Search - Tide-Line Blue: Anime Legends Complete Collection on DVD

Impressive character designs, good animation, fair storyline

Courtland J. Carpenter | Fort Wayne, Indiana United States | 09/14/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is one of those post apocalyptic type storylines where the world must deal with threats after being mostly destroyed. They called it the Hammer of Eden, which presumably is some ultimate weapon. The story begins when a populus island is hosting, an attempt to gather nations to create a new United Nations is attacked by cruise missles. It's not like negotiations were going well, larger or more well off nations wanted bigger measures of control. Of course thats just natural, and the way the UN is today, but in the anime its seen as a cause for conflict.

Trying to escape the destruction, are a young man named Keel and his friend, a beautiful pregnant girl, who is induced into labor due to the suddenness of the attack. I mentioned character designs in the title, because they are clean and distinct. They are less like many anime character designs in that they have natural looking haircolors, well proportioned features, and are easy to differentiate. The pregnant girl's design is perhaps one of the most striking I've ever seen in an anime.

The boy, Keel and his pregnant friend end up abord a giant submarine, which is like a modern day Nautilus, and has a modern day Captain Nemo type as its commander. Contrasting to the organizers of the potential new UN, this commander believes threats and intimidation, through attacks on the military will force the smaller nations to form treaties, and stop their warring. This anime is basically a contrasting of those two styles, as well as an attempt to bring them together by the actions of the youngsters.

There's some funny stuff for American audiences in the way the US energy mogul, a Texas-like oilman is portaited. Ultimately, the anime seems to bright and colorful for the kind of world it is depicting. I would have liked to have seen these characters interact in a storyline of a much smaller scale, and a much less serious subject. Ultimately this series was much too short for what it tried to do. The tragic events had less impact than they should have because the participants were not well endeared to the audience. On story this really rates only 2-3 stars, but I couldn't help liking it due to the characters."