Prism Ark

Information of Anime

Based on the video game of the same name.  Priecia & Hyaweh are on a mission to save her kingdom Wind Land from the invasion of the Sublam Kingdom.

Storyline (CONTAINS SPOILERS)

Below is a summary of the storyline I've seen.  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 starts off with Priecia & Hyaweh already in progress on a mission that would save the world from destruction from an army of angels that Sublam had summon.  With some comrades, they make their way to the enemy kingdom.  However, they would have some obstacles along the way as Priecia is a target to Sublam for many years.  Her lineage is suppose to be destoryed.  During their travels, the show would shift back & forth about Priecia's past.  It would go from her childhood to the point where she became a knight to fulfill her deceased brother's wish.  This occurs in the first episode.  At the second episode, the show goes back in time to the point where Wind Land is in desperate need of more soldiers for their army & financial support.

Priecia comes out of hiding to recruit young blood into her army.  Wind Land goes all out in getting people to join by offering a training school in swordsmanship & sorcery.  Here, she meets Hyaweh who possess great fighting abilities which attracts the Wind Land kingdom.  Here, all the characters are present over time & shows how they started to interact with one another.  A major chunk of the show shows the character & relationship building between Priecia & Hyaweh as their backgrounds are explained a bit & their personal characters.  Because Priecia cannot stand & be honest to Hyaweh, she challenges him to a duel which turns out to be an acting competition for their school festival where the both of them come to a draw.  The competition is settle at the Royal Knight tournament though with Priecia as the winner after everyone in the school has graduated.  In the middle, we learn there are other spies in the Wind Land kingdom.

At the Royal Knight ceremony & the crowning of a new queen, Priecia takes Hyaweh out of the castle & confesses to him & he does the same.  He also learns that Priecia is not the real princess, but a replacement.  The real princess is still missing since her family was attacked during her childhood.  She is still believed to be alive.  However, it's believed that Hyaweh comes from a royal bloodline.  During this time, the castle is attacked by Angels.  But Hyaweh & Priecia together saves the kingdom.

My Personal Review

Prism Ark is something that I don't know about when I first picked it up.  I decided to watch it because of the name of the title being interesting.

Animation

The character designs are quite nice.  Cute looking female characters that pretty much look the same with others.  I'm a bit surprised that Hyaweh is a bit feminine looking too.  One character that struck me was Sister Hell's clothing & weapon design.  Pretty cool looking.  Other than that, the designs aren't too appealling to me.  They are quite nice overall & would attract some people.  After episode two, the character designs go wacky such as SD forms, bizarre hairdos, one dimensional bodies, etc.  It almost makes it look like you are watching another show.

The backgrounds are okay.  Has some detail, but not much.

The colours are mainly on the dull side with some bold colours.  This is almost becoming a standard with many anime shows now.  But I did find the dark backgrounds to be quite visible in dark room conditions.  A good thing really since I use a 19" LCD monitor.

In terms of the animation movement, it's mainly supernatural stuff.  The flow & movements isn't too bad.

Sound

The sound effects are mainly on the realistic side.

The seiyuus here are ok.  They perform their characters well.  However, none of the characters actually grew to me much.

The music is on the pop & rock side.  It's got some orchestral stuff a bit.

Story

At first, it looks like Priecia & company going to save her kingdom.  The flow of the show isn't too great.  It switches from the present to the past too much & that's during a battle.  It's almost like Naruto, expect the battles are dragged out.  The battles are pretty short.  Because of the transition, you can't really enjoy the action in the battles.  Too many interruptions.  But at least you know about Priecia's past & how she became a knight.  However, this is only in the first episode.  If you can bear with this, things pick up a bit.  However, it sidetracks back to the past where Priecia & company don't know one another as Wind Land is recruiting people.  But this is a good thing as it introduces the characters & gives viewers that are new to the series like me to understand about them.  However, it feels like watching a totally different show as it seems to turn into a high school comedy with a lot of funny & weird looking character designs for both the main & minor characters.  Also, it gets heavy on the love side between Priecia & Hyaweh.  So heavy, that the war is pretty much out of the picture.  It's more love comedy.  Technically, this is how it should be since the show is based on the ero-game.

The show does show some of Priecia & Hyaweh's past such as the boy that Priecia was waiting for since childhood & the knight that saved Hyaweh & his sister Filia when they were young from an Angel.  Also, we see some "present" stuff such as how Sister Hell came about.

As for the end, it's incomplete.  You need to get all the answers from playing the game.  A lot of parts in the show are missing as it speeds up the timeline due to the show's number of episodes.  Most of it is about the characters & their relationships with one another.

Overall Conclusion

Prism Ark is a bit disappointing at the start with all that switch in time.  That first episode alone almost made me want to drop it.  But the next episodes were entertaining as some nice comedy were thrown into the show.  However, it will leave you feeling incomplete.

Prism Ark gets a 6.5/10.  The show has too much movement in timeframes as it is short.  Although you get Priecia's background in detail, it can be really boring.  Plus, a lot of the story is missing in the show which forces you to play the game if you don't have any background on the series.  However, I admit the show is pretty funny in the later episodes.

Last updated on June 16, 2008