Anime Rebirth

Review - Yokoyama Mitsuteru Sangokushi

Review by Roriconfan

Prologue
The thing that stands out here is the origin of the story. This series is based on the most famous Chinese epic story/novel of all times, the Romance Of The Three Kingdoms . I have read a big summary of it and I must say, the series is faithful to the original script.

Story: 10
The novel is 1.000 years old, very long in duration, it is based on real historical events, involves hundreds of characters and describes a 20-year-old war around the unification of the vast and chaotic land of China. Since it was written millennia ago, the story differs a lot from typical anime scenarios and the way of life, as we know them today. Here are a few examples:

-The heroes don’t always win. This is not a typical scenario of good triumphing over evil.
-Women exist only as wives or traitorous seducers. You won’t see any female warriors or irritating girls hitting dorky boys all the time.
-Allies constantly change sides under the pressure of politics and honor. Compassion and justice are just used as political maneuvers and don’t help someone choose sides.
-Lies, secrets, betrayals, hypocrisy and ass kissing are absolutely normal to use and no one accuses someone just for using them. Everything is allowed in war.
-Strategies, terrain advantages and not numbers decide the outcome of battles. Good tactical advisors were more important than a million soldiers.
-The generals of the opposing armies were not afraid to fight in the front lines. Plus, killing the leader of an army was enough for a war to end, since the soldiers didn’t have a saying in the conflict or shared their leaders’ ambitions.

It is a very realistic scenario, if you compare it with the superficial American movies we get today. It makes The Lord Of The Rings appear simple and childish. It takes the combined efforts of the Iliad, the Odyssey and the Argonaut Campaign for a story/myth that is equal in length and quality. So, the story is a 10 without a doubt.

Animation & Sound: 6
An epic story of such proportions deserved graphics and sound, reminiscent of The Twelve Kingdoms anime (similar name and civilization) or the movie Hero , starring Jet Li. Having played a little of the Dynasty Warriors games, I expected very detailed cloths and long battles. Being a big fan of the Suikoden games, which have, ahem, “borrowed” many story elements, I expected supernatural powers and attention in personal dramas. Unfortunately, the series is pretty low on all these departments.

-Almost all the characters have simple cloths, making peasants and nobles to look the same.
-Facial variety is narrow, making most characters to look alike (that sounded like a racist comment).
-Wars are conducted in quite simple and boring ways. There is a lot of repeating footage on every battle.
-Stale images, absence of bloodshed, poor visual effects and uninteresting music themes take away all hopes of considering this department interesting.

Characters: 6
There are hundreds of characters in the story. That would be a good thing if they had been given different mannerism, personalities and purposes. Unfortunately again, they are not.

-Most of them are stunts that appear in a few episodes and then get killed or disappear without a trace from the story.
-Many characters have a sudden change in intelligence. Some suddenly become charismatic leaders and super tactical advisors and others who are veteran warriors suddenly become country bumpkins who are tricked by the simplest trap.
-All characters have the same goal: Get sneaky, earn authority, raise army, kill all who oppose, conquer lands, become emperor of China. It gets boring after seeing it for the 50th time.

Value & Enjoyment: 6
If you have read the original novel, the series seems as a poor attempt at representing the events in it. It could become a lot better if there was something else, besides a good story, in order to be kept interested. Without it, the series is one, big, average show.