Time: Trinity Blood

"Trust me. You don't want to make the whole world your enemy."
-Abel Nightroad​

Years ago, before Toonami made its resurrection, I was up late at night and decided to give the late night block Adult Swim on Cartoon Network a watch. Please note, this is also the time before I decided to get heavily invested in the anime community. And during my watching, I saw a commercial for a somewhat appealing vampire anime that piqued my interest. Unfortunately, this anime was severely dwarfed by another anime to premiere that night, Bleach, and faded into obscurity. Nonetheless, I decided to watch Trinity Blood to the end. My reaction? Well...not what I was hoping for.

Story:

Quite honestly, the story for Trinity Blood is probably its weakest point. Years ago, I used to be a huge fan of vampires and vampire-themed media, so I was ecstatic when I saw that a show like this was going to air on Adult Swim. However, it didn't really know what sort of tone to decide for itself. In some episodes, it was about political espionage and in other episodes it was about two extremely-overpowered vampires whipping out their heaviest weapons and fighting each other to the death. On the other hand, I don't really think you can necessarily blame the story structure for the series seeing that the creator of the original light novels, Sunao Yoshida, died before he had a chance to finish and wrap the entire series up. So whether or not you'd give Trinity Blood a pass on its story before of this is all up to how you, the viewer, feel.

Characters:

In terms of characters, the two biggest characters worth of mention are the two main characters, Abel and Esther. Both characters get a notable amount of character development throughout the series, but as stated in the story section, I feel that the characters didn't receive the full amount of development because of the series being cut short due to the death of the original author. As for supporting characters, there are quite a few, but honestly, none of them really glued to me, stuck out to really give worthwhile mention, or developed enough to grow attached to. This was most likely to give more emphasis to Abel and Esther due to the limitations on the series or it could just be the fact that Yoshida did not develop any of these characters whatsoever. I don't know. I didn't read the light novels much.

<em>Art:</em>

I'll be frank, even though I'm not the best judge when it comes to art and animation, I quite liked the art style for Trinity Blood. Sure it didn't stand out all that much compared to other series I could give mention to but won't, but I found it quite enjoyable. The biggest mention I would probably give for the show's animation would be its intricate attention to the characters eyes when expressing strong emotions of anger, sadness, and grief. So for all intents and purposes, I feel the art in this series gets a ☑."

Audio:

The music for this series, overall, I didn't really care for. There was a few shiners, such as the track titled "Crusnik" in the majority of fight sequences, but outside the opening and ending, there really isn't much to speak of. Sure, the music is decent, but just nothing to brag about.

As for the voice acting, I have to give great mention to Troy Baker and Colleen Clinkenbeard for their portrayals as Abel and Esther respectively. The biggest shame would be the fact that they did so well in their roles as the two, but have much more known roles in series like Fullmetal Alchemist, Bleach, and Fairy Tail that the roles in this series are easily dwarfed.

Verdict:

Now, I bet you're expecting that I would recommend this series to you in a heartbeat, aren't you? Well, sadly, I'm not. The series isn't really all <i>that</i> great. There are certainly better series out there than this one. The only thing I will say is that I <i>would</i> recommend this series if you are a huge horror junkie or just a fan of vampires in general.

 

To be honest, it's no Hellsing Ultimate, but it's not what you'd call a total write off. I do agree with a lot of what you said, Time, but it's somewhat more entertaining than other anime I've seen with vampires. I wish they took more time with it, the story anyway, give it a little more T.L.C., and and really open up the throttle on the series. Other than that, I personally give it one thumb up.

 

The show certainly is entertaining, but in terms of story, it's near the bottom of my vampire anime list, with the lowest being Vampire Knight so far

 

I agree about Vampire Knight. I watched it, and said to myself, "ehh".

 

The problem with Trinity Blood was the fact that the original author of the series died before it could have been finished, so the series itself, the light novels and anime, were incomplete. So in my opinion, the series doesn't get a pass, but it doesn't get a strike either.

With Vampire Knight, it was basically an annoying love triangle that was about as interesting as watching white paint dry, and as far as I know, the series was still running, so it doesn't really have that excuse.

 

Vampire Knight is like an anime version of a chick flick from hell.

 

So..........Twilight?

 

I guess..... never saw Twilight. Don't think I'm missing anything though. Stuff like that isn't in my wheelhouse.

 

Not to say I haven't heard of Twiligjht, just, no.