Fantastic Children

Publisher
Beez Entertainment
Country of origin
Japan
Format
Series
Running time
26 episodes aprox. 25 minutes each
Year
2004

Fantastic Children - Volume 1

By Joseph (Joe) Wood
21st Nov 06

From Takashi Nakamura, animation director on Akira and a key animator on Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind comes Fantastic Children. From the deep and soulful opening theme song to the preview of episode six, the first volume of Fantastic Children had me completely captivated. I don’t think I have known one-hundred and twenty-five minutes be so enjoyable or go so fast in a while.

The “Children of Bèfort” a group of white-haired children appear throughout history, meddling in human affairs but searching for someone or something, or so the myth goes. In reality the “Children of Bèfort” are the reincarnation of several scientists from the planet Greece searching for Princess Tina, who is reincarnated once every one-hundred years, in order to return home. The story begins in 1901 with the children tracking down the latest reincarnation of Tina, but they are too late, Tina has passed away, leaving several paintings that show the world from where they came. Further tragedy strikes when one of the children forget who they are reducing their number from six to five (another of the children had already forgot themselves and went on to discover x-rays). In 2012, Thoma, a young boy in training to become the guardian of his home island, encounters two orphans from the mainland, Chitto and Helga, who are both being neglected in the orphanage. Thoma helps Helga and Chitto escape the orphanage; meanwhile the remaining “Children of Bèfort” begin searching for Princess Tina once more.

Moments in the episodes will have you clutching your cushions or leaping behind your sofa in fear, as they can be quite dark, while others will have you laughing at the exploits of Chitto and Thoma. There is far more going on than first may seem, a detective searching for the “Children of Bèfort”, another resident for the planet Greece also searching for Tina, mysterious shadows hunting the “Children of Bèfort” and a secret organisation that seems linked to the strange events taking place. All these elements and more are introduced an it will be interesting to see how they fit into the main story over the course of the series.

Visually Fantastic Children is similar to the works of Osamu Tezuka, the characters look like they could have just come out of Astro Boy or Metropolis, and this adds to Fantastic Children’s enchantment. The backgrounds are incredibly detailed ranging from late Victorian buildings and cars to the tropical islands full of Buddha statues on Thoma’s island home, and it all looks like a individual work of art.

The first volume of Fantastic Children shows a lot of promise for the series, if the standards for the rest of the series is as high as the opening volume then “Fantastic” will certainly be the word to describe the series.

R2 DVD Notes

Features: English/French/Japanese Audio, English/French Subtitles, Production Gallery, Clean Opening and Closing Animations, Trailers and a booklet.

Release information: Publisher: Beez Entertainment Release Date: October 16th 2006 Classification: PG Running Time: 125mins

Notes: The booklet that comes with the first DVD volume offers a bit more of a look into the world of Fantastic Children, with some intresting segments on reincarnation. It's a nicely prodcued booklet but it does give slightly more away to the story than the first volume it self does.

-- Joseph (Joe) Wood 21st Nov 06

Fantastic Children Images