The Place Promised in Our Early Days 10/10

It's the rare moment an anime is released that reminds you of why you got into it in the first place.

Before you got "into" there was "something" that made you a convert.

You may have seen an interesting cartoon on Saturday morning about a space war filled with more mature storylines than you'd ever seen during that time.

You may have caught a Roger Ebert review of some japanimation movie where he declared it a masterpiece and it looked like nothing you'd ever seen.

You may have gone over to a friend's house and someone turned on a show about a guy who turns into a girl when splashed with water and it made you laugh.

That "something" caught your attention and made you a fan. In later years you recall the feeling of having discovered something great, and you long for that again, that "something" which reaffirms your belief you support the greatest artform available to TV. It is elusive. The search is almost impossible. Almost.

In the last few years we have seen an explosion in the amount of available anime in North America. With a massive number of DVD releases, more shows than ever airing on TV and the availability of the internet for downloading we have the ability to access more anime than ever. While this is a great thing, all too often that new series, OAV, or movie are nothing really new. Once in awhile we see a great story, a new premise, an interesting character or a cool CG effect and we're reminded of how great anime is compared to anything offered up from our North American media monsters, who cater to the lowest common denominator, but that yearning is still there.

You search desperately through the morass. As you view title after title you start to lose hope. You view shows that are good, shows that are 10/10 and then finally, at last, find that for which you sit through all the rest for.

The last was Cowboy Bebop and it's been a long time since then.

I have resigned myself to a fate of having few titles of this quality to review. This is a masterpiece. Period. My score may seem odd but my scoring system was meant to compare normal anime. The Place Promised in Our Early Days is not a normal anime.

It's the "something".