Claymore Anime, first impressions
I have been reading Claymore (クレイモア, Kureimoa) since the very beginning. I found that beautiful looking manga on the shelf of my trusted newsagent and I immediately believed that I would have liked it. It resembled much of Berserk (ベルセルク, Beruseruku) at first, having both a similar story and style, still insecure and disproportionate, but that it revealed a great potential. Sure Norihiro Yagi (八木 教広, Yagi Norihiro) is still way below Kentarou Miura (三浦 建太郎, Miura Kentarō)'s style, but I can recall the incredible evolution that took place throughout his creations.
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It happens to every mangakas, so even Miura with time passing by had an evolution of his drawing-style, however like it happens to every "great" mangakas, there's a point where readers want this evolution to freeze, to not evolve anymore, but it hardly ever happens, given that these great mangakas, even knowing that they might relax on their successful style achieved, still want to make progress, and the outstanding Miura didn't escape from this rule. Giving an example, Caska, a random character...^^, we'll now examine the author's style evolution in details, dwelling with more attention upon 2 types of styles, that's pre-eclipse and post-eclipse. |
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[thanks to Berserkchronicles for this last part!]
And almost the same happened with Claymore. At the beginning it was almost unknown, so I decided I would make it a bit more visible by contributing in its Wikipedia entry, until I recently discovered that MADHOUSE had prepared an shot-for-shot adaptation animated series. I watched until episode 9 and I have to say it was pretty well made. The fighting scenes and animation excel if compared to the manga, whereas the sentimental ones seemed more powerful on black and white paper, although I have to admit a few tears graced my cheeks more than once.
The story is old but solid, consistent and well portrayed. What makes us monsters or humans? Is it our blood or the result of our actions? Through the eyes of half-monster lonely girls and innocent abused children Norihiro Yagi unveils in front of our eyes the dark side of humanity, the pointless sense of fear for strangers, those who are different and the inner fight in each one of us, who can become a monster. There are no bad people or good people in absolute terms, and that is the true nature of the World, like Japan always taught us.
If you'd like to try and watch it eclipse anime made an excellent work of encoding, you can find all the episodes in h264 (torrent).

From Volume 6 to Volume 14
From Volume 15 to Volume 21
From Volume 22 to Volume 29






















Comments
Claymore has a much better
Claymore has a much better graphic compared to Berserk and it also is overall much better.
As far as the anime goes I
As far as the anime goes I could somehow agree with you (maybe ^_^), but the manga of Berserk is far more superior. The character development is more intricate, the drawings develop an a unique way and it touches many more topics.
Also, you can read it at many different levels, the symbolism is complex and well researched. Overall, it's a life experience, it's been going for some 15 years and it will keep on going. It takes 18 months to make a Berserk collection, the level of details is maniacal and the story breath taking.
Claymore is a nice quick read and it lasts a few months. ^_^
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