After Ayatsuri Sakon finished, nearly two years after I originally started blogging it, I’ve been searching for another anime to blog once every month or so. In the end, I decided to support Live-eviL, C1-Anime and Minor ja Nai in their attempt to revive interest for the World Masterpiece Theatre-production Little Princess Sara. Les Miserables has been turning into a true masterpiece by now, and the few episodes I’ve seen of Perrine Monogatari have been really good as well.

Little Princess Sara is also special, in the way that it’s based on the same story that Soukou no Strain was based on, though obviously the writers of the latter took a lot of artistic liberties by placing a story that originally happened in England, about a century and a half ago into a science-fiction setting. It’s also notable that Sara’s original last name is now Crewe, instead of the Werec, which later changes into Crewe in Soukou no Strain. Ralph also isn’t her brother, but her father, surprisingly. I also don’t think that Ralph is going to kill Sara’s precious friends in this one. ^^;

The thing that did remain the same, though is Sara’s huge respect for Ralph, but that’s naturally obvious, since her mother died when she was four, and he’s been taking care of her ever since. He’s also incredibly rich, and he’s been giving her whatever she wanted, hence the title of this series: Little Princess. Because of that, the Sara of Little Princess is rather spoiled, but I wouldn’t call her arrogant. She doesn’t fit in the stereotype that has been set by anime that the rich kids have to be the cocky bastards who look down on everyone at all. Instead, she’s incredibly innocent. Her father probably has been protecting her from everything harmful, but yet she tries to please everyone, and she looks incredibly naive as well. I’m not sure whether we’re supposed to hate her or like her at this point, but that probably will become clearer in the next episode.

This first episode was actually quite similar to the first episode of Les Miserables as well, if you ignore the fact that Fantine was incredibly poor and Ralph is incredibly rich. Ralph has been coming from India, and he’s about to get back, leaving his daughter in a local prestigious school in the middle of London. The rest of the episode basically focused on Sara, spending her last few moments with her father. Another interesting detail is that in the next episode, Sara will be purchasing Emily, making another link to both Soukou no Strain and Les Miserables.

Okay, the creators are NEVER going to finish this one in just four episodes. They haven’t even reached the Tower of Salvation yet, for goodness’ sake. Still, this gives me hope for some kind of second OVA, to cover the things that happen in Tethe’alla, so that some quality-time can be devoted to the case of Regal and Presea. The next episode will probably end with the death of Remiel.

That said, the creators did a good job with this episode. There were a few things I didn’t like, though. The hot tea, for example, was done better in the game. But then again, Collette was a real airhead there, so it was easy for Lloyd to fool her. Sheena’s performance in Luin also was disappointing, especially how Lloyd and the others turned up at the last possible moment to save the day. Furthermore, why didn’t Sheena use her final summon at that time? It would have been the perfect opportunity. The game did this a lot better when Lloyd basically arrived when she was mourning over the village. What also bugs me is how the creators didn’t even mention why the Desians attacked the village in the first place. The little girl was a nice touch, though.

Still, the creators thankfully did well on the parts that really mattered: Collette, losing everything and Lloyd, finding out that he’s been fighting with the thing that killed his mother. I would have liked a bit more emphasis on the Expheres and the monsters in the building up for it, but it can’t be helped, with the length of this series and all. I must say, Collette felt really annoying in the game, and Ufotable did a good job of making her relationship with Lloyd quite touching. The two of them are much closer together, and it works perfectly.

I seriously hope for a second series of OVA’s, though. Basically, the only characters that got any depth in the first half of the game were Lloyd and Collette, while the others got this with the second half. I just want to see Raine’s mother, and how the two got abandoned. I want to see Presea, and the horrible things that were done to both her and her sister. So far, the creators have been giving a few hints that the fourth episode won’t be the end of this: they showed glimpses of both Zelos, and the last two Desian Cardinals, neither of them had any big role in the first half.

I already had some sort of vague feeling that the climax for this series would turn out worthwhile, and indeed: the second half of this episode was just awesome. One of the advantages of having so many characters in a series is that you can show many fights at the same time, and as it seems: the creators of Baccano are masters at this. Seriously, if you haven’t given Baccano a try, you really should consider. I can’t think of many other anime that have better writing than this series.

Only few anime realize that if you want to have a great fight, the inclusion of comedy can be a great addition, and Baccano finally made me understand why. The combination of excitement with Isaac and Miria’s quirks was just awesome. Some creativity in the choreography also helps, like how Isaac, Miria and Chezlaw just came flying by, while Jaccuzi was busy trying to fight off the leader of the guys in black suits. ^^;

Rachel also surprised me with some actions I honestly didn’t see coming, even though the reason for her leg to be in bandages hadn’t been explained yet. She basically freed both the Nathalie, Merry, Nick and Nice, and got hurt in the process. Then she tried to save Isaac and Miria, were nearly falling off the train in an attempt to save Czeslaw, who had just about given up hope of trusting someone (it seems that the companion he was with went crazy, making Czeslaw eat him).

Meanwhile, Rail Tracer kicks Ladd’s ass, while suddenly Lua shows up (finally!), and Rail Tracer threatens to kill her, a task that Ladd assigned to himself, though I really think that he feels something for the girl. It’s a strange kind of feeling, considering how he’s insane and all, but he basically tries to save her, but jumps off the train along with her in the process.

Back in 1930, it seems that Isaac and Miria have been sharing the two bottles of “sake” with Firo, Luck, Berga and Keith, as we see them get shot by Dallas around the middle of the episode. Meanwhile, Maiza manages to escape from Szilard by jumping through a window. Szilard follows him and bumps into his own car, driven by none other than Isaac and Miria, who just ran over Dallas and his two companions, who happened to stand there as well. Obviously, Szilard doesn’t like this, but he decides to go after Maiza first, and orders Ennis, who happened to be nearby as well to kill Isaac and Miria.

Surprisingly, there was nothing about Eve this episode. Jaccuzi rocked, though, as he showed himself to be something much more than just the coward of the first few episodes. I also laughed at the passion Nice seems to have for her bombs. The people inside the dining car also surprised me when they took up guns to defend themselves. ^^

There’s one episode left, and I’m pretty interested in how this series is planning to end.

Okay, if this episode didn’t remind you of Serial Experiments Lain, then I don’t know anymore. There is just no other director who relies so much on creepy sound-effects to create an atmosphere as Ryutaro Nakamura. It does work, though, and I liked this episode a lot. It’s still mostly a case of building up, but things are getting more intriguing as we learn new information about the characters.

It seems that the main character’s sister was his older sister. The two of them were in a fight when they were kidnapped. The face of the kidnapper was also revealed in this episode, and the freaky thing is that he looks like just an ordinary guy. He was killed by a truck afterwards, though. The guy in suit, who we saw in the previous episode, seems to be some kind of detective or psychologist, who hopes to find out more about what happens through hypnosis. It seems that the case still isn’t solved after all these years, but I wonder why… could it be that the body of the main character’s sister still hasn’t been found yet?

Overall, I was able to follow most of this episode, though I’m going to need to watch the subs later when they come out to fill in a few things I didn’t pick up, especially regarding the reasons why the brown-haired guy is so curious and likes to investigate. It could be in his nature, but I’d like to know that for sure.

This episode also sees the main character (I really need to find out his name), discovering the place he’s been seeing in his dreams. It seems to be beyond a shrine, where the girl who managed to see him in his dream-state in the previous episode lives. Apparently, he had no idea where he had been kidnapped before, and he the shock of the kidnapping probably made his sub-consciousness to lock out some of these experiences, like the kidnapper’s face. When he also tried to enter the area, he suddenly entered a dream-state, which seems to back this up.

Then the final main character seems to have had a similar experience when his father(?) ended up dead, right in front of his eyes. We don’t get much info about him, though. Either that, or I failed to pick it up. Regarding the animation, this is et another one of these shows that couldn’t keep up with the high quality of the first episode, and the animation quality has gone down. Despite this though, it still looks very good, but there may have been a bit too much recycled scenes.

What also intrigues me is the OP. It somehow reminded me of xxxHolic, and I feel that once the characters are established, the creators are going to treat us to the stories of these different beings. Or it could be that this series is just like El Cazador, where the OP and ED have nothing to do with the show itself. :P