"I know what this anime needs! GIANT MECHAS!"

Because they couldn't, you know, use giant evil creatures/demons instead. -facepalm- When Mai Hime used giant mechanical creatures, at least there it kinda worked, but in KnM... it looked ridiculous. Heck, maybe the people themselves could have gained magical powers, become the heads of Orochi themselves.

I have a couple friends who are into yuri that were immediately turned off by the mecha. XD; I, on the other hand, literally start laughing aloud whenever I see those over-the-top mecha attacks.

Anyway, your thoughts on the mecha aspect?

Yeah, I never really got the whole 'giant mecha' element. It seemed pretty dumb.

It definitely seemed utterly random. But then, all of Kaishaku's work that I've ever seen (which, okay, is limited to Kannazuki no Miko, Shattered Angels/KyoSora, Eternal Alice Rondo, and Amnesian) has been an ode to Bad Writing. It's just that, with KnM, well...here's a quote from Anime News Network's review of Vol. 3:

"It's a veritable chamber of horrors for anyone who respects their own
intelligence. Add in the contrived, stilted dialogue, virtual absence of
substantial character back-story, and the occasionally awful animation,
and you get a sure-fire recipe for disaster. With only one little
problem. It's really, really good."

Basically, it's as if Kaishaku threw a bunch of random sour-tasting ingredients into a pot and somehow managed to invent a brilliant dish. Or it's like a novice trying to cook fugu, and they managed to avoid the poisonous parts by sheer luck. For example, take Himeko's reaction to Chikane's rape of her in the manga: slight abdominal pain, mild worry that she somehow made Chikane mad, and (later on) a bit of embarrassment over not being a virgin. It's laughable how ridiculous that is as a reaction to a horrific, traumatizing event, the kind of thing that only a male writer with no understanding of the concept could have come up with, and yet it's somehow completely in character with the Solar Priestess who's able to redeem Chikane and allow them both to find happiness with their eternal cycles as miko; it's as if the continuous yet consistent absurdities combine to make a character who somehow transcends it to be awesome instead of stupid.

...the mecha, on the other hand, were not so lucky an ingredient in the hot-pot. Though, as Erica Friedman once said, it makes an eerie sort of sense that the gods of ancient Japan were giant robots.

I haven't seen and do not plan on seeing KnM...I don't see what all the hatred for mecha in general is all about though :/ Gundam is a long running franchise for a reason, and Evangelion, as much as I hate it, is considered an anime classic as well. Again, not talking about the mecha in KnM specifically, as from what I've heard, those were used rather poorly, but I do think mecha series get a lot of unwarranted hate these days.

@Dezo: I usually go "wtheck?" at a lot of this author's decisions and
dismiss it for the yuri. XD;; However, if it's COMPLETELY horrible, then
I won't read it.

Blair Phoenix wrote:Again, not talking about the mecha in KnM specifically, as from what I've heard, those were used rather poorly, but I do think mecha series get a lot of unwarranted hate these days.

I was talking about the use to mecha in KnM, not mechas in anime in general. If you watched the anime you'd see how utterly pointless they were and why people both bemoan their existence or poke fun at them.

Demon wrote:@Dezo: I usually go "wtheck?" at a lot of this author's decisions and
dismiss it for the yuri. XD;; However, if it's COMPLETELY horrible, then
I won't read it.

Blair Phoenix wrote:Again, not talking about the mecha in KnM specifically, as from what I've heard, those were used rather poorly, but I do think mecha series get a lot of unwarranted hate these days.

I was talking about the use to mecha in KnM, not mechas in anime in general. If you watched the anime you'd see how utterly pointless they were and why people both bemoan their existence or poke fun at them.

Yeah I know, was just blowing off steam, considering your friends. Mechas are something you really need to devote a decent amount of time to for them to really work in a series.

Blair Phoenix wrote:I haven't seen and do not plan on seeing KnM...I don't see what all the hatred for mecha in general is all about though :/ Gundam is a long running franchise for a reason, and Evangelion, as much as I hate it, is considered an anime classic as well. Again, not talking about the mecha in KnM specifically, as from what I've heard, those were used rather poorly, but I do think mecha series get a lot of unwarranted hate these days.

I admit, I tend to get turned off of mecha series quite quickly these days (and I say this as a fan of Macross, Macross Plus, and Patlabor). I think it's because of the idiosyncratic "the military machines look like giant humans" routine; I'd like to see the same kind of story as seen in mecha stories but featuring a different or original kind of tech (perhaps ironically, Simoun did that really well).

Back on topic, I actually rather like KnM's mecha designs; they had a wide variety and ranged from the typical to the seriously whacked (I adore Yatsu no Onokoshizuchi, especially). It's more that...well, these mecha weren't supposed to be mecha in any way; they actually were (within the definition of the series) various Shinto gods of destruction. I mean, the story goes somewhat like this: the will of Yamata no Orochi awakes, calling to the humans who are its "Necks," the vessels of its power, consuming them from within with the will of darkness. A seal breaks, a massive rock the side of a boulder levitates into the sky, possessed student Souma Ohgami is teleported to the top of the rock, where he takes hold of the hilt of a sword impaled there, rips it forth, and the boulder splits apart, a demon of destruction sealed for generations awakening again, as Souma's body merges with the god...

...and he appears in the cockpit of a giant robot.

(It also doesn't help, ironically, that some of those mecha fights could have been awesome--the three-on-one with Reiko, Corona, and Nekoko against Souma and Himeko, for example--but were settled instead with a lot of still shots and single attacks (the manga reduced several battles to one or two panels!). So they were not only badly introduced, but mishandled once they were there.)

Considering KnM was the first anime I ever watched and what opened my eyes to lesbians in animation, the mecha doesn't bother me.

I can see why they used mecha, they probably could have done better with something like Demon suggested. Or they could have just had powers themselves, but the mecha's not that big of a deal. It's not in the way and it doesn't detract from what's going on.

If it does distract you, you're thinking about it too much and loosing sight of what's actually going on in the anime.

I've never been too big a fan of KnM anyway, the mecha was just another point I didn't like about it. I liked the yuri of it, but that's it. On the note of the mecha though, it just seemed out of place, and I probably would have stuck around for it more if it was something like them getting the powers and whatnot.

I could care less about the mechas in KnM but I loved mechas in other animes I guess but it had to be there of course for the story unless they found a way to change it...but wouldn't it have sucked if they changed the storyline...i guess i don't have a good imagination.

I just rewatched this in one go last night and...found that the mechas didn't really bother me as much as they did the first time. Yeah, they all look Gundam-ized to hell and back, but they didn't bother me so much anymore.

Of course, it might've helped that I had it playing more in the background than paying close attention to everything, but when I do pay close attention, I tend to get nitpicky to the point of snarking/riffing out loud at two in the morning. v(o-o)v

Eh, for me its the opposite. The more I watch KnM, the more the mechas bother me. XP