Vision of Escaflowne

Name: Vision of Escaflowne Anime Review
Item: Vision of Escaflowne
Rating: 91
Author: Gara

ARCHIVIST: Gara

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LOGGED: 2001-02-10

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REVISED: 2001-05-13

91%

Editorial Score

Consensus Grade: Aged Like Wine 🍷

📊 Production Parameter Matrix Scale 1.0 – 10.0

S [STR] Story & Narrative Direction 9 / 10

A [AGI] Animation & Cel Craftsmanship 8 / 10

S+ [INT] Character Dynamics & Cast 10 / 10

S [SYN] Voice Acting & Soundtrack 9 / 10

Consensus: Aged Like Wine 🍷

CLASSIFICATION S-TIER

[+] Strengths & Highlights

Escaflowne has originality as it's key feature. The concept of mechanical mecha (as opposed to largely electronic mecha of the future) in a fantasy setting works well, and adds to Gaea's unique feel.<BR> <BR> The characters are great, the heart of the story, as they should be.

[-] Vulnerabilities & Flaws

THOSE DAMN NOSES! While this is really a minor point, it's annoying enough at points to be disctracting!

⤢ Fullscreen • Hover 2001

Aged Like Wine 🍷

Modern Consensus: Both 2001 and modern critics align in celebrating Yoko Kanno's orchestral score and the hand-drawn mechanical animation as an all-time peak of 90s fantasy anime.

📖 Overview

Vision of Escaflowne is a 26 episode series following the exploits of Kanzaki Hitomi through a bizarre sequence of events out of her control.

🎬 Storyline & Narrative

Hitomi seems like a fairly average teenage girl, fickle, uncertain, and eager to show off, except for her penchant for accurate Tarot readings.

From this, she rapidly descends into the confusion of another planet of humans, anthromorphic creatures and giant mechanical Guymelefs, about to be torn apart by war. Finding herself with the new king of Fanelia, Van Fanel, she finds herself overwhelmed with new people, (Allen Schezar, a Knight of the Kingdom of Astoria among the first of them) places, (such as Freid, a duchy with a long standing destiny) and above all, the heightening of her amateur tarot to accuracy, coupled with precognitive visions.

Hitomi also finds herself confused with her emotions, and her love interests change quickly, although not always under her direct control.

One of the major bonuses of doing a full length series is the ability to spin a deep and long story, and to develop characters to their fullest. Escaflowne takes great advantage of this; everyone's roles are fleshed out in the deep and engaging story.
The setting is also unique, allowing Vision of Escaflowne to cross genres, from Mecha and Fantasy to Romance and Sword Fighting.

👥 Characters & Dynamics

Kanzaki Hitomi is a teenage girl caught up in a struggle she doesn't always fully understand, and pulled from all directions.

Van Fanel is also a teenager, and the new king of Fanelia, a small kingdom on Gaea after the death of his mother, and disappearance of his brother. Van is acompanied by his pet/friend Merle, who is largely comic relief, but on at least one occasion brought me to tears.

Allen Schezar is an Astorian Knight, and a stereotype : Tall, blonde and noble. His crew however is a much more varied and interesting group of ragamuffins.

The villains in Escaflowne are all original, and extremely well done. Without giving anything away, I can say that at least one of the villians, Folken, is probably my absolute favourite characters in Escaflowne and one of my all time favourite characters.

Fansites have huge charts linking together the various characters every possible way!

🎨 Animation & Visual Direction

The animation quality is excellent, obviously computer enhanced at points where it would improve the effect of a scene. The actual art is also extremely high quality, although the length of the noses sometimes becomes distracting as you think "Why bother with swords, they could stab each other with their noses!"

🎵 Voice Acting & Soundtrack

The japanese voice acting is excellent, and emotional. The voices are convincing and match their characters well, adding to the atmosphere of the story.

🟢 What We Liked: Escaflowne has originality as it's key feature. The concept of mechanical mecha (as opposed to largely electronic mecha of the future) in a fantasy setting works well, and adds to Gaea's unique feel.<BR> <BR> The characters are great, the heart of the story, as they should be.

🔴 What We Disliked: THOSE DAMN NOSES! While this is really a minor point, it's annoying enough at points to be disctracting!

💬 Early-2000s Fandom Pulse Community Rating: ★ 4.5/5 (6 historical responses)

• Community Praise: This title is probably my favourite anime of all time. I first saw it in dub form ;-.- but even so, at the time I was impressed. It was the first anime I'd actually seen that atempted to flush out a solid plot and characterization. In addition the music that was kept in the English version of the show was impressive. I must agree with the whole nose thing though, I must 'pointedly' add that it is enough to bother me, but no animated feature can please everyone. The movie, however was a major disappointment after seeing the series. • i like what you wrote its very nice.^^

• Contentious Points: Good review, but not much excited... And, please, don't say anything bad abut their noses. This archaic style is IMHO one of the best things i the movie...

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