Mature (May contain sex, drugs, and extreme graphic violence)
Vintage:
April 6, 2004
Status:
Completed
Summary:
Kenzou Tenma, a brilliant Japanese brain surgeon working in Germany, saves the life of a small boy who has been shot in the head. Little does he know that doing so would destroy his entire career at the hospital and that his fiancé would leave him. When the hospital director and doctors of the hospital staff are suddenly murdered, he gets a second chance but also renders him as the main suspect to the murders. Life goes on for Tenma as he saves people at the hospital, and he goes back to the joy of being a surgeon again.
Years later, an injured thief gets brought to the hospital. After Tenma saves his life, he finds out that the thief is involved with the rising count of serial murders happening in Germany. Suddenly Tenma is involved in it all when the little boy, who is now a young man, turns up and kills the thief in cold blood right in front of Tenma. Now Tenma must clear his name, find out more about the boy he saved in the past, and reevaluate what the value of life is.
Written by sr_guru on November 1, 2010 at 12:22 AM
Overall Rating
Excellent
Story: 5
Dialogue: 5
Animation: 4
Entertainment: 5
Warning, the story in this anime is very dark and morose, I do not advise letting anyone under the age of 13 watch it at all, and advise pre-viewing before allowing anyone under 18 watch it.
That said, the story in this anime is brilliantly written, and it is engaging. It will draw you in and cause you to watch 10-12 episode marathons without even realizing how much time has passed. The pacing is a little slow at times, but overall it works very well, and the plot is advanced in every single episode.
The dialogue is the key to this anime. Like with another dark anime in the same vein, Death Note, the dialogue is what drives this anime. There aren't any fight scenes, although (often brutal) violence is used to great effect in several episodes, thus the anime is held together or falls apart based on the dialogue. And in that regard, it does not disappoint. I never found myself wishing a character would just shut up so the anime can move on, in fact I found myself rewinding on several episodes because I would miss a single sentence due to a small distraction and be lost for the next 2-3 minutes, thus having to back up and find out what I missed. Every word counts, and that is what makes this anime so amazing.
I only gave the animation a rating of Good because, while it is indeed well animated, it isn't of the same caliber as other animes that I would say have Excellent animation. This, of course, does not mean that the animation is in any way a weak point for the anime. While it isn't absolutely top notch, the animation certainly helps bring the world to life, and the characters expressions are well done, adding to the pathos generated by the dialogue and the circumstances of the lives of the characters.
Overall, this anime is easily one of the best I've ever watched, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who doesn't get disturbed easily by occasional brutality and a very morose story.
