Customer Reviews

Air TV: The Complete Series S.A.V.E.

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This was a series that truly made me feel at peace with myself and the world around me. All the characters are so innocent. This is definitely in my top ten anime series and maybe in my top five. This series is rated TV 14 but I am not sure why. I would rate it TV PG. Anyways on to the storyline.

The story starts with a boy that travels from town to town named Yukito. He finally arrives at his next destination only to run into the most unusual girl in town named Misuzu. Misuzu ends up inviting Yukito to stay with her and her mom. He does and during his stay with them Yukito encounters many women with problems. He tries his best to help everyone he can in the town and the town grows on him. Mean while he still searches for the person his mom told him about called the lady in the sky (A woman with wings). Yukito believes that woman is in that town. Yukito ends up making many friends and discovering a more beautiful part of life.

The ending to this series made a tear run down my cheek and believe me it is not easy to make me tear up. You will experience many feelings when watching this anime and will be able to relate to almost all the characters without difficulty. I would recommend this anime to any anime lover and to someone that is looking for a story that will make their hearts hurt with sadness. If you liked Rumbling Hearts or Suzuka then I have no doubt that you will treasure this series.
-J

I just couldn't really get behind this one. I feel like it's so close to being a great anime, but it just missed the mark by like 1/10th of an inch. It had all the elements of a great story --a lone hero; a damsel in distress; and ancient curse; and magical winged beings of incredible power. The only problem with it was that they put in a lot of stuff that just wasn't pertinent to the main story. It felt like episodes 2-5 were mostly filler material in order to make Yukito into a heroic figure, but they didn't really have to do that. The reason I stick to that is that after the two girls stories were finished, they didn't appear anywhere else in the rest of the show, really. That makes them filler that wasn't necessary.

There were some plot points that also bugged me, but I don't want to give away too much. You'll see it if you look. All I can say is that over a thousand years of storing magic in the doll, the best that they could come up with was that? Also, they really didn't make the details of Lady Kana's life fold into the story in any kind of coherent fashion. It seems to me, that if you've been searching for the girl in the sky for over a thousand years, you would have been able to pass on more than just a doll and vague stories. It didn't really make sense to me.

Aside from that, there were some real touching moments. I was disheartened by the character's fates, and it showed some really sad moments. If you like to shed a tear, I've no doubt that you will watching this. It's sad in a lot of ways. The animation is great and the English voice cast was excellent. I would recommend this to a friend, but I personally just didn't like the way it seemed thrown together.

I didn't know much about this Anime and only bought it because it looked somewhat interesting. What a great surprise! Don't let the cover fool you. It is a quiet anime but without making you want to go to sleep. It has a fantasy side to it but in a realistic way (if that makes any sense to you). It's very emotional..so prepare yourself for that. I recommend having some kleenex around while watching this series.

It's impossible to miss the signature style of Key/Visual Arts: Great character devlopment, awesome emotional involvement, stunning visuals, heart-touching, tear-jerking, amazing music, and lovable protagonists.

The characters are relatable, believable, and sympathetic. The characters don't get handed the idiot ball (even though there were plenty of chances for it to occur) and do stupid things that make you want to bang your face against the wall; no, their actions/reactions are realistic. What I'm talking about is that some writers in series make characters behave like total retards just to make a plot point work. And that doesn't happen here. I can't remember any times that there was something incredibly to obvious to me, as the viewer, that they SHOULD have been doing that they were doing the OPPOSITE of.

The animation, as already stated, is beautiful. The scenary creates feelings of pure bliss--especially the sky. It's obvious that they put a TON of effort into the blue sky with its white whispy clouds during the day, the orangey hues of dusk, and the starry skies at night. The sea is also very nice, whenever it's shown. The characters are also very nice to look at. Hair (usually Misuzu's) blowing in the wind is especially well done. The only thing I can complain about is that the male characters' eyes are "normal" sized (read: small) when compared to the girls. If you've seen Kanon, Clannad, or Angel Beats!, you know they like to have all the characters have big eyes. Oddly enough, the guys seemed to have missed the boat here. I don't mind big eyes, but if you're going to do them, it'd be better if you were consistent.

To give you an idea about how clear and crisp it looks: Even though it's a DVD, it looks like a blu-ray (at least when both are viewed on an HDTV). I say this because it looks about as good as my Angel Beats! BD (except for certain special effects-driven scenes that weren't needed in Air), even though its 5 years older. This could be reversed to say that Kyoto Animation's quality has hardly changed in that much time, but really, when you see it for yourself, it's hard to believe it COULD be any better.

The musical score is beautifully appropriate for the themes presented in the series. Most of them come from the game it's based off of, so they may be familiar to you. The intro song, "Tori no Uta," does the perfect job setting the tone in the beginning: pure, fantastic bliss. Insert songs are also light and "airy" (ha ha I'm punny), setting the mood for their respective scenes. If you don't cry to "Aozora" during the climax at the end, you'll probably never cry in your life.

As you can expect with any classic Key/Visual Arts work, your tear ducts will get a work out (for both the happy and the sad). It's heart-warming, and heart-breaking.

The English VAs are great (especially Haruko and Yukito, IMO).

The relationship between Haruko and Misuzu is, I believe, the most relatable, realistic, and touching of them all. If nothing else, seeing Haruko's character develop--along with their relationship--is a good enough reason to give this series a shot in and of itself. In hindsight, she is my favorite character: My heart ached for her and her plight more than anyone else.

I would've liked it better if the side stories of the other characters (Kano, Minagi, and Michiru to a lesser extent) were done better (I LOVED Minagi!). First of all, they were too short. I feel the series could easily have reached the 24 episode mark if they had expounded more upon these side stories, spent more time on the main story arc, and stuffed the content in the OVA into the main series. Second of all, once these two characters' arcs are done, they don't appear in the series anymore except for a brief cameo. Third, it would've been nice to see them tie in somehow with the main story of Michiru. And lastly, the characters (Kano, Minagi, and Michiru) should've had more time to develop on screen before we focus on them.

This is the only thing that hurt the score at all (I rate it 9/10, but since this is Amazon...)

tl;dr: Sad but beautiful and touching. Plot may confuse you at times if you don't pay close attention.

Okay, everyone basically knows that this series is about a traveller named Yukito who is searching for a winged girl so I'm not going to touch on the plot of this anime, as you can read other reviews, or better yet watch Air yourself. I will say that this series will make much more sense to everybody once you become familiar with the visual novel upon which this anime is based. So if Air frustrates you at certain points, try reading about Air's various manfestations :) there were actually nine drama CDs and a movie released in this franchise as well. Please please please do not pass over this series, as it is one of the most beautiful anime's I've EVER seen. Once you look at this series, you'll never go back to 2D cell art :3

I will even venture to say that Key/Visual Arts understands the essence of what anime is and creates it with the utmost perfection.


HUGE SPOILER ALERT***********

Because most people are annoyed with you-know-who turning into a crow, I will briefly say that the crow's name is actually Sora and he's got a much larger role in the visual novel. When yukito begs for a chance to save Misuzu , you are shown what happens through Sora's eyes. For some strange reason Sora and Yukito are 'one' n the anime.

After getting another series Kanon I thought this series would be just as endearing, and while it does have heartache and a somewhat touching storyline at the end the series itself turned out to be rather forgetful. The series characters do touch you somewhat but if you don't pay close attention to the story you will become lost and confused on what's going on with the characters and the plot in general. The one thing that was a real let down for me was the characters themselves, while you do at times feel for what's going on at the end you don't really feel any empathy or connection to their plights. I felt the other major problem was the series was to short if it had been longer it maybe have been better and allowed more time to connect with the characters and the situations going around them. The animation and soundtrack are decent so no worries about that and the voice cast for the English and Japanese actors/actresses were very good too. So is this for fans of drama or tragedy animes worth adding to their collection?, I say check a few episodes online before making the final decision on that...

I do like Air. Just barely.

This could have been a good series if it had kept its 12 episodes focused on Misuzu's arc. Instead, the first five or six episodes deal with a couple of other girls in the seaside town where Air's story takes place. That wouldn't be a problem had these other girls meant something to the story or the two main characters, but ultimately they don't. After episode six, you never see or hear of these girls again, and when the series ends you're left wondering what point they served being there. The other major problem I had was with a certain character turning into a certain animal, with little explanation given. Wha...? But that's something you'll have to see for yourself.

This show has some goods things to it, though. If you love tragic stories, you'll have a higher chance of liking Air, as it's more tragic than Kanon and Clannad. Like Kanon, it has an awesome English dub. The first five or six episodes, while largely meaningless to the overall plot, had some nice comedy moments, and the episodes taking place in feudal era Japan served as a refreshing and cool change of pace. I also liked how the character Haruko developed over the course of the series. The omake episodes, Air In Summer, were nice, but I need to add that it has a creepy scene that really, really wasn't necessary. It involves a girl offering her virginity, and it just feels awkward and "why?" in an otherwise PG show. What else... well, I guess one of the best things about Air is that it's the most unique of the three Kyoto Animation/Key series. Kanon and Clannad have a lot in common; Air, not so much.

The structure of this show feels haphazardly put together, but when you look at each episode individually, there's some good stuff here. I would recommend this show to huge fans of Kanon and Clannad, but only if you're crazy about Kyoto Animation's style. Air isn't as well put together as Kanon or Clannad, so you need to really love Kyoto's brand of animation to enjoy this. Or maybe not. I've seen people online say they prefer Air to Kanon and Clannad. These people tend to be pretty rare, but they are out there. Who knows, you may end up being one of them.

Air is a pretty decent show, though not quite as good as Kanon and Clannad that came afterwards. ADV also gave it a great dub. But it's not worth buying this set. Not only does it cram all the episodes onto two discs, with Funi's usually bad AV quality as a result, but it also strips one of the episodes from the series. It may only be a recap episode, but it's still part of the show.

This is not a complete collection, and not worth buying.

When I watched the first episode of AIR I knew I was in love with this series. I always had wanted to find out the mystery that was placed in this, but it never seemed so big. Then I got to the final episode of 12 And I don't think I could stop crying. Whether your an anime fan or not, you must watch this series for your kids, or your kids lives. Not knowing what I was going in to, I never expected this series to touch my heart and reach out. For anyone who doesn't like this series, then simply they have no heart. As much as It has mystery, comedy, and laughter, AIR is a completely,a tearful series that I have one, made one of my TOP favorite anime's ever.

y-o-u m-u-s-t w-a-t-c-h t-h-i-s!_

(AND ITS CHEAP!)

Its a really great anime great story and great characters even though its only 12 episodes long. There are alot of funny and sad moments. i have recommended this anime to friends and they enjoyed it. If u have seen Clannad, Angel Beats, or Kanon then u will really like this one.