Dance in the Vampire Bund (PG14)

Dance in the Vampire Bund

Storyline ***
Graphics ****
Character Structure ***
Soundtrack **
Entertainment ****

Oh boy do I have mixed feelings about this one. Just bear with me as I try to make this review linear and un-hypocritical. And to note, the picture to the left is from the manga. I was too lazy to find the anime-specific title poster.

To start, this is a lolicon show involving vampires and werewolves. The story centers around the vampire Mina Tepes who looks to be about twelve or even possibly younger. She is the vampire queen who has recently developed a 'bund' or a safe haven for vampires, especially the fangless (vampires who gave up their fangs to give up drinking blood, thus alienated from vampires and humans alike). With the help of a werewolf named Akira who has lost most of his memories, Mina brings her plan to have vampires thrive as civilized people to life. Many oppose her like the humans who have wealth and power and an organization by the name of Telomere.

There are only twelve episodes and the series ends on a cliffhanger. I suppose it's because of this that the show suffered a bit as far as the story progression went. This show lacked satire and was serious for most of it. And sadly, because the show's set up in a way where the timeline goes back and forth in a vast array of flashbacks and story reiteration, it was confusing to watch and keep up with. I don't suggest watching this in an extended period of time, I personally suggest doing it all in one sitting or two. Don't get me wrong, the story was interesting. The technique is what gave it its mediocre grade.

I've never really heard of the animation studio 'Shaft' before but after looking it up, I gotta say that this wasn't their first gorgeous anime. I personally didn't like the design of Mina Tepes, but they did a great job making her beautiful. She is shown in multitudes of outfits, all of which I thought were beautiful. The animation studio didn't skimp out on the outfit designs, always making sure they had much detail to them. The whole show had a very dramatic cinema feeling. The animation alone really made up for much of what was lacking in the show.

I have to admit that the characters lacked a bit. They all met the standard expectation of establishing a certain stereotype and keeping to their character. However, this -as usual- made the characters predictable. In rare cases, the characters did things that were a bit out of character and that just threw me, as the viewer, out of the loop and just made the story very confusing. Also, there were no real satirical characters. Everyone was quite serious all the time. The one time I can think that was funny was when Mina cooked. However, in a sense, even that was serious. But like I said, all the characters did what they needed to in order to get the story to move forward.

There is a great lack of soundtrack. It may have been because there were so many serious moments but I can't remember much of the soundtrack. There were a lot of dramatic eye scenes where they zoom in on the eye and you'd hear noise from the background or a monologue. There was no real music that brought the show alive. This show disappointed in the soundtrack department.

For a very 'serious' show, it was quite entertaining. It kept me at the edge of my seat most times and because it was so short, I didn't mind watching it. Many parts of it, like the soundtrack, the lack of character development, and confusing story should probably have made the overall entertainment rating drop down to three stars at best but I have to admit, I was truly entertained watching this. Again, it's a short anime so you shouldn't expect too much so I would suggest you watch this if you don't mind the lolicon genre. I say "if you don't mind" because the lolicon wasn't the biggest part of the show. It was barely ecchi at all. I think many would enjoy this show if they have a fascination towards vampires and werewolves.

On a random note, I hope I'm not the only one who noticed that Mina Tepes looks like Rachel Alucard from the game BlazBlue. I put the two pictures below so you can make judgement yourselves. They're both 'vampires' and they're both loli. They look so similar...
The left is Mina, the right is Rachel.