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I enjoyed GITS SAC a lot so I'll have to check Witch Hunter Robin out. Is it out on FunimationNow?

It's series like this one that keep me watching anime.

Although they left the ending a bit open so they could have made a second series, I'm glad they didn't - Robin's story (and that of the STN-J) was told.

Karasuma looked mid-30s, at least - I wouldn't have called her 19. Robin being 15, though, fits perfectly - this was her first posting, after all.

The person who suggested that Robin resisted glasses because she was vain clearly didn't listen carefully enough. She didn't need glasses normally; only when using her power, because it distorted her vision. I did think it was funny that they gave her "old-lady" glasses, but it fitted - she could look over them when not using her power.

Thank you for reminding me of this wonderful series. This was the show that I watched back in the old days when it aired at 11:00PM on Friday on YTV in Canada. The following day my friends in math class and I would always discuss the episode. This was a surprisingly good series back then, and the first anime that I ever watched with an adult atmosphere. It was a unique gem.

pajmo9 wrote:

It always impressed me how they made the show feel more like a live-action police drama then an animated one despite the supernatural elements. It's to bad Syfy never made a live action show out of it after licensing it, or maybe we're lucky.

SyFy doing it back THEN given how they handles lots of their shows...I think we're lucky. They've really improved overall their original tv series content the last several years. So if they did it NOW I think it would be a much better product. Who knows, maybe Netflix will pick it up and do something with it

GeorgeC wrote:

I'm surprised there was no Blu ray release.

You mean to tell me this was done digitally in such a way that an upscale wouldn't be worth it?!?

Glad I kept my Bandai DVDs then!

Still have the original single releases dvd's myself. Plus the artbox..

fanime99 wrote:

The person who suggested that Robin resisted glasses because she was vain clearly didn't listen carefully enough. She didn't need glasses normally; only when using her power, because it distorted her vision.

Rewatch the episode. It's the one titled Stubborn Aesthetics.

Why only on DVD, though? It's 2018; Blu-ray is king now. I'd rather have higher video quality and more episodes per disc.

LightningCount wrote:

The reviewer mentions Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, but interestingly enough, Witch Hunter Robin was created and aired both in Japan and the US prior to that title. GitS: SAC Season 1 was October 1, 2002 – October 1, 2002 in Japan and started airing in the US on November 7, 2004, whereas Witch Hunter Robin was July 2, 2002 – December 24, 2002 in Japan and started airing in the US on February 16, 2004. As such, I tend to think of Witch Hunter Robin as the starting point of the modern police procedural anime (with a twist). [...]

I believe that the date I highlighted needs to be changed.....

nobahn wrote:

LightningCount wrote:

The reviewer mentions Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, but interestingly enough, Witch Hunter Robin was created and aired both in Japan and the US prior to that title. GitS: SAC Season 1 was October 1, 2002 – October 1, 2002 in Japan and started airing in the US on November 7, 2004, whereas Witch Hunter Robin was July 2, 2002 – December 24, 2002 in Japan and started airing in the US on February 16, 2004. As such, I tend to think of Witch Hunter Robin as the starting point of the modern police procedural anime (with a twist). [...]

I believe that the date I highlighted needs to be changed.....

Fixed it! Thanks. It's supposed to be October 1, 2003. (It was a typo that happened when I changed the end date away from January 8, 2005, which was the end of GitS: SAC Season 2, because I didn't think it was relevant to the point of which came first.)

Spoofer wrote:

fanime99 wrote:

The person who suggested that Robin resisted glasses because she was vain clearly didn't listen carefully enough. She didn't need glasses normally; only when using her power, because it distorted her vision.

Rewatch the episode. It's the one titled Stubborn Aesthetics.

I rewatched the early episodes fairly recently on DVD...I don't recall her exactly sticking her nose up in the air and saying something "vain" in terms of "I think they make me look ugly." What I remember watching the early episodes was that she felt insulted and insecure, stating that she should know her own body and powers better than others. She may also not have liked the look, but she didn't want the burden and to admit she was wrong, above all else. That is a form of vanity, but I didn't personally find it to be out of character, or annoying, or excessively "emo," either. She challenges her older co-workers about all sorts of matters, correctly and incorrectly. We're talking about someone with a lot of self-confidence in her powers (justified or not), and someone who is rather young and naive in many ways. She grew up in a pretty isolated situation to begin with, and her social awkwardness shows up many a time, like when she deals with Michael early on and won't stop talking out loud. So, when her confidence gets tested, like many young people, she's going to try to process it, and may become defensive as a part of that. She's also in a new country with new people; as she's trying to adjust, she's not going to exactly be happy about finding she can't even trust her own abilities. Personally, I liked that there were such flawed characters.

Wow, didn't know there's this much interest over one of my favorite shows of all time. Smile

I remembered seeing this accidentally on somebody else's TV at Episode 15, right when the plot starts to get moving and I fell in love. It was the first "dark" anime that got me hooked. I had no way of watching it at the time, so I contented myself reading episode summaries online and googling episode screencaps so I can imagine what happened!

Eventually when I got to watch the entire series I realized I was spared from the slowness of the first half, and found the ending frustrating as hell. But it remained with me and set a standard for the type of shows I would like later on.

Mr. sickVisionz wrote:

This was the first anime I ever dropped. Waaaaaay back when I was renting DVDs from Netflix around '04. I felt really bad about it at the time because I had this stupid idea that something was "wrong" if I didn't finish a series I started.

I remember those days. Now on stateside we have twenty+ other shows lined up every season on six different streaming platforms. It is kind of strange looking back, but missing a show like this could cut you out of the conversation and hurt your 'credibility'--yeah, right. I hope we can get a re-release of Blood+ while we're at it. That limited (the black one) set is super hard to find in good condition at a realistic price.

I'm rather surprised by how fondly Witch Hunter Robin is being look back upon here. Personally, I always found it to be tremendously boring even upon revisit as an adult some years back.

Because unlike it's fellow Adult Swim anime compatriots of that era were of a similar somber and cerebral tone, Wolf's Rain and Ghost in a Shell: SAC both had a lot of deeper things going on in them that I simply didn't grasp well at the time. Witch Hunter Robin on the other hand? Still just seems to be all surface level aesthetics of brooding gothic melodrama with not much else behind it. It couldn't even make a clear simple "persecution of others is bad" message.

Last edited by Spoofer on Sun Nov 25, 2018 3:20 pm; edited 2 times in total

LightningCount wrote:

I rewatched the early episodes fairly recently on DVD...I don't recall her exactly sticking her nose up in the air and saying something "vain" in terms of "I think they make me look ugly." What I remember watching the early episodes was that she felt insulted and insecure, stating that she should know her own body and powers better than others. She may also not have liked the look, but she didn't want the burden and to admit she was wrong, above all else. That is a form of vanity, but I didn't personally find it to be out of character, or annoying, or excessively "emo," either. She challenges her older co-workers about all sorts of matters, correctly and incorrectly. We're talking about someone with a lot of self-confidence in her powers (justified or not), and someone who is rather young and naive in many ways. She grew up in a pretty isolated situation to begin with, and her social awkwardness shows up many a time, like when she deals with Michael early on and won't stop talking out loud. So, when her confidence gets tested, like many young people, she's going to try to process it, and may become defensive as a part of that. She's also in a new country with new people; as she's trying to adjust, she's not going to exactly be happy about finding she can't even trust her own abilities. Personally, I liked that there were such flawed characters.

It's been 15 years, but I'll do my best to remember my impressions. But that is indeed the definition of vain I'm accusing her of exhibiting. Granted, the writing was on the wall with this show, in terms of how emo/brooding it was aiming to be.

By the 4th episode, she's already endangered the mission, herself, and her team quite a few times due to her poor aim. When her partner deduces the problem, and kindly offers her the solution, she rejects his appraisal and his solution, denying the evidence right before her face, as it was plainly evident both times she held the glasses up that they improved her vision. In the episode's climax, she foolishly attempts to engage in battle with her bad vision yet again, until she's pinned down by a constant barrage of pressure and has no other choice but to rely upon them. I'll also point out that even though it's clearly established her vision is subpar in general (not just when she's using her power), for the remainder of the series she only dons them to utilize her powers, rejecting the aid they'd provide to her daily life. A stylistic choice by the animators to represent her battle look, no doubt, but it becomes a reality for the character nonetheless.

(The point is probably moot regardless, since the animation's stylistic choices don't usually depict her as peering through the glasses during battle to begin with...)

So why does she spend a good chunk of her life denying she has a vision problem? Why does she continue to reject it when Amon presents the evidence to her? Why does she wait until she has no other choice but to rely upon them? Again, my take is vanity. She doesn't want to admit that there's something about her which is subpar/deficient. Even something as run of the mill as requiring glasses. She struggles to concede that she needs to rely on assistance, especially when the suggestion comes from her partner, so she instead spends her life holding herself back, refusing to take responsibility and to take any steps in order to overcome the shortcoming. We spend 3~4 episodes wondering what's holding her back, only to find out that it's her own stubborn refusal to assess and improve herself. The sort of thing that many find obnoxious about stereotypical emo teenagers wallowing in their own self-pity in general.

There may also be a parallel in denying the truth of her vision to denying her existence and role as a witch, which again presents her as a rather weak person unable to assess and take responsibility for herself, and define who she is and wants to be. Which is a valid exploration for a sullen teenager, but...

... the problem is, the landscape of US anime at the time had us all catching up via DVD and TV (and fansubs) on shows like Evangelion, Bebop, FLCL, Lain, Haibane Renmei, Wolf's Rain, Now and Then Here and There, even stuff like X, and dozens more. Shinji was dealing with incredibly complex issues of self-worth and was struggling to define himself as a worthy individual, while being forced to get in the robot over and over. Spike had half his gaze fixated on the past, while unable to live and find meaning in the present. Naota was stuck in the turbulence between childhood and adulthood while anyone and everyone around him was trying to exert their own definitions upon him. Etc. Every other show was dealing with far weightier concepts and depicting them in such unique, novel, and exciting ways, and then there's Robin who is sulking and brooding over something as petty as acknowledging that she has to wear glasses. It's beyond trite compared to the prevailing standards of the time (even with many other B and C-tier shows), and I believe this to be a large reason why this show was quickly forgotten.

And yeah, perhaps it's my own fault for going into a show that so fully encapsulated that teen emo subculture, and the fact that I had long passed that age of my life by the time Robin hit, and was already on my way to adulthood where accepting one's limitations and promptly dealing with them becomes a necessity. I had no desire to move backwards. Whereas, for most of the shows I listed above, their subject matter and the finesse in which they were executed have no expiration date.

But again, this is only one of the many issues I had with this show.

spoiler[This is the show where about halfway through, their headquarters are raided, explosions are going off left and right, bullets are absolutely shredding the windows, walls, hardware, and we see the team drop one by one as they're savagely gunned down by a spec ops team, and we get a pretty good view of their bloodied bodies on the floor perforated with bullet holes... Robin's crying for Amon at the end as he sacrifices himself to save her, and as his consciousness slips away, realizes the truth of their attack in a manner which is presented to the audience as futile and tragic before his supposed untimely end.

And then the next episode the team is chillin' in their HQ as if nothing has happened. Halfway through the episode it's exposited that the spec ops team was using "plastic bullets".]

..........

I remember a similar scenario in Blue Gender at the time, but even that pales in comparison to how absurd this clearly manipulative and inconsistent bait and switch was.

Which is basically par for the course for this show in terms of how horribly written it is.

I actually just found my set for this the other day. All volumes in the series box, most dvds disc only bought used from Gamestop (those were the days). I agree with the review, started off with potential and mystery but kinda didn't come together. Decent art style. It was a fun Adult Swim show to randomly see.

Spoofer wrote:

I remember a similar scenario in Blue Gender at the time,

Which episode was that? Because all I recall is how all of the groups ultimately suffered high casualties.

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REVIEW: Witch Hunter Robin DVD