Synopsis (source: MAL):
Most people think that ninjas are a thing of the past, but Recca Hanabishi wishes otherwise. Although he comes from a family that makes fireworks, he likes to think of himself as a self-styled, modern-day ninja. Sounds like fun, right? Maybe not. Recca ends up in lots of fights because he once made the bold announcement that if someone can defeat him, he will become their servant.
Then one day, Recca meets Yanagi Sakoshita, a gentle girl with the ability to heal any wound or injury. Their meeting sets off a chain of events, which culminate into a shocking discovery. Recca is the last surviving member of a legendary ninja clan that was wiped out centuries ago. Even more astonishing than being an actual ninja, he also wields the power to control fire. What does this mean for Rekka? Who are these strange people after him and Yanagi? Find out in Recca no Honoo!
Opening Theme: “Nanka Shiawase” by the Oysters.
You can have a listen of the song on YouTube and make your own judgement on it.
The series has two ending songs.
“Love is Changing” by Hikaru Nishida (eps. 1-32) and “Zutto Kimi no Soba de” by
Yuki Masuda (eps. 33-42). These songs are also available to see on YouTube.
My Review
Flame of Recca is a 42 episode anime series from Summer 1997.
I watched Flame of Recca with the Discotek Media DVD release. Their DVD release is in its original 4:3 aspect ratio. The release does have the original Japanese language with English subtitles and English dub (Dubbed by Ocean Studios). The dub was honestly just ok in my opinion. In the beginning, the voice acting sounded very robotic with little effort put into it at all, especially with Kagero. However, the voice acting does get a bit better midway through the series. The Japanese dub sounded just fine and that’s how I watched the majority of this series. However, I disliked that the subtitles would call the characters by their first name and not their last names like how they say in the anime. I understand that they probably do this because English speakers aren’t used to people calling each other by their last names, it’s still a tad annoying though. They also omitted Japanese honorifics which I also don’t like. I just prefer the subtitles to match what the characters are actually saying.
The art and animation was quite good for its time. I like that it is all hand drawn and uses cell animation. It’s something you don’t see a lot of now-a-days. However, there were times where I felt the animation could have been better. There were some scenes that were oddly drawn. I'm not sure if that was on purpose or just the style of the show but maybe it was just me. As far as the sound and soundtrack goes, I read up on other reviews and apparently a lot of people found that the soundtrack wasn’t very memorable at all. I have to disagree on them with that statement. I remember I had downloaded the soundtrack of this series way back in the mid 00’s and I seriously thought this soundtrack is the most memorable one I’ve heard in a long time. It’s nothing like any other soundtrack I have heard in anime these days or even back in the 90’s. It’s catchy, upbeat, and fun.
As far as DVD packaging goes, the discs are layered which I’m honestly not a fan of. However, the discs are at least not stacked. I like that the DVD set has a slip cover though it would have been nice if Discotek Media included an episode guide with this set so I know what episodes are on the discs. The other thing that kind of annoyed me with this set was that I had to change the audio to Japanese with subtitles in just about every episode even though I had set it up in the set up menu before I even watched the disc. Normally when you set it up that way, it should stay like that through the whole disc. As far as the video quality goes, there were times when I felt like it didn’t do pan over scenes well. It looked a bit jagged and at times, it seems like they didn’t bother de-interlacing the video in certain parts. Maybe it was just my TV so it’s difficult to say. Otherwise, the video quality is mostly clear and it still looks pretty good.
Overall, I was just a tad disappointed that the series ended on a cliff hanger. I don’t want to go into details about it since I may give away spoilers, so we’ll just leave it at that. I was able to watch this series within 12 days and I enjoyed watching it. I’ve actually had this anime on my backlog for probably 15 years now. I wanted to watch this anime mainly because I was a huge fan of the manga back when it finally got licensed in the States in Summer of 2003. I don’t remember ever watching the anime series back in the mid 00s but I did know an anime for this series existed. I feel like this was a show that could have been aired on Toonami because it just had a Yu Yu Hakusho vibe to it. After a bit of research, I learned Flame of Recca was actually directed by Noriyuki Abe who also directed Yu Yu Hakusho. It would explain why watching this anime made me want to re-watch Yu Yu Hakusho again. Other-wise, this series is worth at least one watch, especially if you enjoyed Yu Yu Hakusho.
Grade:
Overall (dub): C+
Overall (sub): B+
Story: A
Animation: B+
Art: A
Music: A+
DVD release: B
+ Likeable cast of characters, memorable soundtrack, tons of creative
tactics in tournament matches.
- Series ends
on a cliffhanger.
P.S.
By the way, this is actually my very first anime DVD review I've ever
written. It's something I've actually always wanted to do. I used to
follow a blogger back in the mid 00's named Matthew Whitehead who would
review anime and watch torrents raw. He had similar tastes in anime that
I had and inspired me to write anime reviews in a similar format.
Sadly, his blog on wordpress no longer exists and I can't find his
content anywhere. So Mr. Whitehead, if you're reading this, thank you
for being my inspiration. :)
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