Anime Review: Loveless
Apr. 8th, 2023 03:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jennariaLOVELESS - 2005 Japan/2006 US, possibly available streaming (a web-search showed me various sites that claimed to have it) but not on any of the major platforms
Amount watched: 5 of 12 episodes
Official description: Twelve-year old Aoyagi Ritsuka is left with his insane mother as his only family when his brother, Seimei, is killed suddenly. After moving to a new school, he meets Agatsuma Soubi, who claims to have known his brother. Ritsuka eventually discovers that Soubi and Seimei used to be a fighting pair, whereby Soubi was the "Fighter" and Seimei was the "Sacrifice". Now that Seimei is gone, Ritsuka has inherited Soubi, who will become his "Fighter". After learning that Seimei was killed by an organisation known as the "Seven Moons", Ritsuka decides to investigate into his brother's death, with the sometimes useless help of Soubi, along the way.
[Incidental note: the icon I'm using for this post is, in fact, of Soubi.]
Weeb rating: 6 out of 10. Possibly higher, because not only do we have the 'why the fuck hasn't Ritsuka been taken away from his mother for his own safety' question (answer: either Japanese children's welfare offices are terrible, or it's an Anime Thing, because Ritsuka ain't the first nor the last anime character to have serious parental issues that you'd think would get official notice and somehow...doesn't), but also the whole 'semi-romantic relationship with a hella age gap and power differential issues is fine!' thing, which you also see in anime kind of a lot.
Ass rating: On the one hand, I don't remember a lot of actual nakedness? On the other hand, the fights tend to contain a lot of chains and vaguely BDSM vibes. Also, the cat-ears. It's part of the world-building that everyone is born with cat ears and tail, and lose them with their virginity. So, uh, that's a thing.
Shit rating: 5/10 - this is an id show, so don't expect things like resolutions.
Violence rating: 6/10 - in addition to the abusive mother mentioned in the summary above, the fights do tend to involve blood, albeit at low levels.
Crack rating: 9/10. No, seriously, the crack starts at cat-ears and goes up from there. What the fuck.
Actual opinion: So this was one of the shows that my friend Kay showed to me, way back in the day, when she was introducing me to all things anime. This means I've watched about one disc's worth, and absorbed spoilers for the rest via osmosis and fanfic.
And. Uh.
There's the kitty ears/tail, with a side of their being tells of someone being a virgin. (And various characters having Opinions on the subject, with all the implied slut-shaming and virginity-Fetishization you'd expect.) There's the seriously BDSM vibe of the whole Fighter/Sacrifice dynamic, part of which is because the Sacrifice both gives orders to the Fighter, and also takes the damage, and part of which is that a common attack is trying to bind up your opponent, which is made visual in collars and chains. And there's Soubi's whole fucked-up deal: boy was abused by a teacher back when he was a kid, then treated as a thing to be used and given away by Seimei, and now this 20-something man is expecting a 12-year-old kid to be the adult in whatever kind of relationship they have.
(At least Ritsuka is in therapy? No seriously, we see him having an appointment, this is canon. Unfortunately, he's also got an absentee (?) father, an abusive mother, a dead brother who was his Only Protector, and now Soubi. Also a couple friends his own age, who he only meets as canon starts. Ritsuka needs more than therapy.)
Wife tells me that she picked up the manga at some point, but noped out and didn't finish. I can't say I blame her. It's an id show, and it's not interested in staying away from the Problematic.
Amount watched: 5 of 12 episodes
Official description: Twelve-year old Aoyagi Ritsuka is left with his insane mother as his only family when his brother, Seimei, is killed suddenly. After moving to a new school, he meets Agatsuma Soubi, who claims to have known his brother. Ritsuka eventually discovers that Soubi and Seimei used to be a fighting pair, whereby Soubi was the "Fighter" and Seimei was the "Sacrifice". Now that Seimei is gone, Ritsuka has inherited Soubi, who will become his "Fighter". After learning that Seimei was killed by an organisation known as the "Seven Moons", Ritsuka decides to investigate into his brother's death, with the sometimes useless help of Soubi, along the way.
[Incidental note: the icon I'm using for this post is, in fact, of Soubi.]
Weeb rating: 6 out of 10. Possibly higher, because not only do we have the 'why the fuck hasn't Ritsuka been taken away from his mother for his own safety' question (answer: either Japanese children's welfare offices are terrible, or it's an Anime Thing, because Ritsuka ain't the first nor the last anime character to have serious parental issues that you'd think would get official notice and somehow...doesn't), but also the whole 'semi-romantic relationship with a hella age gap and power differential issues is fine!' thing, which you also see in anime kind of a lot.
Ass rating: On the one hand, I don't remember a lot of actual nakedness? On the other hand, the fights tend to contain a lot of chains and vaguely BDSM vibes. Also, the cat-ears. It's part of the world-building that everyone is born with cat ears and tail, and lose them with their virginity. So, uh, that's a thing.
Shit rating: 5/10 - this is an id show, so don't expect things like resolutions.
Violence rating: 6/10 - in addition to the abusive mother mentioned in the summary above, the fights do tend to involve blood, albeit at low levels.
Crack rating: 9/10. No, seriously, the crack starts at cat-ears and goes up from there. What the fuck.
Actual opinion: So this was one of the shows that my friend Kay showed to me, way back in the day, when she was introducing me to all things anime. This means I've watched about one disc's worth, and absorbed spoilers for the rest via osmosis and fanfic.
And. Uh.
There's the kitty ears/tail, with a side of their being tells of someone being a virgin. (And various characters having Opinions on the subject, with all the implied slut-shaming and virginity-Fetishization you'd expect.) There's the seriously BDSM vibe of the whole Fighter/Sacrifice dynamic, part of which is because the Sacrifice both gives orders to the Fighter, and also takes the damage, and part of which is that a common attack is trying to bind up your opponent, which is made visual in collars and chains. And there's Soubi's whole fucked-up deal: boy was abused by a teacher back when he was a kid, then treated as a thing to be used and given away by Seimei, and now this 20-something man is expecting a 12-year-old kid to be the adult in whatever kind of relationship they have.
(At least Ritsuka is in therapy? No seriously, we see him having an appointment, this is canon. Unfortunately, he's also got an absentee (?) father, an abusive mother, a dead brother who was his Only Protector, and now Soubi. Also a couple friends his own age, who he only meets as canon starts. Ritsuka needs more than therapy.)
Wife tells me that she picked up the manga at some point, but noped out and didn't finish. I can't say I blame her. It's an id show, and it's not interested in staying away from the Problematic.