Air TV: The Complete Series (S.A.V.E.)

This was a series that truly made me feel at peace with myself and the world around me. All the characters are so innocent. This is definitely in my top ten anime series and maybe in my top five. This series is rated TV 14 but I am not sure why. I would rate it TV PG. Anyways on to the storyline.

The story starts with a boy that travels from town to town named Yukito. He finally arrives at his next destination only to run into the most unusual girl in town named Misuzu. Misuzu ends up inviting Yukito to stay with her and her mom. He does and during his stay with them Yukito encounters many women with problems. He tries his best to help everyone he can in the town and the town grows on him. Mean while he still searches for the person his mom told him about called the lady in the sky (A woman with wings). Yukito believes that woman is in that town. Yukito ends up making many friends and discovering a more beautiful part of life.

The ending to this series made a tear run down my cheek and believe me it is not easy to make me tear up. You will experience many feelings when watching this anime and will be able to relate to almost all the characters without difficulty. I would recommend this anime to any anime lover and to someone that is looking for a story that will make their hearts hurt with sadness. If you liked Rumbling Hearts or Suzuka then I have no doubt that you will treasure this series.
-J

I just couldn't really get behind this one. I feel like it's so close to being a great anime, but it just missed the mark by like 1/10th of an inch. It had all the elements of a great story --a lone hero; a damsel in distress; and ancient curse; and magical winged beings of incredible power. The only problem with it was that they put in a lot of stuff that just wasn't pertinent to the main story. It felt like episodes 2-5 were mostly filler material in order to make Yukito into a heroic figure, but they didn't really have to do that. The reason I stick to that is that after the two girls stories were finished, they didn't appear anywhere else in the rest of the show, really. That makes them filler that wasn't necessary.

There were some plot points that also bugged me, but I don't want to give away too much. You'll see it if you look. All I can say is that over a thousand years of storing magic in the doll, the best that they could come up with was that? Also, they really didn't make the details of Lady Kana's life fold into the story in any kind of coherent fashion. It seems to me, that if you've been searching for the girl in the sky for over a thousand years, you would have been able to pass on more than just a doll and vague stories. It didn't really make sense to me.

Aside from that, there were some real touching moments. I was disheartened by the character's fates, and it showed some really sad moments. If you like to shed a tear, I've no doubt that you will watching this. It's sad in a lot of ways. The animation is great and the English voice cast was excellent. I would recommend this to a friend, but I personally just didn't like the way it seemed thrown together.

It's impossible to miss the signature style of Key/Visual Arts: Great character devlopment, awesome emotional involvement, stunning visuals, heart-touching, tear-jerking, amazing music, and lovable protagonists.

The characters are relatable, believable, and sympathetic. The characters don't get handed the idiot ball (even though there were plenty of chances for it to occur) and do stupid things that make you want to bang your face against the wall; no, their actions/reactions are realistic. What I'm talking about is that some writers in series make characters behave like total retards just to make a plot point work. And that doesn't happen here. I can't remember any times that there was something incredibly to obvious to me, as the viewer, that they SHOULD have been doing that they were doing the OPPOSITE of.

The animation, as already stated, is beautiful. The scenary creates feelings of pure bliss--especially the sky. It's obvious that they put a TON of effort into the blue sky with its white whispy clouds during the day, the orangey hues of dusk, and the starry skies at night. The sea is also very nice, whenever it's shown. The characters are also very nice to look at. Hair (usually Misuzu's) blowing in the wind is especially well done. The only thing I can complain about is that the male characters' eyes are "normal" sized (read: small) when compared to the girls. If you've seen Kanon, Clannad, or Angel Beats!, you know they like to have all the characters have big eyes. Oddly enough, the guys seemed to have missed the boat here. I don't mind big eyes, but if you're going to do them, it'd be better if you were consistent.

To give you an idea about how clear and crisp it looks: Even though it's a DVD, it looks like a blu-ray (at least when both are viewed on an HDTV). I say this because it looks about as good as my Angel Beats! BD (except for certain special effects-driven scenes that weren't needed in Air), even though its 5 years older. This could be reversed to say that Kyoto Animation's quality has hardly changed in that much time, but really, when you see it for yourself, it's hard to believe it COULD be any better.

The musical score is beautifully appropriate for the themes presented in the series. Most of them come from the game it's based off of, so they may be familiar to you. The intro song, "Tori no Uta," does the perfect job setting the tone in the beginning: pure, fantastic bliss. Insert songs are also light and "airy" (ha ha I'm punny), setting the mood for their respective scenes. If you don't cry to "Aozora" during the climax at the end, you'll probably never cry in your life.

As you can expect with any classic Key/Visual Arts work, your tear ducts will get a work out (for both the happy and the sad). It's heart-warming, and heart-breaking.

The English VAs are great (especially Haruko and Yukito, IMO).

The relationship between Haruko and Misuzu is, I believe, the most relatable, realistic, and touching of them all. If nothing else, seeing Haruko's character develop--along with their relationship--is a good enough reason to give this series a shot in and of itself. In hindsight, she is my favorite character: My heart ached for her and her plight more than anyone else.

I would've liked it better if the side stories of the other characters (Kano, Minagi, and Michiru to a lesser extent) were done better (I LOVED Minagi!). First of all, they were too short. I feel the series could easily have reached the 24 episode mark if they had expounded more upon these side stories, spent more time on the main story arc, and stuffed the content in the OVA into the main series. Second of all, once these two characters' arcs are done, they don't appear in the series anymore except for a brief cameo. Third, it would've been nice to see them tie in somehow with the main story of Michiru. And lastly, the characters (Kano, Minagi, and Michiru) should've had more time to develop on screen before we focus on them.

This is the only thing that hurt the score at all (I rate it 9/10, but since this is Amazon...)

tl;dr: Sad but beautiful and touching. Plot may confuse you at times if you don't pay close attention.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 30 reviews  4.2 out of 5 stars