Rurouni Kenshin Season 1
Comedy / Action / Historical-ish
Animation: B+
Story: A-
Dub: Did not watch dubbed... actually totally forgot it had a dub.
Sub: B+
I'll admit back when I first heard about kenshin, I thought that it had to be the most retarded story ever. A manslayer who doesnt slay anything? Reverse blade sword? Roflamofzlzl. No.
Then I got bored and ran out of stuff to read. At the time I used to work full time at a borders bookstore, so I thought id give some random series a shot. Kenshin was one of those series (along with Girls Bravo and some other bad bad manga). I was hooked after the first volume. I ended up finishing the whole 20 something manga volume series in just a matter of days. After I was done, I wanted more. I immdiatly went online and ordered seasons 1-3 in the economy pack (Or w/e media blasters calls its bulk re release)
Season 1 stays pretty true to the manga, which imo is always a plus. There was some filler here and there but nothing of bleach caliber. The season itself covers the manga volumes up to where the Kyoto arc and Shisio-sama make their appearance.
The voices for the characters were done quite well. Kenshin's VA was especially interesting. From the joking kenshin to the "im about to break my vow not to kill" kenshin, the VA did a perfect job of portraying the character.
The animation itself was pretty good. There was some 'quality' moments here and there, but nothing that detracted too much from the viewing experience.
The fight scenes were very well animated and I noticed very little of that shaky jitterery crap that a lot of older series have (Go see Maison Ikkoku. I got seasick in my bed at times). You'd be hard pressed to notice that this was made in 1996. Holy crap that was 14 years ago almost to the DAY that it first aired in Japan.
Well. It's time for Season two. I'm already sitting here smiling as I'm typing this. I cant want for shishio to make his appearance.
On a brief side note: Has anyone had issues with Media Blaster brick sets coming in with loose disks / broken cases? Season 1 of kenshin and berserk both were broken for me. /annoyed.
TL : DR overall suggestion: A very good watch. Recommend buying it, or at least renting.
Season 2 up next. ETA to review: 3 days.