Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Chaika - The Coffin Princess Avenging Battle
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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The story had a lot of good elements, but when it came to closing out the season and wrapping things up the execution was very poor. Two or three more episodes would have helped a lot.
6.5/10 for the first season, 4/10 for the second season. What a waste of potential. This should have been far better than it actually was. |
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Angel M Cazares
 Posts: 5450 Location: Iscandar |
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I agree that the conclusion was poorly done and rushed, but those grades are harsh. My 8/10 for both seasons is very generous compared to yours. |
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DangerMouse
Posts: 3984 |
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Agreed, I really hope they do. Really enjoyed this show. |
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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Yeah, I think you are being pretty generous. That's entirely your right to do so, but it's not a fair reflection of the quality of both seasons. Hence the "generous" part. The first season would've easily gotten an 8/10 if the final three episodes hadn't been so poor. That arc was almost a complete write-off, although Chibi Frederica was cute. The second season - especially with its extremely rushed ending and badly-handled character arcs - was decidedly inferior to the first season. Therefore it obviously deserved a lower grade (than the first season). |
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Taskforce
Posts: 72 |
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At this point with the current anime industry being what it is, a show with any ending at all should be given +1 point and if its remotely satisfying +1 more. I think the final ep review on ANN was a tad generous myself, but all things being what they are with anime these days, even the most terrible endings can be satisfying just because at this point they're endings. |
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Tuor_of_Gondolin
 Posts: 3524 Location: Bellevue, WA |
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I disagree. A bad ending can spoil an entire work. If the ending is really bad, it makes the whole story pointless, or worse. I won't go so far as to say that I'd rather have no ending than a bad ending, but I *can* say that I've seen endings so bad that I ending up wishing I'd never spent any time watching it at all, and usually feeling like I'd been betrayed somehow, which in turn causes me to avoid any works from that source in the future. As for my rating... well, I've yet to see the final episode, though I've watched all of the ones previous to it. I don't really want to see my appreciation for the show eroded any further than it has been already... I think, at the moment, that I'll give it at 6/10. If I actually watched the final episode, based on the comments I've read so far, it'd probably drop down to a 5. Such a shame, as prior to it diverging from its source material, I would've given it a solid 7 or maybe even an 8, but not now. I'll probably get around to watching the last episode before long. But first I'm going to have to steel myself. How disappointing. |
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Animerican14
 Posts: 963 Location: Saint Louis, MO |
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Started this entire series for the first time about one to two weeks ago. Being ignorant about most-anything related to Chaika before starting it, including the source material, I've had a grand old time. (How early did the show diverge from the source material to upset people? I reckoned that the only part where it might have diverged significantly to at all become "worse" might've been somewhere in the last arc, and that'd be because the LN is still ongoing).
Like a lot of others have said, though, it was definitely rushed. Too bad! We really could have had this last arc dedicated to at least a few more episodes. Too many things were gone through too fast for certain events to have much impact. Still, even in its rushed fashion it tied up the loose ends pretty well and still proved itself to be engaging and fun. The "B" grade + analysis by Paul felt pretty spot-on.
Since this is "from what [you] heard," is this some unsourced speculation you just found on somewhere like /a/? Were the sales (of the LN? the anime? both?) and views so low as to warrant an actual budget and episode-count cut? Chaika's lack of appeal in Japan seems surprising to me, but then I haven't paid attention to its reception outside of a supportive ani-twitter, memes and fan-art. Anyway, while I'd really like to see a source on what you suggested, Izanagi009, I know that at least one element that was left vague in the finale-- specifically, spoiler[the nature of Chaika's memory loss upon firing Niva and how much loss was incurred]-- was clarified over twitter by a staff member. Well, I say "I know" because I saw a paraphrase-TL of https://twitter.com/fumihilo/status/542718800567623680, a tweet made by the mech designer on the show:
Apparently spoiler[the memories that Chaika lost were the false, implanted memories-- like her "memories" of ever being Gaz's daughter and, presumably, that instilled drive to collect his remains to give him a funeral. Maybe Niva, having finally found a PERSONALITY (which, remember, Chaika told her she had some episodes earlier), had a hand in seeing to it that it was just those alien memories that got removed? So from what I understand, it was indeed a very happy ending for Chaika-- she only forgot the things that weren't actually hers to begin with, and held onto the memories she made on this journey with Toru and Akari since episode one.] 
Having a clearer for-the-record translation still won't hurt, though. Maybe more confirmation-hunting will need to be done on /a/... |
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Izanagi009
 Posts: 464 Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA |
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The comment about the budget cut came from a comment on Crunchyroll so I said "from what I heard" since there is no way to verify it hopefully that is the reason for the shortened episode and not an actual initial script. |
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A Mystery
 Posts: 1887 Location: Netherlands |
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I think it was clear enough that whatever memories Chaika lost, she is quite happy now. She seemed childlike afterwards, so I suppose she does not know about her purpose anymore and maybe even lost more. I do not need a lot more of explanation to get that, sometimes it's nice to fill in the dots yourself.
And Akari and Tohru not being brother and sister anymore - Akari doesn't want him as a brother, I mean: would you write a prologue of 300+ pages about your love for a simple brother? I guess she wasn't that affected by not being his sister, since that's not what she wanted. Now she's living with him and Chaika doesn't seem to be his girlfriend, losing her memories to the point of being too childlike for an adult like him. I loved this show, even though the last two episodes were too fast paced and could've used some more humor and dramatic exposition. I'll give it 8 out of 10. Satisfying conclusion at least. |
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gedata
 Posts: 615 |
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Gotta say the reviewer here was rather generous when handing out the grades. Ending wasn't bad on paper, but doing as muchas it tried to do in one episode was an awful idea. spoiler[Seeing Niva change sides and fire a beam to obliterate Gaz (which he could've easily side-stepped) was eye-rollingly dumb. I guess this is what you can expect when you have an overpowered villain to handle in just 20 minutes]
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Wrangler
 Posts: 1346 |
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I enjoyed both seasons (i won't say series) of Chailka. 10 episodes was not enough to spread out enough of the pacing to really give a feel what was going on.
It was extremely well done series, writing and animation and music. I'm disappointed that it ultimately was a 10 episode season instead of 13. Unless they held back yet another episode as "special" filler episode marked up as OVA sell. Series is going be roughly 22 episodes not counting the 1 OVA episode from season 1. Love series, hate the pacing at the end. they need additional episode wrap things up better. I love Red Chaika at the end, spoiler[little red violent riding hood.] |
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meruru
Posts: 471 |
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Review was spot on for the last episode. It even felt to me like either they skipped some details, or I missed something, like how was black Chaika seemingly intact by the beginning of episode 10?
I think in a way you might consider the ending poetic, considering spoiler[ Chaika came to the conclusion all of her memories were lies. Perhaps she even preferred to start over with real memories this time.] |
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Cyclone1993
 Posts: 947 |
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As for where the anime separated from the novels, after discussing it with someone who has read the novels most of the plot stayed the same but some of the details were different.
For example; spoiler[ Guy is actually a good guy in the novel who wants to revive Gaz so he can be killed once and for all. Gaz died and came back in order to rebel against God who apparently fed on negative emotions. Toru and Fredrica were teamed up in the tournament and they made the contract then, etc.] They hit all the major sections but fill it in with their own details near the end. I can't help but feel if the op and ed were cut, the extra 3 minutes could have really contributed to the series. This show is my obsession so I'm giving it very high scores, although the second season isn't quite as high. I'm planning on buying the manga but I think its only covering the first 3-4 novels. I've read the first two novels in a fantastic English translation, but he has since given up on the project. Which is a shame I found his translations to be almost professional level. Not only that but he deleted them off his website, along with the site. I've only found them through other sources on the Internet. But they are out there if anyone is interested. |
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Animerican14
Posts: 963 Location: Saint Louis, MO |
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Oh, a "fantastic" translation, huh? Close to professional quality? I've rarely, if ever, heard good things about light novel fan translations, so news of a good Chaika TL is surprising. It's not the one on baka-tsuki.org now, is it? Because it looks like barely anything's been done with the 1st volume there. :P Am curious about knowing what TL you're talking about... The Chaika LN hasn't yet been licensed, right? If that fan translation is so wonderful, maybe Dark Horse/Vertical/Yen Press/etc. can hire him or something, hah. |
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Cyclone1993
Posts: 947 |
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I work on editing Light Novels occasionally, so I know first hand how stiff some of the translations are. But, no the Chaika novels have a great translation for what counts, and its not the one on Baka-Tsuki, he had his own site that had them on it. But unfortunately the translator deleted it after getting into an argument with someone I think...There hasn't been any sense, but I wish he would continue. |
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Am curious about knowing what TL you're talking about...
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