Dog Days is, without a doubt, virtualy vapid. The main character is barely expanded upon from what we learn about him during the first few episodes, his motivation is lucid and those around him treat him like a piece of furniture for the most part. The entire show also seems to suffer from the same issues recent Final Fantasy games have suffered from, where it doesn't seem to understand who the main character is! The entire plot is circled around the main chracters love interest and the 'villan'. It's like in Final Fantasy 12, we all know Vaan isn't the hero, Ashe is. The animation is colourfull and fluid, yet nto very interesting and easily forgettable, all the music save for the opening is uninspired and yet...despite all of this...I like Dog Days.
I REALLY like Dog Days...
I think I'm ill.
I think I should, at first, explain why I watched Dog Days in the first place. If there's one thing I love, it's medieval themed anything. I'm probably one of the few people in the universe who can put up a defence for Zero No Tsukaima. Sadly, it seems to be an aspect that's lacking these days, and I was really happy to see something that not only looked interesting but also might be entertaining. When I found out it was by the same man who brought us Nanoha, one of my favourite series, I was pretty much hooked on the idea...but...
Allow me to explain both sides of the arguement, because if I don't I think I'll lose it completely. Let's begin, as always, with the plot:
We enter into Unnamed Magical World where two kingdoms are at war with eachother. The Kingdom of Biscotti and the Kingdom of Gallette. Now, wars in this world are a little different from the wars in ours. When you think of war, you think of guns, tanks, bombs that sort of thing. Or maybe swords, shields and medieval knights right? You'll find very little of that here. What does happen is this, a mysterious power source called Flonjar energy allows armies to fight to their hearts content without dying. Instead, when particular blows are struck, they turn into little fluff balls (although they do fight using swords, bows and other Medieval things, but you get the idea). Yes, these two kingdoms are populated entirely of Dog people and Cat people, FURRIES UNITE! Due to this, their battles are more like contests than actual 'battle'. They score points when enemies are defeated and both armies have to advance further than the other. Simple enough right? Except Biscotti is losing this war, and so their leader, the Princess Millhiore, decides to use magic to summon a Hero to help them out. As it turns out, this means dragging a human across dimentions to fight for them. In this case, it's a Junior Athletics champ called Cinque who just so happens to be pretty good with a Bo Staff. And that's just scratching the surface people, there's more to it. Unfortunately, I am unable to explain the rest to you without spoiling the rest of the series, so let's move on.
Strangely enough, Dog Days seems to suffer from Square Enix Syndrome: Being unable to decide on a main character. Despite first appearences, Cinque is not the main character. Although I'm sure many people can debate me on this point, allow me to remind you that Cinque gets absolutely no development whatsoever. This isn't that much of a problem, because he's not a bad character if you can stand him. No, the main character is Princess Millhiore. She the young, inexperienced leader of a nation that has to lead them into a war she didn't want and, as you'll discover, she doesn't even understand why it's being faught. To completely understand her development and her character though, we have to talk about Queen Leonmitchelli. Completely on the reverse end, Leon is the Queen of the enemy kingdom of Gallette. This wouldn't be a problem if it didn't turn out that both Leon and Milhi have been friends since they were little kids! Seeing the problem here? Leon herself is an interesting character, though she may appear sure of herself and maybe a little arrogant at first, her desire to protect her friend is apparent in the end and, through the plot, we learn of her real reason to declare war on her neighbouring kingdom. For what there is to talk about Cinque, I suppose I probably should. As a human who was magically wisked away from his home planet by a dog carrying a knife (no really), you'd think he be a little culture shocked right? Kinda like how Saito was in Zero no Tsukaima at first? Not in the slightest! In fact, once he's shown how it's actualy impossible to die in the war, he's a little excited to take part in it. You see, Cinque is a an expert gymnast and athelete, pretty good with a bo staff and eager to prove himself. The problem is that that's about all there is to him, he doesn't particularly advance from this point except the traditional main character route of protecting the romantic interest. His character isn't bad, I just feel like it could have been done more effectively. The rest of the character are, while not completely cookie cutter, are not really developed upon and serve really as litteral backup for the main characters. While good to have around, could be dropped and not much would, on the whole, be lost. With the possible exception of Eclair, the captain of the guard in Milhi's forces, who spends alot of time with Cinque either fighting by his side or argueing with him in wacky hijinks.
Dog Days is a concept created by the same man who brought us Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, and oh boy does it show. The magic they use in this show reminds me alot of Nanoha, just the general feel of it and how it's executed. I half expect the symbols on the back of peoples hands that they use for magic to start talking. Animation wise, Dog Days gets a 'good' at best to 'passable' at worst. While the art quality drops on occasion and the side characters suffer from Generic Face Disease, it's not unpleasent to look at 80% of the time. It's quite possible to say that the opening has the best animation, which is sad because quite alot of the action scenes in Dog Days could have used it's quality.
Sound wise, Dog Days gets a pass. The intro, once again in the style of Nanoha, Dog Days has it's opening sung by Nana Mizuki who always does a good job, if her singing style is your sort of thing. The opening song, Scarlet Knight, while not her best song proves that even when Nana Mizuki isn't amazing, she's still pretty good. Otherwise, the show has no particularly memorable songs. They're not bad, but not particularly memorable either, at least nothing you'll be bobbing your head to for any time to come. The dialogue is passable at times, verging on pretty damn good with the always awesome performances from Norio Wakamoto (Emperor Charles Zi Britannia, Code Geass) and Tetsuya Kakihara (Simon, Gurren Lagann) who voice General Godwin and Leon's brother Gaul respectively. And if you're a fan of her voice work, Nana Mizuki also voices one of the side characters, Ricotta Elmar. The rest of the voice actors/actresses do a good job aswell, I'm just naming some of the more interesting performances.
Where the series falls down majorly however, it's the execusion of the story. It's lazy, predictable and, as previously stated, deluding itself into pretending Cinque has anything to do with it at all. It's sad to say, but Seven Arcs seriously dropped the ball on this one plot wise. The ending is sloppy, which is where most of this issue lies. The main conflicting villan is defeated within a single episode, and the series stretches out for another 3 episodes that could have been used to boost the story and bump up this shows score.
Dog Days did quite a few things right, but the rest are wrong in such a big way it may be hard to enjoy for some. It's enjoyable for the most part, yes, but parts of it will rub the wrong way. If you liked Nanoha at all, I recomend giving Dog Days a watch. If you like medieval themes anime, I'd give it a go. If you like developed characters and an interesting narative, Dog Days might be worth avoiding. I half feel like the series wasn't done justice, being an original work it's able to do it's own thing without having to adhere to an already established plot and having to cater to a legion of fans who will pick apart every flaw with it. The issue, is that it makes you feel like it would be a whole lot better if they'd had more time to develop everything properly, establish the world a bit more and develop Cinque a bit more, we could have had a series that you would really want to continue. As it stands though, I don't see Dog Days continueing past this series. Perhaps a manga would be nice to see, but considering the original creator is still working on Nanoha Force and Nanoha Vivid, I don't see it happening in the forseeable future. Up untill the last 3 episodes, I'd pretty much set my heart on a score of 8/10, but seeing how it seems to have crash landed I'm bumping it down to a 7/10, and that's only because I found it enjoyable. I know someone who lumps this on the same level as Rio: Rainbow Gate, which is actualy kind of depressing when you think about it.
Final Score: 7/10