This show has a pretty major identity crisis
What They Say:
After dying during the battle against the Underworld, Gold Leo Saint, Aiolos, finds himself mysteriously resurrected in Asgard. He encounters a woman named Lyfia who asks him to fight on Asgard’s behalf against a man named Andreas who seeks to take over it with the help of the sacred tree Yggdrasil. Now Aiolos must battle against Andreas’s warriors as he seeks out Yggdrasil and tries to discover the truth behind his revival.
The Review:
Content (warning as portions of this review may contain spoilers):
So I have a pretty good history with the Saint Seiya franchise. I enjoyed the original 80’s series, liked The Lost Canvas and was good with Omega up until the incredibly mixed second season. Needless to say that when a new series was announced it caught my interest and especially since it’s one focusing on the Gold Saints who are generally the coolest characters across every incarnation of the franchise. What I ended up getting however, is a show that’s very confused on what it wants to be.
The premise is pretty straight forward fare for Saint Seiya stuff. After dying during the battle in the Underworld (aka the Hades arc in the original series), one of the Gold Saints named Aiolos finds himself in a place called Asgard with no clue as to how he’s alive. He’s quickly captured and eventually ends up meeting with a woman named Lyfia who wants him to fight for Asgard against a guy called Andreas, who’s trying to take over using the power of a sacred tree called Yggdrasil. Aiolos refuses at first since he’s determined to get back to the battle in the Underworld, but when Lyfia is attacked by one of Andreas’s warriors, he comes to her aid. During the fight, Aiolos recieves a vision from his brother who tells him to find Yggdrasil in order to learn the reason behind his resurrection and gets a shiny new piece of armor to battle with. He beats the guy but it appears Lyfia may be trying to use Aiolos for another purpose.
To get things right off the bat, this show assumes it’s viewers are already familiar with the Saint Seiya franchise. Like to a pretty absurd degree as it offers zero explanation for any of the concepts or terminology it’s throwing out, not even bothering to name it’s protagonist until the last few minutes of the episode. The way it’s written also makes it feel a lot more like a filler arc than a series proper and that makes the barrier to entry even worse. It’s a show pretty much entirely for hardcore Saint Seiya fans which would be fine except for the fact that Toei’s marketed the show to an international audience that’s generally unfamiliar with most of it (the exception being Latin America since Saint Seiya is pretty much their Dragonball Z in terms of mainstream popularity) so it feels a bit shortsighted and more than a little questionable.
Though putting that barrier aside, I’m not sure how much it really offers for the hardcore fans either. The production values are super cheap with the action scenes having almost zero animation behind them, so anyone hoping to see the Gold Saints get to show off is out of luck on this one. Visually it’s not as outright poor looking an effort as Sailor Moon Crystal which Toei also decided to do as a web series, but given how much that show’s production has suffered it’s not much of a compliment. About the nicest thing I can really say here is that the remix of the original series’s second opening “Soldier Dream” sounds good but aside from that I got nothing. As a fan of the franchise, I’m willing to give this thing a shot, but if you’re not already indoctrinated into it, this show isn’t going to help it’s case any.
In Summary:
Soul of Gold doesn’t really seem to be sure who it’s for or have much in the way of cool behind it. There’s a slight chance whatever story it has could be kind of interesting but as an action piece, it’s poor looking animation is a real killer. Hopefully it’ll improve but for now I’m not so sure.
Grade: C (for Saint Seiya fans), D (for newcomers)
Streamed By: Crunchyroll, Daisuki