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ローゼンメイデン 
If you haven't seen this series in its Widescreen format, I think you should give it a try. Admittedly, episode 1 was higher in quality in comparison to the other episodes but the framing of the Widescreen version still makes the series look a lot better. If you're interested, take a look at the Widescreen version of the first episode. I've also created a screencaps comparison to show the two version side by side. There are certainly many details and tasteful framing missing from the pan and scan version of this series. Anyway, this episode is basically an adaptation of the fox spirit mini story and the Shiritori (word connecting game). It was a good decision to combine the two since the fox-spirit story was a bit short and will not be enough to make a full episode if it was adapted on its own.
Opening Theme: 「19才」- Juukyuu-sai (Widescreen Ver) by Suga Shikao - PSP format (MB) | AVI format (46MB)
Ending Theme: Reason by Fonogenico (Widescreen Ver) - PSP format (MB) | AVI format (10.8MB)
Brief summary:
The story begins with Watanuki and Himawari attending Doumeki's archery tournament. Despite having injured his arm, Doumeki manages to win the tournament. His winning arrow, however, is broken so he decides to chuck it into Watanuki's bag. On his way back from the tournament, Watanuki smells a pleasant scent coming from a corner of the street. When he follows the scent, he finds an Oden stall in the middle of nowhere. Much to Watanuki's surprise, the stall is also operated by a Fox-spirit and his son. Despite his initial shock, Watanuki agrees to come inside when the fox-spirit invites him to enjoy the special Oden that he makes. While Watanuki is eating, he realises that the son of the fox spirit is seen peeking through his bag. Watanuki is confused because all of the bento box have been eaten. He, however, realises that Doumeki has dump his broken arrow into his bag.
Watanuki is annoyed with Doumeki but nevertheless asks the fox-spirit boy if he wants the arrow. Upon asking if it's okay, the son accepts the arrow from Watanuki. As a thank you for the arrow, the fox-spirit stall owner tells Watanuki that he doesn't have to pay for the Oden. He also gives Watanuki some more Oden to take home to Yuuko. The next day, Yuuko asks Watanuki to deliver an item to the fox-spirit. However, she needs it do be done tonight during the full moon. Since there is a danger in doing this, she asks Watanuki to take another bag with him. True enough, halfway through his journey, Watanuki encounters shadows that turn into spirits. The spirits proceed to chase him so he decides to open the bag given by Yuuko. Out of the bag Mokona appears and asks Watanuki to engage in a game of Shiritori. This is a game where you say a Japanese word and you have to use the last kana to say the next one.
For example, if you begin with the word "Shiritori", you take the "Ri" out of the "Shiritori" to make "Ringo" (apple), etc. As Watanuki does this, the spirit disappears one by one. Halfway through evading the spirits, Watanuki falls flat on his face and drops the package that he was carrying. He, however, manages to deliver it to the fox spirit, who explains that Shiritori is akin to an old protection spell used to create barrier against evil spirit. The fox-spirit then opens the package which turns out to be a cage containing phantom birds that can only be seen during full-moon. Unfortunately, one of the birds seem to be broken because Watanuki dropped the package. Because of this the stall owner takes the broken arrow that was given by Watanuki and put it between the moonlight and the cage. The light coming from the arrow fixed whatever problem the bird had with its tail. They then released the birds out and the birds end up flying to Yuuko's place.
Impression:
Seeing Watanuki, Yuuko, and Mokona eating Oden makes me want to go to Japan again. I used to buy some of these delicacies late at night because that's when they usually are available in Japan. You can, however, buy some from combini but I'm not sure if they taste just as good. Anyway, this is an interesting combination of the fox-spirit story and the Shiritori one. In general, it makes the story more effective. I think the first time I played Shiritori was in my Japanese class. It was quite interesting because there are certain words you can't use and after a while you start to wonder what kind of words you can use in the game. We used to goof off and start using people's name even though it's not permitted. I didn't know it actually has the power to ward off spirits though. Although that may just be something that is made up by CLAMP. Moving on to another issue, the animation is also a lot better although as usual the night scenes don't far well.
Crossover-wise, I can't be the only one who thinks that the phantom birds remind me of the mechanical bird from Clover. It never cease to amaze me as to why so far CLAMP only made that music video instead of a full fledge series because I'm sure there are many fans who would like to see Clover as an animation. Anyway, this particular crossover with Clover makes me wonder why Tsubasa is singled out as the only series in which this series doesn't have a crossover with. The only explanation I can come up with is that crossover with Tsubasa often takes quite alot of screen time from the actual xxxHOLiC story. They are integral part of the story and therefore can take a lot of the anime screen time if they were included in the anime. Considering the fact that there are a lot of materials that need to be covered within the first season, I think it's understandable why the writers decide to excise any Tsubasa reference from this series.
Thanks for the summary~
The episode seems quite awesome ! I'm very looking forward to watch it.
About the widescreen version, it does make a hell of a difference, but no fansub has done it. I think they'll only do it, IF they do it, when the DVD is out u.u
Yeah, unfortunately the Widescreen version is not subbed yet. l33t-raw has the Widescreen version on Tokyo Toshokan though if anyone wants it.
question: why does the production take the time and effort to cut off scenes to make it less attractive? Why not just let stay widescreen? We could have black strips on the top and bottom - allowing subtitles to take place there instead of right infront of the image scene. They're not wise - or Is it beneficial to their business?
Hmm... well, this chapter was quite a mix, shouldn't the kuda kitsune be already there?, and the arrow and the ghost birds? hmm more changes; guess that producers are doing this to enlarge the duration of this season... and about the Widescreen problem; maybe they are expecting to sell more DVD's ; what a honorable reason ... ¬.¬
Another crossover is the backpack given to Watanuki. It's one of Sakura's from CCS.
"I think it's understandable why the writers decide to excise any Tsubasa reference from this series." I don't think it's understandable... I mean, Tsubasa and xxxHolic are being broadcasted on different TV stations, so, I think xxxHolic staff decided to cut any relation with Tsubasa because they don't want that people that see xxxHolic (broadcasted on TBS) change the channel to NHK for watching Tsubasa because one of the characters from TRC appeared on xxxHolic. In conclusion, I think it's a competition strategy from Production I.G. and TBS against NHK and BeeTrain.
Yamid, that thought did occur to me but I don't think competition on its own will make them do this. After all, xxxHOLiC is screened on Friday morning at 26:25 (2.25 AM) while Tsubasa is on Saturday evening at 18:25 (6:25 PM). First of all, these are two completely seperate day and timeslot, so it's unlikely one is going to flip channel to watch Tsubasa while watching xxxHOLiC.
In addition to this, while Tsubasa is going on, TBS screens Evening News so they clearly are going for two seperate audience. Looking at these two timeslots further, it's likely that those who'll follow xxxHOLiC are most likely are the hardcore anime fans who'll tape the show. I doubt there will be that many casual watcher who can stay up until 2 AM to watch an anime. Especially not in Japan.
But since the only people who's going to watch it are anime fans, they're most likely already aware of Tsubasa anime since it was aired one year before xxxHOLiC was even aired. So those who are interested in Tsubasa will watch it regardless whether or not there is a crossover in xxxHOLiC. If anything, TBS and xxxHOLiC could benefit from Tsubasa's more mainstream audience (since it's aired on prime time) if they had kept the crossover.
Out of curiousity, do you know if there are going to be multiple seasons of xxxHOLiC like there is for Tsubasa? I was devastated because someone said that there would only be 22 episodes. I was really hoping that it would be proven wrong so that's why I'm asking. It makes me slightly mad because it seems like the producers of xxxHOLiC are being too lax with it and aren't trying their best. In comparison to Tsubasa, it seems to be so lazily designed. Granted, I still love it because it's xxxHOLiC.
Unfortunately I have no idea how many episodes xxxHOLiC will get. The schedule on Shoboi's calendar, however, shows that so far it only gets 13 episodes. But that site doesn't usually show the other half of the schedule until the show nears that number so it's hard to tell one way or the other.
Quality-wise, I personally think Tsubasa is as badly designed and shoddily animated as xxxHOLiC. Tsubasa, however, has the benefit of being screened on a Widescreen format right off the bat so the quality doesn't seem as bad as xxxHOLiC.
On the other hand, Tsubasa doesn't have the characters or story that I like. Okay, I may want to see it again when it gets to the part where Kamui, Fuuma and other X characters appear but until then, I'd rather watch xxxHOLiC because at least the story in this series is interesting.
Which chapter in the manga did the X characters appear? I never read X, but I have a basic understanding of the storyline and I've seen a few pictures of the characters. The only reference I caught was after Yuuko helped a woman end her dependence on her laptop. Yuuko mentioned "yin yang masters" whom she knew when they were small, but I didn't see any of the characters in any of the chapters I've read so far.
IIRC, X characters start to appear from Chapter 109 of Tsubasa but the characters don't talk until Chapter 110. But if you're thinking about xxxHOLiC then no, so far X characters have not appeared in xxxHOLiC.
Your reviews are nice, I will come back here to read them!
What is Yuuko eating halfway through this episode? In the morning with her green tea she is eating something brown with orange spots in it? I'm not too familiar with Japanese food, and I want to know what that strange food is!
I’d like 2 speak about something connected 2 “xxxHOLIC”. Sometime in April 2006,I surfed around Wikipedia for some CCS/Sakura facts. There, the site explains how famous Sakura is that Syaoran even appears in xxxHOLIC asking for a medicine from Yuuko(or something like that)to help his beloved Sakura. Wikipedia also said about Sakura being more or less (may mean “every now and then”, I guess) connected even to the latest CLAMP-created manga/anime – xxxHOLIC, of course. However, when I surfed thru Wikipedia again around the 1st week of May (this time, I was already quite hooked to knowing more about xxxHOLIC), I looked again for that part about Sakura, but it was already DELETED by the Wikipedia Staff. This one puzzles me….
Is it because somebody corrected that fact and said that it will not or did not happen at all? Or maybe, the updated Wikipedia Research Staff found out that they were wrong? Did this really happen in the manga, but is now omitted in the anime to further excise (to be hyperbolical, even “exterminate”) all tie-in set-ups from TC? Or was I possibly wrong in my way of understanding what the site had stated there? Sorry, my friends, as I haven’t read the manga or watched the anime at all. I just constantly live by this greatly done Memento Specials…..so if I’m talking crap….Gomenasai….God bless u all….
Sorry, for posting consecutively.... I just want to say that this episode was great for me. Maybe, it's just me hallucinating; but the street were Watanuki's walking seems to remind me of the streets where the "Chobits" pink-character (symbolizing Chii, I believe) was walking down to find "the one that is for me and only me..." And by the way, Garten-san, this review was technically higly proficient in English. I don't mind if u have flaws in grammar sometimes though.... I just want to compliment you for a review-summary-analysis that is indeed worth the praise...God bless....
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