Summary:
We follow the characters of Hal and Fem as they investigate a strange town that was devastated by the war. Everything seems too lively for a city that should be in ruin.
Impression:
A new adventure begins ! Forget about Dalian and Huey, this time we follow the story of two new character. Fem and Hal. Hal seems a lot more experienced than Huey, he knows what he’s doing and he seems to be using darker and more dangerous power too.
His staff is an interesting addition, he uses the power of the phantom book and consume them to unleash their power. I know that this is only an anime, but I hate to imagine someone consuming valuable unique and powerful book. I value art and to see them go down to ash, even if in the end it is for the greater good, is something that shocks me. I’m also not sure if I like the staff itself, it just doesn’t feel quite right to me. But at the same time it is interesting since the user of the staff is doomed to burn by the power he unleashes.
We now have new characters and it is a nice change of pace, the calm, experienced and confident Hal and the tsundere and perverted Fem. In the end Fem and Dalian don’t seem too different from one another, if only that Fem looks more trashy than Dalian, but it is an interesting style. Now I don’t mind having those new characters, as long as they eventually meet the originals. I don’t want the story to branch into something else completely, I want to see a link between the two duo.
Something of interest is the contrast between the activation of Fem and Dalian. The animation and ritual to enter Dalian looks romantic and full of passion, while the ritual to enter Fem looks rough, evil and painful. It seems as if Fem is a street prostitute and Dalian is a princess. And as we all know, using a prostitute without protection will lead to your demise, since it will backfire sometimes later. I really want to see Hal and Huey meet each other, Hal seems to have so much to tell Huey about, and maybe in the process he will enlighten us and tell us more about the supernatural universe of Dantalian no shoka.
Conclusion:
While the show changed of characters, they remains similar enough that I didn’t feel loss, it was an interesting change of pace and it shows us a lot more about the world of phantom books.
ZeroG signing off