K First Impressions--50 Shades of Blue

Blue is my favorite color, so BRING ON THE BLUE FILTER YEAH!

  
My only expectation for this from the PVs that I saw was that the animation would be gorgeous, and I wasn't disappointed. Everything else? No idea. Well, a little bit of an idea. There are these factions that apparently don't like each other, one that has uniforms and carries around swords and another that looks like one of the color gangs from Durarara!! and who like to blow things up (Enter a room, explosion. Exit a room, explosion). Durarara!! is also the closest example I can think of to describe the feel of this show; there are some supernatural elements with giant swords hanging in the sky, some gang intrique, and a little bit of school life. There's a pretty wide cast of characters too, including one that looks like the clone of Shizuo Heiwajima. The similarities begin and end there though; a lot in this premiere episode is left for us to ponder, and there isn't a voiceover narrative.

 
However, aside from what I mentioned above, there wasn't a lot of anything going on in this episode except pretty characters in a pretty setting with pretty effects and blue filter. But like I said above, I only came into this episode with the expectation that I was getting eye candy, so I'm fine with this. The plot will have time to make itself clear. And to be honest, I think that GoHands' idea is to stun us with looks first and plot later, since there were a lot of interesting and beautifully rendered shots that you just don't see very often. If the rumors are true and this show is GoHands' attempt to make a name for themselves in terms of animation, then they're already doing a good job. The fish-eye lens for the skateboarding shots was a personal favorite by how it looked realistic (in the sense that this shot has been in every skateboarding movie/commercial/game ever and it's replicated very nicely) without making the CGI too obvious. I do wonder where they're getting the budget for all this, though.


Overall, as long as this doesn't pull a Guilty Crown and end up with all style but a hilariously bad story, I'm fine with this. Eye candy and blue filter never hurt anybody. Unless blue happens to be your least favorite color, in which case you should probably skip this.

Images from Hulu.com.