Utawarerumono: 8/10 (Version 2)
First of all, let me say that no aspect of this series is outstanding. Rather than being brilliant at one thing, it's more of a good all-round series. It's a solid series; one that fans of war stories set in the ancient past will get into from the get-go. And, despite the main character having his own harem, it's safe to say the series can be enjoyed even by those who dislike harem series.
The story starts with a man getting found injured in the forest near a small farming village. He has a mask, no memories and doesn't have a clue who he is or what he was doing in the forest. He quickly becomes friends with Eluluu, the young healer who found him, and her little sister, Aruruu. He gets given the name Hakuro by the village chief - the name of Eluluu and Aruruu's father.
At first all is well but the situation quickly turns ugly. Hakuro has to come up with a tactic to save the villagers from being eaten alive by the angry 'God' of the forest. He does so, and earns the respect of the entire village. Then the local feudal lord pays a visit to the town in order to collect taxes. One of the guards kills the village chief, resulting in Hakuro being named chief, and he helps the angered villagers lead a rebellion against the feudal lord. Hakuro kills him, which leads to the Emperor getting involved in an attempt to avenge his brother.
From there, the series takes a path fans of the Suikoden video game series will be familiar with: armies fight, new, super strong allies join and, bit by bit, Hakuro's army grows in power. Soon a mere rebellion transforms into a war between nations, with war after war following Hakuro as he rises to power, as if caused by him. As he continues to become more powerful, staining his hands with more and more blood, the questions of who he is and if what he's doing is right become increasingly troubling.
Where the story falls short, after an involving opening and enjoyable middle, is the ending. Prior to the last section of the story, it had been fast-paced bows and arrows warfare. Aside from a few winged magic users, there'd been nothing to suggest the ending would be quite so ridiculous. All of a sudden robots come into the picture, with one nation destroying all others with these machines, and Hakuro's true identity is revealed during the mecha action. In an attempt not to spoil the story, I'll just say that Gods, evolution, space stations, hi-tech science labs, blob monsters, reincarnation, a Godzilla style final battle and all of the usual anime ending stuff you can think of comes into play. I'm not quite sure how to describe it, actually... It's best just to say it ends in a horrible manner and leave it at that. It's a shame because if the series had ended like it started, without all of the seemingly random rubbish, it could've been a top anime.
The ending aside, my other story issue lies with the battle tactics. Hakuro's tactics usually come down to him telling people to go left or right and him letting his elite soldiers slaughter the enemy soldiers. With the main character playing the role of tactician and the story being about him quickly rising to power, I expected in-depth, jaw dropping battle strategies. Maybe I was expecting too much? I don't know, but it's fair to say the battles could've been more complex.
While on the subject of battles, if you've played any of the Dynasty Warrior games you'll have a good idea how the combat goes in Utaware. The generals are all powerful, killing the grunts with one blow, and the proper, more intense combat involves one on one battles between opposing generals. But the combat isn't very exciting, with some animation recycling occurring and the important fights just simply failing to get my blood pumping. It's a shame because some dodgy, out of place CG aside, Utaware is lovely to look at. The art is appealing, the colours vibrant and, as far as I'm aware, the backgrounds were all drawn by hand, giving them extra charm.
To end my story comments on a positive note, I'll end by saying that, if nothing else, the Utaware story is an entertaining one to sit through. The story is always on the move, with there rarely being episodes not focused on the on-going struggles of Hakuro, and it flows excellently from episode to episode. Another story positive is lack of perverted content. I may be little off when I say this but I think the game the anime was based on was an erotic one, involving Hakuro picking one of the female characters to be his girl. While there are elements of this in the plot, in the anime it comes across more like a straight-forward romance that develops in a logical way as the series progresses. The only scene that comes close to crossing the line is one where Karula - a warrior with a HUGE sword and big boobs - offers herself to Hakuro in exchange for his help and almost gets accepted. Overall, the series was highly enjoyable and surprisingly tasteful.
In terms of the huge cast of characters, Utaware is a little hit and miss. The cast are more likeable than well developed. The main cast members all stand-out, with most of their names and personalities sticking in my mind straight away, but not many get fleshed out. You learn their quirks and that's it for the most part. Hakuro gets the most time, as you'd expect with him being the main character, but you never see a lot of his past, and what's shown isn't very clear. Eluluu, the female lead, is cute and likeable enough and her interaction with Hakuro and her little sister, Aruruu, adds depth to her character but she very rarely came across like a real person. Aside from those two, only Oboro and Karula get decent development. Oboro fights whilst constantly worrying about his blind and bedridden little sister (some early episodes focus on this subplot) and Karula has her own little story relating to her past. In short, the cast have a lot of likeability but fairly limited development, with a lot of the blame for this laying with the series length.
As for the music, Utaware has a solid soundtrack. There are some memorable tracks and lots of fitting music that, while unlikely to be listened to outside of the anime, improves the viewing experience. The opening and ending themes are very good, the opening in partcular sticking in my mind.
All in all, Utaware surpassed my expectations but still ended up disappointing me because of how it ended. Until the final volume I was prepared to score it in the 9-10/10 tier, but it'll have to make do with a solid 8/10 instead. I respect the series for not being perverted despite it being based on an erotic game and having a large cast of attractive females. At worst, you could say it panders to the moe market a little, but there's nothing included that made me think the series was aimed more at perverts than people looking for a good story. I recommend anyone looking for some primitive, bows and arrows war look the series up.
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There's one last, non-vital thing I'd like to touch upon: the DVD extras.
Included on the Utaware DVDs is a four part omake series. These short episodes focus on light-hearted fun - very different from the usually serious main story, and I rated the omake series 9/10; one point higher than the main series. Why the rating, you ask? Because the omakes are hilarious. I'm not the sort of guy who roles around laughing, but even I laughed during the third episode when, after Oboro had broke her doll, Touka went batshit insane, beating the crap out of Oboro and making some of the most weird and amusing screams I've ever heard. I loved how Hakuro left the room after seeing Touka's bloody hand and crazy expression, leaving Oboro to his fate (once again!).
Do yourself a favour and watch the Utaware extras. You won't regret it.
