Continuing from where I left off yesterday from CLAMP Chronicle I, let’s go into 2 more of CLAMP’s original work turned anime in this article.

Recap –

1. Magic Knight Rayearth (Released 1994)
2. CLAMP School Detectives (Released 1995)

Cardcaptor Sakura (Released 1998)

This is one of the earliest anime I got attached to almost a decade ago, and it still remains one of my all-time favourite alongside Ranma 1/2. Possibly CLAMP’s most successful work, it’s still pretty popular even now. This evidence can be seen in one of CLAMP’s latest work, Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE and xxxHolic.

Kinomoto Sakura is the chosen heir of the magical Clow Cards, created by the most powerful sorcerer of all times, Clow Reed. Clow Reed had an interesting background. His mother was a magician specialized in magic found in the Eastern world while his father was a sorcerer who specialized in Western magic. Clow Reed combined these two magic together, creating a new hybrid only he could use with the power of the Moon.

When Clow died 500 years before the series began, he had already predicted Sakura as his successor and made all necessary arrangements to help Sakura in her task of collecting the Clow Cards.

Of course, not even Clow Reed is perfect and there were some things beyond his calculation. One of such is Li Syaoran, a descendant of Clow on his mother’s side of the family tree.

Sakura, Kero-chan (who is really Kerberos, the Beast of the Seal), Syaoran and Mei Ling (an anime only character) hunts down the scattered Clow Cards, more often than not helping each other out, despite the fact that Syaoran initially viewed Sakura as a rival in becoming the new master of the cards. And Sakura’s best friend, Tomoyo, always makes sure Sakura have something different to wear each episode as they leave in search of Clow Cards.

The Judge, Yue, who is the other guardian of the Clow Cards besides Kerberos only made an appearance after all the cards that were scattered had been gathered once more. His role, as his title suggests, is to test and pass judgment on those who wish to become the new master of the cards. Unlike Kerberos, Yue is rather anti-social and serious.

A total of 70 episodes with 2 movies, and the 2nd movie is set after the series and serves as the true ending for Cardcaptor Sakura, finishing what episode 70 left hanging. While some parts differs from the manga, I still enjoyed every episode and have found no complaints on how the story went in the anime 😀

Great theme songs and music as well, especially the 3rd opening, Platinum.

Grab Cardcaptor Sakura

Angelic Layer (Released 2001)

Suzuhara Misaki recently moved to live with her aunt in the city, where she discovered Angelic Layer, the hottest game in the market. Angelic Layer involves controlling a doll, called an Angel, through the power of thought. Players, called Deus, use a special helmet which can project their thoughts to move Angels on the playing field, called a Layer (hence, Angelic Layer).

Misaki first witnessed the battle of the reigning Angelic Layer champion with her doll, Athena and instantly felt attracted to play the game. A mysterious… or rather, suspicious looking man in a lab coat approached her and began teaching her about Angelic Layer. Later on it was revealed that the man is really Mihara “Icchan” Ichiro, the genius behind the game and an acquaintance of Misaki’s mother, also known as the champion of Angelic Layer.

I actually prefer how the story went in the anime more than the manga for most parts, except for the ending and coupling. The ones in the manga were much better if you asked me 😀

Other than the above, the rest of the storyline were just great. The were more battles which were in greater details than in the manga, making it much more interesting.

The battles on the layers between the different dolls being brought to life is nicely executed. Those who thinks that this anime is too feminine (with dolls and all) will think twice once they’ve seen the actions during a fight between two Angels. It usually gets pretty intense 😀

Grab Angelic Layer

Coming Next…

An unfinished series (for the manga) which I never got around to watching, and one of CLAMP’s funniest work, which is also related to one of the series in this article…

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Note: A list of links for the entire CLAMP Chronicle series can be found at the end of this post.

CLAMP is one of my favourite mangaka group and I always try not to miss any of their work whether manga or anime. CLAMP have at least 15 different manga titles created by them and have done illustration for various novels and manga as well. Among all these, some were turned into OAVs or movies and a few more was made into anime series.

I’ll be highlighting CLAMP’s original works which were turned into anime series in this 4-part article. Only anime series based off CLAMP’s original works will be featured. I won’t go into those that were made into OAVs or movies unless they have a full series along with it.

These are arranged chronologically from the time they began to air, from the oldest to the latest.

Magic Knight Rayearth (Released 1994)

Magic Knight Rayearth is about 3 girls, Hikaru, Umi and Fuu, from different schools and backgrounds who just happened to be at the right place and the right time together. While the 3 schools were on a field trip to Tokyo Tower, a mysterious force transported the 3 girls into a different world.

They later discovered that they were chosen as the legendary Magic Knights of Cephiro, the world which they were summoned to. In order to bring peace back to the land, and to rescue the Princess Emeraude, the Magic Knights had to first seek out the ancient Rune Gods; Rayearth, Celese and Windam.

What’s interesting about these Rune Gods is that they are actually living mechas which can be piloted by the Magic Knights. Because they are living, magical mechas, they are able to offer advice and use magic.

The real fun actually begins after the Emeraude/Zagato arc, during the invasion of Cephiro in season 2. The Chizeta Princess’ Djinns and Lady Aska’s giant Sang Yun were just to fun to watch in battle. (Beware of the Djinn laugh, I know a few people who became addicted to it… scary… You hath been warned… lol)

Overall, the anime was quite nicely done, except for the ending, which I preferred for the one in the manga. The anime chose not to show the truth behind Cephiro’s pillar system and the true identity of the fluffy and lovable Mokona.

Grab Magic Knight Rayearth

Clamp School Detectives (Released 1995)

The CLAMP School is featured in many other of CLAMP’s works, and the CLAMP School Detectives (a.k.a Clamp Gakuen Tanteidan) is founded by the youngest son of Imonoyama Zaibatsu, founder of Clamp School.

Elementary School Board President, Imonoyama Nokuru, along with fellow Elementary School Board Secretary, Suoh Takamura and Treasurer, Akira Ijyuin, formed the CLAMP School Detective after aiding an elder lady in distress.

The bunch of elementary school geniuses goes around the campus and out, seeking to help out any and all ladies who are in need of help. There are also some cameo appearances by the CLAMP School Defenders, the Duklyon team. The 20 Masks later on also spawned a spinof prequel to the series but was never animated.

While it’s kind of disturbing to see elementary school students getting together with kindergarten students in a relationship, the series is rather fun and interesting to watch. There really isn’t a grand plot involved, but there are some arcs that span across several episodes, which aren’t bad at all.

My favourite arc would probably be the 20 Masks thief arc, although his get-up reminds me of Tuxedo Mask… Ugh… I don’t want to remember him.

Grab CLAMP School Detectives

Coming up next…

A couple of CLAMP’s top works and one of them happened to be one of my all-time favourite…

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Anime have great soundtracks, as I’ve mentioned before here. More than half of my music collection are anime soundtracks, with the rest a mixture of game OST, English songs, Chinese songs, etc.

Most anime soundtracks are pretty good, but there are a few which are outstanding for me. These are the songs that I can play over and over again, day after day, month after month and even year after year. I can listen to them almost anytime and anywhere without that nagging “ughh… not this song again…” feeling.

Tsubasa Chronicle

There are 4 volumes of Tsubasa Chronicle OST to date and they are all composed by Yuki Kajiura. I was first exposed to his style in .hack//SIGN and could instantly recognize his style through the first piece played during the starting of Tsubasa Chronicle’s first episode. He did an excellent job of composing the rest of the series soundtracks and they are currently my favourite. “A Song of Storm and Fire” and its few different versions are tops.

Gundam Seed & Gundam Seed Destiny

I didn’t know at first, but Yuki Kajiura was involved in composing the soundtrack for both Gundam Seed series, including the songs by T.M. Revolution. The soundtracks were great and most of the songs were awesome too. My favourite tracks here would be “Invoke”, “Ignited”, “Meteor”, “Vestige” and “Kimi wa Boku ni Niteiru”. Yes, I realize most of them are by T.M. Revolution 😀

.hack

As I’ve mentioned before, Yuki Kajiura had his hands on the .hack//SIGN series, and the OST was great. The other 2 anime series, .hack//DUSK and .hack//Roots were not done by him, but I liked them both as well, although I did find the soundtrack for DUSK to be annoying after a while…

Black Cat

Really a lot of great soundtracks here, especially liked the opening song and “Kuroki Neko”.

Eureka 7

I didn’t really liked the entire soundtrack for Eureka 7, but I loved the opening songs and a few other soundtracks from the anime. Shounen Heart definitely my favourite here.

Ranma 1/2

One of my all-time favourite anime and plenty of great songs and humorous tracks, featuring characters from the anime singing along to their own songs. I just love the DoCo (Female Ranma, Akane, Shampoo, Nabiki and Kasumi) group and their songs. All the other whacky songs never failed to put a smile on my face either 😀

Cardcaptor Sakura

Another one of my all-time favourite anime, this is the real reason why I liked CLAMP in the first place. The soundtracks are mostly fun to listen to and I can never get sick of the 3rd opening, Platinum.

If you’re interested in grabbing yourself a copy of any of the OST above, you can do so from Play-Asia.com. Their prices are good and have low worldwide shipping rates. 😀

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A new poll have been added to the sidebar, you should be able to see it at the right area of the blog the moment the page loads. To start off the first poll, I would like to know which anime are you most anticipating and looking forward to watch right now.

There are 4 choices in the poll, which are-

• Suzumiya Haruhi 2nd season
• Shakugan no Shana 2nd season
• Gundam 00
• Clannad

If you would like to see  a different anime title to be included in the poll, just drop a comment 😀

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I have a feeling next week’s list will be much longer 😀

This week we have –

Naruto Shippuuden Episode 20

History’s Strongest Disciple, Kenichi Episode 37 – 39

There are possible (minor) spoilers if you haven�t watched it yourself already so read at your own risk!

Naruto Shippuuden

Episode 20: Hiruko vs the Two Female Ninja

Rating: 5/10

This episode was pretty boring. Nothing worth mentioning. Sakura and Chiyo-baa dancing to Sasori’s rhythm. Nuff’ said.

History’s Strongest Disciple, Kenichi

Episode 37: Dangerous Temptation! Let’s eat the hot pot together!

Rating: 6/10

Kenichi finally decided to deal a pre-emptive strike on Ragnarok by directly challenging Thor, the 7th Fist. A decent episode, but it was unreal to see Kenichi throwing the giant out of the ring. Then again, this is Kenichi we’re talking about, so anything is possible. While Kenichi might think otherwise, I’m with the others in thinking that Thor is a bit nuts with his combat sumo ideals. I wouldn’t want to end up looking like him, that’s for sure!

Episode 38: Lovely Kitten, Women’s Struggle!

Rating: 8/10

Very interesting episode with Kisara showing her other side and began to get close with Kenichi and Miu after saving a stray cat from being run over by a pair of gangsters on a bike. Kisara’s expression when she realized she had been discovered by Kenichi and Miu was just priceless. It also soon became obvious that Ragnarok will have one member less when the Freya, the 3rd Fist, sent her own troops of Valkyries to “take care” of Kisara under the suspect of betraying Ragnarok.

Episode 39: Shigure’s Personal Teachings…

Rating: 8/10

The first half of this episode felt slow, but that’s probably because I couldn’t wait to see Shigure appear and take on the girls from Freya. Freya made an appearance herself, but only for a minute or two before disappearing into thin air. During that time there were also a bit more into Kisara’s background, how she was part of Freya’s Valkyries and decided to leave and run her own group because she could not agree with using weapons to become stronger than men.

That’s nice and all, but the fun part began when Shigure finally shows up. Using only a rice spoon, she did this…

And oh, it was nice to finally know Shigure’s philosophy on weapon usage.

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