[Kurona]

Just finished Ryuki's movie. ... The hell was that about?

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShyGuy

I feel the same way, I really like Kobayashi's work but Ryuki doesn't feel quite as polished as her later stuff with Den-O and OOO. I think there are a couple reasons, one is that Inoue actually wrote around 14 or so episodes of the show, so he actually wrote almost 30% of it. Kobayashi still wrote the majority, but his contribution is significant.

Beyond that, I also think the main thing that differentiates Ryuki from her later work is the personalities of the cast. Den-O and OOO both have casts of genuinely good people who are friends. Sure some of them are jerks but they ultimately mean well and care about each other (Even Ankh comes around in the end). Ryuki, in contrast, has a cast made up almost entirely of unlikable assholes or outright villains, most of whom do not get redeemed or have any real positive qualities. Ryuki has a much darker overall tone than her later works. A lot of her standard themes are still there, but like you said, Ryuki seems kind of "off" in comparison to her later stuff and I think it's a combination of the bleaker tone of the show and that she just hadn't hit her full potential quite yet. Personally I really enjoyed it and would like to see her return to something like that, but I think it does make it feel a bit odd compared to her later material.

Incidentally, I still haven't gotten over the fact that Inoue wrote the recent Ryuki miniseries and not Kobayashi. I would have loved to see her come back to Ryuki all these years later after solidifying her style and skill, and getting Inoue of all people instead hurts me deep in my soul. There were things about it I enjoyed, but it felt like so much missed potential. I still sometimes think about what it could have been had she returned to write it.

... yeah, yeah basically. Agree with all of that