Anime Review: Kara no Kyoukai

Anime is a very diverse medium. One second you could be watching a comedy that makes you laugh for days, the next minute you could be watching a drama that breaks your heart, the next you could be watching an intense action anime with a high amount of violence, and the next you could be watching a touching romance anime. This is what differentiates anime from most other mediums, due to the different aspects it can get away with. Every once in a while, though, there comes an anime that manages to combine a lot of genres with fluidity and grace, weaving together a complicated story and interesting characters that are entertaining to watch; but, these are hard to come by. When I first heard of Kara no Kyoukai, an anime movie series based off of light novels produced by Type-Moon (who, by the way, are responsible for the Fate franchise), I thought they would fit the bill quite nicely. Sit back, relax, and read on as I review Kara no Kyoukai.

The Setup/Order Guide:

Kara no Kyoukai’s setup is a strange beast. It’s a series consisting of seven movies, each with its own plot and separate characters (with the exception of 3 continuous characters). The movies take place between the years of 1995-1999, following the characters Shiki, Mikiya, and Touko, and that’s all you need to know about that. I went into these movies pretty much blindly, and in all honesty I think that’s the best way to watch them. A lot of people wonder about whether or not they should watch this in release order, or in chronological order. I personally think you should watch them out of order for reasons that will be explained in the story section, but for those rebels who want to watch them in chronological order, it goes Movie 2, 4, 3, 1, 5, 6, and finally 7. There’s also the epilogue for those who want to see the full conclusion, but I haven’t seen it and don’t think it’s truly necessary considering the masterful conclusion that is the seventh movie, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

The movies are told out of order

The Characters:

I believe the characters to actually be the weakest aspect of Kara no Kyoukai. Not to say that they’re bad, but the only two who really developed throughout the series are Mikiya and Shiki. Mikiya is kind of your standard protagonist, and there wasn’t anything truly special about him. He’s kind, idealistic, and a bit reckless, which lands him in a lot of trouble due to the dark nature of the show. He’s also the most grounded character in the entire series, without anything relatively supernatural about him. I suppose one could argue that provides a juxtaposition towards the dark supernatural world of Kara no Kyoukai and Shiki for that matter, but I do wish he was a little more interesting. Well, with the exception of the seventh movie, but there will be no spoilers here. Next, and probably the most famous character from Kara no Kyoukai, Shiki. She is the best character of the series, hands down. She’s just so intriguing, and mysterious, which is unfortunately where I have to stop due to spoilers, because talking about what makes her character great would literally spoil the entire series. Next, there’s Touko, who’s my second favorite character and who I wish would’ve gotten more focus. She’s a magus who’s basically Mikiya and Shiki’s guide to the supernatural world, and has a very straight-to-the-point personality. She seems to be the most upbeat and lax character in the entire series, but she’s shown to also be very wise and all knowing. As for the other characters, they weren’t bad, but not all were the most memorable, especially near the beginning of the series in the first and second movies. The honorable mentions are Fujino, a girl with a very tragic and unsettling story in the third movie; Azaka, Mikiya’s annoying younger sister who had absolutely no place in the story and made movie 6 feel like filler; Tomoe, who’s only present in movie 5 and is one of more fascinating characters of the series; and Lio Shirazumi, the villain of the seventh movie, who’s probably the best villain I’ve seen in quite some time. Everyone else was either generic or not very memorable, especially the main villains of movie 5. I’m sorry, Arya and Alba just weren’t very interesting to me, especially Arya, who is literally a textbook generic villain. They tried to make him deep by giving him long and confusing monologues, but that’s all they were: long and confusing. This is especially strange, considering the fantastic villains of the Fate franchise (with Kirei still being my favorite), but I guess nobody’s perfect. So, overall, the characters were above average for the most part, but there are quite a few setbacks in this category.

From left to right: Touko, Mikiya, Shiki

The Story:

As I stated earlier, I believe that you should watch these movies in their release order. Why is this, you may ask? It’s because the story is meant to be told that way. The entire point of Kara no Kyoukai’s story is to piece together the mystery. Movie 1, which is set in the middle of the timeline, is meant to get you interested into the story by showing you future events, and you as the viewer will most likely want to know how the story got there. It’s a perfect balance of showing and not outright telling you what you’ve gotten yourself into. It’s the same psychology as Baccano!: they show you those opening spoilers so you’ll want to know how it got there. Movie 2 establishes the main characters of Mikiya and Shiki, so you learn the foundations of the series, but leaves enough open so that you want to know what happens next. Movie 3 gives you more clues, Movie 4 solidifies the timeline, and then movies 5, 6, and 7 are told in order because you know enough information to continue from there. For those of you who saw Kara no Kyoukai, think about it; would the story have interested you enough if you watched it in chronological order, if you watched it in release order? Think about it.

I believe release order makes the story more interesting

Pretentiousness:

Normally I don’t like making a separate section discussing the themes of a particular piece of entertainment, but this is a special case, mainly because one of the most popular complaints against Kara no Kyoukai is the fact that it’s “pretentious”; in other words, tries to display deeper themes and philosophy when it doesn’t have the capacity to do so, and comes off as not knowing what it’s talking about. To this, I say; yes, some aspects about it are pretentious. The dialogue, for one thing, can be very pretentious at times. It almost always tries to dump exposition on you, uses big words and complicated phrases that mean nothing in the long run, and every three sentences tries to get you to think about something deeper that has no meaning to the actual progression of anything. This was something I did have a problem with, but in the end it was made up for. How? Movie 7, that’s how. In Movie 7, the main theme that ties everything together would be the true nature of humans: are we truly savages just like animals in the wild, or can we surpass these instincts and prove ourselves different? This theme is displayed through the characters of Lio Shirazumi and Shiki (which, by the way, is what made me really like her character). I’m not going to spoil anything, but I might make a QuickThoughts video about it in the future, as I find it fascinating and is what really ties together all the movies. Of course, there are other themes too, like Love, Betrayal, Is it morally right to kill someone?, etcetera, but none are nearly as powerful. That’s why I believe Kara no Kyoukai to not be pretentious, but a series that uses the supernatural to make a commentary on the state of human beings, as the theme is tied into the plot better than I’ve seen anywhere else in an anime of this nature, which is saying a lot.

A lot of the dialogue is pretentious, but the story does contain some legitimately deep ideas and concepts

The Animation/Sound:

This part is flawless. Seriously. Studio ufotable knows what the heck they’re doing whenever they animate a project. Everything looks fluid, the lighting is amazing the action scenes are a sight to behold, and the Type-Moon character designs are just as good as they’ll ever be. The music, which was composed by Yuki Kajura, is probably her best work yet. There are so many memorable tracks on this OST that it’s become one of my favorites, right alongside Baccano!, Durarara!!, and Trigun. It creates a wonderful atmosphere, and combined with the beautiful animation creates a perfect presentation. There is, unfortunately, no English dub, but the Japanese is very well-acted, especially Shiki's seiyuu.

OST Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB_ltsS9w4c&index=1&list=PLdoRxZOzppokjHQbQ0UdIuNA9eODDu-DK

The animation is gorgeous 

Final Judgment:

Overall, while I did have my issues with it, I believe Kara no Kyoukai is wonderful, and perfect if you’re looking for something dark yet beautiful. However, do not watch it if you’re sensitive to blood, violence, and darker elements that are almost never present in an anime. I give the Kara no Kyoukai series an overall 4 out of 5, and a recommendation to watch it if only to get to the seventh movie, which deserves an honorable mention, as it has become one of my favorite anime movies period. But, like always, it’s up to you to decide your own opinions.
ScoreCard: 

Further Recommendations:

Fate/Zero

Another Type-Moon anime, these two both share the problem of pretentious dialogue, but overall Fate/Zero is a lot easier to follow and explores different themes and ideologies. It also has more action and a better cast of characters.

Tsukihime

It’s another Type-Moon anime, but I don’t know much about it. Go watch it and tell me how it is. It sounds relatively similar to KnK, though.

The next review will be on a book about Native Americans.