Gantz Volume 3: Aftershocks - Active Anime
- Active Anime
- Rommel Saladanan
- 08/14/05
- click here
"...tense mysteriousness and cliffhanger stops."
Gantz Volume 3 contains episode 5 and 6 of the series. The episodes move fast, but the sci-fi action takes a backseat to the sur-reality of everyday life. Viewers get a change of pace and see what the home situation of Kishimoto, Kei, and Kurono are like. For all of three of the characters, ?happy? is not how one would describe what they have to come home to. Coming to terms with their near ? or actual ? death experiences becomes rather strange when their ?real lives? are just as brutal. ?Aftershocks? is a fitting tile for this volume.
Now that most of the cast of episodes 1-4 are dead, Episode 5 introduces a new round of characters (or the latest dead meat?) to add to the main survivors in future episodes. The opening sequence of Gantz, which changes slightly with every episode, now includes a sneak peek at what looks to be the next monster or alien or THING a new group will have to face.
These two episodes explain a lot about Kei and Kurono?s characters. Kei is still, well, a horny teenage guy who doesn?t give a damn about anyone else. Kurono is revealed to be a caring older brother, orphaned and left to live in an abusive relative?s home. It?s still somewhat of a mystery as to why Kishimoto slashed her wrists in the first episode, but here the viewer also sees more of her. (Literally and figuratively?)
Gantz still keeps the cynical, dark humor very much alive in these two episodes. The series is an adult anime, and these next two episodes are still in the same vein as the first two DVDs. Despite the lack of any monsters appearing, the show still manages to maintain its tense mysteriousness and cliffhanger stops. After the non-stop ?Huh?!? factor of the first two DVDs, these episodes are a welcome breather before the madness begins again. Once again, the pessimism towards human nature rises to the fore, and we are introduced to an even bleaker picture of the human race in everyday life.
Posted on Sunday, August 14, 2005 (Archive on Wednesday, September 14, 2005)