Noir
I’m sure you’ve noticed some trends in my reviews of the shows I like. If the show has women who kick butt or a killer soundtrack I will fall madly in love with it. Noir fits BOTH of these criteria! Color me overjoyed and in fan heaven. The show’s two female protagonists are no slouches; in fact they are high caliber assassins. The show is like a precursor to Black Lagoon, in that the show is orientated on the ladies and if there are men on the scene, they usually are the ones wringing their hands in the corner or getting beat up. Also the soundtrack is written by Yukari Kaijura, who brought us the equally wonderful OSTs of .hack//SIGN and Pandora Hearts.
Noir is surprisingly deep for a show about female assassins. Usually these types of stories consist just of the gals kicking butt and taking names, but Noir brings us a twist: Plot! And a darn good one at that! Mireille is your average young French woman with a tragic past, and like all average young women with tragic pasts, she’s become an assassin. On one of her “jobs” she runs across someone whose assassination skills surpass her own, an amnesiac girl named Kirika. They team up. They don’t necessarily fight crime though. Things are going fine for them until a mysterious secret order known as Les Soldats enters their lives and seems torn on whether to recruit them or kill them. Of course, the order has ties with both Kirika’s and Mireille’s rather hazy pasts and will push them to the brink of their new found partnership and slowly blooming friendship.
The series starts off episodic: the girls get a job, they take care of the job, nifty ending credits. But then things get intense and it grips you and doesn’t let go until the very end. All the main characters are well developed, at the end of the series you feel for EVERYONE. Even the villains. It’s also one of those shows that makes you question who the real villains are and where that line between justice and murder really is. The show is a little bit on the old side, released in 2001, but it’s held up well! The fight scenes are still awesome and have some really iterative ways to take out someone bigger and stronger. Give it a shot, especially if you liked Black Lagoon or Gunslinger Girls. And a small warning: the main theme will get stuck in your head for AGES!
Comments
Wow. I was utterly bored by the series. I wasn't attached to the characters at all. And I would never, ever list it anywhere near the same sentence that included Black Lagoon or Gunslinger Girl. Unless it was to say: Black Lagoon and GSG are way better than Noir. :(http://girlg33k.blogspot.com/2009/10/noir.htmlMy main complaints were that Mireille was a sorry excuse for an assassin; the animation was all sorts of average (except for some amazing scenic art); that the plot was drawn out, predictable and dull; and that the whole thing was relatively uninteresting. I didn't think it was outright awful, just...boring.(Ah, forgive me, I may have double posted.)
It certainly is more subdued than Black Lagoon. I think I was going more for they are similar in that both shows are about strong women who kick butt, than they are both rollarcoaster rides o' action. Though I did think it was fairly action-y, just...a more thinking action-y. Not like the shoot-em-up fest which is Black Lagoon (and which makes Black Lagoon so fun!) I guess it's like comparing Davinci Code to Pulp Fiction ^_^;
I watched this series, like in mid-2000, so I'll write my two-cents' worth based on what I can remember for this anime. Personally, I like this show though I wouldn't compare it with Black Lagoon. Noir is more fantasy, while Black Lagoon is more grisly and reality-based. In fact, I didn't complete Black Lagoon as the grim reality was a tad too much for me to stomach at the end. Both shows depressed me rather but Noir has a ray of hope at the end. I like it for its poetic reminiscence, it's not a action-based show I believe, hence it may be an acquired taste for some. I think it'll probably compared closest to the Gunslinger Girl. The theme Noir wanted to explore is deeper than Gunslinger Girl (hence the longer plot) so may appear more draggy than the latter. I love Gunslinger Girl too! At the end of the day, I just can't get enough of kick-ass girls i suppose =P
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