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Rating: Can poetry be made using images instead of words? From my point of view, Shingo Araki and Michi Himeno somehow succeeded in doing so. I would count them among the poetic singers of beauty, perhaps minor poets, but with their work, they help others to understand and savor it better than they could with their own senses. What the two animators have sung about is the beauty and elegance of the human body. They interpreted it. They were probably pioneers in Japanese animation in the use of exaggerated perspectives, kinetic lines, and wide angles for a better rendering of the plastic gestures of their characters. They were among the first to adopt particular stylistic solutions such as strange hair colors (green, blue...). With their style, they contributed more than anyone else, perhaps, to defining one of the most famous elements of old-style Japanese animation: the eyes, the gaze. But all these things, in their most beautiful works, were used with a unique class and measure.
Their work, for better or worse, depending on the viewpoints, significantly influenced the collective imagination of the generations who grew up in the last decades of the past century. It would be superfluous to mention Goldrake, Rocky Joe, Knights of the Zodiac... in sum, a lot of stuff.
...and Lady Oscar.
This cannot certainly be considered a review: A review proposes, advises, informs. In this case, there is nothing to be proposed to someone, no one to be advised or informed. This is just my personal appreciation of what I consider one of the most beautiful animated series, if not the most beautiful of all. Certainly, it is among those characterized by a distinctly high average quality of graphic rendering. Those with some familiarity with old anime series know that in long-running productions (over 20 episodes), to reduce time and costs, only some episodes were made with a certain care, usually the first, the last ones, and some significant episodes in between, while the others left quite a bit to be desired graphically. Whenever recently I've happened to glance at an episode of this series available on the tube, I have always been amazed by the graphic rendering, always high-level. And my eye today, worn in the past by hours of anime and trained by years of raids on comic book pages, is a very harsh judge, not many of the series I have fond memories of passed its examination.
The pencils of Araki and Himeno seem to have danced on the page while creating looks, faces, horses, carriages, and the rich with uniforms and hair. I have also read the manga in the past, and I can say there is no comparison; the characterizations by the two animators gave the characters a life of their own compared to the manga, and decidedly more charm. Their physical change throughout the story was also particularly curated.
It is also one of the most innovative animated series. Solutions were used like dividing the frame into comic-style quadrants (like the image I used) to tell the same scene from different viewpoints simultaneously. Honestly, I don't remember similar things in other series, at least not realized as well.
I have much to say about the story, but I’ll spare practically everything for those who will want to read this. I’ll just say that I have always been struck by the particular way the relationships between the main characters develop, especially in the second part of the series, particularly the one between Oscar and Marie Antoinette. The last episodes are then... I don’t know, maybe I’m of a tender heart and a melancholic soul... but I think they are one of the most beautiful things created in the field of animation.
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