Legendz: Tale of the Dragon Kings

Legendz: Yomigaeru Ryuuou Densetsu is one of anime that I watched when I was around 13 or 15 on my local tv channel, I generally loved it, especially with its hilarious kids comedy like what you see on american cartoon like Looney Tunes, etc. Now I'm 18 and I had a nostalgia with it, so I decided to watch only to remember some aforementioned hilarious moment and also some awesome moments in it. After finish watching it (including CD drama), I found that, the cover of anime is COMPLETELY MISLEADING, with its awkward character design, I thought that it was only focus on its hilariouscomedy, boy I WAS wrong. I had never expected it would be deconstructed like this. It's not a general kids show, no, it's not even appropriate enough for kids. Maybe kids' standards in Japan were different, though Story: 9/10 I found the first half series being lighthearted with its hilarious gags also a lot of character moments in it. Let's see, the story is about Legendz, mythical creatures that people believe that they were real and really existed long time ago. Just like in real life, the legendz are mythologies. Only, in this, on the setting of time, the legendz are being reborn for some reason. The reborn of these legendz were first represented with the creation of Talispod, one of kids' toy developed by dark WiZ company in order to make children happy. It was later called Legendz battle by the kids, showing virtual legendz appearing from talispod and you began to do like sword fight with your friend. The problem was shown later that some of legendz appeared in human world for REAL. Here comes some of questions like: "Why legendz appeared for real? What's the reason of it? What's Legendz War and how come it happened?" Yeah, the first half of the series didn't explain too much about the problem, but there're indeed some clue where it's going to be very serious some time later. We got a team rocket-wannabe who were commanded to steal Shu's talispod, because he had a real and special legendz with him, Shiron the Windragon, and maybe have a connection with the later story, yeah he did indeed. They are doing quite similarly like what pokemon's team rocket do every episode, only in this, they're not too annoying. Things became more complicated when there's something revealed about the existence about 2nd Windragon, which was clearly awkward. Also following the reborn of legendary earth, water, and fire elemental legendz. Things got more complicated when there's explained about legendz war, where it happened when the nature of the earth has been diminished, being desolate because humans' doing against the nature of earth, their darkness in their heart and their negative emotions and legendz began to fight the personification of the aforementioned darkness, resulting destruction to human world and being reset. Now that's going to be happened again on Shu's era where humanity have been grown more complex with technologies and so on, also it's told that the technologies that human created had harmed the nature of earth badly. Later it was told why Shu and his friend were chosen to be saga and why they must face these things completely. Humans later have expected legendz to be dangerous creatures, threatening, resulting them expressed negative emotions that has brought back the deep darkness of the world and being reborn to destroy the existence of life on earth. How they will stop the disaster and how they can overcome the real darkness of the world, it depends on what they do in order to survive. The stories were thought provoking enough for kids show, showing how deconstructed they are, also darker and edgier than most of kids show. From the existence of human being with its technologies that apparently bring destruction to the mother earth to the negative emotions of human that had brought back the true darkness of the world. It's simply intriguing and you need to think a bit to make it reasonable. Characters: 9/10 The main character here, Shuzo Matsutani is kind of typical shounen who is silly, and kind of annoying but hilarious. But, well, it was a bit different of our typical shounen characterization, after all. Even though so, he had a lot of awesome and sad moments too, and interestingly he saved everyone from the worst situation with his silliness, that's just an unusual moment seriously. His family problem wasn't that serious, his father and mother are simply just wanting their children happy at all cost, none that all. After the first half episode, there's an episode when Shu for the first time really felt despair. He didn't want to make his parents worry about him and he didn't want his parents especially his mother to be involved with legendz war. He got quite serious development in these moments. Second main character is Dino Sparks, who is introduced on around first 5 episodes. I found his character being special, what I mean is he's a rich person but he isn't happy at all because his activities had to be scheduled so even he can't play outside like what most kids do on their age, also he had serious family problem, where his mother left home because of his dad's doing and mistakes. It simply made Dino hates his father because of that. Later it was shown on 1 full episode about Dino's father, Bruno Sparks character moments and his past. When he remembered the fondest moment with his wife, and his dream to make toys to make kids happy. We really get his character development after it, made him brave to talk to Dino and said "I'm sorry, Dino. I wasn't a good father for you. I realized that I've made mistakes that have made you sad all this time. I won't ever let it again to you my beloved child." Damn, that's really touching seriously. Also eventually in the second half episode, Dino's mom had back for long time but had her appearance changed from slim to big fat. Even though so, Dino didn't lose his love to his mother, also Bruno, her husband until last episodes. "Despite what you look like, you're my wife and I will always love you." That's what I got from Bruno Sparks, what a beautiful and touching moment. Next is Mike McField. I really like the characterization of him. He's a nice guy who want to be nice to everyone, evoking them when they're in problem, and he love natures very much also he's addicted to hamburger. He's the first person that able to talk to Dino, the lonely rich guy and even can become friend with also sharing his favorite hamburger with him. He's the type of sympathetic person who can understand someone's feeling and also nature's feeling. That's why he's being chosen as Tsuchi no Saga (Earth Saga) because his deep love with nature. He got some serious problem with his feeling when he's transformed into a griffin and going berserk hurting each other. He felt despair after it happened, thinking that his friend would never forgive him of what he had do with them. He got quite good development after episodes, though, only not as strong as Dino. Also he had less moments with his family. Next is Meg Sprinkle. She looked like an annoying girl at first, yeah. She made some of funny gags with her Meg Chop for many times, I really enjoy it. She seemed to be the least focused character, but not until her changed mind about her impression to legendz, especially when she finally met her partner legendz, Zuou. She didn't accept him at first, because she thought legendz were cruel, and had made her sad. But it went through time and eventually she can overcome those feelings. Still, she didn't have much time about her moments with her family. Next is Halca Hepburn. She's the one that I can said, got the most character development than all and having deep characterization out of the other characters. She's the one who loves legendz very much, hoping legendz becoming real and apparently her dreams come true. At first she was so crazy about legendz, like a nerd. But thing got changed in her mind, her impression of legendz after seeing them becoming threatening to humanity especially for the kids, though she was misunderstood. We got to see her change from crazy to legendz, joining Ranshiin to destroy the existence of legendz in the world. Things got changed again when she finally met her dad, who was also loving legendz when he's still younger. There's also thing that explaining their past about reading books about legendz, explaining it like a dad telling a fairy tale. What become worse after that is her dad was the one behind these problems. From a legendz lover become the one that willing to destroy the existence of legendz forever. He has a reasonable motives, though, only it's kind of silly. This made Halca feel in despair anymore, thinking what she must do to save her beloved ppl. But after that, she became developed and she was the one that had stopped the disaster, along with Shiron and Ranshiin. Last but not least, for the minor characters. This is where I found that Legendz CARE SO MUCH of its minor characters, even there's an exclusive episode which told us about the story of some of minor characters after it disappeared from the episodes. Even the team rocket-wannabee, they got so much development and the thought of "they're cruel people just like team rocket in pokemon" in our minds doesn't prevail anymore. They also had understandable motives why they did those mission to steal Shu's talispod, and eventually resigned from dark WiZ company and began to help Bruno Sparks to make children happy with their toys. I can conclude that they just want "kids to be happy." Even the parents here had their role of how they rescue their children, what they'll do to protect their beloved children. All people cooperate with each other to stop the disaster, even the main human villain himself. This was really intriguing in character section. Sound: 8/10 I liked the song Kaze no Legendz, it's just wonderful. Also Mou Donimo Tomaranai was also unique ending. Most of their soundtrack were classic jazz, which really give us the american things in it. The last ending song was very sad, and it really match with the moment on last episode.. Art: 7/10 Despite being a 2004 anime, the art was reasonable, though. But the problem is, the design of characters were MISLEADING. People will seem it more likely a family comedy with many gags on it. I knew they're trying to make people surprised, I really appreciate their motives of making this anime. Overall: 9/10 There's simply no one like Legendz out there, although I found the overall of the series being similar to Digimon Tamers, especially its plot, both are REALLY awesome. What I really enjoy especially in this series is that, even though on a very serious situation, they can make you laugh. What a mixed feelings, from the silly-but-fun comedy to breaking the 4th wall. Everytime when something's getting serious, they did put the gag on the right time, so while you're enjoying the gags, you didn't lose the feeling of enjoying its seriousness. I remember in some dialogue "We have to blahblahblah..." "Huh?? but it wasn't written in the script.." It made me really LOL, seriously, without losing the seriousness. Despite its seriousness and hilarious things, this series actually had given me some life morals. We, human often don't know about what we did to the earth of our creation of many stuffs, even we often don't care about nature. This series actually want to tell us that "Things that destroy the humanity are the human itself." It was true after all, seeing what we had done to the mother earth in real life and how sad the earth was feeling when it's being hurt. I was very sad that this kind of wonderful anime is quite underrated and even on quite low score, 7.4. People should give it a try for sure, don't just judge the cover from the art style and also its earlier episodes. You'll find it wonderful if you understand more of this series, seriously. I hope this review helps, thanks..

It is saddening to see such a charming anime drop its own charm. At first glance it looks like a kids' show, and the first few episodes do feel like a toy sales pitch. But also starting from first episode the comedy showed off its fast pace, from the character interactions you could tell the main cast genuinely cared for each other, and the attention to detail with the plot (in a kids' show!) was great, so the fact this was made for promotion you forget. It especially hurts because the anime showed it *could* deal with character emotions in a mature and believable way. The timesit did so were touching. Yet, the moment the story headed for large-scale drama and destruction everything started to fall apart. Despite how careful they were being with character actions, the main cast started acting very out of character when it most mattered (serious moments). This also goes for side characters, every single one acted in ways a person would never act during the serious arcs. Despite having previously shown the ability to act like normal people before these arcs even happened. So while the anime does keep up this façade of good comedy and character interactions for a long while, it decides to head into a more war/fighting related plot, which would be fine if it wasn't for the dubious writing. Or maybe it's dubious in my eyes, but it was written like this because Legendz is ultimately a kids' show. But that's also an excuse, in the beginning they could keep up the quality while at the same time remaining as serious as a kids' show can be. It really feels like halfway they gave up on good writing and just added whatever a kid would find cool. My point is: don't be deceived by thinking it will deal with things in a believable way. As long as you expect kids' show developments and actions from both characters and the plot, you may avoid the bad impression this ended up leaving on me.