The Skull Man

Here's a preview for The Skull Man:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/nw4fnz

It's from the original creator from many classics, including Kamen Rider, Cyborg 009, and Gilgamesh. It's also one of the two new BONES series, and I'm a fan of them bringing some of my favorites like Eureka seveN, Fullmetal Alchemist, Kurau Phantom Memory to name a few.

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Skull Man revolves around Tatsuo Kagura, who early in his life was subjected to several mutating science experiments that ended up giving him amazing powers and skills. Longing revenge for the murder of his parents he becomes Skull Man, a shadowy crusader who battles The Syndicate and its evil leader Rasputin.

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http://www.skullman.jp/
http://anidb.info/perl-bin/animedb.p...anime&aid=4925

i will check this out i use to watch cyborg 009 with my brother on cartoon network...

Skull Man Episode 1 by SHS & NanaOne

Been lookin forward to this.

Edit: Pretty good start, but it was piss boring except for the last 3-4 minutes.

I watched the prequel to the series which was recently released, and it was done using live actors. The style used is a direct rip-off from Sin City, but it's still very nicely done. Do try and download it if you can.

The version I watched is a raw, but from what I gather at least 1 group is doing the subs for that episode. In fact, I did the banner for them. :)

http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/3668/skullmanmu0.jpg

Will provide the link to the show once they are done.

The Mask makes him look like a gargoyle or something.

The description gives a bit different image of the show. It looks like they have chosen the outside observer perspective for telling the story, as the main character is not the Skull Man himself but that journalist and the camera girl (it's a crime, btw, that the girl isn't a blond despite being voice acted by Ayako Kawasumi). Of course this way they can keep things far more mysterious.

Episode 2 - Makoto

Nothing in the first two episodes really makes me want to keep watching this series... It could develop into a decent crime drama, but right now it just feels like a slow anime rendition of every other Hollywood crime film that's been made in the past 20 years.

Yeah, it is quite uninteresting. The description made it out to be interesting, but so far I can't bother to care enough to remember the names to even comprehend the mystery going on.

I'll five this series a couple of more chances, but so far, like you say, it hasn't been too impressive. One problem is how there have been quite a few characters, but none of them seem to connect anywhere. They just pop in on the screen, say some obscure lines and then disappear. Maybe because the main character is a journalist they have tried purposefully to build this kind of approach where everything seems distant and unknown, but somehow it makes it hard to really like anything in the series. Pretty much the only thing I look forward to is the interaction between the journalist and the camera girl.

Episode 3 - Makoto

Seems like Makoto's the 10sigh of Claymore manga, except for anime. They finished Witchblade lightning quick (though it may have just been ripped DVD encodes and scripts), and are working lightning quick on this series.

I'm kind of baffled by the recent actions. Is the Skull Man a good guy or a bad guy? I mean, the secretary of the actress, while a mutant of some sort, didn't seem like any criminal, yet was the primary target (if not the only one). And it also looked like she didn't even know she was a mutant before that theater scene. So, based on the third ep at least it looks like the Skull Man is indiscriminatingly liquidating all mutants. In that sense he would likely kill his two friends and himself at the end, following noir story trends.

Edit: Episode 4 - Makoto

I was really bored with episode 3 yet again, I basically skimmed through the whole thing, and read a bit of stuff here and there. Until, the part with the mutants and stuff. I thought, finally it's starting to get interesting. He's getting revenge, so it's not a good-guy bad-guy sort of thing I don't think. Seemingly Saya (the secretary) isn't a bad guy, but is linked to the murder of the Skull Man's parents. I wouldn't know of that if I didn't read the descrption due to the fact, that they haven't revealed anything really yet.

Saya kept spouting that line McBeth, fair is foul, and foul is fair. So I'm guessing she was doing foul things to get her position (though only a secretary), but at the price had cost the life of Kagura Tatsuo's (Skullman) parents.

After watching a few of the episodes recently I can understand why everyone is either bored or confused. This show is one big murder mystery and the audience for the most part gets to see the majority of the show through the story of the journalist -- with some ocassional side stories.

Everything the journalist learns is a sliver of truth, but often times he looks at things incorrectly. So we can't really lock down the skull man's motivations or affiliations. Is he in league with the scientist? the religous sect? .

The concept of the Skull Man being good or evil is another issue. After what he did at the end of episode 4 he's certainly not a good person, but who knows what are his motivations. They use a lot of double talk and foreshadowing in the show that you have to pay attention to. The shakespeare quote is obviously one. The actress talking about how main character can't be so innocent is another. And the PI when he mentions "black coffee can taste so good" is another metaphor for evil can be deceptively nice.

Where does that leave me. kinda confused. this a good thing if the story does have a direction and doesn't dick around with more pointless deaths.

This so far reminds me a lot about Lost. A lot of mystery, but very little payoff when the show finishes. Hopefully we can start getting more definate answers soon.

Episode 5 - Makoto
Episode 6 - Makoto
Episode 7 - Makoto

The series so far has been 5% of good stuff, and 95% of excrutiatingly ambigious boring nothingness. Well, my theory that the skeleton man was that priest is now probably 80% confirmed at this point.

How many times have we now seen the real skeleton man? I think the first time it was him, when the main character got his ass kicked at the construction site. And then when the new actress was killed, and lastly in this episode. The regular murders were performed by this blackmailed priest guy, I reckon.

It kind of seemed like there were two behavior patterns for the Skull Man, but I honestly didn't use enough time to analyse the situation that I'd have thought there's the original one with whatever agenda of revenge and another who's just a tool for political murders.

*Bump*
I've started watching the series based on it's cool name and stuff, but i can't get the final episode to work properly (makoto-subs), did anyone else have this problem?

oh, and just for the hell of it:

Dear: Kirico
CC: any other anime girl.
Subject: your brother
He has gone evil and bad, but don't come looking for him, he is already too far done the road, and no matter what you do, it would only drive him to his innveatble death, when he would try to redeem himself in your eyes. If you truly care for your family, go away when he tells you to, and invite him over to the holidays, or better yet, stay with your parents and take care of them, they have already lost one child to the adventuring willies, don't let them experience another loss of a child.