Overview

The way that I figure it, you can divide every season of anime into three sets of series. There's the Generics - the ones that are there every season, in some form. The series that are the same story, with a different name, in other words. Then there's the Brand Names - the series that make the season. Often these are sequels, or else eroge conversions, but they share a common trait with the Generics in that it's still stuff that you've seen before. Now, needless to say, I'm after the third group, the Wild Ideas... These are the series that try a really new spin on something. They might be based on a manga, or eroge - but not the sort of 'seen it before' material shared by the first two groups. It's hard to do, and be successful - the sad thing is, it seems like most viewers want either the Generics, or the Brand Names... In short, they want stuff that they're comfortable with. Get to the point, JC, I can hear you saying. Alright - it's this season's Wild Idea that I'm taking a look at today, Spice and Wolf.

Review

A long, long time ago in a galaxy far... erm, whoops, wrong review. About six hundred years ago in a quaint little hamlet of a farming village, a little boy made friends with a wolf. A particularly wise, and proud wolf - in fact, you might have even called her a kami. The little boy asked her a small favor - to help the village's grain grow healthy. She decided to grant his wish, and the wheat grew. Present day - a trader by the name of Lawrence Craft comes the a remarkably prosperous farming village of Pasroe to trade some salt for some of their grain. As it happens, he arrives just in time for a pagan festival to the 'Wolf' for another year's good crop. One of the residents in the village is an apprentice of his, named of Chloe, cuts the last bundle of wheat for the season, thus 'catching' the wolf. This happens just as Lawrence is passing by with a slightly larger bundle in his cart, and as tradition dictates, Chloe, now the "Horo," is locked into the barn for a week of feasting.

Lawrence has been a trader for seven years by the time that the series starts, and is pretty well established in the area that he travels. He also has a knack for picking up on little hints, and for using his cunning to get people to talk to him. His dream in life is to save up enough to open his own store - and just so there's no misunderstanding, the term store in this series means a major trade house in a city, with peddlers coming to him for supplies. That's not to say that things are perfect, though - and the conversations that he doesn't quite have with his horse should be proof of that. That all changes when he finds a nude girl sleeping in the back of his wagon under some furs he'd picked up to sell farther down the road... A nude girl with wolf ears and tail, who howls at the full moon when he wakes her up. This is Horo - the very same wolf who made, and has been keeping, the promise she made to that little boy so long ago... But the people of Pasroe have forgotten about her, and the little boy is long since gone.

Spice and Wolf is based on a series of light novels written by Isuna Hasakura, and ran along side a manga adaptation as well. The manga is still running, and we're stuck waiting for a second season to the TV series. In fact, it's fair to say that the Japanese fandom is going a little crazy for S&W - in addition to the anime and manga, there's a radio drama, and a Nintendo DS game coming along too. So why the furor over it, you might ask... Put simply, while it's very much a fantasy/romance story, it's an entirely new take on the genre. Rather than focusing on the hack'n'sorcery route that most fantasy storylines take, Spice and Wolf's plot is taken through the eyes of economics and trade. Lawrence is a crafty son of a bitch, but Horo's centuries of experience make him look like a little child in comparison.

There's a heavy emphasis in the series on the influence of the church in this world, and the one god that is spreading in power - and corruption, if you read between the lines. In fact, much of the first arc's story is driven by the fact that the church's influence has finally reached the village of Pasroe. That's part of the reason that Horo wound up traveling with Lawrence - and a source of considerable issues as the series progresses. In fact, I'd say that it's strong enough to be a statement on the real world - you be the judge, of course. In any case, be prepared going in for some pretty heavy symbolism to be shown through the use of the church.

I want to take a moment to talk about the character dynamic, because it's one of the more unique parts about the handling of the series. As I said, the series is based on a series of light novels, and looks to be sticking right close to them. That means that the steady cast is a grand total of two characters - Lawrence, and Horo. Three, if you count the horse. In a situation like that, it's all too common to find that the supporting cast, which only has to hold up for one arc, doesn't get fleshed out properly - only the portions of their character that relate to the primary story. However, there's an added variable to the telling of Spice and Wolf - the fact that Lawrence is a trader.

This opens up an interesting window - Lawrence has an actual motivation to keep ongoing relations with many of the supporting cast. After all, there's no telling when he'll be back in the area to do more trading. That in turn allows a mechanism to flesh out the supporting cast, as part of the process of Lawrence forming relationship foundations that will serve in the years to come. It's not always entirely successful, unfortunately, though I suspect that's as much because the anime was trying to cover a lot of ground as it was because the anime was more focused on the development between Lawrence and Horo than the manga or novels. Still, it's an great technique that does add some depth to characters that otherwise would have served as only filler material.

As for the main characters themselves, I'll admit that Lawrence probably could have used some more work. It's not that he's shallow - just that for the better part of the series he's rather badly out shown by Horo. He does have his moments, though, and the guy's got some balls too. More importantly, he's not perfect - and there are a couple scenes in the series where he could use a good kick in the balls because of it. I'll give credit where it's due, though... Lawrence is smart, and quick on his feet when in a bad situation. More importantly, he's sly, and while he can be cornered, he's pretty good at getting out. He's a damned solid character, and well written... the trouble is that he's a penlight standing next to nuke getting ready to clear its throat.

Horo is something else entirely. Looking for your standard, pretty, charming, polite anime girl? Sorry kids... what you've got is an egotistical drunkard with an apple fetish that's not afraid to prove just how much smarter and more experienced she is than you. She's rude, has a nasty temper, and mean enough at times to get into the scary sandbox where even the big kids are afraid to play. There's something distinctly alien in the characterization of Horo, and you know what? It's fucking awesome. She's not a tsun/yandere, she's not a moe blob, she's not a queen bee, and she's not a spineless girl willing to be walked all over. I was wondering how to sum her character up - how to categorize her, if you will, and I'll be honest... Moonie over at TenchiFF provided the best term I could use. She's Horo. Of course.

Yet, at the same time that Horo is... well, Horo, the thing that really makes her a great character is that she has the depth to be able to be sad, to cry. On the whole, she's absolutely irrepressible - there's just no dismissing her... yet there are moments when you start to realize that behind that is a woman who's been alone for a long time. These moments are also some of Lawrence's strongest - and worst, too. It's like I said... he's not a perfect character, and while he gets it right a couple times... a couple times, he also gets it very, very wrong. Hey, they're both flawed in their own ways... what a fucking concept, huh? Characters that aren't perfect... wow. Knock me over with a wolf's tail.

There's some damned nice animation going on in Spice and Wolf, folks, though much like H2O, I can't say that it's incredible. In retrospect, I have to blame that on series like Gurren Lagann, and ef - a tale of memories, both from last season. Both of them had animation values so incredibly high that I'm starting to realize that my expectations are forever tainted. So, while the animation you'll see in Spice and Wolf doesn't come close to the levels of those two series, it's still pretty damn awesome. There's a lot of sweeping vista shots that suit the idea of a traveling peddler, and some nice skies to go with them. The cities tend to look a little too similar while they're walking about for my tastes, but not to the extent of being a bad thing.

As for the character design, I have to say that I was rather impressed. Lawrence sports a bit of stubble that might someday become a good Van Dyke beard that actually suits his character. Horo is just wild about herself - in fact, she qualifies as being down right narcissistic. Can't say that I blame her, though - she's got a very nice tail... and I don't mean the furry one. The one problem that some have noted is that Horo looks more like a fox girl than a wolf girl in her human form. As for the supporting cast, good, solid job all around there. While not QUITE as interesting as the several stages of dress - and lack thereof - that Horo goes through, still a nice amount of attention paid to detail.

I'd say that the op theme, Tabi no Tochuu, is definitely my favorite of the season, up there with other awesome entries like Tatta Hitotsu no Omoi (Gunslinger Girl 2), Euphoric Field (ef - a tale of memories), and Erinyes (Night Wizard). It's a soft, sad/hopeful theme that does an incredible job of capturing the essence of both Horo and Lawrence, especially when taken with the opening credits. The ending theme, The Wolf Whistling Song, is a rather humorous, jaunty little stroll through a fairy tale sung in (intentionally) bad English. Catchy little tune - and it'll get stuck in your head worse than the YMCA song. Meanwhile, on the character VA side of things, I have to say I was pretty impressed. Lawrence is voiced by the same guy that does Lelouch in Code Geass, and he did a great job here after a slightly flat start. Horo's VA, Koshimizu Ami, gets big points for being able to run a pretty good gamut of emotions and mood swings. Hey, they were having fun in their roles, and I've said often enough that that shine through in the characters themselves.

Overall

Yeah, huge surprise here... WATCH THE SERIES! Heh, if you didn't see that one coming from the review, you really need to stop skimming to my overall comments. What can I say that I haven't already said? When I first ran across the Wolf and Spice light novels, I was intrigued for the simple fact that I like wolves. I knew the series was going to be a winner when I heard the opening theme in the promo. Spice and Wolf has a lot going for it - not the least of which is the fact that the novel series has already finished its run, and by all appearances both the manga and the TV series are going to be sticking to that track. The only real difference between the manga/novels and the TV series, in fact, is that Chloe was added specifically for the anime. Now, if I had to make any complaints, it would be that the series really should have been twenty four episodes. I can't for the life of me imagine why they split it up into two separate seasons, save that perhaps they didn't want to get too far ahead of the manga series... A little late, for that. Also, I might have liked Lawrence to spend a bit less time on his economics lessons for Horo... they were required for the storyline, but they could have been trimmed down a bit.

That said, it's an awesome little series, with great animation and voice acting. C'mon, folks, give it a try... just remember to bring an apple or three dozen to keep the wolf at bay...