Shakugan no SHANA-Tan

Information of Anime

Shakugan no SHANA-Tan comes from the DVD Volumes of Shakugan no SHANA as a DVD bonus.  They are three minute shorts with a Chibi Shana.  I think there is ine episode per volume.  Later, a title called Itadaki no Hecate-Tan appears.  It's actually the same as Shakugan no SHANA-Tan but using a different name.

Storyline (CONTAINS SPOILERS)

Below is a summary of the storyline I've seen.  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.

There is no storyline.  It's basically a spoof of the story line from the TV show with Shana-Tan.  It sort of retells some parts of the story with sexual references & poking funny at it's own series with some cheap advertisements.  For example, going to the official Shakugan no SHANA website & the seiyuus behind the characters.  It basically ends with a cheap promo selling of watching the movie.

Animation

The drawings are same as the TV show.  The only change here is Shana going into chibi mode.  It's pretty cute actually & I didn't think it would be possible with that kind of drawing style.  Her head is very big & her legs & arms are very thin.  However, the black lines are very thick when you look at her close up.  It's a bit blurry as if it was poorly drawn.

The backgrounds are the same as the TV show again.  However it's much cleaner & there isn't that eerie feeling.  It's more bright & cheerful.  Plus, it's more silly looking.  For example, the sun isn't a full round circle.  It's a swirl of lines.  The tones are good as they don't mess up together with the characters.

The animation movements are smooth.  The movements look pretty natural to me & there isn't any distortion or breaks that I noticed.  It's quite cute to see Shana-Tan run a mock on Sakai's head.  Not only that, it's really natural & realistic.  The speed wasn't strangely fast & the movements didn't involve heavy swinging.

Sound

The sound effect are ok.  Unlike the TV show, it's got more silly sounds.  The volume level is about right since I didn't hear any fuzzes.

The seiyuus of course are the same as the TV shows.  The seiyuu for Shana-Tan's, Rie Kugimiya, does a very good job with the chibi voice.  It's very cute & fitting to the chibi character.  Hecate is a quite off.  The seiyuu behind her voice really doesn't do a good job with younger characters in my view.  This is based on all the performances I've seen & hear of her from other shows.  I do like her work & voice, but I didn't think it was suitable for her.  But, the studio can't change voices since she is part of the original TV cast & her original character's voice was ok.

The music is the same here.  If you were expecting some chibi or cute music, there's rarely any here.  It's still symphony based.  However, it made the show a bit silly by over hyping the situation.

Story

A retelling of the original TV show's storyline.  But, it focuses more on some areas of the show with Shana-Tan & Hecate-Tan.  There are some ecchi humour in it that's pretty weird & sick, such as Sakai jiggling her breast to have Yoshida get some sort of erection.  Also, some Yaoi action & Yoshida having some sort of sexual climax.

Overall Conclusion

Shakugan no SHANA-Tan is funny.  It's purely for fanservice & full of laughter.  Even though I strongly recommend watching this, you would still be watching it anyways since it's only about three minutes long.  But, you should watch the original TV show first to grasp a better understanding of the series.  However, it has a lot of ecchi content that goes beyond TV ratings I think.  The ecchi level is really through the roof & younger audiences should probably not be watching this.

Shakugan no SHANA-Tan gets a nine out of ten from me.  It's funny & entertaining.  Chibi Shana really makes it cute.  Even if there was no storyline involved, it's still fun to watch for pure entertainment.

Last updated on January 16, 2008