Erementar Gerad

Information of Anime

Coud "Cou" Van Giruet, an air pirate of Red Lynx, stole some cargo from an air ship.  Curious of what's in the cargo, Coud opens a tomb & finds a young girl inside.  Her name is Reverie "Ren" Metherlence, an Eden Raid.  Eden Raids are a magic race that humans treasure.  By making a contract with them, humans become Pleasures to the Eden Raids & they transform into powerful magical weapons for the humans.  Ren, however, is a very powerful Eden Raid & is targeted by many.  Ren has a goal which is to go to Eden Garden because a voice called for her.  Coud promises Ren that he'll take her there & begins their journey.

Storyline (CONTAINS SPOILERS)

Below is a summary of the storyline I have.  This section does contain some spoilers.  If you haven't seen the series yet & don't want to be spoiled, skip this section.  If you want to know the story & want to see how I viewed it, read on.

The show mainly involves Coud & Ren going to Eden Garden with Arc Aile & Chaos Choir going after Ren.  Ren is a powerful Eden Raid a lot of people what her powers.  Cisqua, Rowen, & Kuea (Kullweet Envatilia) from Arc Aile wants to take Ren with them since their organization is to help Eden Raids live in a safe environment.  However, the trio decides to help Coud & Ren get to Eden Garden instead.

Throughout the show, there are talks about how Eden Raids are just tools as weapons for humans to use.  As the story progress, we see Coud thinking it's wrong to use Eden Raids as tools since they are living beings.  In their many encounters & battles, Coud learns more & more about Eden Raids & thinks of a way to get humans & Eden Raids to live together in harmony without using them as tools.

Later in the series, the group learns that Arc Aile's evil intentions in using Eden Raids as tools of weapons.  Because of her strong values with the organization, Cisqua forces herself to protect Ren & other Eden Raids from their evil ways.  She decides to escape with Coud & Ren & continue their journey to Eden Garden.

Along the way, Chaos Choir continues to hunt down Ren.  We also learn that Chaos Choir is from Eden Garden & produces Sitting Raids as tools for their battles.  Another interesting thing we learn is the person calling Ren is Eve, the queen of Eden Garden, & Ren is the next in line.  Currently, Eve is nearly out of powers to produce Sitting Raids & Chaos Choir needs Ren's powers.  In order to stop Arc Aile from fighting, Cisquea goes back to Arc Aile with a tablet that may end the war to both sides.  The tablet contains lost history of how Eden Raids & humans once sang together in peaceful harmony.

Because of the war between Eden Raids & humans, Ren thinks about going with Chaos Choir in order to end the war.  This is based on what Chaos Choir told her.  If Ren returns to them, the battle will end.  However, it's different than what they mean.  They take her away forcefully as the war between human & Eden Raids occur.  With Ren separated from Coud, Chaos Choir target Coud in order to stop the Pleasure bonds between the 2.

In order to save Ren, Coud gets help from Kuea & Rowen to get to Eden Garden.  As they reached Eden Garden, Eve steps down from the throne & Ren takes it, thinking it would end the war.  However , the generals of Chaos Choir had a different idea of ending the war by using Ren's power to defeat the Guardians (aka humans) & ruling the world.  Kuea & Rowen fight off two Chaos Choir generals while Coud goes off to save Ren.  However, Chaos Choir wanted this to happen in order to kill Coud, which they did.

Seeing Coud defeated, Cisquea, Kuea & Rowen decides to matter into their hands in order to save Ren.  Meanwhile, Eve uses her remaining powers to bring Coud back to life.  Watching Eve fade away, Coud is determined to end all of this sadness & pain & goes off to save Ren.

Meeting the Chaos Choir generals, Coud tells them that they are using Ren's powers for their own greed & choosing against Ren's will.  Seeing the Pleasure contract is gone after he died & refusing to seal Ren's powers again, Coud uses brutal force to break Ren's spell that binds her as the queen & successful does.  However, the Chaos Choir generals react with Ren, who has no control with her body, & attacks Coud & company.

In the final episode, Coud & company are losing to Ren & the Chaos Choir generals; even though Ren is trying to fight off the general's controls.  They tell Coud & company to surrender & become their tools.  Frustrated with the comments of how Eden Raids are this & how humans are that, Coud weakly gets up & tells the Chaos Choir generals how much he loves Ren.  Suddenly, with Eve's help, he starts to chant the lost song of the Eden Raids & Guardians, & Ren chants along with him in the middle.  The chant causes all the contracts between the Eden Raids & Guardians to end.  Later on, Eden Garden falls back to the Earth.

Near the end, we see Cisquea writing a letter explaining how the battle between the Eden Raids & Guardians have ended.  Arc Aile & the Eden Raids have negotiated to end the war & work together for a better future.  We also learn what some of the characters are doing now; especially Coud as he & Ren have rejoined Red Lynx.  This is how the show ends.

My Personal Review

Erementar Gerad is an entertaining series to watch.  A lot of interesting twists in the plot with plenty of action on the side.  Plus, the relationship between Coud & Ren is enjoyable.

Animation

The character designs are made pretty good.  Although the clothing designs isn't too flashy, they were appealling.  There are times where the characters would go into SD mode & it's quite cute.

The show use colour that are pretty bright on the characters & dull on the background.  The colour balance is pretty good, especially the night scenes.

The animation movement is natural.  No weird running positions or sudden movements. It flowed well & is clean.

Sound       

The sound effects are clean & sharp.  During the merging of Eden Raids & Pleasures, the sound effects of wind & "crystal-like" sounds are clean & don't create any fuzzes.  However, the explosions are fuzzy & weren't quite loud as I wanted them to be.  The distance of where the viewers are looking from & the explosion didn't seem to make a difference.

The voice actors are good.  They matched their characters quite well.  Cisquea's voice sways at times.  Some times she sounds cute & fits her character well.  But there are times where her voice doesn't match her appearance.  It sounds a lot older.

The music is pretty catchy.  The folk genre really shines in the show & helps establish the environment of where the characters are.

Story

The story has a lot of twist & turns in it.  These changes help with the character development, especially Cisquea.  It is nice to see how the characters react when they learn something that they least suspected.  There were parts in the story that I was shocked to see, especially the ones from Chaos Choir.  There were times where the characters from Chaos Choir kind of ticked me off with their ways & that's a good thing.  Playing with the viewers' emotions really helps them get into the story.  Also, the end was decent.  It ended quite well, even though it wasn't the best.  But it tied up the show well.

Overall Conclusion

Erementar Gerad should be part of your "to watch" list if you are into good storylines with fantasy & action involved.  I enjoyed the series a lot & it really gets to me.

Erementar Gerad receives a mark of 8.5/10.  The enjoyable characters & well written storyline with twists are what make the series earn that score.  The lost points was the story's pace.  It felt a bit slow for some reason with all the side stories involved.  Even though it help develop Coud & the group's views on Eden Raids, those stories could have moved a bit faster & focus more on the main plot.