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FLAG
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Animation - 7.5 |
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Sound - 6.5 |
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Story - 6.0 |
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Character - 3.5 |
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Value - 5.5 |
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Enjoyment - 4.5 |
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Average - 5.6 |
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| Average |
5.2 |
| Animation |
8 |
| Sound |
6 |
| Story |
5 |
| Character |
3 |
| Value |
5 |
| Enjoyment |
4 |
| Note: This review is based on G_P fansubs, which are very good both quality and translation wise.
Quote:
No matter how wonderful the smiling faces in the picture, the instant you click the shutter, it becomes a thing of the past. That's why people like us always have our cameras raised, ready and waiting for that next instant.
Both originally created and directed by Takahashi Ryousuke (Gasaraki) Flag is a show which offers a whole new storytelling to anime industry. It also sacrifices everything, including pace of the plot and characters for that storytelling and a strong sense realism. Flag's story takes place in our world, probably in the near future, as mecha weapons are deployed for wars. Anyway, it all happens in the middle of some south eastern Asian state, I didn't catch the name of, during the civil war. Saeko Shirasu, a photographer, took a picture of flag which was raised when the conflict seemed to be at its end, hence her photo and that flag became symbols of peace for that country. However, peace is not that easy to achieve, as the flag which should have been a symbol to end the war was stolen by terrorists. It comes back down to Shirasu to accompany special troops in pursuit to retrieve the flag and end the boiling conflict for good, all the while taping and taking pictures of everything around her.
Flag had it all. It packed neat ideas, it offered original plot it had its distinctive storytelling. Anti-war message is very well conveyed, humanity's tenacity to survive in the most horrible of situations is very well shown, you can also notice many manifestations of individual feelings vs society concept. Now then, how come a show, which appears to pack so much and is carried out with style gets such ratings from me? Simple. It's boring. I don't remember the last time I was so constantly fighting sleep when watching anime, I seriously had to stop my encodes at times, get up and do some exercises to fight drowsiness away, because, man, was it one sleep inducing show. Even though it packs so much good stuff and appears fresh and original (I darn liked the first episode) it fails to deliver anything in an exciting way, heck, even my review delivers it in a more exciting way than this show does. That unique everything through camera storytelling is mostly to blame here as all you ever see is either identical to what you see in the global news on TV or Shirasu taking photographs of various things, like sheeps, mountains and damned grass, or whatever. And looking at someone randomly moving camera around is not my idea of fun. And if it's not tormenting you on bland grass photos (it's well animated though) Flag makes you spend most of your time on watching guys you don't know talk about things you don't care. It gets better when narrator starts talking philosophically near the end, but that's way too far to save the show. It's basically a compilation of many news and documentaries about Israeli you have already seen on TV, except here it's fiction, so you don't even care as much.
Conclusion: Unless you are a photographer or you get kicks out of watching the news, you shouldn't really touch this show. It's suitable for anyone who is above 13 years of age, but, frankly, I can't picture a teen watching this anime. Heck, I'm interested in philosophy and politics and I still couldn't sit still. Best for mature audience with nurtured patience Flag is a show which would have gotten much more fans if it was live-action. If you liked Flag, then, well... errr. I recommend watching documentaries about Israeli or global news, Iraq reports. Seriously, I have no anime to recommend.
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1 of 2 people found this review helpful.
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| Average |
6.0 |
| Animation |
7 |
| Sound |
7 |
| Story |
7 |
| Character |
4 |
| Value |
6 |
| Enjoyment |
5 |
| Based on 5 episodes - then I gave up out of boredom.
A very heavy war anime that includes lots of minute details that you don't really need to know about. If you are someone who enjoys war series that includes details about the country's economic, religious, and political background - as well as details into the plans of all military operations - this will be a festival for you.
Otherwise, if you watch anime to avoid heavy material or want some really interesting central characters, avoid this anime.
I couldn't get into FLAG for one primary reason: the characters. While realistic, FLAG portrays everything from a documentary point of view. Therefore, rather than having some sort of all-seeing narrator, everything is told from the POV of two photographers. 1) Someone following the Special Ops of the UNF forces and 2) Another journalist who is trying to learn more behind the country's history and operations. As a result of this myopic perspective, I really couldn't get into FLAG. The lack of any real interesting things happening and the excess of 'realism' was a big turn off.
I know of some people who did enjoy this show and loved the journalistic presentation, but it isn't for me.
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1 of 1 people found this review helpful.
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