Superb
I've recently viewed this series for the third time (the 1st was in 2003 and the 2nd in 2007) and incredibly I've yet seen new particulars that I've missed the previous times. I consider it a sign of a worthy production.
The story is complex but not obscure and, in contrast to Neon Genesis Evangelion, everything reaches a natural explanation toward the end of the series. And where NGE takes a lot of references from the Qabbalah and the Jewish tradition, RahXephon takes its from Aztec and Mayan lore.
Sometimes it takes time to check the crossed links in the anime, and sometimes require a little of work to understand what is apparently a missing point. For example is easy to grasp that Watari Shirou is the father of Ayato, a little more tricky it's to understand how Kisaragi Quon is the real mother of Ayato and his twin brother Itsuki
The characters are well developed, with deep and complex interaction between them. The main character, Ayato, is well characterized and doesn't provoke the impulse to slap him continuously (as Shinji Hikari does)
Premising that I've seen the original Japanese anime and not the American dubbed one, I can state that the audio is simply outstanding. Starting from the ouverture of "Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg" by Wagner the series is full of music, the recurring theme from "Polovetskie plyaski" by Borodin, up to the compositions by Hashimoto Ichiko, like the delicious "Katun no Sadame", make it tasty to listen. And the music pervades everything in the show, dolem (DO-RE-MI?) are named with music terms (like Allegretto, Fortissimo, Falsetto), the last purpose of the RahXephon system is "to tune the world" etc...
Everything is cured even the name of the characters, e.g. "Kamina" means "the name of the god", "Ayato" is written as "the design of the man", "Watari Shirou" could be translated as "requests truth the samurai's son"
There are also numerous references to other works in primis "L'oiseau bleu" by Maeterlinck (also Michiru, the dead daughter of Kunugi Jin could be a transliteration of Mytyl), but also references from Japanese folk tradition like "Urashima Taro". It's like a game to find them all.
I consider it a masterpiece and I recommend to view it.
I've recently viewed this series for the third time (the 1st was in 2003 and the 2nd in 2007) and incredibly I've yet seen new particulars that I've missed the previous times. I consider it a sign of a worthy production.
The story is complex but not obscure and, in contrast to Neon Genesis Evangelion, everything reaches a natural explanation toward the end of the series. And where NGE takes a lot of references from the Qabbalah and the Jewish tradition, RahXephon takes its from Aztec and Mayan lore.
Sometimes it takes time to check the crossed links in the anime, and sometimes require a little of work to understand what is apparently a missing point. For example is easy to grasp that Watari Shirou is the father of Ayato, a little more tricky it's to understand how Kisaragi Quon is the real mother of Ayato and his twin brother Itsuki
The characters are well developed, with deep and complex interaction between them. The main character, Ayato, is well characterized and doesn't provoke the impulse to slap him continuously (as Shinji Hikari does)
Premising that I've seen the original Japanese anime and not the American dubbed one, I can state that the audio is simply outstanding. Starting from the ouverture of "Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg" by Wagner the series is full of music, the recurring theme from "Polovetskie plyaski" by Borodin, up to the compositions by Hashimoto Ichiko, like the delicious "Katun no Sadame", make it tasty to listen. And the music pervades everything in the show, dolem (DO-RE-MI?) are named with music terms (like Allegretto, Fortissimo, Falsetto), the last purpose of the RahXephon system is "to tune the world" etc...
Everything is cured even the name of the characters, e.g. "Kamina" means "the name of the god", "Ayato" is written as "the design of the man", "Watari Shirou" could be translated as "requests truth the samurai's son"
There are also numerous references to other works in primis "L'oiseau bleu" by Maeterlinck (also Michiru, the dead daughter of Kunugi Jin could be a transliteration of Mytyl), but also references from Japanese folk tradition like "Urashima Taro". It's like a game to find them all.
I consider it a masterpiece and I recommend to view it.