Sengoku Night Blood Episode 1 [First Impression]

Eva’s First Impression

Talk about a super awkward opener. All our dear heroine was trying to do was use her phone and then shit got weird and she was cast into the supernatural alternative universe of the Sengoku Era, and just on the outskirts of a battlefield no less.
She ought to send a complaint, she didn’t sign up for this.

To make matters worse, in this case for the viewers – it looks like we are with yet another Otome Game Adaption where the Heroine is not given a name. Look, I let it slide and take the creative route with Amnesia because there the heroine lost her memories, but here under no circumstances did the heroine lose her memories. At first I thought maybe I missed her name being given, but then I realized they missed their chance when Hideyoshi was introducing her to the crew. So it looks like we are going to have to give her one, yet again – otherwise we stick to calling her “Heroine”.

And I have yet another dilemma: I am struggling to determine whether or not the heroine is colorblind or they are just doing it for the effect. The color-filter changes when we start seeing things from the heroine’s perspective, but doesn’t appear to be consistent either. It’s really throwing me off.

The premiere also spent about 75% of its time introducing a list of characters that felt as if it were never going to end. I think it was half-way through when I gave up trying to keep track of everyone’s names and identities, but they did help by highlighting who the key historical figures were. Honestly the introduction of the established (based on history) warlords and the various fractions was incredibly overwhelming. I would have preferred to see them spread out the debut of these characters, only once their presence became relevant or necessary for the plot. Seeing them scrim or goof around felt like a lot of time was wasted there.

Then comes along a Tanuki called Imari, who breaks the ice in a sense of giving us a hint about the plot. The Heroine who comes from another world is the one Himemiko had told him to look for, and needs her to lend her power to the land of Shinga. In Shinga, there are are tribes of non-humans creatures (werewolves and vampires) who have special powers and once lived peacefully thanks to Himemiko’s Powers. But one day, Himemiko mysteriously vanished and the world descended into chaos. In attempt to unite the nation, warlords began fighting against each other.

Up to this point: The heroine has been fairly level-headed, and haven’t freaked out too much, or maybe one could say she’s not reacting to this insanity enough? Well either way, she shows she at least has a good head on her shoulders, as she came to a pragmatic conclusion that it would benefit her to help Imari search for Himemiko, since she might know why she was sucked into Shinga in the first place, and how to send her back to her world. Common sense, but it’s good to see the heroine be at least proactive in that measure.

Of course it’s too soon to say how proactive Heroine will be in this series, but I hope she will be since I hate it when they are passive. It was a start to have her show courage to take Hideyoshi’s joke of her taking up the sword and fighting alongside him seriously. But I got to say, when she asked him if there’s anything she can do, I did freak out for her for a moment thinking, “GIRL YOu”RE GONNA GET IN TROUBLE, HE’S A VAMPIRE AND HE”S WOUNDED” but thankfully he didn’t go apeshit of needing blood and stuff. That is until she cut her neck and that set off the trigger. But again, much to my relief – he didn’t go Diabolik Blood crazy and only licked the blood. (And let’s hope this series doesn’t go anywhere near that insanity!)

And lo and behold, her blood is special! Apparently it enabled Hideyoshi to finally awaken, which begs the question as to why wasn’t he up until now, and what sort of new powers is he going to get? I will admit though it was quite funny how calm the two of were afterwards.

Premiere’s Verdict: Well for starters, it is nice to see that for once in a Sengoku Era inspired story, it appears in this story: Nobunaga will not be the male lead, it is instead, Toyotomi Hideyoshi– which is refreshing to say the least. As so much time was spent on introducing what appeared to be the entire cast, it was difficult for me to get a gist of most of their personalities, including Hideyoshi. The heroine on the other-hand, I hope she will continue to emerge out of her shell – but when you’re thrown into an world with blades and supernatural powers as your weapons, it’s going to be tough to contribute. With that in mind, I do fear she might be reduced to a support role of buffing the parties with her blood.

With that said, it is definitely too soon to say whether or not I would enjoy this show. The potential of what this could be is far too hazy for me so I will have to give it a few episodes to get a better feel which direction of the series will be going. I would hope the next episode would provide us more information on what Nobunaga means by awakened, and how this changes things (I suspect they will), as well as to some clues as to what sort of powers, aside from her blood the heroine possesses. The word of her arrival to this world is getting around, and once the warlords catch the wind of her blood offering powers, everyone’s going to be after her. But let’s not forget there was also the matter with “Yakuma”, that was quietly mentioned. We saw werewolves fraction (I am assuming) discussing how the number of Yakuma increased recently, we don’t know what they are, but I am guessing it is a different entity from Vampires and Werewolves, and Himemiko is usually the one that keeps them at bay – thus is will likely be the heroine’s job to deal with it.

Possibility of Blogging: Uncertain – Will give three episodes
Possibility of Watching: Moderate

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 MoonNyte’s First Impression

Well I unfortunately can’t say very much, It had my attention in the beginning when she was teleport ed to the Sengoku Era just from being in her phone, what kind of phone she had to make that happen is beyond me I wish my phone could do that so I can meet some of my anime husbandos…. Sadly as it went on, I got lost and nothing seemed super interesting to me, like after the other side retreated from the war it got really slow to me because they spent too much time introducing the characters and the typical quirks in their personality types and it got too much cause they were throwing a new guy left and right, for me sadly, watching most of the episode was boring, aside from one or two had caught my eyes the rest felt…lackluster, or that they were trying too hard. I’m not a huge fan of historical anime, i’m kinda picky because they have to do it right and while this might be interesting for some, I can’t see myself watching the whole season. I will say though I like the heroine so far, I mean she’ pretty shy and awkward around them but anyone would if this beam of light sent you to a different era randomly, I like her appearance, she seems like a calm and rational girl with a good head on her shoulders, I mean she didn’t scream or flip out when they spotted her, she kept her cool despite her being terrified, she didn’t do anything dumb or unnecessary when Toyotomi Hideyoshi was nice and gave her a hand so seeing her being calm in an unknown situation is very nice~ Good job girl.
Like Eva mentioned it was nice to see that Nobunaga wasn’t the lead character, or at least it looks like it for once, I have nothing personal against him but since there’s a lot of Sengoku animes out there it needs to be different to stand out you know? Toyotomi Hideyoshi seems to be a nice, refreshing guy, and I like that! When she accidentally disrespected him he didn’t look down on her or got mad, he just kept being kind to her which is cute and again nice to see! What really made me have a hard time watching too was the faded bloom effect and character designs, the effect made it look like the poor girl was color blind and the guys, I found them to be very handsome but they seem too flashy looking for this Era, I like the character design from Hakuouki more, not too flashy, looks like they fit in the Era they are at and yet still look hansome and badass af.
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Possibility of Blogging: None
Possibility of Watching: Medium, I’ll give it two more episodes.