YEEESSSSSS I’ve wanted to do this review for a long time!!!! Yes, I’m reviewing another shonen series. I’ll do something shojo-ish soon, I promise. :)
Anyway, Eureka Seven’s story goes like this: Renton Thurston is a bored 14-year-old who loves lifting – basically surfing on thin air – and will do anything to get away from his boring hometown. One day, he gets the chance to join his heroes, Gekkostate, when a young girl, Eureka, and her robot crash through his roof! By providing the final piece of the girl’s robot, Renton unlocks its full potential, and gets to help Gekkostate… with their laundry and paperwork.
Eureka Seven is a fun, fairly lighthearted series through the first volume; then things pick up in volume 2, and the plot’s twists and turns completely hook you. After all the standard character introductions, there’s drama that rivals most shojo manga. Example: learning of Gekkostate’s military background makes Renton begin to doubt everything he ever thought about his rebellious heroes, and he takes it out on Eureka. As the tension builds, things begin to look like they might amount to something bigger.
The characters’ personality traits add to the chaos. Eureka is relatively emotionless, but her feelings for Renton begin to confuse her as time goes by. Holland, the leader of Gekkostate, is short-tempered and serious, and totally revenge-oriented at times. Dominic, who works for the military, is a coward who decides to abandon his charge, Anemone, rather than disobey orders.
As for weak points, the only thing that comes to mind is the whole clichedness of Renton getting to join his heroes. But the cliche gets twisted by how Renton has to work his butt off doing trivial chores, so I’ll give it credit for that.
Despite that the Eureka Seven manga follows a different plotline than the anime, it’s certainly as good as it. So far, it’s a good series for fans of shonen sprinkled with romance.
CJ’s rating: 8.5 out of 10 California rolls.
Possibly objectionable content: A parody panty shot (among other things,) violence, intense scenes and some mild cursing. Bandai gave this a 13+ rating, and I agree with that.
CJ
Crisu
Rakuen
Dave
ladytemeraire
The Eureka 7 anime series is definite eye candy but some how it gets confusing at first, with the viewer being thrown into this semi-abstract world with little explanation for things at first. However the plot turns in a very interesting directions and the themes covered in the show are particularly interesting. Most likely I think I’ll give the books a try.