Opening Songs
OP 1 - Vanilla Sky (Mashiro Ayano)
Ending Songs
ED 1 - Mirai (GARNiDELIA)
Genre: Action, Science Fiction
Episodes: 12
Game to anime adaptations aren't always bad. They're always relegated to being trashy or inferior when compared to their original game counterparts, but sometimes that's not the case. Unfortunately for "Gunslinger Stratos"'s anime adaptation, it IS inferior to its game counterpart. Well, it may as well be, I'm not too sure about the game's story, but at least the game looks f**king great. The anime? Not so much. In the first place, basing an anime off a PVP based game isn't the best idea (remember "Blazblue"'s anime adaptation?), so "Gunslinger Stratos" had a disadvantage from the very start. There are some nice character designs here, but at the end of the day, that doesn't help too much when everything else just feels so...mediocre. Its a bland show most of the time, with very little going for it that's actually cool, interesting or exciting. Unless you're somehow a hardcore fan of the game, I'd say this is one that's completely skip-able.
 |
| Look's cool, its a shame that the anime is not. |
Its kind of a waste when the opening and ending themes to a mediocre anime are so good. The opening theme is "Vanilla Sky" by Mashiro Ayano and the ending theme is "Mirai" by GARNiDELIA. While "Vanilla Sky" is highly synth based/rock heavy and "Mirai" is a slower, more controlled song, both are amazing songs for an anime like "Gunslinger Stratos". Even the opening animation was cool as sh*t, it worked so well with the song.
Rating: 6.0/10
Cool character designs alone aren't really enough to save a show that doesn't do well in anything else. "Gunslinger Stratos"'s plot, story and battles SHOULD NOT have dragged into a 12 episode epic, IMO it would have worked as a 90 minute movie or something. There was simply not that much to work around with. While their designs are great, they are mostly BORING cardboard characters that...honestly want to make you cringe at times. Especially the main character....BOTH of him. The cooler and probably more interesting characters have little to no screen time so its really tough to actually connect yourself with the ENTIRE cast. Speaking of that, this is another one of those shows that suffers from a cast overload, half the time I don't know who's who and the lack of any meaningful explanation or introduction whatsoever really hurts the newcomers (like myself) who are actually trying to give a damn. The action scenes are alright at first, but they get old, really quickly. Because its always the same characters fighting with the same style. Nothing to see here, really.
 |
| Just. F**king. Shoot. |
Kazasumi Toru is...kind of a loser. He's gifted with the potential to become a really strong and successful person, but chooses to hold back because he wants to blend in with the sheep of society. Basically, even though he's really good, he chooses NOT to be because he doesn't want to get a whole lot of attention. Despite that, he's constantly under the attention of one of the prettiest girls in his school, Katagiri Kyoka, this leads him to be hounded by her brother and his aide, Kyoma and Shizune. One day, Toru sees the afterimage of a girl crying for help, and he cluelessly wanders after her, which leads to an event that changes his life forever. He is sucked into a battle against a parallel universe of similar beings, with the fate of the world behind all the fighting. He and Kyoka are brought into a battle unlike any other, and are forced to fight their parallel others in the other world...alongside many others.
"Gunslinger Stratos" isn't a show that's worth your time. There's not much reason to really go for this one unless you REALLY like the game. Newcomers should stay away, hell, even if you like the game, there's really not much of a reason for you to watch this one since you can get a much better experience from the game itself. Why the hell did you think I avoided "Blazblue Alter Memory"?
