.Hack//Legend Of The Twilight (graphic novels and DVD vol.1)
(Yes, that cover is signed by VA Bryce Papenbrook himself. =D)
“Legend”-ary or just wasted space on Barnes and Noble’s shelves?
Los Angeles based punk-rock group, Bad Religion’s song “I Love My Computer” has never felt more at home than in the series known as “. Hack (Dot Hack)”. The bare basics of .Hack is that in the series, a new online RPG (Role Playing Game) called “The World” is released and is a hit among the masses of gamers everywhere. The only problem is that the game is sometimes too realistic and dying in the game means you could fall into a coma in reality. Which is where the series starts getting complicated. The .Hack franchise has spawned four games, three anime series and three manga (graphic novels) series.
The series I am reviewing here is the third “.Hack” anime series and the first “.Hack” manga series, which is called “.Hack//Legend Of The Twilight”. TokyoPop publishes this series in the U.S. and Bandai Entertainment releases the games and anime. This series is about two twins named Shugo (Shu-go) and Rena (ray-na) who win a contest that organized by the makers of the game, CC Corporation. Their prize is that they use the avatars, or in this case, character likeness of the legendary “Dot Hackers” Kite and BlackRose, The mysterious characters that solved “The World’s first mystery. While playing the game, a powerful monster starts attacking both Shugo and Rena. While trying to protect his sister, Shugo’s character dies. About an estimated minute later, a girl in white named Aura resurrects him and gives him “Kite’s Bracelet”, a powerful weapon that can change any monster’s computer data. Before she leaves, she tells Shugo that he is the “chosen one” the “one carry on the legend of the Dot Hackers”. Shugo then comes back to life and continues playing where he left off. That pretty much sums up the intro to the series. The rest of story involves them and their friends trying to solve the new mystery of “The World”.
The drawing in this series is very detailed and well done. The artist also shades in the characters well enough so that it looks like a colored page that was printed out of a printer with only black ink, like the ones at school. The artist also does a great job at coloring the characters for the cover or the color inserts, which are in Volume 3. All in all, like most mangas the drawing is excellent.
The script for is good and funny at times but the lettering sometimes throws the words out of context. An example of this is in the first book’s intro, where an “o” looks like an “a”. Sometimes the script is written to break “the fourth wall”, or the wall between the viewers and the TV. Examples of this are the show’s characters realizing that they are on T.V. and start talking to the audience or talking about the show’s production, scheduling etc. Shows that have done this are Warner Bros. animated series, “Animaniacs”. A cartoon that poked fun at entertainment with quotes like “[Steven] Spielberg eats this [philosophical] stuff up.” Another show that has done this is Boston Legal, a dramedy (Comedy-Drama) about lawyers in Boston, Mass. In one of their episodes, James Spader and William Shatner’s characters discussed the show’s scheduling and the “Sweeps” (I don’t know what that means either). Anyways back on topic, Dot Hack has one of the main characters say about their female friend, “She does know that we’re the heroes in this Manga, Right?”
The story is well developed as the characters reveal more about themselves throughout the series and the readers get to watch them grow. The characters also have realistic emotions about what happens as well. The only downsides to this series are its price and companion anime. The individual of all three books are $9.99, times that by three and you get the price ($29.97) of an average “Game Boy” game or a cheap “GameCube” game (Author’s note: I stink at math, Please don’t flame me if that’s not entirely correct).
The anime while not completely abysmal isn’t as good as the books are. This is because they changed the storyline for the anime come episode 5, where Rena dies and gets resurrected in another dimension of “The World” while in a coma in reality. This adds another objective for Shugo and his friends to do besides solving “The World” ‘s new mystery. The anime also starts off with a miscellaneous player dying in the game and losing consciousness in reality, in contrast with the manga that immediately introduces you to the main characters. In the anime version, Shugo and Rena’s parents are also divorced; this is not mentioned in the manga. Another point that Bandai USA screwed up on was that the main and some of the major characters have irritatingly grating voices. Some of Bandai’s scripting for the English dub was also dumb as well with some of the really touching scenes in the series destroyed by some pointless quotes and dumb jokes. The basic point here is that the only similarity between the manga and anime is the emotional content and the fact that they both have the same series name. The bottom line is also that the books are better than the anime. Which seems odd when series like “Azumanga Daioh” and “Naruto” follow their animes almost intently and are also at the same quality as their respective animes.
It should also be noted that .Hack// Legend Of The Twilight could be categorized in the same “Action/Comedy” genre as the anime “Full Metal Panic”. This is because while .Hack also has the “Fantasy” genre going for it, both “.Hack” and “Full Metal Panic” have an excellent equilibrium for serious “action-packed” scenes and comedic/slapstick scenes.
O.K. rating time! I give the .Hack//Legend Of The Twilight manga a 9 and the .Hack//Legend Of The Twilight anime an 8. This is because while both the anime and manga are good in there own perspectives, it really wasn’t a good idea to give both a different story to follow because that just confuses the actual story of the series.
RT Gomer Productions 