An exciting and adventurous tale of chivalrous deeds which will make the hearts of fair maidens swoon? Or a boring collection of cliches and hackneyed story elements that feels much too much like a great many other shows? This will be easy to figure out.
What They Say:
Yotaro Hanafusa is a descendent of the “Knights of the World.” With the Knight’s Code of Chivalry hammered into him since childhood, Yotaro cannot stop himself from saving damsels in distress. He wears a mask, and is known on the street as “Knight Lancer” but he has always kept his identity a secret. While on an outing, Yotaro saves a 6-year-old girl, Makio Kidoin, the only child of a powerful business tycoon. When Yotaro discovers that Makio leads a lonely life in a huge estate, he resolves to protect her. He and his friends disguise themselves as lodgers and move into her mansion.
Episode 1: “He’s a Real Hero”
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Based on the light novel series by Hideaki Koyasu, who is also serving as the chief writer (Series Composition and scripts) for the series, Lance N’ Masques follows the trials and travails of Yotaro Hanabusa, a young knight who belongs to the last order of chivalrous knights left in the world (actually, there are plenty of orders of knighthood which currently exist in the real world), but this one still has its members go around armed with lances. And so armed, they…do stuff I guess? In Yotaro’s case, he complains about wanting a normal life, but then switches into chuunibyou mode…ahem…I mean chivalrous knight mode whenever he hears a lady screaming in distress. When acting in that mode, he suddenly becomes a powerful champion of justice, aiding damsels in distress and fighting off wrongdoers. It would completely seem like the daydreams of a bored and lonely middle schooler if it wasn’t for Yotaro whipping out a gigantic lance when needed.
After a false start (where a high school girl he saves from a bunch of older guys looking for “some fun” reacts to his courtly manners—kissing her hand to show his respect and devotion—by calling him a “pervert”), Yotaro seemingly finds his true “lady” in Makio Kidoin, an heiress to a giant conglomerate (aren’t they always?) who looks about…7? but lives all alone in a huge mansion. During the day, she has a staff of maids, but they all leave at the end of the work day (except for one maid, Yuifa [the subs say “Yuhua” but the official pronunciation is clearly Yuifa, though the character appears to have a Chinese name and Yuhua is probably the modern mandarin pronunciation of the characters in her name], who seems to have some affection for her young charge, even if that’s against “the rules”—and there’s also some kind of secret Yuifa is hiding). That I had to write a long and convoluted sentence like that shows you what level we’re dealing with here. I feel like I should have Hatoko (from Inou Battle) on board to help write this review so that non-chuuni sufferers can understand what is going on here.
Suffice it to say that Yotaro saves Makio when she’s in mortal peril (Note to readers: 7-year-olds engaging in unsupervised rock wall climbing without any safety gear is probably a big no-no. For responsible scaling of heights, please watch the delightful Yama no Susume/Encouragement of Climb. Actually, that’s just a good idea in general) and unlike normal girls, Makio seems enthralled by the whole concept of “heroes of justice” and so she is not repelled or weirded out by masked Yotaro’s heroics (when in knight mode, he is required to wear a mask to keep his identity secret). As it happens, it would appear that Yotaro is lacking in accommodation and in meal provision, so after saving Makio, he runs off to hide behind a rock and nurse his noisy stomach. Fortunately for him, non-masked Yotaro is found by Makio who is a cheerful and generous child, offering him free meals and lodging at her giant mansion. This comes in handy for her, however, when the next day a group of obvious Bad Guys, men in black suits, one of whom is bald, big, and sports an unusual tattoo, come to kidnap Makio. They apparently recognize Yuifa as being from “the organization” and they themselves would appear to belong to a different organization…or maybe not. I have no idea because it was all too confusing and poorly conveyed.
That would sum up most of Lance N’ Masques, really. It really could have done with some serious editing and revising. While keeping information hidden and laying mysteries before the viewer is good writing, throwing a bunch of obscure hints and confusing the viewer serves little purpose other than to make one feel little need to see episode 2. Throwing in extra characters with no suggestion as to why we should pay attention to them contributes to the general mess of this first episode. In addition to Yotaro, Makio and Yuifa, we’re also introduced to Yoriko, Alice and Shirohime, who apparently form Yotaro’s entourage, though it’s not yet fully explained what their roles are (other than Yoriko clearly being a maid and Shirohime obviously being a horse…though she oddly transforms into a cute horse girl at times when talking to Alice). This is a not particularly interesting story told in a rather poor and disjointed manner than fails to capture the viewers’ attention unless they are really into one of the fetishes on display here: hero worship, a transforming horse, or disturbingly, the very young appearance of Makio and the framing of her and Yotaro as potential romantic partners (I would love to say it’s all in Yuifa’s mind but…I have this sinking feeling that it isn’t).
My final verdict is: Don’t bother. There is much worse, but why waste the time?
In Summary:
Lance N’ Masques is not really an offensively bad show. But it is so thoroughly mediocre, so filled with tired and bland content that is, to top it off, poorly told, it achieves…probably nothing that the creators of it intended. I’m not sure it really could ever have been good, but perhaps had the script been in the hands of someone other than the original author, the material that is here could have been adapted to work better in animated form.
Grade: C-/D+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Apple iMac with 12GB RAM, Mac OS 10.10 Yosemite
