Anime: Bounen no Xamdou w4w58

Bounen no Xamdou (Xam'd) is Bones at its finest. It's a show that epitomize the studio's weird style and convoluted plotlines. You won't see anything truly similar, but at the same time it will feel quite familiar to shows from Bones such as Eureka Seven and the recent Heroman, as well as with shows from other studios like Nausicaa and Mononoke Hime.

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Art & Animation
Xam'd can boast of having one of the best animation works of its year. From the very beginning you'll be watching a show that is absurdly fluid, has very sharp visuals, makes good use of movement with its constant action scenes, and at the same time give us an unique style and identity that is only similar to Eureka Seven. It's easy to be amazed by its first episodes, and the quality keeps on through basically the entire show, maybe failing only in some scenes near the end where Bones' typical mind-twists plays rob the scene. However, Xam'd lacks a decent work in shadows. Much like shows like Gurren Lagann, it's very opaque and shadowless, with a somewhat lazy work at coloring although the palette selection is definetely superb and bright.

Sound
The opening theme of Xam'd can show you a lot of what to expect from the show. It starts with many beats, it grows on a crescent, becomes freakingly flashy at the end and finish with a high peak. It's not a type of music that I enjoy, but I was pleased to see how well it introduced me to every episode. Aside from the opening, every other sound aspect of Xam'd is well done, from background musics that are always present and timely used to a voice-acting that is mature, professional and never annoys (ah... let's forget Hinokimaru).

Story
Xam'd is a tale of Akiyuki, a normal boy who gains bizarre powers as he is hit by a seed called "hiruko" when a mysterious white-haired girl blows up his school bus. After gaining his power and transforming into an abomination, Akiyuki starts his journey to find the answers he needs to understand his powers, his place in a world that hates him from transforming into a "monster", and to understand the struggle of the recent wars and religious conflicts of the land.

1. Typical story, different progression
   Basically, Xam'd is the tale of boy who gains superpowers and need to find his place in society. It's nothing really new, although it is used by many great shows. What happens here, however, is that Xam'd, unlike shounens and other japanese shows, never ends up as super-power wafare where the protagonist fights the evil guys and becomes uber-powerful. On the very contrary, Akiyuki never really gets that powerful and he struggles a lot through his journey. Xam'd is more about character interaction than anything else, which is kind of surprising considering how it starts and how it has all the necessary elements to craft a typical shounen.
   
   But it's Bones
   I've said Xam'd is Bones at its finest and this is clear after you watch a few episodes. Since the very start, very little is truly explained about the bizarre world. What are humanforms? What are xam'd? What is this ruikonism? How is the geography of the world? Why the war? Why the attack? It rarely gives us direct answers and many times it leaves us without knowing about anything. It gets more and more convoluted as it goes on, especially during the later parts, where it goes into a psychological play with Akiyuki and makes the confusing plot even more confuse. Fortunately, nearly all the confusion the plot creates is about the details, as the main story of the show is quite straightfoward to get and has very little detours on its way.
   

Character
Xam'd gives us a vast and varied cast. What we have here is a real mix of personalities and stereotypes, going from your typical shounen lead and slowly growing strong girl to realistic adults such as simple father and mother. This mix may be the best ingredient Xam'd has to offer, especially when you notice that it never boils to the super-power shounen it borders.

1. Interesting narrative
   One thing to notice about the huge cast is how Xam'd tackles to present each of them. The narrative constantly goes around the cast in nice chunks of episodes, making sure you know what is happening with a specific character without forgetting someone else. Each character has its deal of problems, dark past, common personality, or whatever, and because of that each time the show changes its focus you'll have a somewhat different kind of experience. When it goes to Akiyuki you'll have the "find yourself" quest. When it goes to Haru you'll have the girl in love that tries to grow. When it goes to Nakiami you'll have a silent fantasy drama. When it goes to Ishuu and her crew you'll have a shounen comedy. Etc. The variety is nice and the pace is definetely superb for most part.
   
   Monologues and development
   Fortunately, for a show with such a varied cast, the monologues are kept at a limited basis to Akiyuki. You'll still have insights for many characters, but he is the one you'll know more deeply. The way this is done helps in a few ways to make the character development of the show somewhat very pleasing. First, the screentime is only robbed by Akiyuki and his monologues for around four episodes in the second part. Second, the cast is given their personality and obvious reasonings, but keep you interested in truly knowing their little secrets and motivations. Third, all the cast relates in common way, making every event that happens with one of them something that matter in the development of the other. And finally, nearly all the cast has a good deal of screentime to give us their best, from Nakiami to Akiyuki's father.
   
   And the adults are not dumb bastards
   Once again, unlike hundreds of shounens shows and even a few Bones' shows, Xam'd makes sure to keep adults as adults. They won't act like stupid leaders to motivate the teenagers and they won't be making wrong choices every time. In Xam'd, the adults contribute a lot to the main "teenage" cast. In fact, even Akiyuki, Haru and Nakiami could be replaced by older characters and the show could keep basically the same level, which is a huge plus. It's worth noting this as I've recently saw so many shounens with stupid adults that rewatching Xam'd makes this point very clear.
   

Value
Xam'd is a huge show. It has high production values, very fluid animation, mature voice-acting, decent sound direction and is kind of iconic to its production studio. It's like a signature show for Bones with all the positives and negatives inherent to the studio's works. This mean Xam'd will feel familiar to many, and yet can easily be far more impactful and lasting than every other show that only borrows a "few" of the studio style. The initial story is kind of typical and the convoluted plot has tons of useless unexplained details, but everywhere else it succeeds nicely. One thing to remind us too was the fact that this aired in the PSN, which is by itself a nice plus and a terrible limitation to this great show.

Enjoyment
Xam'd is extremely enjoyable through most of its episodes. It's thrilling with action, quest for finding a purpose, solving mysteries of the world, mysteries of the cast's past, and so on. It has many parts where its superb animation makes the show outstanding, other where the varied cast shines, and a few that drags more than necessary. Overall, Xam'd is a show that will please those looking for a mature adventure or a alternative fantasy setting. Those who like to understand every little detail and have resistance to the convoluted works of Bones may be intimidated though.

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Comments
I would easily call Xam'd an incredible show if not for a somewhat boring start of the second half. It's a show that has many interesting concepts, a solid quest for the hero who wants to find his place, tons of interesting characters, and a superb production value.

The show surprised me a lot when I first watched it. Especially because I wasn't reading about it on anime boards and it was very hard just to get my hands on it. I mean, usually shows that never make to the mainstream of the internet even a little are bound to be either extremely limited to the japanese audience or just trash that no one cares. Xam'd, however, proved to be quite an interesting show that yelled "Bones" everywhere. It reminded me of Eureka, Full Metal Alchemist, RahXephon, and everything else the studio made. that with an outstanding production value for its year and the show instantly caught my attention.

Sadly, the pace took a turn down on the second half, the psychological play is not that great, and the convoluted setting can be a bit intimidating to face. However, from all positives and negatives, Xam'd is a definite watch, especially if you like Bones' shows.

Eureka 7 meets Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind and after a night of wild ion and lots of booze, the result is Xam’d. There are many similarities to those two shows plus the storywriters seemed to be drunk most of the time to really focus on what the heck the story is all about. Because let’s be honest; studio BONES simply sucks at storyboards.

And this is what actually ruins this show; what exactly is it about? Is it the lead male’s quest to find a way to control the symbiotic creature inside him? The lead girl’s attempt to save lives? Some war for whom gets to defeat whom? Hard to say; it could be all of that together. It looks simple in the beginning and it’s easy to follow up to a point but then they keep adding more and more and more side stories and secondary elements to the plot and they hardly try to explain them. What is even worse, is that it was not a problem with the duration of the show, but the mid episodes were very slow in progress to the point they ate up most of the time which could be used to subtly showcast everything. The scriptwriters had to turn the plot into turbo mode in the last third and since they had opened a hundred different things, nothing made sense and went by with just a vague ing. I mean, the characters seem to know what is going on because it’s their world and their terminology but the rest of us are kept in the dark all the way. Series like Neon Genesis did the same but you could still follow most of what was going on with the only blank spots being the character motives and the weird stuff in the finale. But at least it was extremely entertaining even without that. You don’t have that in Xamdou because it is not heavy on action or fan service; it’s mystery and adventure and unintentionally became cryptic as heck because BONES sucks at exposition.

You can always look for the answers on some wiki on the web but it’s just not the same because there is no established connection with most of what is going on. There are also many parts where the characters vaguely refer to all the events and vaguely hint what they are all about. The average viewer though will not have proper detective skills to figure it all out, nor will he even bother to do so. Sure, it is equally bad to have the characters breaking the fourth wall and explaining all to you in a forced monologue but THIS is equally bad, as it accepts from the viewer to memorize everything and even try to connect things on his own. Which may sound cool at first but it clearly doesn’t worth it by the end of the show as there are too many things going on at the same time and they all feel like they weren’t looked into as much as they should have. Plus, you probably don’t even care to find out.

The story begins with the lead male, Akiyuki, living a normal school life. At some point a kamikaze kid blows up and this mutating thing enters him, which turns him into a huge bioorganic beast. And then some dudes from a neighboring territory attack, he has to escape, starts losing his mind but is saved by, Nakiami, the lead female of the show, who takes him on her flying ship and together goes on a quest for a way to control his power and bring a stop to all the deaths of the affected people.

So far, so good; we have a very interesting beginning with a normal teenager getting superpowers, some sort of religious war going on, flying ships, and a quest for salvation. It is all easy to follow and to be frank, it is not something I have encountered in any other show with this exact blend of elements. It looked like from the start that it would be a lot more than some generic quest by a bunch of silly kids.

So the story continues by getting to know the characters more. The flying ship is in fact doing postal work on a continental scale, which is a fine excuse for them to get paid and looking for clues here and there. I mean most shows have the characters be full of magic money; no idea how they find the needed provisions to roam around. Anyways, it feels better than that excuse of surfing mercenaries on Eureka 7, and makes another allusion to Last Exile.

From here and up to the middle of the show the plot keeps going back and forth amongst numerous characters in different locations, fleshing them out to be more than NPCs offering short termed aid or importance to the plot and yet never clearly explaining why is everything happening. Or how. Or for what purpose.

And then we have a showdown of sorts amongst childhood friends the reason of which appears to be who gets to score with Haru, the heartbreaking girl… Hm, now that is just shallow. Anyways, this was the part where the story started to fall apart as the motives of the characters became harder and harder to follow. Why did that dude kill himself? Why are those zealot kids killing themselves when they could just plant bombs and escape to repeat the process and increase their chances in the war? Sure, they give vague hints but if you are not Sherlock, you will most likely miss the connection points.

Also, this is the part where the pace slooooows down a lot and far less interesting things are happening, or even make sense. But what did you expect if the main character gets amnesia? God how I hate that trope; it resets progress and eats up a whole bunch of episodes for no reason. Ok, maybe it made some reason in this case as Akiyuki was looking for the meaning in his life or something, but it also ate a lot of precious time and left everything else hanging out to dry.

The final episodes have this huge war going on, which by now makes no sense at all without reading a long wiki about the stuff they left out or your mother is Agatha Cristie. Plus, for a war the action part was quite short and random and didn’t even matter in the entire plot. In Evangelion, even if you didn’t get the story you would at least love the action but here it is all mambo-jumbo. So I must warn anyone who is interested in the show to NOT expect good action scenes. All the progress happens through dialogues as the pen is mightier than the sword. Plus, the sword in this series is goddamn ugly.

To be frank, I didn’t like the Xamdou transformations much; they looked like silly sponge creatures. Other shows with people turning to freaks have really cool looks, like in the case of Guyver or Tekkaman Blade. Here, it looks plain weird. It is unique in its own way of course but that doesn’t mean it’s appealing; it’s just memorable.

And the finale comes along and… nothing makes sense. Or it does if you read the wiki but at this point I didn’t care to find out because I had lost my interest. It felt like a big let down at how they wasted all those episodes on strolling aimlessly in the countryside and neglected to explain more of what is going on.

The story is quite interesting actually, but just like in Eureka 7 and Last Exile, the setting remains a big blur at many parts and you are left with a lot of blank spots in the end, which translates to bad storytelling. All that terminology and innuendos and areas and people and you hardy get half of what is going on.

I loved the artwork and the animation; they are very good most of the duration and almost of movie quality. Studio BONES never fails to deliver in general looks of any of its shows. What I disliked was the action parts, as the beasts and the fighting choreography looked silly to me. The music is fine too, with the main theme being very memorable. Unfortunately, the dialogues end up being the only thing that progresses the story, thus breaking the first rule of good storytelling “show, don’t tell”. Heck, one would wonder if they even “tell” it since it’s all so vague and cryptic.

Most characters are interesting as they all get fleshed out immensely throughout the show. Too bad the vague setting makes their motives weird and uned after awhile. Plus, as much as they get fleshed out, besides five all the rest end up being completely irrelevant to the main plot (the one in the ending that is, as very little makes sense in the second half) which eventually makes them all to be decorations and not active personalities that affect the events around them.

Down to it, all this blabber and silly fighting didn't get to me. It is not a good war drama; at least not compared to Legend of Galactic Heroes and Gundam 08th MS team. Its romantic sub-plots ends up being minor rouses while the world-building aspect is sacrificed considerably around dragged and autistic personal drama. It is not even that good as a journey of self-acknowledgement either, as many things are left to speculation, vague hints and some Buddhist type of life very few would bother to figure out. If you try to find similarities between this and Full Metal Alchemist, you will easily tell how it did a very bad job compared to that adventure because they lacked focus and didn’t notice the time restrictions until it was too late. Plus, despite its weird philosophy and themes around happiness and harmony of the soul, it sure didn't make me think or feel anything special as Neon Genesis, Serial Experiments Lain, Mind Game, Kaiba, or Tatami Galaxy did. So it’s all nothing but a pretty birthday box with a very beautiful cover and an expensive vase inside which someone dropped accidentally and thus when you open the box you find your gift to be in pieces.

They are nice looking pieces though.

This one's hard to evaluate, since most of the impact it had on me was emotional, not rational. As most of you can imagine, the technical aspects of this series are a strong point. It's visually attractive, with nice character designs, unusual organic mecha design, a mixture of natural landscapes with rural populations and some ancient monuments. The music is nice, though there's nothing spectacular there. Normally a series has to be much longer for me to notice the BGM. In this case it wasn't a bother, and it suited the mood. The opening and ending songs (both from the original online broadcast and the TV broadcast) were nice and catchy, toghether with some nice and well done animation. For me these were the best openings and endings of last year (though they didn't win the AR award, but they placed second).

Then we have the actual content of the series, which displays a variety of characters in a war setting similar to that of Gundam, where two nations are warring and an independent and pacific island town were some of the characters live gets involved. One of the nations uses some sort of organic mecha, while the other has a sort of small mechanic robots driven in a way similar to Evangelion, through mental connection/coordination, rather than levers and buttons. Also in the middle of this struggle we find an apparently independent postal airship, inhabited by a merry bunch. During the attack on the island, our main character gets involved in a terrorist bombing attack by an albino girl to his school bus. The explosion she produces, on top of destroying everything around her, sprays some sort of energy that impacts the protagonist turning him into a being called a xam'd, another sort of organic mecha. At the same time, the north country invades the island with their organic mecha, the hitogata (or humanform). After figthing the enemies in this new shape, the main character, a guy named Akiyuki, is rescued from a foreign girl from the postal airship named Nakiami, who takes him with her, and teaches him how to survive in his new form. Obviously, the plot developes as the island becomes an investigation site, Akiyuki's schoolmates become soldiers to comfront the loss of many of their friends, Akiyuki's parents have to deal with his dissapearance (and their own issues as a couple) and the postal airship travels to the north with unclear intentions.

We get to meet a lot of characters, some of which are introduced well into the story, like Raigyo and Yango. Most of them are really appealing and well developed, while some of them are just there, not doing much. After watching a good portion of the series I found myself attached and familiar to them, wanting to know what was going to happen next (though the series doesn't present make use of important cliffhangers). You could say it's character driven. Now there's a problem. At some point I started feeling like I didn't really get what was going on. I didn't really understand what the main enemies were investigating, nor did it turn to be that important at any point. Also all of the xam'd background was related to some sort of tradition or religion, however you want to call it, that I didn't really understand, so except for the upfront situations the series was showing me I wasn't really getting what was going on. The series includes a ton of cryptic conversations, where characters speak about things you still can't get, or about customs and stuff you don't know, without providing a proper explanation. Because of this, most of the character's motivations weren't clear to me. I didn't get what the hell the Zambani was actually trying to achieve, nor did I get what the hell Sannova was doing, sending those childs to collect hiruko, what was Hiruken, etc, etc. It wasn't even clear why the two nations were fighting each other. Maybe a second watch could help clear some of this stuff up, but I'm not one to rewatch shows, much less shows that I couldn't fully enjoy.

I still think that this series is avobe average in most aspects, and I would recommend it, but be aware that this isn't going to be an average mecha series. In fact, the mecha don't even play such an important part. There are only a couple of actions scenes during the whole series, and some of them don't even involve mecha. The story is complex, to the point where you might be wanting to rewatch previous episodes and some dialogues in particular, from time to time. I also think it might hold some sort of symbolism that I didn't grasp the meaning of. It has some small, very small amount of romance, in particular between a couple of the main characters, and also the relationship between Akiyuki's parents is pretty interesting and different.

You should watch it and decide for yourselves.

Hey AniDB, it’s a rare event I watch an anime the year it was made, but when I saw Xam’d was a new Studio Bones production (my favorite team so far) it quickly jumped to the top of my que. So how did this offering fare? Here’s my two cents.

Animation
Studio Bones, I hear they deliver some serious eye candy!
Damn straight, and for Xam’d they put together a wicked team with a wicked resume to get the look for this one. The colors, fluid movement, extreme attention to details and consistent quality in the lines are top notch, but it’s really the unique designs that steal the show. Look, check this design team out team out:

Directed by Masayuki Miyaji (Asst. Director Spirited Away)
Animation Director Masashi Okumura (Key Animation Sword of the Stranger)
Art Director Takashi Aoi (Darker than Black)
Character Design by Ayumi Kurashima (Eureka Seven)
Xam’d design by Seiichi Hashimoto (S-CRY-ed)
Mecha Design by Kimitoshi Yamane (Gundam SEED, Cowboy Bebop)
Organic Monster things designed by Kenji Mizuhata (Mars Daybreak)

It’s not even fair to put this team together, it’s like the modern day New York Yankees of baseball or something, this team is proven and Xam’d is just bred for success in the animation department and it does not disappoint. Two thumbs up for Xam’d animation, hell yeah!
• Looks/Visuals : 9/10

Sounds
What kind of soundtrack do we have to compliment the glorious animation?
They got another stud on board, Michiru Oshima (Fullmetal Alchemist composer) who once again just makes good anime score that sits comfortably in the background, never really steals the show, and just fits the pulse of the story and setting very well.

What about the opening and ending themes, find anything cool?
Yeh, I did. The opening track for all episodes is by Japanese experimental electronic rock duo Boom Boom Satellites who play here “Shut Up and Explode”. Really catchy drum and bass upbeat driving tune with a great buildup. I liked it so much that I tried this band out on ActionExt.com to see what else they have (for free stream). This is in my opinion their best tune, which I listened to in full almost every episode.

Are the Seiyuu, veteran studs as well?
Hm. Well our main male protagonist Akiyuki is portrayed by Atsushi Abe who I’ve never heard before. He does well, standard, not much to praise. Nakiami, our female hero is voiced by Yuko Sanpei (who voiced Renton Thurston in Eureka Seven, but that’s trying to sound like a young boy so…yeh hard to compare) I personally thought her voice sounded very heavy and deep, a bit too old for her characters visual look, though not too old for the weight her character is supposed to carry, so another “just good” job. And Haru, the hottie of this series, is voiced by Fumiko Orikasa (Bleach as Rukia) and in my opinion she sounded best and brought her character out very well. She’s got the biggest resume though so maybe it’s the experience that makes her character sound best.
• Score/Voice Acting : 8/10

Story
Okay, so the story and tags; Adventure, Gunfights, Aliens, Military, Human Enhancement… Massacre! Sounds like it’s full of glorious bloodshed and action!
Yea it does and you know what? It ain’t! Xam’d is boring as all hell!

WHAT?! Why, what happened?
Well those above things do happen, but in very few episodes. That tag for “Slow Plot Development” needs to be beefed up. The majority of the story here is quiet character development. It’s Akiyuki flying around on a postal ship with a mostly boring cast trying to find his place in this really cool world which unfortunately we really never dive too deep into. There’s a lot of potential here, but we never really see it fleshed out coherently.

Well that’s a disappointment…
No no, it’s just for a more specific audience. It comes across feeling very “Eastern”. Makes me think of Final Fantasy 7, where a little story very slowly turns into this “find yourself while fighting this epic enemy and save the world from kinda itself” type situation. It’s not my specific cup of brew, but I know this story most certainly has its fan base.
• Story : 5/10

Characters
So the cast, you said it’s boring but the tag says Great Side Character and Strong Female Lead, what is it?
Well, both can be true right? The three characters I named for voice actors along with Ishuu the captain of the postal ship Zanbani, and Raigyo are very good. They have believable motives and reactions and when they’re on screen you pay a bit more attention. The later too unquestionably have the least time. But that’s it for the cast! The rest of ‘em are flat and static and I couldn’t care less for them. They really make an already slow moving story really drag, and I would gladly see them all erased in a flash if it were in exchange for more action and development of the five characters I cared for.

What about the villain, does he/she/them add anything to the mix?
No, and that makes me sad because I’m always one to root for the villain. For the majority of the series Commander Kakisu appears as what would appear to be our primary antagonist. I’ll be honest I just never got his motives. He has potential and a back story but never delivers nor comes across to our heroes as a great threat.

Did you find a favorite Character?
When it’s not the villain or a dark and tragic hero it’s usually the hottie, who in this case is Haru. She’s drawn very well and like I said before voiced very well. She’s likable though not as important as I would have preferred. I liked her more at the beginning (and in the credits) visually.
• Characters : 6/10

Value
So boosting this anime to the front of the line to see them-sick visuals, is it worth it?
I would say no, and I am sad to say that. If you want to see a world with fantastic workings, environments, technology and design, you will get your fill with Xam’d. But the tags I would bold are “SLOW plot” and “Japan” because the overall feel to this anime is just foreign and difficult (for at least me) to relate to.
• Value : 6/10

Enjoyment
You got burned.
Sadly yes. I’m the kinda guy that hates giving up on an anime, so I struggled though this one, much like I did with Noir, and the result is probably the same. It’s a great anime, I’m sure in many ways, but sadly, just not my flavor. I wanted to stop Xam’d a few times and give up. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. The designs were just so good and my appreciation for the visuals too high to do that. I ended up with a very lopsided opinion ‘cause the good was very good, but the bad oh so bad (to me) …the overall tally, it will say watch it, but I say do so with reservation and a finger at the ready on the eject button. Here’s hoping the next Bones release is aimed in my direction…

What was your favorite moment of the series?
Episode 14 when Furuichi (a very muddled reoccurring character, school friend of Haru and Akiyuki) goes to get some drinks and has a moment where he debates existence and stuff. I loved the end of that scene. It kinda reflects how I felt about Xam’d actually.
• Enjoyment : 5/10

Overall : 7

If you read it, please rate it, even if you hate it
Thanks!

Note: This review is based on Fabulous fansubs. There are a few minor translation errors, but the quality is truly 'fabulous'. Recommended. As you might have noticed from my ratings I didn't particularly like Bounen no Xamdou and I cover the points why. However, if you feel that the points I cover are not relevant to your enjoyment factor you might as well check Shinypate1's review. Since as he notes, we are like Siskel and Ebert on this show. After all, different people search for different things in anime.



Originally created by a dozen or so script writers, half of whom also participated in the creation of Eureka Seven and directed by Miyaji Masayuki (assistant director in Eureka Seven) Bounen no Xamdou is a show as inconsistent as you would expect from a creation of ten people with completely different opinions. It tells a tale about a boy who gets infected by some weird thing named Hiruko which makes him turn into an overpowered monster of destruction. Unfortunately, it's not as cool as it sounds since the guy loses his sanity whenever he transforms into Xamd and eventually turns into a stone... err, if someone doesn't transform him back, though it's not really clear how does Nakiami do that. Anyway, not long after the incident, that guy gets picked up by a drifting airship, which drifts around the world for no apparent reason, and you get Eureka Seven all over again. At least that's what I thought until the plot suddenly turns to be overly ambitious and starts collapsing over itself, unable to believably justify half of its happenings.

Frankly, I haven't seen a bigger waste of potential since watching GONZO's Last Exile a few years back. Actually I wouldn't be surprised if someone from GONZO actually slipped into the BONES studio and "polished" their script. The first two episodes are great, setting is interesting, characters seem likable and potential appears seamless. It gets slightly harder to watch when you realize the show copies a great lot from Eureka Seven, but it's still cool, because it also offers much of its own original stuff. However, in the second half everything starts to collapse almost as if someone else started to write script for the show, which I believe was the case. Anyway, the director with an experience of being "assistant" at best in the past certainly didn't know how to deal with things. Setting starts to collapse because nothing is justified, nor explained in it. Much stuff happens, but you don't understand any of it, and you are not even hinted and what it is. To put it simply - I was observing a group of white haired teens eat rocks, turn into monsters and wage wars against some sort of mechas, as to why they are doing that and what the hell are they even doing, I never knew. Characters don't help either as I got the feeling that they were separated from me by some invisible wall. They have personalities, I just don't know them. In the end even the great animation and beautiful background score didn't manage to raise this show above mediocrity. It had all the potential to become one of the best anime of the year, but it collapsed over itself, in the same fashion majority of GONZO's shows do.

Animation: 8/10

There is little to complain about the animation done by Bones (Darker than Black, Eureka Seven). To put it short, it looks just like Eureka Seven with better technicals. Backgrounds are very well detailed, you can see little pieces of debris lie around after explosions and so on. Character designs don't lack detail either, though I found that males look quite generic. Main character has a short black hair and wears white shirts which are too big for him. Yep, Indecisive Lead Character Design #1. I couldn't help but ask for some fantasy when looking at other males as well, though they are still above the main guy. On the other hand, the females have great designs. Though Haru looks like Code Geass' Shirley rip-off (same seiyuu even) she looks, well, good. The other few, more important females, have red or even blue hair, are detailed and attractive. Finally the fluidity of motion is really good. Everything moves in a realistic way and even little stuff like debris after explosions or water spatter flies around the screen and creates great visual spectacles. They didn't hook off from doing inbetweens, that's for sure. Anyway, the only real complaint I could squeeze in animation department is that it lacks fantasy. Not only in male designs, but in the direction as a whole. Seriously, there are no cool shots at the moon, no cool scenes where characters artistically blend with the backgrounds, all you get is a close-up to whatever character is in action and that's it.

Sound: 7/10

OP Shut up and Explode by Kylee sounds something like a soft rock, but is certainly much slower and more peaceful than the OP. It did suit the conclusion of episodes pretty well.

Background music by Oshima Michiru (Fullmetal Alchemist) is a mixed bag. There are some very good vocal and instrumental pieces throughout the show, majority of which induce that "sad but epic" feel. Unfortunately there are also many generic and bland tracks which escape my memory whenever they finish playing. They barely beat the silence and that's not a good thing. No complains about the sound effects though.

Voice-acting, however, is not of the quality you'd expect from Bones studio. The reason for that is because the expert seiyuu Orikasa Fumiko (Code Geass as Shirley, Bleach as Rukia) and that's only because she voiced Shirley in Code Geass and did a better job there. Still does a pretty good job here as well, when compared to others that is.

Story: 6/10

The setting of the show is too original and too interesting for its own good I guess. I kind of see script writers making the setting so original they ultimately lose track of things and forget what is what. It's basically some parallel world and humans live there. However, there is some cultist-like faction which eats rocks and catches weird shapeless things to transform themselves into what cast in this show calls "humanforms", though they look like anything but human. Anyway, there is a war going between those cultists and military. That's as much as I could catch. As to why they are fighting and if there is even a government somewhere in that world, it was never shown. I don't even understand if they were from the same nation or not. It's even worse with all that cultist business because nothing is logically justified and all you get is see them eating rocks transforming into monsters and so on. I wish I knew how did all of that work and who exactly those white haired kids were. They go around battlefields and gather dead into their sticks but nobody knows why, including the script writers. The setting is so inconsistent that it creates an illusion of many people throwing their random ideas into a pot, mixing that stuff a bit and baking a cake out of it. The unbelievable setting was what ultimately lead me to feel complete apathy to all the wars and half of the plot.

The plot itself promises a lot in the first two episodes, then it slowly degrades, but still goes steady in the following fourteen or so, and then the race downhill starts ultimately making it end up collapsing unto itself. It felt as if the show was set to run for 52 episodes, but then they decided to cut every second one of them. After episode twelve everything starts to move as fast as a truck loaded with lead going downhill, note downhill. You don't get a reason behind character actions, you don't understand where the plot is going and since setting doesn't explain anything you just sit there stare at stuff which happens, though you are not sure why it does. Some characters decide to come back to their home village for example. Why? Who knows. What is the significance of that? Who knows. I was forced to watch a two episodes long journey which didn't bring any sense of significance whatsoever. All I knew is that the main guy is a monster and that he will fight into a big fight in the end, and so he did. All the stuff about cultist rituals was peculiar and I was kind of interested in all those fantasy details, but since nothing was explained everything felt kind of half-arsed and I stopped caring in the end. Especially when those ridiculous DEUS-EX Machina situations started to kick in. Characters traveling thousand of miles in a matter of seconds to save another character falling from a cliff, whom they didn't even know was alive, kind of feels forced to me. I don't understand how can you find another person when he is on the other side of the world without some sort of telepathic powers and I'm pretty sure none of the characters had any. The show has a dramatic and, should I say, original conclusion and it would have worked well if characters were likable or the setting believable, but because obviously they weren't, it fell flat. I think they've tried to tell us the same stuff as in Eureka Seven, but, kind of, failed.

I still did enjoy the plot quite a bit, especially the first few episodes. And until I've noticed that the plot has as many holes as a sieve I kind of held high expectations. Though indeed those were betrayed, I still quite enjoyed the first half and I did indeed want to watch it to the very end in hopes it will explain something to me. It didn't but at least it HAD an end. Anyway, good adventure/monster action show if you are not searching for depth. Don't delve into the things too deep or you'll get burned as I did. Ultimately, if you are the type who enjoys GONZOish plots, then you might as well find this show in your favourites. At least people do find favourites in Last Exile, what is incomprehensible to me.

Character: 5/10

Characters are the weakest part in this show, because, simply, they are ignored for the most part of the running time. Especially the main character who starts as an annoying your everyday lame indecisive lead and is such for half of the show, then gets banged on a head, loses consciousness for like, the following ten episodes and then wakes up with a different personality. I guess I should commend them for originality, but I am quite reluctant to. I never knew a bang on the head is a justifying reason to develop characters. Anyway, it felt so extremely weird that he changed his personalities out of the blue that I pretty much started to ignore him in the later half, and you know, it didn't really matter much.

There are other characters, like Haru who is in love with missing main character and the captain of the ship main character drifts around, but they are never given a satisfying amount of depth and though their personalities seem to build up in the first half, everything gets thrown away in the second. From a depressed and bitter soldier Haru suddenly becomes an intuitive female lead who follows the main character, because, I guess, she loves him, but they kind of seem to forget that in the later half. The captain of the ship, though always shown to have a "different" side in the first half, so picking my interest, gets ignored in the second half, only making cameo appearances doing some incomprehensible things, like blowing up towers. Actually, I feel that characters did indeed have a deep personality, buried somewhere, but all their inner world was ignored in the second half, so we could enjoy many war scenes, explosions and cultists eating rocks. It's as if they cut all the scenes which contained justification of development out and only left the results on. And that sucks, what the hell were they doing anyway.

The only character who comes close to being full-fledged is Nakiami. Though there was still a great deal of her personality traits which remained vague, you at least get what she thinks, sometimes. Anyway, she was the only of the main cast who managed to develop in a somewhat believable way and didn't show new traits out of nowhere. Guess the director of the show only cared about her, heh. She is still not a cool character though, I found her boring and hard to follow, but at least she has shown her personality to the viewers.

Oh yeah, nearly forgot to drop a note about the villain, who, well, is as good as non existent. At first it seems that the scientist guy is going to be a villain and the military captain will be the one who will hold him down. Then in the second half they suddenly flap personalities and the scientist starts crying in every scene you see him and captain starts contradicting himself and do stuff which doesn't make sense. They end up doing nothing significant anyway, so I was kind of wondering why did the creators even bothered to put them there. Maybe to develop Akiyuki's father, who knows. In episode twenty-four or something the real villain gets introduced though - a face in the rock. With as much personality as a rock. He is labeled as Emperor and they tell it's his fault the war is going on, which I found hard to believe since he was just a face in the frickin' rock. Though he could speak through some black bubbles he never made any sense, nor he ever tried to make any. How exactly was he a reason of the war is beyond me.

I actually found more favourites in the side cast, than I did in the main. Though most of the guys are annoying cookie-cutter stereotypes, there is this interesting relationship between the parents of Akiyuki. Then there is this secretary of the military captain who seemed to have a personality. At least those three felt real AND interesting. Too bad they have little screen-time. They still beat majority of main guys with it. Heh.

Myers-Briggs personality indicator:



Value: 5/10

Nope, I kind of find it hard to imagine myself re-watching this show. All the fun I had was in that I expected them to explain the setting. They didn't, so what is there in for me to watch it again? Well, pretty animation might be the only reason I might consider re-watching this show and I might leave it undeleted in my collection as to have an example of how not to screw things in the other half. Oh yeah, I might want to watch some cultist rituals again and imagine they do have some substance behind them. At least it has originality which makes it hard to throw it away.

1. Conclusion:[/b] Unless you are an avid fan of Eureka Seven and you want to watch something similar to it I wont recommend this show. There are hundreds of better shows around, so if you are not really bored you shouldn't watch Bounen no Xamdou. It's not bad, it's just average. It has good things, but the bad things mar them down and it leaves this anime on the very middle of mediocrity. But if you have actually liked this you might want to check Eureka Seven out.

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Rate me! This review is based on the .ts caps as well as the Fabulous fansubs, and will be revised when the DVD or Blue-ray comes out. It's a season-making series, and deserves an in-depth review. If you want a different view of the series, my buddy Summoner has a good one also, and for this series, we are like Siskel and Ebert.

Quick Take:: Bounen no Xamdou (Xam'd Lost Memories) is an action-oriented shounen/seinen series, with roots deep in romance, drama and fantasy. The eponymous manga is a spinoff of the series, not the other way around. It's about Akiyuki, a high-school everyman caught in a war between his parents, a war between the polymorphic alien Hiruken and the military which has taken over Sentan Island. It's a battle between north and south, a romantic battle of a polygonic nature, and the various family , fellow schoolmates, soldiers, and traveling companions, each with good backstory and moving character development. It's an essentially intimate, small story of coming-of-age, finding your identity told against a huge wartime canvas, and an anti-war tour-de-force by Bones and the director/scriptwriter Masayuki Miyajii (Spirited Away, Eureka Seven, Mars Daybreak). It is highly recommended for ages 12 and up, and with the warning of adult thematic material, appropriate for all ages.

Whole reviews will point out the similarities and differences between Xam'd and Eureka Seven,, so I will not recap the obvious similarities in animation and sound more than saying, if you liked E7, you will love Xam'd. However, E7 is a much-longer series, with a somewhat different ending: here, the girl rescues the guy. I wish I could have rated Xam'd a 10, but because of some structural questions and plot holes, it's good but worth about a 8.5-9. Still, it's one of the best series of the season. It screened on Playstation Network, and was posted in capped and .ts subs, so what I watched is digitally excellent and actually better than DVD quality. This quality on the screen is present throughout the series, as animation, sound, and characters are excellent throughout.

Animation: Bones animation (and 16 different episode directors and 40+ artists) is responsible for the technically excellent quality of the animation. Cinematic techiques abound: lens flare, false perspective, extreme closeups, traveling pans, flying camera, post-focus and unusual camera angles, it's all there (some episode directors using them more than others). Backgrounds are visually arresting and hugely varied, from cityscapes seen with shimmering haze to cold, distant mountain fastness. Inbetweens shine, as characters are animated with real movement and emotions on their faces. This attention to facial reactions and body-language is essential to the series, as the most moving parts are the character development found in the character design and animation. With excellent mechanicals, numerous costume changes, interaction betwen figure and background, I can find no fault with the animation, and there are enough "wow" effects in enough episodes (20% is my 10-standard) to garner a 9.5 in animation. They definately left a good portion of the budget on the screen.

Sound: The 2006 winner of the Tokyo Anime Best Music Award (Fullmetal Alchemist: The Conqueror of Shambala) Michiru Oshima is responsible for some incredibly moving music throughout the series. You'll notice many leitmotifs throughout, and each character tends to have a theme. It's the most noticable part of the sound, but I do not overlook the wide soundstage, deep directionality, realistic and inventive sound effects, and the technical artistry of the sound crew.

Op and Ed were "Shut up and Explode" by BOOM BOOM SATELLITES (Appleseed, Vexille) and "Vacancy" by Kylee, respectively, done to an action-packed montage for OP and to a contemplative, character-based closing respectively. Effective, but not the wowsers that the rest of sound is.

Seiyuu: relative newcomer Atsushi Abe (Shugo Chara!! as Kūkai Sōma, To Aru Majutsu no Index as Toma Kamijo) as Akiyuki Takehara, voicing his part with youth and vigor. Fumiko Orikasa (SaiKano as Chise and about 100 other credits) as Haru Nishimura brought a veteran's vocal facility to the part as Akiyuki's love-interest, and Yuko Sanpei (Eureka Seven (TV) as Renton Thurston) is Nakiyami, and yet another of the incredibly talented voice actors in this series. Secondary parts do not have secondary actors, even the great Romi Paku is in the cast. The voice acting never disappoints, and overall I found the series both emotionally and technically excellent, earning a 9.


Story/Plot: On Sentan Island in the south seas, Akiuki, Haru and Furuichi are finishing their high school and awaiting the next phase in their life. War rages between north and south, seemingly connected to the other-worldly Hiruken Emperor and human forces gathering for a final battle on both camps. Into this world comes Nakiyami, a red-haired foreign girl with a mysterious past and an ability to control the Xam'd spirit that takes control of Akiuki during a battle on the island. Akiyuki takes off to discover what it means to have a Xam'd, with Nakiyami's help and the crew of the postal ship Zanbani. Meanwhile, forces gather on all sides of the conflict, which will result in a rousing final battle that covers almost 20% of the later episodes.

The story is an emotionally compelling (if complex and somewhat inscrutable) fantasy, a story of romance, revenge, redemption and restoration. There are very few real antagonists (i.e., no real enemies), but the character development of this series rivals any other 26-episode series I am familar with. It should move you, and from episode 13 on, both amaze and astound you with the animation,sound, and emotional density of the writing (though the speed of the plot development is, for some, breathtaking). On the downside, many characters are introduced and developed, only to be essentially sidelined later in the show. Loose ends are mostly tied up, but we don't know what it all means: what conflict makes the war necessary? The war ends, but we don't understand what it was about, and don't know why it ends. Perhaps like many wars, we ever really know what it's about.

The theology and ending will likely remind you of Neon Genesis Evangelion, because it's hard to understand, but I hope the spoiler may help a bit. Story has minor flaws and plot holes, but despite them, it never fails to move you, earning a solid 8.5.

Character: I loved the character development in the series. This is not just because there are over 30 characters, but because many of them have good backstory and nice character development. The romance (and polygon triangles) is resolved, the broken marriage healed, and the relationship between mother and son is given a tragic end. Akiyuki and Haru are good together. True, the Hiruken Emperor is never given much backstory, perhaps because he's the "double McGuffin" of the series, but even his development is emotionally satisfying (giving a stillborn a name is thematically appros to a series about coming-of-age). The miss here is that there are too many characters, and too much character development, for side characters that are essentially sidelined. Thus, it's a 8.5-9 for me.

Value: I loved this series! I watched it, with tissues close by, every week and I could not wait for it to come to a conclusion; when it arrived, I found myself wanting more. I need a little more story for Nakiyami, both backstory and after-this. More explanation of the sides of the conflict. I wanted to see more post-restoration for Akiyuki and Haru. I even wanted to learn more about the Hiruken Emperor and what happend to him. So, yes, its a very good series, and has excellent replay value. If you loved Eureka Seven, you'll agree that it's at least as good if not better (at least in some respects). I would give this an 8.5.

Enjoyment: Needless to say, this series is one of the best of the season, and is hugely enjoyable. You'll find yourself frustrated with the mystically inscrutable theology, but enjoying the characters enough to put up with it. Let's hope there is more, or more like this, to come! 9 points for Enjoyment.

Conclusion: This series is well worth your time and is a moving tribute to how good anime can be. Get it and show it to your kids.