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Yuugo
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Animation - 7.5 |
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Sound - 6.5 |
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Story - 6.5 |
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Character - 6.5 |
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Value - 6.5 |
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Enjoyment - 6.4 |
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Average - 6.6 |
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| Average |
7.2 |
| Animation |
8 |
| Sound |
7 |
| Story |
7 |
| Character |
7 |
| Value |
7 |
| Enjoyment |
7 |
| Similar to an animated version of James Bond, with more prisoner torture scenes. Yugo takes a bit of familiarising to really envelope yourself into its world.
This isn’t something for most young teenagers, and would help greatly if you knew a lot about politics, history, religion, medicine etc. Even though I’m not particularly hot on all of the abovementioned subjects, it didn’t hinder my entertainment of Yugo much at all.
The story is divided into 2 negotiations, both very interesting and involves a game of run and chase, Yugo doing the running, and his enemies the chasing. A thriller would best describe this type of anime. I begged for this anime not to have any miracles which would somehow get Yugo out of a sticky situation, in other words, I wanted this to have a clever story rather than one which resolved itself by using a trump card.
I have to say, there were a fair bit of that. Yugo would do things and survive things that no normal human would. But strangely, I wasn’t overly bothered with this, there were enough material to make up for the intellectuality of this anime to cover up those moments.
The sound tracks of Yugo fair, the opening theme was rather tasteless, there wasn’t too much memorable music throughout although when they do decide to use music, they really do use some good ones, the last episode was a good example, which helped to bring tears to my eyes.
Not to everyone’s taste, but it’s certainly different, not something that I’d watch again, but happy to have seen it. The best way to determine whether you’d like it or not would be to ask yourself whether you like thriller-action movies, if you do, then go for Yugo.
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| Average |
7.2 |
| Animation |
7 |
| Sound |
7 |
| Story |
7 |
| Character |
8 |
| Value |
7 |
| Enjoyment |
7 |
| (Based after 1st Negotiation; Eps 1-6)
Unfortunatly due to my limited time I was only able to watch through the first negotiation, I'll update this review after I finish the series.
I've heard some mixed opinions about Yuugo and the number of reviews on it remains small. Still, clarifying it as more of a "rarer" anime enticed me a bit more. After all, when one of these comes along it can be thrust into greatness (like Black Jack, Kino no Tabi), or trampled into the mud (like Darkside Blues). Well, so far the anime has had a pretty standard feel.
The story is all about negotiating out of situations, with the main character the negotiator. Yuugo isn't gonna leap from building to building and decapitate enemies with a battle axe. He earns the trust of the "enemy" and gives them what they want in exchange for what he wants. So much for the "we will not negotiate with terrorists" idea. However the premise allows for the inclusion of a realistic, modern, and intellegent story. As far as I've seen, I've been pleasantly surprised.
I expected each episode to be a negotiation in itself, but smartly they've taken complex negotiations and broken them down into several episodes. The Pakistan episode was very intriquing, especially in the way it was portrayed. Seeing the viewpoints of both the terrorists, the Pakistan military, and the people caught in between, its a satisfactory story about relgion and what it means to be a true "warrior" I suppose.
The characters, though many in a few cases, I felt was the highlight. Yuugo is the most developed, but some notable characters include the mute girl and the main terrorist leader - both were given a fair amount of depth. Although its shown often these days, I never seem to get tired of the "never-give-up, never give-in" attitude that many of the main Shonen anime characters have. Yuugo is no exception, calling on every possible avenue to help him through torture and persevere.
Overall I'll watch the rest of the series when I get around to it, and unless it takes a severe nose-dive in the second half, I'll see the scores staying about the same.
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| Average |
4.5 |
| Animation |
7 |
| Sound |
6 |
| Story |
3 |
| Character |
4 |
| Value |
4 |
| Enjoyment |
3 |
| This anime seemed a lot more like an OVA than a true anime to me. The two sections of the anime, one set in Pakistan and the other in Russia, were both good, but there wasn't much of a plot that connected the two, nor was there much character development in the entire seres. In my opinion, this anime could have gone a lot further, and perhaps that would have filled in some of the holes in the chracter development.
--- Unfortunalty, I don't think that this anime is worth watching. Although, the manga sounds like something I'll be looking to check out.
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Ridian |
(2006-04-23 12:27:34) 2004-07-28 01:38:43 |
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| Average |
5.5 |
| Animation |
8 |
| Sound |
4 |
| Story |
5 |
| Character |
5 |
| Value |
6 |
| Enjoyment |
5 |
| Yugo is boring. Yes, I said it. I enjoyed Serial Experiments Lain and Noir, and I just called Yugo boring. It's a highly plot-driven anime, but the main problem is that it's not interestingly written enough to engage a viewer, whether they're looking for a good plot or not. Panty shots? Mecha? None to be seen. It falls back entirely on its storytelling, which is decidedly unimpressive.
Yugo THINKS it's a plot anime, and in the literal sense of the term it is one. Does this mean that it has a good plot, however? Absolutely not. The stories between the two arcs are more similar than they really should have been. It's basically:
a) Yugo accepts job to rescue someone
b) Yugo goes through some awful condition
c) Yugo discovers something important
d) Yugo is captured
e) Yugo is tortured mercilessly but overcomes it through supar willpower
f) Yugo then weasels out of his capture and gets on the enemy's good side through some cultural butt-kissing
g) Negotiation successful
And that's it. The problem is, though, that the plot often diverges from what it's actually trying to get at. For example, the objective of Negotiation 2 is to rescue the young heiress of a Russian fortune. However, Yugo spends 5 out of those 7 episodes running around and doing completely random crap that the developers threw in. This ends up making the plot completely incongruous from the original intention and incoherent, almost like it's two different half-complete stories cobbled together. And the negotiations are puny. They're not even negotiations so much as Yugo simpering and convincing Big Bad Boss to give up whatever hostage they're keeping. The ending for Arc 2 is awful as well, even though Arc 1's is great. So the plots are uninspired and mostly recycled, and simply not enough to keep the anime afloat.
The characters are almost caricatures of whatever culture or profession they may represent, and poorly developed at that. Who would have expected the territorialist Russian woman to be large and ugly? And the Islam fundamentalist is, naturally, warlike and overbearing. Yugo himself is the only character that isn't ridiculously exaggerated...or is he? He plows through so much crap in the span of the series that would kill pretty much any other human being that he becomes fairly unbelievable, even if he is decently personified. Supporting characters are usually annoying, with the exception of Laila, but that's only because she can't talk. The characters do not develop at all in the span of the series, not even Yugo, so the viewer is just left with a plethora of useless supporting characters.
Yugo's reliance on its plot presentation, which is weaker than it thinks, leads me to believe that the anime is pretentious. The concept had potential, but the arcs were just so repetitive and cut-and-dried that it seemed wasted. I wonder if it's similar to the manga as well. Yugo may not be a terrible waste of your time, at only 13 episodes, but there are certainly better things to watch.
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| Average |
7.7 |
| Animation |
7 |
| Sound |
7 |
| Story |
9 |
| Character |
7 |
| Value |
8 |
| Enjoyment |
8 |
| An interesting idea for an anime that does a good job of not falling back on the same old anime cliches, if not quite being as realistic as it intends.
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leelaa |
(2004-12-15 19:54:56) 2004-06-30 13:30:24 |
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| Average |
6.8 |
| Animation |
8 |
| Sound |
8 |
| Story |
7 |
| Character |
7 |
| Value |
5 |
| Enjoyment |
6 |
| This anime was pretty interesting and different, focusing on two independent negotiations headed by the super-human like Yugo. The premise for the show is really what makes it interesting, and the locations and circumstances for the negotiations are nicely done.
There is no central story that ties the negotiations together, its just Yugo, who is McGuiver, James Bond and Superman all in one – I personally can only handle one super hero personality at a time. He is the only character that remains throughout the entire show, and I found him to be rather annoying. He seems to know how entire negotiation will end before the show even starts, like he has psychic powers or something, which makes his feats less interesting.
The show isn’t horrible or anything, but I am glad it ended with 2 negotiations; I don’t think I could take much more of Yugo.
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| Average |
5.5 |
| Animation |
7 |
| Sound |
6 |
| Story |
5 |
| Character |
5 |
| Value |
5 |
| Enjoyment |
5 |
| Animation/Sound:
The animation is average in today's standards, and the music is pretty much unnoticeable in this series.
Story:
I wasn't all too impressed with the story. Yes, there are some clever moments in the story, but for the most part it's just too far-fetched and exagerrated. And what's the deal with the last ep? That was hardly an ending by any definition. It was inconclusive and unsatisfying to say the least.
Characters:
I really did not like the main character Yugo. Yes, I understand being a negotiator requires him to utilize his intelligence to outsmart his enemies, but it was just way too unrealistic and far-fetched. There are times when he would come up with something and I would just question how the heck could he come up with that unless he's a mindreader or a supernatural being. Much of his "intelligence" is just beyond logic of any kind.
Conclusion:
I'm not sure if too many ppl would enjoy this series. It's not action, comedy, romance, or sci-fi. So it's kind of difficult to categorize this series. If you are a fan of slow moving plots with very minimal action, then maybe you'll enjoy Yuugo. Otherwise I suggest you try other series.
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| Average |
8.8 |
| Animation |
8 |
| Sound |
7 |
| Story |
9 |
| Character |
9 |
| Value |
10 |
| Enjoyment |
10 |
| ---Based on episode 1-6 - 1st Negotiation---
Living most of my life in Pakistan my interest in catching at least the 1st Negotiation was IMMENSE. Cause simply put I've never seen an anime focus on Muslims even for a bit, let alone Pakistan. However, looking at the way how the media potrays us these days I was expecting it to be more cliched about all of becoming terrorists shouting "death to unbelievers" or some other crap like that.
Thankfully that isnt the case here. The creators did a wonderful job at doing their homework. From the OP sequence when I saw the name "Bata" at the marketplace I said to myself, "Holy Crap, they even got the shoestore right" (Bata is a shoe chain in Pakistan). The currency also looked familiar and was amazed at how they got a lot of things in surroundings right. From Karachi being the port city and in Sindh province to Yugo finding himself travelling into the mountaineous (oddly looked more like a desert) regions of Balochistan to reach Quetta.
Now as I was honestly impressed by the VERY accurate surroundings I was slightly dissapointed in two major things. Seems to me the cultural aspects were more dramatized. In all my years of travelling around Pakistan I have NEVER EVER seen anyone walk around dressed like Laila. As Muslims are a majority in Pakistan, all girls wear very conservative clothing sometimes a Hijab as well. And what was with the buying/selling of a human... something I hate to admit exists today (after all human smuggling is the second largest underground trade after drugs). Another mistake was the dancer girl thing, I wont deny that its something that does exist deep underground in urban and rural areas, in brothels etc. but NEVER in public. Pakistanis in general get pissed off at something like that especially in the open... like I said conservativeness is a huge aspect of Muslim cultures, Pakistan is no exception. Heck if anyone is accused of adultry/prostitution/fornication etc. it ends up with punishment by death (yeah its THAT strict)... though underground brothels (very few) DO exist. Another thing that was wrong was the extremely high temperatures... this isnt Middle East.. we're talking about South Asia here... the temperature for the most part is extremely pleasant (it is near the equator with tropical weather) and rarely goes over 40 Celsius. Instead we have Balochistan area over 60 Celsius (a place that occassionaly has snow in the winter lol).
Gah! I guess I went overboard in my enthusiasm over the Pakistani culture shown in the anime.. there were faults true, but I overlooked them because the storyline was incredible. Its obviously a fiction with the Pakistani govt. being repressive (which it isnt.. infact the military always saves our collective rears from corrupt politicians) and freedom fighters of small mountaineous rural areas causing trouble and kidnapping for money. Ofcourse religious fanaticism plays a role, how ELSE is anyone going to round up fighters? The story takes its time to get the viewers familiar with the surroundings and the culture (makebelieve but close nonetheless). Very good drama and great storytelling makes this anime a must watch.
Even if Pakistan was shown mostly in a more negative light, I still enjoyed it because I couldnt deny the realism for the most part (except Laila's dressing and dancing like that in public). Great series for Pakistani anime fans as well!!
If you're Pakistani dont get ticked off by the some cultural/religious mistakes here and there its just a fictitious story and its still a lot of fun :)
---Based on Episodes 7-13---
Second Negotiation is just as enjoyable as the first. And I enjoyed it a lot. However was dissapointed in the last episode where the ending is too extremely conflicting of the Russin characters created. This was the only downside to it. Otherewise my points for this series remain the same. Its still wonderfully written with very good moments. And also gets intense in its realism regarding torture techniques and corruption.
Saying that I will recommend this anime to those who want some plot driven drama that comes close to reallife and does a good job of it.
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