Review for Vampire Knight: Volume 2

Introduction

If you're here looking for another ineffectual whine about value for money and disc presentation, then you're in the wrong place. I'm not going to repeat myself here, just go back to my review of volume 1 to recap on the whinge. Suffice it to say that Vampire Knight Volume 2, with its paltry three episodes, on a disc that locks itself away from its users, doesn't leave me a happy bunny. In fact when it comes to general bunny jollity, you'll find me at the Mesousa from Paniponi Dash end of the spectrum. Vampire Knight debuted last month with an initial offering of four episodes, and in that short space of time managed to develop from a somewhat silly, comic high school set-up with its vampires and humans coexisting, into some really quite interesting character drama, as it began to explore the lives of some of the students at the school. Despite my misgivings about the disc and the format, it was enough to make me interested in seeing more, and hot on the heels of the first volume comes the second.


The Cross Academy is a boarding school with a difference. It's also the venue for a unique social experiment, where vampires are trying to co-exist with humans. Of course the humans can't know about this, so the school is divided into the Day Class and the Night Class, and the only time that the human students interact with the vampires is at twilight, when the classes change and the Day Class return to their dorm. All they know is that the Night Class is full of handsome boys and beautiful girls, aristocratic and elegant. It's down to the Guardians to keep from the Day Class from learning the truth about the Night Class, two students, Yuki Cross and Zero Kiryu who have to protect the humans, should the worst happen. The school's headmaster adopted Yuki when she was five, after a trauma that left her with amnesia, while Zero's own traumatic past has left him with an abiding hatred of vampires, and a secret that he keeps hidden.


The next three episodes of Vampire Knight are presented on this disc from Manga Entertainment.

5. Moonlight Festivities
Following the revelation of Zero's vampire affliction, the headmaster Kaien Cross gives Yuki a bracelet, which in combination with Zero's tattoo, should serve to restrain him if his proclivities resurface. At the same time, there is a new ethics teacher in school, a one-eyed man named Toga Yagari that has all the girls aflutter, but freaks Zero out completely and he runs out of class. Yuki follows him into town to try and get an explanation, only to be attacked by another E-Class vampire. Before Zero can do anything, Yuki's rescued by two of the Night Class, who apparently believe it's their duty to eliminate E-Class vampires, humans turned vampire that run out of control. They invite them to a party at the Night Dorm to explain, but that may be walking into the lion's den. And with all the blood (tablets) flowing as they celebrate Ichijo's birthday, the one lion that Yuki has to deal with turns out to be Zero.


6. Their Choices
Toga putting a bullet past Zero may have stopped him, but that's no long-term solution, especially as Yuki sees Toga the Vampire Hunter as more of a problem than Zero. But the thing is that Zero and Toga have a past together that makes Zero more accepting of Toga's decisions, and Zero can't come to terms with his vampire nature asserting itself, especially as he's one of the few that isn't helped by the blood tablets. The bloodthirst is getting stronger and stronger, and Toga's final solution is looking more and more attractive. But Yuki isn't willing to give up on Zero, and she comes up with a plan that may sate his bloodlust, and delay his eventual turning into an E-Class. The trouble is that what she has planned is considered a sin by human and vampire alike, and no one, but no one can be allowed to find out. But just when you think they may have solved one problem, another rears its head, as Toga has some worrying news for Zero.


7. The Scarlet Maze
Yuki and Zero's new arrangement ought to have solved their problems, but it's introduced a whole new awkwardness to their friendship. On top of that, Zero's cruel accusation of Yuki rather being with Kaname cuts pretty close to the bone. Yuki runs off to be by herself, only she can't get away from the truth, or the past that made it so. She's reminded of her life following her arrival at Cross Academy after being rescued by Kaname, her loss of memory, and gradually growing up to become a normal girl again after being adopted by Kaien Cross. She also recalls the arrival of Zero Kiryu and the antagonistic triangle that resulted between her, Zero and Kaname. Zero's doing some reflecting of his own, as is Kaname, and Kaname finally tells Zero why he allows him to live.

Picture

Vampire Knight gets a 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer, which as is often the case, is an NTSC-PAL standards conversion. That said, it's an exceptionally good one, clear and smooth throughout, with no ghosting or judder immediately apparent, and signs of blended frames at a minimum. The only telltale is the overall softness inherited from a lower resolution image. Vampire Knight is a series that is originally aimed at the wobbly-kneed demographic, so you can expect a whole lot of pretty male characters in this show, tall, elegant, moody, while aside from Yuki herself, most of the female character designs are fairly generic. The world design is stylised but effective and quite detailed, but I did feel that the overall animation was static, or it saved up most of the animation for the action sequences. This is a show where you expect to see a whole lot of rose petals fluttering past moody tableaux.

Sound

You have a choice between DD 2.0 Surround English and Japanese, with player locked signs for the English track, and player locked translated subtitles for the Japanese track. The sound is fit for purpose, and opting for the Japanese track, I found that a favourite voice actress of mine, Yui Horie was voicing Yuki, which certainly added to the show's appeal for me. The dialogue is clear, and the theme songs are the expected power ballads to go with the romantic vampire action. The surround sound is appreciated, but it's hardly a surround intensive show. The English dub didn't immediately strike me as amazing, but it's not immediately bad either. I'm sure dub fans will be perfectly satisfied with it. There needs to be an English cast credit reel after the programme, as the credits aren't translated.

Conclusion

I've overdosed on vampires in recent years. I did like Buffy back in the day, and its spin-off Angel, but now, when every second genre television show has bloodsuckers in, I'm quick to reach for the off switch. It doesn't help then that at times it seems that 1 in 3 anime shows is about vampires as well. And it's always vampires as cool, elegant, moody, and making all the girls squeal, instead of dangerous bloodsuckers that would tear your throat out if you stepped outside after dark without a clove of garlic. Frankly I could use another vampire anime as much as I could use two holes in the neck. On top of that, there's Vampire Knight's release format that is annoying enough to get a vein pulsing in my forehead, and you would expect me to give this show a slating.


I'm not going to do that. Vampire Knight has its flaws, more flaws than most shows released on DVD today, and chief among them is the 'girls squealing at handsome vampires' cliché, but it's enjoyable with that, infuriatingly so. I find myself more tuned into an episode of Vampire Knight than I do many other current anime, and that's down to the quality of the writing, and more importantly the engaging characterisations. It's a very interesting story, told with style and vigour, with consistently atmospheric visuals. If there is one thing that the show gets spot on time and again, it's the mood.


What appeals to me most is that the characters are a mess of contradictions, and add to that the coincidence that all three of the main characters are orphans, having faced their own particular traumas. Kaname Kuran is a vampire that wants to coexist with humans. He's a scion of nobility, the purest of the purebloods, yet he is acting atypically for vampires, associating with humans and trying to change the way of things. The rest of the Night Class are apparently only there because of the respect they have for Kaname's nobility, and it seems that were it not for that, they would be out hunting and being hunted as tradition has long proclaimed.


Yuki Cross on the other hand is a human who ought to be terrified of vampires, sole traumatised survivor of a vampire attack that left her orphaned. On the one hand she has the memory of the 'bad' vampire that attacked her, and on the other she has Kaname who rescued her. Part of her is indeed terrified of vampires, while they fascinate her as well. As a result, she's both in love with, and terrified of Kaname. At the same time she's been brought up with Zero Kiryu, another survivor of a vampire attack, and someone she considers human, and whom she also has feelings for. Yet now she learns that Zero is well on the way to becoming a vampire himself, and as a human turned vampire, will most likely become a mindless beast before long, far more dangerous than any pureblood. Yet conversely her affection for him remains constant, as does her faith in his humanity and ability to remain human.


Of all the divided souls, Zero Kiryu is the most tormented, coming as he does from a family of vampire hunters. He's been raised to hate vampires, and we meet his master Toga Yagari here, who lost an eye protecting Zero. That's enough guilt to heap on a boy to begin with, but following a vampire attack, Zero has been turned vampire himself and those aspects of him have been asserting themselves more and more, until eventually he turns on Yuki. So we have someone who hates vampires, yet is a vampire himself. The self-loathing is obvious, as is the death wish that manifests because of that guilt. But as much as he wants to die for what he is becoming, he also learns in this volume that he wants to live for Yuki's sake even more, and somehow cling irrationally to the hope that he won't become a monster.


It's characterisations like these that are downright intriguing, and the main reason why I am enjoying Vampire Knight far more than I expected to. In the previous review I opined that low episode counts and higher price tags aren't that burdensome if the quality of what's on the disc warrants it. On the strength of volume 1, I thought that wasn't the case. But the three episodes that we get here are beginning to shift my opinion. If Vampire Knight sustains this standard, then it may just turn out to be an unexpected treat for the winter season.