Forum - View topic(The) Water Magician (TV).
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Edjwald
 Posts: 3696 |
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Wow, it's not exactly unheard of for an anime's animation to dip in quality as the show passes the 2/3rds mark - I've seen anime go from high tier animation to mid tier before the season was over, and it's fairly common for mid-tier animation to become increasingly low tier as the timer runs down, but I can't recall the last time I saw an anime's animation drop this extremely - from high tier to bottom tier - in just 8 episodes. I'm sure examples exists, I just can't recall them off the top of my head. I don't know what was worse - the choppy action scenes or the outright still frames or the magic burst effects.
Which is a shame, because all of the other things that drew me into this anime - the voice acting, the fresh feel even when addressing familiar plot elements, the musical backgrounds, the slow but solid plot progression, the little world building touches just to give the familiar dungeon city some garnish....it's all still there, and it's why I'm still here. I'm just saying, anime that are rushed out before their studios are ready, aren't rare, and neither are anime whose first episodes show what they're capable of and whose later episodes show what they've been reduced to, but the degree is unusual here.. |
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Gina Szanboti
 Posts: 12789 |
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I knew as soon as Abel got into serious trouble that Ryo would somehow show up in the nick of time (though it was already clear he'd eventually make an entrance sooner or later). And yet it was still pretty satisfying watching him mop up after everyone, with added snark (I've had enough of you glaring at me like that). I assume little mage girl ran off to retrieve him, and he was then auto-teleported by the gate?
By this point, it seems kind of stupid for him to keep not asking elf girl about akuma. She seems to already know everything else about what's going on. Probably lived through it. And yeah, even I'm noticing the sadness of the animation, though that usually doesn't bother me too much unless it gets as hilariously off the rails as Wizard Barristers ep 11. |
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Cryten
 Posts: 1399 |
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Repeated still frames, awkward off model faces, weird camera angles obscuring any place where animation might be demanded. Yep that is some pretty bottom tier animation being made here. Its more a case of how did the first 2 episode end up with good animation, as opposed to how did the animation fall so far, IE. Simply because the show has never had good animation since the 2nd, the standard episode of this show is low tier work. Only the first having genuine sakuga moments plus the into.
I think they must of hired out to see top quality people just for the intro work. The regular episodes going to the same people using AI textures for their backgrounds. Ep 7. Well it certainly took its time to get to the point of Ryou turning up. Ironically actually skipping the moment of the girl academic calling on him for help and him finding a way over. So it was both slow in spending a bunch of time talking about research papers both topside and underneath but also very brief in the hero coming to save the day. Though no doubt next episode will delay any action by going over how Ryou got there. Im not gonna expect much from next weeks fight, but will be happy to be surprised with better material. Its just I only saw 1 decent animated attack this week, so I do not expect them to animate much of a sword fight next week. Just have 2 people standing still throwing special effects at each other, similar to how they resolved this weeks fighting with repeated use of the same magic attacks. Maybe its selective memory, but I remember fights being much more engaging with the limited action of the 90's. They might of used reused special attacks and mugged the character moments to fill out time but Lina Inverse and Goury of Slayers fame managed to have many engaging fights with just simple sword slashes and fireballs. (probably a bad example, as one of the top shows of the 90s). @Gina You can certainly feel that the Light Novels are very slow affairs. Reportedly even as slow as the anime is, it is like the cliff notes action orientated cousin of the original story. (according to redditors) Like episode 1 covered a bit more then half of the first novel. |
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smurky turkey
Posts: 5182 |
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Sigh, I was afraid of the drop happening. The animation has indeed been uneven since the second or so episode and an episode getting delayed is usually not good news either. The sheer drop in quality is wild though and when comparing it to the opening and first episode you get whiplash. I am still invested in the characters and seeing Ryo doing whatever he wants but the novels deserve better. Also yes, the novels are very slow and the start consists of hundreds of pages of the mc learning to use his magic/sword.
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 25662 |
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Just think how much money and time the production is going to save by switching over to black and white stick figures!
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The Scream Man
 Posts: 315 Location: Sydney, Australia |
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Theres animation dips and then there are... whatever happened here.
Woof. |
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Edjwald
Posts: 3696 |
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Welp, I can't say I was expecting - not even hoping - for the animation to start clawing its way back up to its former heights, and indeed, I'm pretty sure if I played the scene back and squinted hard enough, I'd see the popsicle stick that was holding up and rushing those two motionless, cardboard cutouts at each other in that final climactic fight between the demon prince and Ryo. But I'm still enjoying the show. There are times when I thought that this show was a budding romance with the elf mage, and times I thought it was a bromance with Abel, and times I thought it was a nomance - but whatever it is, I'm liking the character interaction between those three figures.
I'm sort of doubting that the guildmaster and the academic will be able to keep Ryo's power level on the downlow though, given that less than heroic scene with the hero. |
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Cryten
Posts: 1399 |
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I wonder if that Hero scene was meant to be in the same dungeon and related to the expired orb they found or not. Perhaps a precursor to the events.
That the animation was bad needs not be said, it did a little better with the duel but even that was just sword swatches. The ending segment used the cheapest and lamest of shortcuts, the standing completely still with an effect representing multi hit attacks. That effect was low brow back when Ranma 1/2 did in the in early 90s. Having tried reading the first Light Novel now I can very definitely say that the Anime is the superior product. The novel loves pointless tangents, spending pages describing inaccurate historical accounts and fudged scientific theories that power Ryou`s imagination and endless obsesses over boring repetitive magic technicalities that always just boil down to: Imagination is what powers magic. Where it is good is in its character work (though it is not at the level of high quality). The anime does the novels a favor by being the cliff notes to the novels obsessions. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12789 |
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So I guess once the dungeon reopens, there will be no further issues with getting to the deeper levels, since Ryo bored passages straight down to level 40.
 But does this mean each level's monsters will now have an easy time of getting to the upper levels? It's not clear to me what prevents them from doing that anyway, not just in this, but any dungeon series that has more dangerous monsters the deeper you go (except that one where the dungeon master regulated where the monsters went and kept the floors stocked).
Will Ryo need to go sword shopping next week? I can't remember, was the sword Sera broke given to him by the Fairy King or otherwise special? |
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smurky turkey
Posts: 5182 |
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Nah, they were using (relatively) cheap training swords as stated. He was not using the fairy king sword and considering how sharp that thing is it makes sense for a practice bout. Dungeon wise they usually self repair so I assume that the holes will be filled up pretty soon, similar novels have invisible walls to lock monsters in on their floor with only a stampede breaking that rule.
The animation is still real bad but repeating that endlessly won't change anything. I do like that every episode is varied in regards to there being combat, slice of life relaxing and some information about the world. I am becoming rather curious as to what Akuma are given that they view heroes and demon kings as weak. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12789 |
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When did they say they were training swords? I went back to check from when she asked for a mock duel to when the Guild master collected him, and I still don't see it.
And it's starting to get really frustrating that no one will dare to mention the word "akuma." After the run-in with the demon princeling, I thought Ryo might finally come clean, but noooo. Then the akuma herself refuses to tell either. |
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smurky turkey
Posts: 5182 |
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You are right, my bad, it was not clearly stated, a mock duel was mentioned and they both used identical swords in the duel hence it being logical that they used training/duel swords. Also, Ryo his sword is unique in nature/looks and Sera being high rank is probably not wielding something simple either.
I forget but that did book that Ryo read in the first episode not caution against the whole Akuma thing? |
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Cryten
Posts: 1399 |
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The book says: Akuma. Not fallen angels.
Sooo you can draw conclusions from that. @Gina One of the things I did glean from my read is that several scenes in Ryous head indicate that he is worried that no one knows the word Akuma. He mentioned the word once to Abel and saw he was confused and didn't recognise it. Later discovering that they have things called devils. Basically he is considering the knowledge outside of this world. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12789 |
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So after reading your and smurky's replies, I had to go watch the first episode again and realized I'd forgotten nearly everything from it except his temperature and weapons experiments and his meeting the dragon. I'd though his encounter with the Fairy King came later. This is the result of watching too many new series at once coupled with encroaching senility.
Anyway, I'm a little more up to speed now. I don't see why he'd think the info in the books was outside knowledge since they were written in Phi's (apparently only) language. But his encounter with the akuma happened in this world, and even if, or especially if, no one knows what it is, it seems irresponsible to withhold what he knows about a coming apocalyptic danger, even if it had no name at all. |
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Cryten
Posts: 1399 |
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Yeah, more stuff cut to make the anime more tolerable. The bonus section of the books where written by Fake Michael.
Now I am not saying he is acting smart at all, just that he thinks no one else knows about these creatures. Remember when he encounters the Akuma, she is very surprised to be called Akuma. And upon being called that says that she now must kill Ryou even if it costs her her own life. With her not willing to offer her own species to the Heroes, we the viewers have even more reason to suspect they are unknown here then Ryou does. |
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