Fantastic Children

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

Fantastic Children Vol. 6

By Joseph (Joe) Wood
10th May 08

This review will not contain spoilers for volume six of Fantastic Children!

The final volume of, the surprisingly great, Fantastic Children is bound to disappoint, due to the fact it spells the end of this amazing series. The strong story concludes with an explosion of emotion and feeling, which is bound to invoke a strong reaction within the viewer.

Dumas continues his father’s plans to revive Tina, and the Children of Befort desperately try to stop him. Meanwhile lost memories return, and the truth behind past events are revealed. Helga’s spirit is trapped in the “Interval” a place between life and “The Zone” of death; it’s up to one of our heroes to bring her back, but will they both return.

The events in volume six pull no punches, although you may have believed you’ve figured out how this last volume is going to play out, chances are you’re wrong. The gob-smacking twists and turns are bound to keep you on the edge of your seat till the end. Although their aren’t really any fights or major action there is a distinct level of tension throughout expressed through the characters themselves.

The art style of Fantastic Children’s characters seem very “cartoony” in comparison to most other modern anime titles. The style is reminiscent of Osamu Tezuka, and the effect of seeing some of these characters descend into madness through this visual style almost makes you believe that Fantastic Children could have come from Tezuka himself. Combining this with amazing background artwork and sublime musical score just makes the whole package that little bit extra special.

There are, and were always bound to be, problems with the end of Fantastic Children. The main story concludes strongly but problems arrive in the aftermath with some rather weak and poor storytelling devices used to tie up loose ends. The characters that’ve meet and formed stong bonds with each other, are left in a awkward place where we don’t get to see what becomes of them. It feels slightly like we’ve been cheated by those last few minutes which seemingly write-off any potential continuation, there is an “epilogue” included as a DVD extra but fails to add anything to the main story. Other major problems lie within the quality of the English dub, when the Japanese voice actors speak it feels as if there heart is currently beating at the same incredible pace of the character they are delivering lines for. The English voice actors, no matter what the situation sound like they’ve flat-lined, add to this a number of shaky/dodgy accents and the English dub suddenly doesn’t become an option, a shame considering a high quality dub would have opened this title up to even more people.

Fantastic Children deservers to be ranked highly up there with Ghost in the Shell and Fullmetal Alchemist amongst others. One of the highlights of the year.

-- Joseph (Joe) Wood 10th May 08

Fantastic Children Images