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The Butterfly
Tornado Alley
"Before you start complaining, why not start practicing?"
Yu Yu Hakusho had considerable story to tell with numerous characters in a very short amount of time. For the most part, and for someone completely unfamiliar with the source material, it succeeded.
The story was streamlined and relatively cohesive. The main characters and their characteristics were fired out with the speed of a 22. Yusuke was the tough rebellious teenager who helped out those in distress but didn’t want anyone to know it. Keiko had been friends with Yusuke since childhood and knew all of his foibles and strengths. Kuwabara was Kusuke's rival who couldn’t help but respect the opponent he desperately wanted to beat. After the accident that transformed Kusuke’s life, a plethora of Yokai and supernatural beings were brought in as well as the requisite human baddies.
YYH covered enemies to friends, training sessions, coming of age, and the old end of the world ploy. I enjoyed the enemies to friends and strangers to friends storylines. There were backstories and characters given short shrift, but in a 5 episode drama they did a fairly good job of forming the characters. The hair and costume colors were bold. I have found it helpful when watching dramas or movies based on anime to think of them like Western superhero movies. The flamboyant hairstyles and costumes make much more sense to me now. At least no one was wearing yellow spandex, although Koenma’s pacifier was truly bizarre. One of those things that might work better in animation than live action. The CGI was well done for a drama and there was plenty of it. The episodes kept things moving with fights using supernatural weapons and abilities. The battles pulled double duty by covering up a basic story. If there was a drawback to the fights, a few of them went on too long. The acting was all over the place, from competent to-adequate, completely over-the-top, and barely registering a pulse.
Yu Yu Hakusho felt more like a long movie in some ways rather than a very short drama. As in a movie, characters were given just enough development to differentiate them and understand their motivations. With a myriad of characters involved, both good and evil, the writers managed to wedge in as much backstory and world building as they could. Overall, I found this supernatural fantasy to be comprehensible and entertaining with the forged friendships and creative fights being the highlights.
27 Dec 2023
The story was streamlined and relatively cohesive. The main characters and their characteristics were fired out with the speed of a 22. Yusuke was the tough rebellious teenager who helped out those in distress but didn’t want anyone to know it. Keiko had been friends with Yusuke since childhood and knew all of his foibles and strengths. Kuwabara was Kusuke's rival who couldn’t help but respect the opponent he desperately wanted to beat. After the accident that transformed Kusuke’s life, a plethora of Yokai and supernatural beings were brought in as well as the requisite human baddies.
YYH covered enemies to friends, training sessions, coming of age, and the old end of the world ploy. I enjoyed the enemies to friends and strangers to friends storylines. There were backstories and characters given short shrift, but in a 5 episode drama they did a fairly good job of forming the characters. The hair and costume colors were bold. I have found it helpful when watching dramas or movies based on anime to think of them like Western superhero movies. The flamboyant hairstyles and costumes make much more sense to me now. At least no one was wearing yellow spandex, although Koenma’s pacifier was truly bizarre. One of those things that might work better in animation than live action. The CGI was well done for a drama and there was plenty of it. The episodes kept things moving with fights using supernatural weapons and abilities. The battles pulled double duty by covering up a basic story. If there was a drawback to the fights, a few of them went on too long. The acting was all over the place, from competent to-adequate, completely over-the-top, and barely registering a pulse.
Yu Yu Hakusho felt more like a long movie in some ways rather than a very short drama. As in a movie, characters were given just enough development to differentiate them and understand their motivations. With a myriad of characters involved, both good and evil, the writers managed to wedge in as much backstory and world building as they could. Overall, I found this supernatural fantasy to be comprehensible and entertaining with the forged friendships and creative fights being the highlights.
27 Dec 2023
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