Saint Seiya

- edited 01-16-2021 - Story Saint Seiya is a shounen anime that features several elements of mythology (mostly Greek mythology) where the characters represent and are too protected by one of the 88 constellations. The main characters, the Bronze Saints (or "Knights" in the Western version), are the ones responsible to protect the goddess Athena and the humanity against the 'evil' Greek gods. The fighting is generally interesting to watch, since (almost) every character has an unique gimmick or superpower. On the other hand, due to 'low budget' issues and a more old school approach (it's 80's, fellas), the character won't move much while fighting ...so this may not seem fit for a younger audience, used to a more fast paced animation. Meanwhile, the plot itself is quite simple for the most part, and goes in a very monodimensional way, but not tedious, since all the gimmicks keep you coming for more. The biggest mistake through the start of this series is the fillers. The fillers not only alters some events from the original manga, but also creates some new characters that appear and disappear for the sake of the convenience of the plot and, after all, for the sake of the expensive licensed toys (figures, if you like it better). Although Saint Seiya was not meant to be a cheap excuse for Bandai earn some good money on licensed toys, the beautiful and very well done adaptation of the ugly and lifeless armors from the manga into the shining armor designs of the anime (courtesy of master Shingo Araki) would inevitable create a paramount market for high quality toys for boys and grown men alike. Yes, I said the fillers messed up a lot of the series in the beggining, and some filler characters were obviously created for the solo porpouse of selling new figures. But the anime production seemed to have learned from their own mistakes and later on, they developed an entire filler arc that not only gave Bandai some nice looking figures for selling but also created some good content and good filler characters that match the ones from the original source material, in the Asgard arc. Talking about the arcs, if you ask a Saint Seiya fan, probably one will point the Twelve Zodiac Temples arc as the highlight memory of the anime. The 'enemy of the week' formula applied here alongside with the (let's call) 'tower of combat' (like in the infamous 'Game of Death' of the late Bruce Lee) were a very clever concept put on by Masami Kurumada on his manga, and that was for sure perfected in the anime series. Nevertheless, Kurumada has became so found of this formula that he shameless repeats it on later arcs, until there was nothing much left for the anime to going on. As some of you may know, this 'Saint Seiya' anime is an incomplete adaptation, ending in the Poseidon arc, and having its sequel in Hades Chapter OVAs decades later - mostly for the avid Western (Latin) audience. Animation and sound Saint Seiya's overall OST is very, very good. From the chatchy 80's heavy metal-ish opening theme 'Pegasus Fantasy' by the now legendary Nubou Yamada to the sad instrumentals of the likes of 'Hyouga visits his mother's grave on the deep of the ocean', SS is remarkable for its music. The quality of the animation, though, decreases a lot in some episodes and its more static and low budget than Dragon Ball, for example. On the other hand, the beatiful character design by Shingo Araki makes Saint Seiya a bliss to the eyes, with all those cool and colourful armors. Characters Though some people may criticize their lack of free will in them following Athena, I think the main characters of Saint Seiya stand out in their own merits and distinct traits. Each one of them helped to create the stereotypes of the 'boy band' shounen team that would later influence the very conception of Gundam Wing's main cast. The impulsive protagonist (Seiya), the prime rival with a cool mind (Shiryu), the 'ice guy' with a hidden melting heart (Hyouga), the sensitive anti-violence femboy (Shun) and the badass avenger (Ikki), they all seem fit and are nicely portraited through the series. But other characters I must highlight here are the Gold Saints. Each Gold Saint represents one of the signs of the Zodiac, sometimes even in powers and personalities, which adds some very cool gimmicks for most of them. Special compliments for Aries, Gemini, Leo, Virgo, Aquarius, Capricorn (won't say much to not spoil anything). Veredict I am suspicious for praising Saint Seiya qualities, since it was my first anime, so it was very important to my childhood, and as Saint-Exupery once said, 'childhood is like my country'. Still, I can highly recommend Saint Seiya to those into old-school anime, since it may be dated to younger viewers (probably if you are a Naruto ou Boku no Hero fan, Saint Seiya will not be your thing). If you have time and want to further understand the story, I also recommend to read the manga. The art is worse for sure, but the plot works in a better (and even more consistent) way.

Let me start by saying that this was the very first anime I watched complete. Truth is I was really young when I watched it the first time, but just recently when new OVAs came out I watch it once again. Basically the story follows a group of 5 "Zodiac warriors" of Athena in their mission to save the world from the "evil" gods who want to destroy it. The anime heavily relies on Greek mythology, so the story follows a path trough Olympian’s gods. The story is really absorbing and exciting, the fact that the 12 zodiac signs appears as a main part ofthe story sets the mood for a more personal and deeper involvement in the story (who doesn't want to watch he's own Zodiac sign win??). Whilst the animation is not up to what we are used nowadays, it’s quite decent for its time. The sound is decent but just that. And the characters are well built. But what makes Saint Seiya stand alone, is, its art. Every warrior is based upon a constellation, and every warrior has his unique armor. Somewhat around 100 armors are displayed trough the anime. So I really recommend this anime if you are interested in watching a cult anime, with really cool art, average animation, and a no so deep story arc.

This series is a hard one for me to rate at all. It is one of my all-time favourites, has amazing nostalgic values + I like to think of it as the father of all Shounen Fighting Anime. This is because it started a lot of storylines that have now become cliches Naruto, Bleach and many more use quite often. These include giving the opponent a backbone by giving him a backstory. Tournament arcs are touched on. The attacks of those shows are also very reflective of Saint Seiya and two other animes from its decade (DBZ and Fist of the North Star.) Even YakitateJapan uses ideas born in Saint Seiya, but obviously in a more satirical way... The animation for this series is obviously going to seem dated because of the poor frame rate and some jerkiness in its presentation. However new masters have been made available recently and I had a chance to get a look at them. Overall, it has stood the test of time fairly well. The only things that might be a problem for some viewers are the (as mentioned above) poor frame rate, repeated footage but also the fact that some episodes have inconsistent artwork. Overall, these series has beautiful character designs for both the boys and the girls AND some beautiful backgrounds to match. It's just that some episodes reflect those better than others. Of course, at the time the series was made and with the demand for more episodes, its fidelity to the art is amazing. It does not make the characters look cheap so that they stay on budget. This already makes it better (animation wise) than later shows like Ranma or Naruto where the quality just drops as the series progresses. In the second and third series of Saint Seiya (criminally not given their own sections by most sites) the animation quality raises a bar. The artwork looks a lot cleaner and sharper. The saints are given better armors (or cloths) to fight in. The backgrounds are even more detailed (the Asgard series just looks breathtaking). The sound of Saint Seiya is made up of JRock intros, JPop outro and symphonic compositions within the episodes (with vocals on some tracks). Overall, this gives the series a magnificently epic feel as all types of music are produced incredibly well to suit the mood/s of the show. Soldier Dream is the stand out vocal track for me. The stand out composition in a sea of greatness is Athena's Theme. The only reason I did not give sound a 10 is because these symphonies are reused a few times and as lovely as they are to hear, I just kept wishing for more of them. This does not mean the series is a one trick poney as it does have about 13 soundtracks at last count. The story is what will get you into this series as first. As the synopsis describes it is about a war for humankind (yeah I know, a cliche in today's anime climate but not so much at the time it was made). The interesting thing about this though is that it uses mythological aspects to move the story along. A lot of mythologies are explored, with the obvious ones being Greek, Norse and Bhuddist. The saints themselves wear armors that are derivative of mythologies but in an astrological sense. Like Seiya having the Pegasus armor, Shun having the Andromeda armor or Algol having the Medusa armor. The best thing about the story is how it manages to keep a lot of mysteries to itself in the first series (the Sanctuary Arc) as you do not know if the protagonists are actually right until about episode 50. Preceeding episode 50 are wonderful episodes that develop the characters so well that its climax just moves you to tears. The second and third series have different stories that are persued but despite the length (25 and 15 eps respectively) they still maintain the epic atmosphere and have some of the most touching characters in all of anime. The characters in the Asgard series are probably the best antagonists (as a group) that anime has to offer. They are marvellously well developed so that you feel their triumphs and failures like they were transcending you. Mime, Fenrir, Thor and, Syb and Bud are the best of that cast and their respective stories have the potential to move you to tears (Think Now and Then Here and There). The best part of it is how they actually affect our leading team of five (Seiya, Shun, Shiryu, Hoyga and Ikki) which makes them connect with us even more. The main five are also very successful characters. Of them my favourite is Shiryu because of his values and willingness to sacrifice himself. Shun and Hyoga are close seconds as they have interesting backstories and a powerful bond. Ikki has a very interesting personality that is developed very successfully as the series goes. Seiya, although the main, is my least favourite of the five as he is a little childish and annoying (yet, still well developed). I have grown to like him a lot more with the newer releases of the series though. The great thing about this series is that you are sure to connect with at least one of the characters as there are quite a few of them and, even ones that don't feature for very long have enough of a story that you don't feel they are a waste of time. The sanctuary arc has Aphrodite, Camus, Shura, Saga, Shaka, Shaina, Cassios, Aiolia and Aldebaran as stand outs for various reasons I do not want to spoil. The poseidon arc has Krishna, Scylla, Lymnades, Canon and Poseidon himself to keep you interested. All these characters are so well done that some of their characteristics have become cliches. So you should watch Saint Seiya to see where it all starts. I own this whole series and it a definitely a must see. If you're unsure as to whether you will like it, ADV Films is releasing an affordable thinpak with the first 30 episodes for you to decide whether it is your cup of tea. Also try www.rightstuf.com for good deals on the singles. I think they are something like $5 at the moment for 5 episodes a disc, which is amazing value. I thoroughly enjoy this show everytime I rewatch it as a whole or in parts so I think all of you shounen fans will find something to like too. The chracter design also allows for a few bishounens so the girls are thought of as well.

As someone who had an interest in Greek Mythology since childhood, Saint Seiya was a series that naturally appealed to me. Coupled with it's other aesthetic elements such as the intricate, inventive and cool Cloth designs, the great level of detail and style in it's art to make the male characters noble and the females beautiful or having one of the best opening songs in anime and a great soundtrack in general, the series seems top tier from a stylistic point of view, but what about substance? When it comes to plot and characters, the series can be described as simple but fairly well executed. Allof the major characters have pretty transparent motivations without too much subtlety, yet their personalities of it's major players are all very memorable and fairly consistent. As for the plot, this is something that is pretty simple and unfortunately can suffer from a few poor Shonen tropes such as power of friendship, resolve power ups and general plot armour. However, this series manages to execute these poor plot devices far better than any modern Shonen. The nature of burning one's Cosmo excuses the power ups that can occur and many characters being plot armoured by Athena's intervention is actually fitting in it's ties to Greek Mythology, in which many heroes such as Heracles and Odysseus couldn't get through some impossible tasks without help from the Gods. ===Story Analysis - Part 1: Sanctuary Arc=== Moving on to talk about a few of the individual arcs, the first is the Sanctuary Arc. This arc had a pretty decent opening act with a tournament that had some actual stakes in the risk of the combatants dying and could have been one of the best tournaments in Shonen had it continued to the end, though it's understandable to abandon it when tournaments were a saturated plot line even during the mid 80s. While the later events with the Black Saints, filler villains such as Docrates and then the Silver Saints could feel quite repetitive in their structure, they did have quite a few highlights for the main cast to help emphasise their differences such as Shiryu's tendency of self-sacrifice and Ikki's merciless nature. Things start to truly rise in quality when the events of the 12 Zodiac Palaces occur, which is the most popular part of the series and indeed it's peak. The tension was great as the race against time with a clear limit to reach, with the Gold Saints all having clearly distinct personalities and most of them being interesting characters. Gemini Saga is a particular highlight, with the conflict of his personalities being at constant odds with each other and being the best execution of a split-personality character in Shonen (better than the highly overrated Sensui from YYH). The arc can seem somewhat disappointing in the lack of major deaths in the main cast despite the severity of their injuries, though this is somewhat excusable when one major theme of the arc was the Bronze Saints proving themselves as worthy successors to the Gold Saints. Overall, it was a fairly solid action/adventure that I'd rate a 6.5/10. ===Part 2: Asgard Arc=== This anime exclusive arc is far more than just a filler arc; it's the best filler arc in anime as it actually bothers to make it's anime exclusive characters, the God Warriors, very memorable both in design and personality to the point their characters are even better written than most of the far more iconic Gold Saints for the most part. It was also very well done in how this arc transitions back into manga canon territory and ushers in the next arc in a far more exciting way than the original manga. However, the arc wasn't as good as Sanctuary. For one, Hilda wasn't an interesting villain due to her actions being purely due to mind control. The sense of tension was nowhere near as great as the previous arc either. The amount of time the Bronze Saints had to accomplish their task within was nowhere near as well shown as in Sanctuary and aside from Siegfried, the God Warriors had power nowhere near as great or consistent a strength or grouping as the Gold Saints, with their 2nd strongest member still being only equal to Taurus Aldebaran. The general structure is also a copy-paste of Sanctuary as most of the series was from then on, showing how the series lost a lot of steam after it's first 73 episodes and went with rehashing it's most popular plot line in new ways. Despite that, it was still a decent arc and a masterpiece by filler standards. 6/10. ===Part 3: Poseidon Arc=== The final arc of the original anime was the Poseidon Arc, which was a definite step down from the previous two. It did at least try to be less formulaic by not having it's standard opponents be in such a linear road, but that means little when the execution is still repetitive and, unlike with the two previous arcs main group of villains, the Marina Generals are for the most part a major disappointment. Kanon was good due to his role as a manipulator and Isaac was decent due to his ties to Hyoga (though mainly only to serve as character development for Hyoga), yet the rest were completely bland beyond a gimmick or two. It doesn't help that power-wise, only Kanon, Krishna, Isaac and maybe Sorrento felt that impressive, with the rest getting steamrolled pretty quickly once the Bronze Saints got serious. It was good that the battles required more than just beating the opponent, but it didn't really matter after the first battle since the destruction of the Sea Pillars was no longer a big deal with the Libra Cloth. Having a god as the main antagonist did increase the scale and Poseidon's desire to reshape the world wasn't too hyperbolic from his perspective, though he felt very underwhelming for such a powerful god when he was overpowered twice by the combined power of the main cast (the second time in which he'd gone through a gigantic power up of his own) and coming close to his full power didn't change much overall. It also doesn't help that the sense of tension, like the previous arc's, is nowhere near as great as Sanctuary due to having no solid grasp of how much time Athena had left. If anything, it was worse due to not even being told a solid time limit or constantly shown her physical condition prior to the end of the battle, which in both anime and manga lacked any sort of build up for the next arc (though this is expected with the anime concluding on this arc until adapting the Hades Arc over a decade later). 4/10. Going back to the aesthetic qualities and expanding on them, it's truly where the series stands out as rule of cool. Along with the creativity within the armour of each character, the change of Kurumada's art style to this equally as iconic style of Shingo Araki's lead to it's art possibly being the best of Toei's TV Anime. The soundtrack has an excellent range from triumphant or emotional orchestras to cool rock in order to really fit the tone of each scene. Voice acting is also great with some very well revered seiyuu establishing their performances as iconic with the characters such as Toru Furuya's performance as Seiya, Hirotaka Suzuoka as Shiryu or Hideyuki Tanaka as both Aiolia and the narrator. Overall, Saint Seiya is a fairly enjoyable series, even if fairly flawed. It's far from the peak of Shonen as even during it's era, there were quite a few Shonen of overall better quality such as Hokuto no Ken or the original series of Dragon Ball. However, what tropes of Shonen it established and utilised, it at least performed them better than most, if not all, Shonen to copy it's formula thereafter such as Yu Yu Hakusho and Bleach. Along with having some pretty likeable and unique characters, it deserves a place amongst the good Shonen titles. Overall ranking - 6/10

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