The second, anime-exclusive arc (though again this is my first time experiencing the series anyway…) sees an expansion from Sand Land to Forest Land and introduces an “evil angel” to go along with series lead Beelzebub’s “nice demon” schtick and it works well. They also go from evil ruler of Sand Land to nice ruler of Forest Land, though he has been overthrown by the military, leading to a good old fashioned underground resistance story. Overall it was a fun watch, though I’m happy to see there won’t be any more after this, the setting and the characters already feel pretty thinly stretched… Let’s take a look!

Continue reading →

As a quick little break between older anime reviews I took a look at the adaptation of the sadly now late but certainly still great Akira Toriyama’s Sand Land over the last week or two, that’s the anime series that’s half a cut-up version of the film and half an original story, not the film adaptation or the video game adaptation… that’s a lot of adaptation for a short manga one-off from over 20 years ago! Anyway, these episodes are the film cut up into six with some added bits, but given I never watched the film it was all new to me (beyond a vague memory of having checked up about the manga online in some form or fashion over the years…) So let’s take a look!

Continue reading →