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Blue Gender
(Me): "Why? Why must all the best characters die? Why must the dumbest ones live? WHYYYY?"
Episodes Reviewed: 1-12, 19-26, Adult Swim version
Overall Grade: C-
It may be a piece of crap, but it's a satisfactory piece of crap.
Storyline: 6
Yuji Kaido was supposed to be a "sleeper," who suffered an unknown disease (apparently) and had to go into cryogenic status until a cure was made. It's about 15 years later, he's waken up, and the damn planet is infested with giant bugs. How pleasant. All he can think of (other than "oh my gawd, there's giant INSECTS!!!") is how to escape this hell alive. Well, the reason he's alive is because of a special task force sent to Earth to retrive sleeper samples... and as it so happens, the only alive one they come across is Yuji. After the expected freak out, they're on a mission to bring him to Second Earth, a space station orbiting the Earth. Believe me, no matter how interesting it sounds, it's not worth it.
Type: Action/Horror
There are giant bugs. The only time their involvement isn't action/horror is if Hayao Miyazaki is involved.
Ch. Development: 8
There is a surprising amount of character development. And the strange thing about it is, it isn't even gradual! Someone starts to show signs of change, then the next episode, that character has completely changed! Ain't it amazing? And also completely and utterly stupid?
Sexuality: 6
Two counts of wet T-shirts, two counts of "the morning after sex," and many counts of passionate kissing.
Romance: 6
Love changes everyone, doesn't it? Especially when the relationship can be called in the very first episode.
Drama: 6
There are actually quite a bit (two) dramatic fight scenes, but when your main opponents are bugs, you don't expect them to be too cool. There's also the theme of human sacrifice, and the definition of "acceptible loss" that is rampant in any anime involving some sort of military institution.
Action: 6
Can't think of a sentence not using the word "bugs." Shoot, I failed already.
Comedy: 4
Comedy = thinking how stupid-looking Yuji is most of the time
Dub: B
Dub Voices: 7
Not bad. I have yet to hear the Japanese voices, but not bad. Some are pretty good.
Dub Music: 5
I can't tell what she's saying. Far from an improvement, but still, not bad.
Dub Lines: 8
They're not bad. It's the execution that's a little off.
Censorship: Unknown
Let me just take the time to say that I am surprised. Before, FUNimation came across to me as a horrible corporation doing low-quality work on high-quality anime to make huge profits. Now, FUNimation can now be considered the newest anime-translation-producing company in the business due to the fact that not only do they do everything by themselves, they're also doing average-fare serieses like Blue Gender! I have a newfound respect for you my evil friends!
Now, on to the heart of the matter: the actual series known as Blue Gender. While it may be a cliche-ridden pile of filth that was apparently designed specifically to piss me off, my critic heart, which goes both ways, tells me that it wasn't that bad. There was a decent amount of character development, a few memorable characters, and there weren't any cheesy "they actually lived" moments. You see them die, they die. But my beef with it is not that, but the fact that all my favorite characters were killed, and that the ending is completely meaningless. Well, there is a meaning, but some would compare it to End of EVA, but they are significantly different. For instance, End of EVA had reasoning and sense. Blue Gender was just trying desperately to sound smart and make some sort of point.
By my judgement, about 40% of you are going to be interested in this series, and 50% of those will be interested enough to actually buy the DVDs.
That's my Story and I'm Sticking to it!
