Gosick

As Crunchyroll's winter line-up was unveiled this week, I felt nothing but despair as I didn't care for any of them. Except this one. This is the only show that I wanted to watch and having seen it, I wasn't disappointed. Why did I want to watch this show? Well, just from the promo poster I could tell this was a Sherlock Holmes re-imagining (right down to the pipe) and that's exactly what it is.

This time, Sherlock Holmes is a blond little girl called Victorique, who is pretty enough to be described as a living doll. Watson is an young man from Japan called Kazuya Kujo. Kujo and Victorique are classmates at a prestigious boarding school in the fictitious European country of Sauville. It's the year 1924 and that means that the environment surrounding Victorique also evokes to a degree the atmosphere of London that Sherlock Holmes inhabited with horse-drawn carriages and the likes. Indeed, Victorique also smokes a pipe! (Note: I here by would formally like to go on record as NOT endorsing smoking in any form by any age group)

The Inspector Lestrade of Gosick is one Grevil de Blois, who takes all the credit for the crimes Victorique solves and who, it is implied, controls almost all of Victorique's movements. This seems to be a integral part of Victorique's story, and the key difference between Sherlock and his blond, female and doll-like reincarnation, and you get some sense of her isolation and "imprisonment" (she calls her sanctuary in the library a prison) when Kujo blackmails Grevil to take him and Victorique sailing and has to explain what a ice cream cart is to Victorique and amazes Victorique with the simple act of calling a taxi-carriage.

Certainly Victorique is her own character, modeled though she clearly is after the great detective, and the story at this stage appears interesting and captivating. In the first episode, Victorique solved the first layer of what is turning out to be a deep mystery. The first layer was stupidly easy to solve and it took me less then a second to figure out "who did it" but then, it took Victorique about that long to solve it too - so the trivial mystery was treated as trivial and was only used as a spring board to launch into something bigger. I will certainly be tuning in next week to see if the new mystery is worthy of Victorique's time and see how long it amuses her - she, like Sherlock Holmes, is prone to getting bored easily.

Should you give it a go? Well, notice how many times I said "Sherlock Holmes"? That's pretty much your answer right there. O, there are aspects in this story that can only be present in an anime but at the heart of it, it's another story where the great detective (just to be clear, that's his official title and I am not being an uber fan here) is re-imagined and put in a new world to be bored in... until something happens that requires the employment, as Victorique put's it, the fountain of wisdom that lies within! I for one hope future episodes will involve a hound ^.^

It was a good mystery anime i love, i am going to rewatch it for sure! I hope everyone gets to see it, It catchs you by the head in the first epi for sure. lol. u must watch it if you havent!!!!! hehe

So yeah, in my opinion the anime was so bad that I felt that I had to make an account just to tell people that. Of course I haven't watched the anime in its entirety, I stopped at Episode 10 because I felt I just couldn't subject myself to this. I had thought that this anime was supposed to be mystery genre anime with elements of romance and history thrown (ofc I could be wrong and then my review really wouldn't matter then), but all the cases in the anime seem to be so damn simplistic, or in some cases quite ridiculous with things just haphazardly thrown in just to fit with the conclusion. For example, in the first case with the ship we see Kujo being hit with a handbag and then it is assumed that the bag is heavy, but in real life a girl's handbag if swung can hurt/knock your head regardless of there being a gun or not. The fact that they don't even turn over Ned, but simply check his hand's pulse seems odd. There is also the business with the wallpaper, when the lights go out of course someone will do something, but everyone seems to think that there is something supernatural going on.... Besides that I had correctly guessed who the murderer was before the door opened, not because of my amazing deductive abilities but simply how the scene was presented with everything leading up to that. Now the male protagonist was just horrible in my opinion, he seems to be brain dead... I mean as a character he seems even less intelligent than your typical harem male protagonist, and he is supposed to be quite intelligent (at least he states that he did well academically in Japan. I mean, he smells liquor on the nun and see that most nuns don't exactly peddle street goods, but still thinks she is a nun, and when he sees her in the train he doesn't ask how she got out of prison but just takes it in stride. It still isn't explained why she wanted to steal the same plate that she was selling (I assume that she had insurance or that in fact belonged to the church, but that's simply my assumptions), also it's never explained why the blonde girl murdered the biker. The inspector is also quite infuriating, he doesn't seem to be able to connect dots together, he sees a metal wire with blood in the middle but has no idea what it has to do with the case and then believes that somehow a child managed to kill a grown man on a speeding bike by himself... the nation of Seyrun (or whatever I can't recall the name exactly) is somehow allowed to exist within Sabure when at that time any form of sedition would be quickly put down in the rest of Europe. Also my god... an elder is killed, yet the person suspected right away was a maid, not the person succeeding the elder? WHY????? They see gold coins lying around and seem to ignore it, the Elder's clock flies open and coins fall out and his first reaction is to pick up the coins and not wonder how/why the clock flew open??? WHY????? The maid for some reason keeps missing with her spear strikes on the burning and narrow bridge, and for some unfathomable reason she chooses to not skewer Kujo, but instead to shift the spear's position to where it would be useless... Also did anyone else notice how she was able to run through the entire city in a manner of seconds or if that was a time lapse scene then why didn't anyone else stop her? Everyone in that nation seems completely fine with using violence. Also why would the thieves attempt to see if the jar would float in an extremely shallow pool of water, that would prove nothing it wouldn't sink or float the water just isn't deep enough for that. In every case I have correctly guessed the culprit, except for the headless biker. Okay so I can't help but point out how obvious that the maid had killed the fortune teller... She had aimed a gun and fired it through the bullet hole, the old woman had only been shot in one eye.... ANYONE COULD REALIZE IT WAS THE MAID. On the other hand, besides the characters and plot, the animation itself was quite nice or at least up to standards. Now the ending theme was about the only thing that really brought kept me going, the song was quite incredible and different (sounded a bit like epic music). From what I've read on Wikipedia and other sites apparently the show really shines in the last few episodes and its ending, and for all those out there I hope it does, but for others who were looking for genuinely interesting cases to watch, you're going to be quite disappointed. (yeah i realize my grammar and stuff isn't right and that this sounds more like a rant but whatever...)

Edit: So after much prodding from a friend i actually finished watching the anime, and my opinion really hasn't changed much. I still think that Gosick had failed as a mystery genre anime, with every case being extremely obvious or just unexplained. Although, towards the last few episodes the anime did become much more enjoyable as it began to focus more on confrontations and gave up using half-assed cases. Another thing worth noting was the development in Victorique's (god i hated it whenever Kujo said her name) character, it seemed gradual yet noticeable by the end of the series. Still... the decent episodes were all towards the end of the series, I felt that the rest of the episodes really weren't worth squat.

This is a great anime based on a great novel. I've read the novel first then I watched it. Though the characters in this anime seem to represent typical Ota characters, the story of anime is NOT. Man, even if you are not into those typical Japanese anime characters, you may want to watch these episodes.

If you can watch Prettycure kinda anime that your daughter is watching while sitting along, then it should be OK for YOU (not recommended for kids at all though)

I'm from Japan and working for an US company in the US now... so making long story short...it is one of the amazing stories to me.

Ok. I loved the series and the art design. But I was kind of confused through the entire thing. And talk about getting into trouble! I mean...Could the guy be JUSt a little more carefull?! I thought that the coolest thing about the anime was that the main character had a fictional "well of knowledge" and it would always zoom into her eye when she said this.

Gosick is my favourite anime of all time, which is saying something.
Personally I like mysteries, so the storyline is great. The cases and superstitions are very interesting! The art is nice, and the animation is very fluid. Victorique's cool, quiet, brainy gothic personality and Kujo's cuteness make this series even harder to resist! ^^
Sadly, the ending is really rushed. It is very touching (I was crying through the last two episodes XD >.<||) but still, erm, you know - RUSHED. By the way, Kujo lost his legs?? @______@ Like WTH?? =.=
Overall I give this 5/5 'cause this series is awesome, definitely worth a watch.

Gosick is a cute, interesting, suspenseful, and funny story (: All of the characters (so far) are just perfect <3 I don't think I've disliked a single one soo far.. Also, I love the opening (: And the drawings are so pretty ^.^ (and Kawaii sometimes :D)

Kazuya was kinda weird but nice. Started as a friend then ended up as a lover because he thought that Victorique is a type of person whom need saving. Which is kinda true.

Victorique changed a lot per episode. In a good way. Its nice to know that she didnt grow up into a mannequin type of doll but with the help of Kazuya, she learned to have emotions. But she is always bored. And doesnt like hanging around a lot of people. i guess its understandable since she is so cute and all. She really amazing~

In this anime youll see how legends were made and what truly happened which is really cool considering the fact that these days, a lot of urban legends are known.

Great anime I loved this. I was drawn to this because I watched The Mystic Archives of Dantalian which I also gave very high marks.
The Storyline was always moving in a interesting direction rarely deviating for a break.
The Music was beautiful to my ears but was never in the way of what was on the screen.
The Characters were loveable some time a little clueless but never dis likeable.
The Animation is stunning and beautiful to the eyes complimenting the story.
Overall a definite watch if you watched The Mystic Archives of Dantalian.

I've never been big into anime, my daughter watches all the time. This show definitely caught my attention. Reminds me of a mix of sherlock homes and Alfred Hitchcock. Very good! I can honestly say I am a fan. You don't find this type of attention paid to suspense, the imagination of this anime is truly astounding. I gives me hope that their are still people out there that have an imagination other than the run of the mill blood and guts!

This anime (GOSICK) is so fantastic its full of mystery but Victorique de Blois can solve it.. The writer was so intelligent.. The Music is really great(suspenseful sometimes) ! the characters are so fantastically great!