+ -- issues and comments -- + Angel Sanctuary is a very unique series and with it comes many issues of argument and discussion. Now having it be my favorite series in the whole history of animation, I don't think I can complete my website without commenting on it, can I? Be forewarned that this section was not put up for bashing, arguing or dissing purposes, these are simply my views. You may agree or disagree but please respect these as my opinion, the same way that I would respect yours. If I receive any flames, and I mean ANY, I will launch an attack on whoever sent it most relentlessly and post both the flame and my reply so everyone can see who this idiot is, read: I HATE PEOPLE LIKE THAT! (you may find examples in my guestbook) If you want to discuss these things, do it in the forum or something. Religion First controversial issue, Christianity. Obviously you can't have a story about angels without involving religious contents right? So what was that movie a few years back? "The Prince of Egypt?" If that is a movie that's pro-Christian and the studio had such a hard time getting the church's consent, I wonder what they'd think about AS. Try this: God is a nut, Lucifer is worshipped by half the fans *.*, sympathy towards the Satans, true love = incest, God is worse than a nut - it's a computer, Gabriel IS the one involved in incest, Michael is a everything but the glorious warhero, Raphael has absolutely no virtue, the good guys are the rebel angels... so on and so forth. So Christian, especially Catholics are offended... my comment? "So what, it's only a story. F I C T I O N." These people should look it up in the dictionary and they'll see what it means. Angel Sanctuary is only fiction... and so is the bible. I am atheist personally, neither passive nor radical. I don't just quietly sit back and have no comment on everything, I do think the people who find AS offensive are really stupid - simply retarded. On the other hand, I don't think that I must convert everyone into an atheist either, believe whatever you want. If people want to think that God's real, be my guest, just don't relate that to Angel Sanctuary and don't try to convert anyone else into hating it, since I'm not trying convert anybody either. Confusion Ok, I know that a lot of people think this story is really confusing, don't get it, etc. and therefore in every way is not interested. Yuki-sensei herself even wrote that she often get letters saying something along the lines like "the art is great, but I don't get the story." I just get really annoyed every time I see/hear that. These people must be retards if they don't understand the story. People who don't have the manga, who can't read the manga, who only look at pictures, who missed the beginning or part of it, you're all excused. But if someone has followed the story from beginning to end and still don't get it, then I have no idea what IQ they have. It's true that there is a lot going on in the story and that sometimes it's hard to follow, but it is absolutely ridiculous if someone who can read the manga still thinks the story is to difficult to comprehend - with or without religious background because it's not required. I think the best part of Angel Sanctuary is the story. I first saw this series when it just came out, lying in the bookstore and I thought, "oh, nice cover! (vol 2)" and bought it for a try. What I fell in love with was beyond the art, it's the span of the imaginary fantasy and how each and every little thing would touch me. Art I have no comment about the art, except that if anyone dares to diss it, in any matter, way or form, be prepared to die. (you know that I didn't really mean what I wrote up there about feeling free to disagree with me, right? You are not allowed to disagree on this one -.-;;) Mature Contents and Psychology This is the same reason they gave for not making it into an anime series, and I've been asked so many times why. There's not much harsh language in AS so we can skip that, but aside from some not THAT explicit sexual contents, and "sinful ideas" like incest, it's not that bad right? If they can show stuff with homosexuality like Utena, Clamp stuff (namely Tokyo Babylon, CCS, X) and Sailor Moon (x.x), why can't they show AS? I think mature content in that sense in not the greatest problem in anime, at least Japanese people are much less concerned about it. AS in generally mature in a mental and psychological sense. Basically, half the characters are psychos or have acquired decent amount of psychological trauma in their pasts. Each person has a little story and AS wouldn't be AS without them. However, it's just too deep for the general audience. I don't suppose a 10 year old would sit in front of the TV and wonder why Astaroth has such a delicate nerve... or why Mad Hatter was so obsessed over the one man who would despise her. It's mature in a way similar to Evangelion yet still different because NGE does not really involve traumatic pasts, it's mostly about psychological progression; how one person matures mentally throughout the events in the story. AS is in a sense the opposite, it's total mental breakdown. ^^ That's what I like about it but also the reason why unfortunately it will never become a tv series. Character Dispute Actually one of the biggest arguments is between AS fans themselves, usually divided clearly into the "love setsuna" type and the "hate setsuna" type. I'm sorry to say that though I am not extremely into the second type, I'm leaning towards that side. For whatever reason other people hate him, I personally just dislike him because of his personality. I believe this to be actually a failure in Yuki-sensei's character design T.T She wanted to make him the all-genki, happy going guy but the down side to that is that the irresponsibility and over-confidence (arrogance if you will) shows. I don't think she had expected so many people to dislike him >.< Especially around the time of volume 13-14 when he was the main cause behind Zaphkiel's capture and then execution, she was flooded with Set-chan hatemails. I also disliked him throughout the second half because he caused so much trouble for his friends and then made the other people clean up after him. But I guess I just have to accept that as one of his character flaws, it only makes things harder on myself if I persist to hate the main character of my favorite series. Moral Issues This does relate back to religion though I suppose you don't have to be religious to have strick morals. But I don't feel like wasting time on this, so if anyone has any moral problems with AS, whether it's incest, homosexuality, blood and gore, satanism, or anything else morally related, I don't even want to speak to you. I am simply too dignified to speak to people with such closed minds, especially on the issue of homosexuality or bisexuality (same for Clamp stuff). I'm actually a very strong gay rights and abortion supporter, in otherwords, a complete leftist.