First Date: Bounen no Xamdou
- Title: Bounen no Xamdou (Xam’d: Lost Memories)
- Studio: BONES
- Genre: Sci-Fi
Ratings (out of 5):
- Story: ♥♥♥
- Animation: ♥♥♥♥
- Characters: ♥♥♥
- OP/ED Themes:♥♥♥♥
- Overall: ♥♥♥½
Thoughts:
Sorry I can’t do actual screencaps from the show, but you should hit up the official site for the trailer and other images to give you a better sense of how the show looks…and for the record, it looks pretty awesome. I elected to download the 400mb SD version instead of the 1500mb HD version, and the SD version was more than enough for my 19″ non-HD-type TV.
Some of the specs: the show is subtitled, not dubbed. I assume Sony did the localization; they have the resources and the show’s creation also involves the Sony Japan-owned Aniplex. Some of the translations are a little weird…for example, in one scene a character spaces out, and her little sister says “itterasshai” (usually translated as “have a good trip”), and the character responds with “ittekimasu” (usually “I’m heading out”). But they translated it as “Come back to earth” and “I’m back.” Clearly it’s supposed to be a sort of cute/sarcastic thing, but it felt a little odd to me.
Also, the subtitles are a little small. I didn’t have any problem reading them, but some might, especially if you have a small TV screen.
So! On with the show: the story follows Akiyuki, a boy who lives on Santen Island, a neutral zone in the midst of a major war. In order to board the bus to school you have to show your armband, proving you’re a student…but Akiyuki decides to help out a mysterious girl who he assumes is a transfer student when she doesn’t have an armband, giving her his instead.
Let’s just say that the girl has plans, and they may or may not involve explosions and/or throwing Akiyuki into the midst of the war.
The character design is kind of interesting. Some of the characters are very BONES-esque– several of them look a lot like Darker than Black characters –but some of them almost look like Ghibli characters to me. (I swear to god one of them reminds me a bit of San from Mononoke Hime.) It looks like there’ll be a fun set, though; amidst one set of military types is a guy voiced by Katsuyuki Konishi (aka Kamina), which makes me happy.
Also, I am in love with this woman:
…Ishuu Benikawa. Her design and her appearance in the OP just makes me all giddy inside.
The OP and ED themes are fantastic (although untranslated, tsk tsk Sony). The only downside to the show is that because the plot starts out with a standard “average guy gets weird powers” setup, it’s impossible to tell whether they’ll work it out into something interesting or not. Judging by the quality of the show so far though, I don’t think BONES is fooling around– so I have high hopes for how it’ll turn out.
For the record, as far as I can tell Xamdou is NOT available on the Japanese PS3– in fact, they don’t seem to have the VOD stuff set up at all. Could this be the first ever anime available in the US before Japan (that wasn’t created in large part by an American company a la Afro Samurai/FUNimation)?
If you’re interested, hit the jump for the cast list.
- Akiyuki: Atsushi Abe (Shugo Chara’s Kukai)
- Haru: Fumiko Orikasa (Bleach’s Rukia, Hellsing’s Victoria)
- Furuichi: Shinnosuke Tachibana (Romeo x Juliet’s Benvolio)
- Midori: Ayumi Fujimura (Kaze no Stigma’s Ayano, Nabari no Ou’s Raimei)
- Dr. Takehara: Unshou Ishizuka (Berserk’s Void, Naruto’s Zabuza)
- Fusa Takehara: Risa Hayamizu (Welcome to the NHK’s Megumi, Gintama’s Kijima Matako)
- Akiami: Yuuko Sanpei (D.Gray-Man’s Jean Russell, Darker than Black’s Maki)
- Ishuu Benikawa: Yuumi Tamai (Spirited Away’s Rin)
- Aamu: Kenji Hamada (Honey and Clover’s Takumi Nomiya, Gundam 00’s Patrick)
- Akushiba Katsuyuki Konishi (Gurren Lagann’s Kamina)
- Kobako: Marina Inoue (Zetsubou-sensei’s Chiri, Gurren Lagann’s Yoko)
- Hinokimaru: Fumie Mizusawa (Romeo x Juliet’s Juliet)
- Kiseru-jii: Rokurou Naya (Shin-chan’s Enchou)
- Tenshin-sama: Junko Hori (Speed Racer’s Spritle, or Kurio Mifune as he was known in Japan)
- Yunbo: Houko Kuwashima (Allison to Lillia’s Allison, Azumanga Daioh’s Kagura)
- Toujirou Kakisu: Yasunori Matsumoto (Fullmetal Alchemist’s Havoc, Slayers‘ Gourry)
- Puroi Sukakki: (Direct romanization there) Michiko Neya (Full Metal Panic’s Melissa, Gurren Lagann’s Adiane)
Whew.
Tags: bounen no xamdou, first date, summer 08
July 16th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Lucky PS3 owners, although I’m guessing there will eventually be some other form of release than the PS3 VOD.
July 16th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
It isn’t the first ever anime available in the United States, before Japan. If anything, Sonic X would fit that description bill, though that appeared in Thailand before anywhere else. (Speaking of which, 53+ still has yet to air in Japan, as well…)
Regardless, I’m glad there seems to be positive response to the show, though everyone’s opinion of the service itself isn’t exactly quite “liked”. It’s a little bothersome, the rental time, I’ll be honest. I wish it was just a bit longer than 24 hours. Hopefully Sony’ll allow the service to non-PS3 owners, soon. I’d be more than willing to shell out the money for it.
July 16th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
@ChibiGoku: I think a lot of people are annoyed that you’re paying $3-4 to rent a 25-minute episode for 24 hours, to be sure.
I’ve spent a good chunk of time debating with friends that they should at least support the endeavor’s first episode if they can, though– I think in the long-term, supporting it will make the companies more willing to experiment with different methods than ignoring it, which may make companies close their minds further, as it were.
July 16th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
I’d be happy to support it myself, and I own a PS3 and a HD tv, but it’s not available in my region (Japan) and probably never will be with english subs. I admit that $4 is too much for a 24 hour rental, but it at least seems like a quality show in HD… I guess I probably won’t watch it now, as there’s plenty of anime on TV in HD for free (over the air) in Japan for me to watch.
July 16th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
wow by SD they really mean LD, cuz from what I’ve seen of it the SD version looks a lot worse quality than most SD things I’ve seen… Interesting show though, and I love Fumiko Orikasa.
July 17th, 2008 at 9:44 am
sd version on tokyotosho <.<
July 17th, 2008 at 10:01 am
@anon: Don’t do it! Doooon’t! T_T
July 17th, 2008 at 1:02 pm
@gia: But is there a non-PS3 version for a similar legal download? It’s one thing when not wanting to pay the $4 to rent an episode for a day, but its another when not wanting to pay the $404-504 to buy the console and rent an episode a day.
Sure, there’s the whole “just don’t do it because it’s wrong” argument, but that doesn’t really work. It’s only available on a limited format for a short amount of time, so it’s really not surprising to especially see this put online so more people can see it.
I would have liked to have seen the series released online along side the PS3 release. Perhaps just a SD or LD version for cheap, while PS3 owners got to enjoy the exclusive HD version.
July 17th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
@Niko: Good point, and no, there is no other legal download available to my knowledge. But frankly, this whole thing was so sudden– there hasn’t even been anything on the official Xamdou website, and no one knows if/when it’s going to air anywhere else for any other countries.
This might even be some kind of super-early first episode (which we’ve seen on occasion– I think Gundam 00 had a special screening of its first episode weeks before the premiere), and the rest of it won’t appear anywhere until the show starts airing on TV.
There’s so much we don’t know yet about what’s going on with Xamdou…I guess I’d say either wait a week or two and see if we can figure out what’s going on, or make a solemn oath to pay for the episode in whatever legitimate way you can as soon as it’s possible.
Hey, here’s an option…do you know someone else with a PS3? You could buy the episode that way.
Heh, maybe I should offer some kind of “buy a license to watch the episode through me” thing. Send me your $2.99 or $3.99 and I’ll buy the episode for you on PSN, but you go download the illegal copy. It’s not as good as buying it yourself, but at least they get the money! ;) And you’d have to promise to delete it after 24 hours!
July 17th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
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