#marsred

Early twentieth century, Japan - the flowering era of Taisho influenced by Romanticism. As the nation prospered in modernization, some species were outcasted and stood at the crossroads of their lives.

They were - vampires. 

Although they possessed superhuman physical abilities, they would burn under the sun and only lived off of blood. They suffered from having keen senses, and most of them could not adjust to their eternal life. 

Thus - they were vulnerable species. 

This is a story about a young man named Yatsufusa, who became a vampire against his will and seeks the meaning of life as he encounters different people and species surrounding him.

I'm here with a review of MARS RED: Edge of the Nightmare, a new mobile visual novel game inspired by the anime that's 280k words of exclusive content written by Bun-o Fujisawa! This is a mystery/adventure F2P visual novel mobile game produced by the MARS RED Production Committee, D-techno, and Favary Inc., and doesn’t require any previous knowledge of the play or anime to enjoy!

After taking weeks to finish watching <Mars Red>, I've finally finished this tormenting anime the day before yesterday. I was glad that I didn't straight away believe bad reviews I've happened to read somewhere online beforehand. From its first five minutes, I've already engrossed with the opening theme and the cinematography it applied through the anime.

Unusually, it used movie-like cinematography. The 2.35:1 scope has already intrigued my curiosity because <Mars Red> is the first anime that I've watched with such screen size. Automatically, I doubted if I could maintain watching it till the end because I'm not the type to watch anime movie (unless the movie is super melancholic).

The first episode began rather slow. I could yawn at first. But honestly, I was hugely wrong as I thought it was boring me out. In fact, <Mars Red> was a masterpiece! The plot flowed not slowly, but to be more precise, it slowly burned me down.

I'm sorry if this contains spoilers. But it's so good that I can't help myself but to expose things!

There are many things I love about this anime. The cinematography is one thing. The best part is the plot. It portrayed how bad the world these characters lived in, plus the historical background and setting through the anime added on the tense. Everyone knew how less complicated our technology was hundred years ago, but <Mars Red> excellently showed the ability of those soldiers and personnel strived for winning the war despite the lack of technology usages.

Beside the plot, the personality of each of the characters played their role finely. I love how <Mars Red> showed Maeda Yoshinobu's cause of sadness and sorrow, the lost of his beloved ones, and how the world began and ended for himself. His naturally stern face could hide his real emotion, yet only those closest to him could figure out his overwhelming frustration. Even though he was anguished by those hurtful incident he witnessed with his own eyes, he kept on moving.

This was the unit Maeda worked with - Code Zero consisted of capable vampires. Maeda was the only human (of course the others were initially humans too) but he never planned on killing any of them. In fact, he believed in the unit's ability to solve the elevating numbers of vampires throughout Japan, therefore he trained them in combat and stuffs (this didn't show much in anime but judging from his reliability, I knew he did).

Another interesting characters in <Mars Red> are these vampires.

Suwa was the oldest vampire. He wore a mask because it was said to control himself from lashing out too much power, but I never saw him going on berserk (There was one scene that he could barely control his movement once the mask detached from him). His life experience was his best teacher, which explained why he tried not to get too close to anyone. His failed romanticized relationship told <Mars Red> viewers that vampire - human relationship wouldn't make it, and this drove him to have one with a vampire instead.

Nevertheless, Kurusu Shuutaro's romance surpassed that bad dream of Suwa. Kurusu was a powerful A-class vampire, who loved Shirase Aoi. Due to a logic agreement with Maeda, he declared himself as dead since he has contracted as a vampire, yet he kept on stumbling at Aoi's whereabouts. Despite being aware of his vampire-ness, he was the one who didn't drink blood, which lessened his strength by time. After Aoi was revealed about his condition, Aoi gave him her blood so that he could replenish his strength and fight against other insane vampires.

All right, I've become too focus on the characters.

The soundtracks really gave me goose bumps. The sound contradicted in that one battle between Kurusu and Maeda, which I found it fascinating. Shonen anime lovers must have known how the music was played when main leads fighting against each other, but the paradox music was beautifully engraved through that last episode. It portrayed Maeda's climax of devastation and yearn to meet that particular someone, and at the same time Kurusu craving for Maeda's recognition and acknowledgment.

Other than that, the opening theme is a heart capture. I kept on humming the melody while driving, and I've already added it into my list of Jpop song. I've always heard Wagakki Band but I had no idea how their songs are. <Aria of Life> practically summarized the lamentation of <Mars Red> characters have endured. Please try listening to it on Youtube Music.