time I saw him to the last time the credits rolled, I never once questioned that this was Dean, even though Jensen Ackles only got to voice him in the last two episodes, bummer. The shortcomings of the animation medium are visible still, but rarely detract from the overall experience. Most of the faults are the result of a lack of budget, as it is with most anime; eventually I got a little tired of hearing the two or three main tunes from the aggressively small soundtrack, and hearing that Kansas song at the conclusion of every episode felt rather indulgent, since in the original it was used to signal the penultimate episode of the season. There's also something surreal about still shots where only a character's lips are moving but well, that's animation for you. The fact that this anime is based on a live-action series probably highlights such shortcomings even further, especially in areas where the original excelled, and one of the most outstanding visual features from the original series were the fantastic locations. There simply weren't any utter scenery wow-moments as there were in the original, like the many gorgeous motel rooms or that incredibly creepy house full of redneck cannibals, or the ruined mental ward, or Bobby Singer's place...

If you're a fan, check it out! If you're not, but like animation or horror genre anyway, definitely check it out. 3 stars

First off, let's dispense with any sort of delusions and be up-front about something: It's nigh-impossible to review this series without comparing it to the live-action source. And given how many people are going to be coming to the anime series from the live-action one as opposed to the other way around, there's little good reason not to tackle this from the perspective they're probably wanting.

First off, the series is pretty solid, for the most part. For the most part, it captures the feel of the live-action show pretty well. And given that the individual episodes are half the length of the live- action episodes, that's pretty impressive. About 2/3 of the episodes are remakes of live-action episodes with some changes and tweaks made to maintain some mystery and surprise, and the rest are listed as 'original' but a few are clearly based off of specific episodes (with about as many changes as the remakes). The overall running plot is taken from the first two seasons of the live-action series, particularly with regards to Sam and Dean's search for their father and later the hunt for the Yellow-Eyed Demon.

While I personally was neither expecting nor desiring an exact word-for- word translation of the live-action show into the animated medium, I was admittedly a little disappointed that the animated series runs off of its own continuity. Changes to events are one thing; but at least one recurring creature from the live-action series clearly works under different rules in the anime. I fully acknowledge that this entirely a personal reference, but I was hoping for something a little more supplemental to the live-action series (like how some shows have novels and comics that take place in the continuity without necessarily implying an effect on the original series). A couple of episodes do this sort of thing pretty well, fleshing out the backstories of a couple of the other 'special children' that become more prominent as time goes on, but for the most part it's clear this is a different continuity altogether outside of the big events (finding John, chasing Yellow- Eyes).

The biggest adjustment to make is in the character designs. Some effort was made to make Sam and Dean's animated counterparts resemble Jared Padalecki (who also provides the English dub for Sam) and Jensen Ackles (who dubs Dean for the final two episodes only), and for the most part they succeeded. But other recurring characters (John, Bobby, Yellow- Eyes, etc.) are completely redesigned when they appear at all. And while I can respect that they wanted to be able to do their own takes on some of these characters, I personally feel that the series suffers for it. The animated Bobby, in design and portrayal, lacks all of the warmth and depth of his live-action counterpart and he fulfills no role on the series beyond simply being a source of information or a deus ex machina rather than a substitute father figure and confidant. The Yellow-Eyed Demon also particularly suffers from the animated portrayal, partially due to the lack of an actor capable of giving him nuance; his character design is so painfully generic they could have replaced him with a talking wooden doll. All he contributes in pretty much every scene in which he appears is a booming voice that reminds everyone that all is going according to plan.

But then, most of the characters who aren't Sam and Dean suffer a bit from the show's design aesthetic. You've got the animated version of Jared and Jensen and then everyone else (even characters adapted from the live-action show) is clearly pulled out of the 'generic anime stock character' filing cabinet at the animation studio. None of them are visually interesting with the exception of Missouri, and she's just too 'busy' design-wise. And overall, the contrast between the Sam/Dean designs and everything else is extremely jarring.

Also, while "Carry On My Wayward Son" is a good song, it's actually really easy to get tired of hearing it every episode as the credits music (where it pretty much kills the impact of its use in the season finale summary montages). And the fact that storyline-important details are left for a short scene after the credits is just obnoxious. Post- credits scenes are done in American television to add an extra punchline of some sort or what have you. But people who habitually skip ahead to the next episodes when the credits start are going to be left out of major plot points, and I'm honestly not sure why it has to be this way.

In summary: The series does a decent enough job of taking stories from the show, reworking them to fit in this format, and keeping things relatively fresh and surprising for people who've watched the live- action show. However, it does a crummy job handling pretty much any character who isn't Sam or Dean. Also, the pacing of some of the overarching story stuff is occasionally jerky and uneven. Unless you're a rabid collector of all things Supernatural, this is a rental at best. The people who enjoy the novelty of seeing reinterpretations of the show will find something to get out of this but hardcore canon purists are best avoiding it at all costs.