thoughts: D.Gray-man (anime) -- unexpected ending

Episode 103: It Echoes in the Long Morning

I was utterly panicked when after episode 102 I watched the preview for episode 103 and it was stated as the last episode. I thought to myself, "This can't be. The manga is still going with a lot of new plot and details." Even though I haven't followed the manga, I know that a new story arc is starting to approach. There was so much more that needed to be animated and broadcasted to the fans.


But then I went and discovered that upon acquiring episode 103 from my sources, it was indeed the very last episode.

The series wraps up rather snuggly with episode 103, and like any other anime, it boasts the possibility without promise of a continuation. The war of D.Gray-man continues on, new evolutions of Innocense have been revealed, and the Millenium Earl feels as if he's only just getting started.

I've found no evidence of a continuation anywhere, and by this point in time a possible sequel is more or less out the window considering the length of this anime in its original form.

Indeed, this may more than likely be the end of the entire anime altogether, and the main reason could most plausibly have to do with popularity and ratings.

As of present, I know only that the most popular ongoing shounen demographic anime series are three: One Piece, Naruto, and Bleach. With this in mind, we presume they are popular because of their target audience-- young children, mostly male, all with the penchant for violence and becoming the world's greatest pirate/ninja/samurai (have your pick). They're mostly kids, they have nothing to do-- and these anime also appeal internationally.

Good luck finding girls in the western area who will openly admit to watching anime or indulging in shoujo manga.

In essence, the three mentioned above have one very common factor: they were all anime that resemble the first and longest shounen demographic anime to hit it off internationally, Dragonball. My speculations are my own and will be saved for a later post, but for right now, take it as it is.

D.Gray-man, I assume, never really had that same appeal that One Piece, Naruto, or Bleach have. That, and I assume having a very, very dark themed storyline couldn't really be appropriate for young viewers (never minding that I know nothing of Naruto or that Bleach consists of very bloody fight scenes).

There's a lot of anguish that goes into the pacing and development of D.Gray-man's plot and characters. The anime itself centers around a war against machines created using people who have died who then go on to killing the person who called for that weapon termed "Akuma".

The recipe for an "Akuma":

- One part sadness and sorrow
- One part anguish
- One part longing
- One machine created courtesy of the Millenium Earl
- Two deaths of humankind
- Add an enormous side of suffering

Death may occur regularly in Bleach or Dragonball... but unlike D.Gray-man, it doesn't occur in practically every episode. After all, when you see one "Akuma" you know that at least two lives have been expended for its creation. Not only that, but where there is an Akuma, there certainly will follow more deaths since Akuma were biologically created to kill without reason.


D.Gray-man really began to grow on me after a couple episodes. The storyline is extremely unrealistic, and sometimes even if suspending disbelief, the actions of many of the characters are a little unrealistic as well. Some actions contradict others, and some actions warrant confusion and inquiry.

But as a whole, I was able to do what I couldn't do with Bleach. I watched the entire series of D.Gray-man. And this has nothing to do with the fact that one is now finished and the other is still ongoing. I gave up on Bleach long before I could make it into the third story arc-- when the rescue team saved Rukia and settled the little shinigami debacle, the entire series lost it's appeal to me.

D.Gray-man, however, I can safely say, was able to hold my attention for seventy-episodes straight until I ran out of episodes to watch and could only sit in wait for the next available release.

It's very safe to say that I'm going to miss those weekly releases of D.Gray-man now that it's over.


The ending episode of D.Gray-man does two things:

Firstly, it allows us to watch one last fight between exorcists and akuma by finishing off the battle between Lenalee, Allen, and Level Four-kun... as well as incorporating the late-comer generals. This was quite the fun battle, but it really should have ended when Allen's left-arm sword was pierced into the Level Four Akuma's torso.

Allen-kun and Lenalee do make a pretty good combo. I'm going to miss seeing the kickass Lenalee now that she's finally recovered and gotten stronger.
Any reasons that Cross Marian has can NEVER be good. So don't ask... Really. Don't. O.o
Things aren't that easy huh?

The second half of the episode wraps up the series with the idea that the war between the Dark Order and the Millenium Earl will continue to rage on even as the anime ends. Lenalee's Innocense displayed an evolution from equip-type to what Komui terms crystal-type, and Allen has been able to fully use 100+ percent synch of his own anti-akuma weapon.

Cross Marian is returning to the Order's head honcho base for further discussion, and the Bookman duet are expecting more history to be recorded of this time period.

The headquarters on top of scary black mountain is now going through a process of moving after being completely and utterly demolished by Level Four-kun, and I have a feeling that the head honcho guy, Lvellie is still not satisfied with how things are run at headquarters by Komui. Krory is finally awake since his almost demise in the ark after the Noah twins pretty much puree him.


Everything at the Order will be heading back into a normal direction. But deaths have occured and friends and family were lost to the cause. This is what happens in war, but one cannot help but feel a little aghast at how fragile all of these people we watched throughout the storyline are.

There is a lot of tension between the Order, the exorcists, and the Lvellie but none of this will ever be settled unless one continues to follow the manga, or the producers decide that fans deserve a second chance at bringing the ratings up.

All in all, I'm quite disappointed at the sudden ending even if it was a good wrap-up. Lenalee has just become her kickass self all over again, Allen is getting stronger and stronger, and my precious Lavi and Yu are no longer going to grace me with their uber-bishie presences. I'm going to miss it all seriously.



It's interesting that they get their third change in uniform at the very end of the anime series. They look pretty good though. And Lenalee is even growing her hair back out-- so pretty.
But I guess everything has to come to an end at some point in time. I just hadn't imagined it would have come so quickly when all of those other ongoing shounen anime are still progressing in the 200+ or 300+ episodes.


***

In upcoming news, I intend to return to the "old anime" area and maybe pick up another popular shounen anime in the form of Rurouni Kenshin. And along with this shounen anime, there's no reason why I can't pick up a shoujo anime either-- the shoujo of all shoujo and the originator of all reverse harems, Fushigi Yugi. There has to be something good about these two or else they wouldn't have been so popular. I'm ready to brave them and see just what was so great about them.

As for any other anime, I may pick up Gintama as a replace ment for D.Gray-man in order to fulfill my Suzuken-sama quota. Boy am I going to miss the uber-bishie adorableness that is Lavi at his cheerful best. Suzuken did wonderful and I'll miss being able to hear his voice as Lavi.


Now to look forward to whatever else Suzuken will become a part of in the future, and maybe he'll be able to work with his friend Takahiro-san as well as associate Kobayashi Sanae (Allen-kun).

random thoughts: Dark Boots Evolved, Lenalee Back in Action

Episode 102: The Word of Promise



This is the moment I'd been waiting for since the time our heroine of D.Gray-man lost the use of her Innocense.

While I began watching D.Gray-man because of Suzumura Kenichi and his cast as Lavi, I began to grow to love this anime very much. Between the entire cast of the Dark Order whether or not they fought as exorcists or did research work as a normal person, I found I enjoyed all of their presence.

Lenalee grew on me very early on in the series because of her sense of justice, her toughness, as well as her penchant for treasuring those things and people important to her. We are shown that Lenalee has had a tough life ever since the first day she was discovered to be a host for Innocense. She was taken away from her home, separated from her brother, and forced to fight in a way she didn't really care to know about.

And then Komui entered into the organization as some regular joe, section chief and gave Lenalee a reason to live again.

As time passed by, Lenalee came to treasure the Dark Order Headquarters and everyone within which became her only home in the whole world. And thus her sense of needing to protect this life of hers was very great, so great, in fact that she has the willpower to go as far as sacrificing her own life to make sure she never loses anything or anyone she holds dear.

I like Lenalee because she's not a damsel in distress all the time.

At least she wasn't until she pushed passed the limits of her Innocense and lost the power to use it. And then she became just some regular little damsel who wanted to fight but could do anything but wait for everyone around her to save her time and time again. Throughout this time, you could see the frustration and the annoyance in her expression. She hated being the one who needed protection and she wanted to be the one protecting others.

But the wait is finally over.




We finally present to you the episode in which Lenalee is finally pushed passed her limits of remaining as the poor princess who needs protection. As a last resort to protecting her family of Dark Order and all of her friends and her home, Lenalee allows the damaged Innocense to be forced into her body so that she can fight once again.

And the results were quite fantastic. As her Innocense fragment had been shown to have evolved to protect her more than once already, it now ends up evolving even further to create a weapon against akuma in the form of her Dark Boots, but made purely from Innocense that has used her blood as a component.

It looks pretty cool and it seems that by uniting with her Innocense fragment in this way, Lenalee has become on par with the newly formed Level 4 akuma who has been whipping everyone's butts. Even Allen has been having issues fighting the newly upgraded akuma, although he is also the only exorcist among the Order who can keep up with the evil weapon at this point.

And so what happens?

After saving Allen from becoming fertilizer for a new Akuma experience level, it seems that Lenalee easily learns how much stronger her own power is. She feels faster, she feels more power, and she becomes aware that her boots are different than they were before.

This is no longer an equip-type weapon she'd been using since the beginning, but something completely different.

A little motion sickness is surprisingly not what I figured Allen would be worried about at a time like this.


And thus the two tag-team it up and destroy the level 4 who'd been wreaking havoc around the headquarters. The whole place is completely destroyed, the whole science research team is dead, and I'm not even sure how many exorcists there are left in the whole organization around the world anymore.

On top of that Lavi and Kanda have yet to acquire their still broken Innocense weapons.

While all of this is going on, I really, really kept wondering where the heck all those above 100% synch rate Generals were at the moment. To be honest, there's no way they could be anymore tired than Allen who'd been fighting hell and back before the Generals even arrived in the isolated science area to help out.

But anyway, apparently the fight with Level 4-kun isn't exactly over because the next episode continues the battle with him. I look forward to more and hopefully the series doesn't end before more can happen.

At least Allen is still strong and still going. I'd hate for the poor kid to have had to go through so much and end up being weaker than Lenalee. After all, no matter how I look at it, I still feel he should be the strongest of all the exorcists since it seems only right in that aspect.

random thoughts: The Musician of D.Gray-man

Episode 93: Melody


While I don't really like to blog anime by episode because I'm lazy, I kind of wanted to point out this lovely 'Musician' plot device from the latest episode of D.Gray-man available to me.

At the end of episode 92, we were shown that somehow, Allen was able to play the piano as well as the score that could restore the ark. During that time, I thought the melody was really pretty and couldn't help paying extra close attention.

Actually, the Earl was the one who'd played the melody first and, honestly, I couldn't really piece together the connection between the Earl's image and the elegant music. It wasn't working for me.

Let's compare. See above.
The music started and I was all thinking, "Ooh, this sounds nice..." And then I saw the piano and the keys being played by some invisible force. I thought it was really cool.

The typical, mysterious and beautiful way to play...

Um, yea, not so beautiful anymore, huh...
I will admit, clowns are kind of scary. The Millenium Earl is no exception and there is something awfully out of place about the Earl playing such a peaceful sounding music score. At least Allen is good-looking enough to pull off looking cool while he was playing. Cute kid, he even tried to sing to the song too... I chuckled.

In episode 93, we got to see a more in depth scene of when Allen was playing the song and restoring the entire ark. Very heartwarming lines and shots about desires and whatnot. It was interesting how the image of Komui Lee popped into Allen's mind, which further proves just how much significance Komui is in holding together all the exorcists.

Can't think of desires, then think of Komui nii-sama.

What a way to convince our star exorcist to piece life back together.
The ideas got Allen into realizing and thinking about wanting all his friends back. Sometimes it's hard to believe that Komui Lee is really this kind of person because of his seemingly dual personality:

I think the caption says it all.

Anyway, getting back on topic... I kind of wish I could share the song on this blog, but I don't have a good copy of it right now except for what I could probably rip from the episode itself. But then I'd have to explain that voices will be heard speaking and I can't get rid of them because of my capabilities as a blogger.

Thanks to Shinsen-Subs, however, I was able to follow along with the romanji version of the song as well as the English translation. The song is very beautiful, sort of like a song of hope praying for life again. It is quite in tune with the idea of Allen's playing of the piano to restore the ark.

I wouldn't mind listening to it again and again, and hopefully there will be a somewhat "full version" or the like of this song out soon.

On an end note, episode 93 overall wasn't much to write home about. Lavi continued to be his... interestingly baka self (how adorable ^_^). "Bakanda" and "moyashi" fought again as soon as they met (I don't think these two were meant to be close friends). Chaoji is still wallowing in the loss of his comrades. "Kuro-chan" is out unconscious dreaming of Eliade and those good old days of being a vampire. And the good Marshall Cross has decided to continue on his womanizing ways.

On that note, sometimes I wonder what type of atmosphere this anime is really supposed to convey, because it can be either extremely dark and twisted... or it can be really... well, like this:

Sometimes I wonder if maybe Tim isn't the real hero of D.Gray-man.

Really now, a ruler? Though I was wondering the same thing myself.

I should be asking that question.

I'm looking forward to the coming episode of D.Gray-man as usual. The series is really growing on me even though at first I'd been interested in Lavi only. Allen has grown hotter, I've come to love Kanda and his "screw off" personality, and as much as I hate to admit it, the good Marshal Cross Marian is actually pretty cool. I'm really hoping to see Lenalee be able to stand up and fight again like her kick-ass self at the beginning of the series. Her current "damsel in distress" role is kind of bugging me.

Overall a fun episode, but it was more of a climactic ending to the ark story arc and a new transition into the next story arc.

The Many (Anime) Faces of Kenichi Suzumura

When I began to religiously watch anime like it was a part of my everyday diet, I also began to become accustomed to recognizing certain voices among certain anime roles. This character's voice probably sounded like another character's voice from another anime, this cat sounds awfully familiar to the rat from there, this guy sounds like such and such... and so on. Among the large sea of anime voice roles, I'm not surprised that that of the one and only Kenichi Suzumura-sama stood out against them all. I can undoubtedly say that I had been drawn exclusively to it like first love. I began to extensively "research" the many possible characters wherein this particular male seiyu had lent his talents.

Yea, I'm a bit of a fangirl, you could say. I find, I love, I obsess, I cling...

Often referred to as "Suzuken" by many (myself included), Kenichi Suzumura is a very well known male voice actor from the Osaka Prefecture. Currently, according to Anime News Network (ANN), Suzuken has 102 voice roles credited to his name and had won the "Best Radio Personality" in 2008 (per wikipedia).

Other info on Suzumura-sama includes birthdate, affiliation, friends, team members, etc, etc, etc...
But I won't mention too much of it here, lest I sound like a creepy stalker.

I was also very excited to learn that Suzuken participated in many anime theme songs, most recently the Bus Gamer first episode ending theme, Train. Other songs include the image/character songs for some of his roles such as Bokura no Love Style with Yoshinori Fujita for the Hitachiin twins of Ouran Host Club fame, and Primal Innocense per Shinn Asuka of Gundam Seed Destiny.

- credit Kenichi Suzumura @ wikipedia
- credit Kenichi Suzumura @ Anime News Network

Literally, as professional voice actors, it isn't wrong to say that they can be associated with many, many different faces in the anime world. Today I'm a psycho killer, tomorrow I'm a king. They're like live action actors, but they get to change appearances in more ways than just putting on make-up and getting a face-lift.

I could list all the Suzuken roles if I wanted to:

- Shinn Asuka from Gundam Seed Destiny
- Hikaru Hitachiin from Ouran High School Host Club
- Kamui Shiro from X
- Chika Akatsuki from Zombie-Loan

These are only few of his more well-known ones as a main character. But of course, wiki and ANN have already done an excellent job detailing each, big and small, and so I won't repeat their work. Yeah, this post is already long enough as is...

As Part 1 of my "Worship Suzuken-sama (Really Now Fangirl Much?)" feature, however, I will share a few of the roles that I have already seen and that I found to be some of my favorite ones.

***


Rakushun -- Twelve Kingdoms

To begin with, I have a very, very soft spot in my heart for this furry little hanjyuu who is half-rat and half-human. Although by no means a bishounen or even a very popular role, Rakushun had easily become one of my favorite characters from Twelve Kingdoms, even before I realized who the seiyu for him was. Though in watching Twelve Kingdoms, I quickly discovered that the wisdom entranced, caring voice of Rakushun belonged to Kenichi Suzumura. And through knowing this, I slowly began to learn the other various anime roles Suzuken has been involved in.

One could say that Rakushun was the catalyst to my "Suzuken-sama Worship," among all things anime.

Besides being a wonderfully created character amidst all the complexities and chaos of Twelve Kingdoms, Rakushun's personality, niceties, and friendship-love for the main protagonist, Youko, was magnificently brought to life by the voice behind the character. Suzuken has a talent for portraying a very wide array of different characters.

Rakushun allowed for a much calmer, more level-headed, kind-hearted, wisdom-infused, extra hyphenated double-good description of a Suzuken voice than many of his other roles. Granted Rakushun hit the preaching meter quite consistently, he didn't go overboard and make me go spit barbeque on the poor rat. Otherwise, we wouldn't be seeing this post, period... though I've no doubt that Suzuken-sama may indeed find another way into my heart. (Ahh... I think I've hit the pentacle of otaku-ness.)

Overall, Rakushun is an all-around lovely role and I'm glad that it was through him that I discovered the greatness of Suzuken-san. One of the greatest things about watching anime, I found, is hearing one of your favorite voices all over the place in every way, shape, and form. It's like being on a natural high... or the like.



Hikaru Hitachiin -- Ouran High School Host Club

Of all the Suzuken roles I've seen thus far, this has to be one of his most celebrated. No matter where I go that Kenichi Suzumura is mentioned, not far behind will I also see the words "Love Hikaru!" or "Kyaa! Hikaru!" or "Hikaru is my favorite twin!" and the like. Though I do not deny that Hikaru is a very good-looking bishounen in the world of shoujo manga and anime, I really think that his fans love him more due to his devilish personality than his looks (otherwise, they'd probably love his younger twin, Kaoru just as much).

In reality, I also think this has much to do with Suzuken.

Having Suzuken voice the playful, "wild type," teasing young Hikaru Hitachiin makes the elder twin even more enticing than he already is. Sure, he has to share fifty percent of his lines with Yoshinori Fujita, the seiyu of younger twin Kaoru, but somehow, because of development, character, and simple individual charm, Hikaru tends to stand out more than Kaoru. There could also be an older brother complex floating around since those are popular nowadays.

Then again, who am I kidding? Between one twin or the other, no matter how many times I've seen the darned anime, I still can't tell them apart when they're wearing the exact same uniform. The voices I distinguish well, but aside from that, those two really do live in the same world of evil of whence they came and act like the same entity when called for. Even if Haruhi does claim that Hikaru is one level meaner than Kaoru, the question is really, how much is one level and how mean is Kaoru as compared to the average normal high school boy?

Moving along... Hikaru, of course, cannot be without Kaoru, and the two seiyu collaborate as if they'd always been twin brothers rather than just doing their duty as a voice actor. This turns the twins into a very lovable single unit and as a whole are very hard to resist in terms of their "type" of host.



Truth be told, Ouran was probably the very first place that I heard Suzuken's voice. But at the time, I had just gotten into anime and really didn't give a hoot about the voices. In fact, the only voice I was familiar with in this series was that of Maaya Sakamoto (who took on the role of Haruhi quite wonderfully), because I'm a fan of her music.

Hikaru is by no means my favorite Ouran character. In fact, I never really liked the cheeky little bastard.

In fact, I'm a Kyouya Ootori fangirl all the way and every time he schemes or smiles or talks or pushes his glasses up or looks at the fourth wall or schemes or does something surprisingly non-egoist or... well no matter what he does, I sigh like an obsessed otaku (which I am). He's hot and he's intelligent and he can make any girl swoon... but this isn't the place for his worshipping since he's not voiced by Suzuken.

Call it bias or call it favoritism, but Hikaru is my favorite of the twins and my third favorite Host Club man. As opposed to many traditional fangirls out there, I'm not too drawn towards ditzy blondes with a heart of gold, taciturn good guys with loyal to best friend and master tendencies, nor even the sacrificing and more insightful younger twin brother with a good heart type. I'm also kind of turned off by loli-shotas, but really, who doesn't like Honey-senpai?

Suzuken's participation has a great deal to do with why I like Hikaru. BUT, I admit wholeheartedly that in recent chapters of the Ouran manga, I've grown to love Hikaru and respect him more. Completely unrelated to Suzuken, Hikaru is starting to grow on me because of his newly found sense of maturity. His heartwarming speech to Kaoru about the two of them being twins was absolutely lovely.

"Kaoru, we are twins. Isn't it an incredible gift? Normal people can only face their future alone... You and I can fact it together. We aren't depending on each other. From now on, we'll influence each other... it would be good if we could stimulate each other. If we don't forget this, then for sure, a future twice as fun than normal people's awaits us!! That's why we'll always stay together even after this. Because we can't do otherwise. You didn't know that this is why twins are born, right?"

Hikaru actually said these words. I'm so proud of him, and extremely impressed. And also kind of wondering what kind of hair-dye he bought and whether it was laced. Of course, I do not refute Hikaru's tendencies to glomp or pamper his little brother. It's very sincere, very beautiful and this is why I'm loving Hikaru so much now.
Sadly with no tie to Suzuken-sama... I'm feeling a little traitorous.



Lavi -- D.Gray-man

My love for Lavi is a very special case. As a character, he isn't outstandingly unique and he isn't even really that popular. Lavi is a supporting character in this adventure anime and places maybe second or third in popularity following Allen Walker or even Kanda. But nothing at all will change the fact that it was because of Lavi that I even considered watching D.Gray-man at all.

I wasn't very aware of the story of D.Gray-man and I could really care less about the too-nice Allen Walker and his tragic past and his curse and his "wah-wah, Shishou is an ass but he taught me how to use my weapon" sob story. Okay, so he's never really sobbing and instead just radiates a very evil, akuma worthy aura; but I paraphrase.

Anyway, for the first thirteen episodes of D.Gray-man, I crunched until the beloved voice of my Suzuken-sama could be heard -- for the first time in episode twelve at the very, very end. I was a very happy fangirl.

(I would like to emphasize at this time that after watching twenty episodes of this series, I grew to love it and all the other characters. D.Gray-man, for me, is no longer only about Kenichi Suzumura's voice. Oh yeah and Allen-kun has grown quite well and somehow I feel that after his little transition, he's a bit more mature and a bit... hotter? Makes me almost wanna pull a Road Camelot on him... almost, but not quite there. -_- Again with those traitorous feelings.)

But I digress... Lavi's character design and character biography was very agreeable in terms of my likes and dislikes. I knew that I would fall for Lavi before he even showed up in the series, and when he finally did... well, I swooned.

As far as character goes, Lavi is a pretty ideal hero. He's highly intelligent, has an outstanding memory like a recorder, and he's a strong warrior as an exorcist. Although his involvement with the Bookman clan calls for complete detachment from personal emotions, his tendencies to cherish his friends of the Dark Order can be very endearing, especially the extra care and kindness he sets into watching over the welfare of Allen, Lenalee, and even Krory. His somewhat one-sided closeness to Kanda is adorable, always addressing the latter as though they've always been best friends even though Kanda seems quite indifferent.

Voiced by Suzuken, Lavi's character is brought about with all the playfulness, wisdom, optimism, experience, and distress and caring that makes Lavi so likeable as he develops throughout the series. Through Lavi, I've discovered that Suzuken has some of the most adorable vocal gestures in his laughing, his snickering, his scoffing, his teasing voice, and even his sighs and breaths of relief.

And now as a new climax of the storyline is taking place, Lavi's character is revealed to have a darker personality in the past that I have yet to see for myself. This detail in itself turns Lavi from a simple sidekick supporting character into one with more depth than expected. I look forward to seeing this new development even if it's a small one; although even without an intriguing past, Lavi has always proven to be a very well-rounded character. After all, as Renge-sama of Ouran fame has mentioned, women can be suckers for the traumas of men. Having a shadowy past can make such a likable character even more irresistable.



Zack Fair -- Final Fantasy VII

I'm actually an avid Cloud Strife fan (he who is voiced by Takahiro Sakurai who has partnered with Suzuken on many occasions in other anime). Cloud is especially hot in Advent Children. And who wouldn't love Cloud Strife? He's very hot, he's very reluctantly heroic, he's very mysterious, he's very aloof, and he is extremely meloncholic. I'm not being sarcastic at all. Each and every one of these qualities, while annoying and aggravating for most men, are absolutely attractive for Cloud Strife. He's wonderful! I'm in love with him. Having a tousled head of blonde hair and an outstanding cape/jacket-completely black outfit makes him even more delectable.

BUT... I digress. This post is about Kenichi Suzumura and not Cloud Strife.

Suzuken's role in the Final Fantasy VII franchise is none other than the great Zack Fair, who had absolutely little to no screen time in the excellently produced CG movie Advent Children. Imagine my fangirl surprise and excitement when I realized that Suzuken was actually featured in one of my all-time favorite animated movies -- I had no idea that he even participated in it until one day when I was browsing his info page on wikipedia (probably for the thirtieth time... and here I redeem myself as a Suzuken fangirl).

And then imagine my ecstasy when I found Last Order to be exclusively a retelling of certain parts of the FFVII game when Zack Fair was the hero and poor Cloud was merely a catatonic blur.

Somehow, I never really pictured Zack Fair with the boyish, cool, smooth voice of Kenichi Suzumura. His looks and his background as a SOLDIER gave off a rougher appearance than the voice of Suzuken would suggest. And yet, while watching Last Order, I somehow became able to grasp the connection between voice and person. Suzuken was able to make it happen, getting rid of that playfulness, preachiness, and boyishness that some of his other characters have. With Zack Fair, he presented a voice with coolness, smugness, authority, and quite the manliness as well. He brought Zack Fair to life like no one else could. It was wonderful and I found myself wishing that he hadn't died so early on in the storyline.

Zack Fair is somewhat of a tough guy and I had a great time watching an OVA dedicated solely to him. It was great how he had so easily taken on the duty of watching over cloud, saving Tifa's life, and sacrificing himself to save Cloud.

Though a small role, I believe that this is one of Suzuken's best. In full, he was able to bring out the entirety of Zack Fair's person within the few seconds of his screen time in Advent Children coupled with the twenty-minute time frame of Last Order.

***

While these aren't the only Suzuken roles I've been exposed to, these are the particular ones that I actually liked. Others I've seen include Kairi Okayasu from Peach Girl, Ayumu Narumi from Spiral, and Ginshu from Amatsuki. Others I've caught snippets of, but haven't exactly seen the entirety of the series to judge the character. But none of them have been able to stand out like the aforementioned four roles I've talked about.

In the near future, my goal is to completely review each and every one of the Suzuken roles (yes, this is how much I like this guy) and decide for myself which of his voice roles I like the most. Some of his roles, I have some reservations about watching because of negative reviews (about the character alone and not of Suzuken's participation, thankfully).

Shinn Asuka is known as the worst possible main protagonist in Gundam history and the most disliked Suzuken role mainly because the character is highly detestable as a person.

On the other hand, I've read good news about Isumi Shinichiro from Hikaru no Go and have already taken a liking to him. I've been exposed to Mikiya Kokuto of the Kara no Kyoukai storyline and found him to be rather likable, though since he was pretty much unconscious during the majority of the first movie, I have little to say about him.



Kenichi Suzumura is undoubtedly an amazing seiyu, bringing a wide variety of characters to each of his voice roles. He is capable of playfulness, charm, coolness, wisdom, and can voice immensely realistic emotion in his characters. Aside from that, his voice is absolutely attractive and sexy. There's this IT factor that make for well-liked actors, singers, and all sorts of performers. As a seiyu, Suzuken definitely has that very IT factor that makes him so charming with just a simple voice role.

And so with this, the mere Part 1, of my "Suzuken-sama Worship" concludes with the promise of a follow-up post when I feel I have more new knowledge and opinions to share.

Fangirl-ing Suzuken-sama is indeed fun. Even though some of his roles aren't my absolute favorite within the anime/movie/storyline itself, there is no doubt that he is my absolute favorite male seiyu.