Let's us head back to the early 2010's. After the sucess of Garo's first major motion picture Red requiem which lead to a sequel series seeing much of the original cast return after nearly 5 years. Makai senki seemed to do well enough to allow for more content going into the future. But Makai senki and its epilogue film, Soukoku no Maryu were the end of an era. as Garo's main star, Ryosei Konishi was stepping down from his role as the titular knight, Kouga Saejima. While the series wasn't called Garo knight Saejima. Ryosei had played the title role for nearly a half a decade, so replacing him was going to be a difficult task. So the decision was made that the next story in the Garo universe was going to be set in the far future after Kouga Saejima passed the blade and armor onto a new generation and to begin a new generation of Garo, unfortuneatly for many the new genration was not of to a good start. Yami o Terasu Mono is often viewed as the black sheep of the franchise, the one series that does not measure up to the rest of the franchise up to that point, it was not also helped by the fact that the franchises original creator, Keita Amemiya had nothing to do with this new entry, being busy with the art and character design for the next Shin Megami Tensei title, SMT IV. Leaving much of the work to head writer Itaru Era and director Makoto Yokoyama, so you likely had some of those annoying fans claiming that the series is only good with the guiding hand of its creator and couldn't be done well by others. But nearly 8 years after its original t.v run, is Yami o terasu mono still worth the hate many aimed at it back in 2013.
SYNOPSIS
An undisclosed time into Garo's future, the golden armor has founds it way to a new wielder, Ryuga Godai, but time has not been kind to the armor as its golden sheen has given way to the color black after all this time and a less than talkative Zaruba. Ryuga had been a Nomadic knight traveling from place to place dealing with their Horror troubles before recieving a call to head to the "paradise" of vol city, a utopia where the cost of living is low, school and healthcare is free and you probably are already calling Bullshit that anyplace could be this awesome. As shocker, the city is a haven of horrors feeding off of the unknowing population. Ryuga learns he will be working under Makai priest Burai whom he has a strained relationship, and working with Burai's adopted daughter Rian, and two fellow makai knights, Takeru Jakuzure, the womanizing hot-blooded flame sword knight Zen and Aguri Kusugami, the cold, calculated Sky bow knight Gai. Together they must stop the threat of a new kind of horror and the conspiracy within Vol city."
Now for those who felt that Garo's episodic nature was an issue, I have...semi good news in that yami o terasu mono is much more serialized and does better to fit it across the shows 25 episode run compared to Makai no hana or the original series. I say semi good news because its story has issues to say the least. While their is more story but their is an issue of characters, with less of the one-off episodes it leaves less time for character development for some characters and well, some of them are not likeable, speaking of that."
CHARACTERS
Let's get this out of the way, Ryuga is not given one of the best introductions to a character. As his first action after his monologue about how he claimed the armor and why he fights (According to the episode he merely pulled the garo-ken out of a stone which ends up being contradicted by Makai no hana.) And him attacking a bride at a crowded party. Yeah its a horror but to people just coming in he looks like an insane sociopath killing people, and he also ends up wanted because you know... he murdered someone in plain sight. he then proceeds to spend the rest of the opening episode being an arrogant, whiny jerk who really has no right to bear the title of Garo. Granted its clear they are trying to set up a character arc for him, what with the armor not being fully restored, Zaruba not even talking to him is that over the course of the story, he will have to grow into being worthy of the armor, and here's the thing, the idea of him is not bad, his personality does well to contrast with Kouga who was his predecessor series wise, far more emotive, can crack a smile, but clearly a bit hot blooded to cause him to clash with others, heck even the following episode does give some reason for his attitude around Burai which I will get to my issues with him when we do talk about him. but for much of the about 3/4's of the season, I really couldn't stand him, I mentioned how much of a dumbass he was in how he handled the first horror threat we see him tackle and he spends much of the series kind of an ass, its only when his mother is revealed to be alive and the two meet again do I start to turn my feelings around on him, but thats the last 4th of it, so for 75% of the season I couldn't stand Ryuga.
Our new Garo ladies and Gentleman, now smiling and a few less brain cells.
Which also wasn't helped that his two fellow knights upon introduction give off more chraisma than him helped by the fact that they are played by actors i have seen and already like. Takeru is probably the character that I liked the most, but he is kind of treated as the butt-monkey and kind of only gets a side-story to his name. But Junya Ikeda's performance as him makes instantly likeable even if he doesn't have much story or backstory which is more than I can say for Agri who...has none of those things and is just there to come up with plans and shoot arrows. Sorry Tsunenori Aoki, but hey, after this show ends you have another toku gig that has you as a far more interesting character.
Rian does get more backstory than the other knights and she has some really good moments throughout the show's run, if they were wanting a character who would be different for Kaoru, she does a really good job being the badass priest that can stand alongside the other guys, even if she also ends up being the damsel a few time, most notably near the end, like Takeru I instantly liked her from the start which really can't be said about her adopted father.
A rather apt description of what Aguri is through most of this show.
Burai, oh Burai, where do I start with you. So, remember how Ryuga made such a terrible first impression because of his rather jerkass, arrogant behavior. Well its all this guy's fault because he thought the best way for him to train was to leave him alone on an island and had him fight his only companion being a madou dog and after his training was done, just revealed "Hey, by the way, your Mom, the person who is the reason you are doing this...yeah she is dead." Guardian of the year ladies and gentleman, way to let him know about the loss of his only family member while he was training and given no means of seeing her off at her funeral. So questions, why was he not training him with other knights in trainings, we know dojo's exist to train the future generation, and for those who think that since Garo is a special case it needs special training, well guess what Makai no Hana gives a better explaination on how one becomes Garo. Heck why not keep him closer so he can be around people, its not like he was against having people around, in the bonus prologue episode that aired at the end of the seasons show he was caring for Rian since her childhood. I know I have been on this, but their is not much about his character, he is your gruff, serious mentor and that kind of goes for most of the cast is that they fit into overly done tropes, the rebellious idiot, the happy go lucky guy, the smug smart guy, the badass chick and the gruff commissoner and or mentor. Stuff that has never been felt in other series.
It also applies to the villains, their not bad, but I never felt a legitimate threat, I noticed that most of the time the reason that they get some legs up, is that the heroes (mostly Ryuga) does something dumb to give them that leg up. While Kaneshiro is actually a decent twist villain who was capable of fooling the heroes through most of the season, once its revealed that he has been behind everything, he just becomes a smug, smarmy little prick who ends up being thrown out as the bigger threat of Zedom.
Best girl about to go to work
But arguably the better story that comes out of the villains is that Captain of the SG-1 (no really, they went with that) Enhou, who initally starts out as a standard captain trying to keep peace and being against Ryuga, but as the episodes go by, she becomes aware of what is truly going on around her and it begins to come around to him, and their is her relationship with Rian which is actually some of the more human moments, I've heard people say her acting is not the best but it makes sense from the way she is meant to be this stoic person and we do see cracks in it. Her early arc is one of the highlights of the rather frustrating early portion of the series and something I don't want to spoil for people because it is actaully quite tragic.
AESTHETICS
Alright, its time to get the big elephant in the room about Yami, the one thing that many people says ruin the whole thing for most people, the suit fights, because Yami decides to completely forgoes the physical suits and makes them entirely CG. Now that's not to say that their are no physical fights but when they transform its CGI. CGI had been used throughout Garo beforehand and its quality has...varied to say the least, but here it is on full display during these scenes and it has not aged well and in a way, the suit fights don't feel as special because instead of making the most out of the confines of the budget to bring life, we have gone to the computers for the scenes, granted they are mostly last resorts and only ever show up near the end.
All the armored fight scenes are CG...whether its a good thing or bad thing is up to you
But despite that, the fight choreography is still well done throughout the show for the live action portions, there are the exceptions though, the first episode does not inspire confidence (you notice how I keep bringing it up in a negative light.) Plus one of the climatic fights that takes place on two moving cars that really has no reason to take place on top of the cars since its not a chase scene and was mostly done because it looked cool.
The horrors...are a major letdown. so remember how I said that all of the suit fights were CGI, well that also applies to the horrors as well, almost all of them are CGI and instead of modelling a unique look for most of them, they give inga horrors this cg mouth thing that doesn't make me think of horrors, but aliens or demons from other series. Meanwhile Madou horrors have similar designs outside of the generals of the group. It just feels like most horrors are mooks, nothing special about them and that further makes the end coup de grace of the makai armors feel less impactful because of it.
The Madou horrors, how each of them looks with slight variance
Even the music itself is not up to snuff, the inital opening theme just keeps blaring at you with no kind of slower bits and the big Jam project feels generic in comparison with the original or the follow up Makai no hana, their okay but again nothing special.
FAVORITE/LEAST FAVORITE EPISODES
Least Favorite, episode 1: As I have stated before, the first episode might be one of the worst opening episodes that I have seen for any show, the action is not well shot, Ryuga comes off as an arrogant, jerkoff idiot who has no right bearing the armor and starting in media res in an attempt to build mystery, only makes Ryuga come off like a bigger idiot to us.
Favorite, 4-5: The first good episodes of the show do show major improvement over the first 3, their are some really cool cinematography going on in this episode and giving us a major outsider look through Enhou would've been interesting, even if it doesn't last, what she goes through is a sign of consequences of getting those involve from the outside.
Worst, 15: Okay this is technically a clip show, but its the fact that this clip show, you know the portion of the show that recaps what has happened before in order to save budget, contains key character moments for Ryuga and by extension Rian, and they decide to put it in a clipshow, something no one watches and by extension locking decent character development behind.
Favorite: Episode 10, now one of the issues regarding Enhou becoming a Madou horror is that it kind of wastes the outsider view that the series has going for it, while this is the only real episode that gives us that following Enhou's madou transformation, it does well to show how the city views Ryoga especially with how the world views him following the previous episodes.
Oh hey Mitchy, took the exchange program from Zawame to Vol city I see
CONCLUSION
On its own, Yami o Terasu Mono is a perfectly fine, if at times frustrating series that has moments of brilliance, some decent characters, fine actions and decent villains. It just has one issue, it has the Garo name attached to it. I can applaud the teams attempt at trying to do something different from the past two seasons like having a much more serialized story. But at the same time, it feels like they tried too hard to deviate from what had worked before hand to stand on its own and its suffers for it. I don't like most of the main cast or don't remember. The villains are weak and it don't matter once the climax hit and our giant CGI final boss shows up and while the aesthetic and fight choreography is still solid, the loss of the Garo suits real use in favor of CGI hurts more than it helps. My comment about it having the issue of being a Garo series might seem odd, but it hurts it. People had expectations for Garo, its first two seasons are very well beloved (I have watched the first season but not Makai senki at the time of its writing). The original, while having issues and some dated CGI use still feels special and has characters that I still remember, even Makai no hana for its own issues with characters has episodes that I am going to remeber, the horror movie episode, the thrill ride, the house horror, it may not have the story but by the gods, its episodes are memorable." Yami o Terasu Mono has its moments, but they never feel as special or as awesome as what came or what comes after it. As a tokusatsu on its own, it a perfectly average show that has moments of brilliance, but as a Garo series, its a little disappointing. Its still worth watching and as stated it does get better in its last 4th and you may find something that I and many others likely didn't. But as a show, I didn't like a lot of it. Again, not a bad show, just not a good Garo Series.
FINAL GRADE: D
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