The End of Saint October (no spoilers)

"Saint October" ended in a somewhat odd manner, which is appropriate because
it was a rather odd anime in many ways. The series started out looking like
it would be a mahou-loli parody but it quickly developed a dark and
mysterious undertone. Nothing was quite as it seemed, despite the exterior
appearance of lightness. Even the ending maintained a subtle touch of
melancholy despite having a positive resolution.

All-in-all I enjoyed Saint October a lot and rated it an "A" for its
ambitious juxtaposition of mystery, magic, humor, pathos and even horror
(especially in episode 26). Each episode was well structured, the characters
were compelling, the dialog was crisp, the action was sharply done, the
writing was intelligent and the sound track was surprisingly varied yet
eminently listenable.

It's too bad that Saint October isn't receiving much attention in the
English-speaking part of anime fandom because fans are missing out on
something different, entertaining and challenging. Certainly Chinese fans
took the series to heart and several different Chinese fan sub groups were
doing each episode within a day of release in Japan.

This is a series that I will definitely be looking forward to re-watching
carefully when I receive all the R2 DVDs.

Dave Baranyi


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