Legend has it that only wolves have knowledge of how to enter Paradise allowing them to escape destruction of the world. Enter a pre-apocalyptic world where the entire population of wolves appears to be extinct. Signs of the apocalypse appear and people begin to regret destroying the wolf population.
Wolf’s Rain
3 Stars
The story line is set in a desolate world torn apart by a war of the Nobles. The people eagerly wait for the legendary Paradise to take over. However, they do not realize that the near extinct species, wolves, are the ones that will show the way. Wolves still exist in the world, but they can disguise themselves as humans and live normal lives. Many of them are spread thinly throughout the world and live in secrecy in fear of their lives.
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The show starts with a wolf disguised as a human named Tsume and this rag-tag group of bandits stealing food from the Nobles supply lines. At the beginning, Tsume seems to be a normal human. However, he has some mysterious superhuman powers. His team stumbles upon a nearly dead wolf inside a tree and they are shocked. They are stunned because wolves are said to be extinct. The nearly dead wolf is named Kiba, the one that will open the gates to Paradise. Kiba needs to find a flower girl that was hidden deep within the city. Tsume and Kiba get separated when the city’s Pet Control captures Kiba and sticks him in a cage to run experiments. Another wolf in disguise named Hige seeks out Kiba after smelling him with his superior nose. Hige rescues Kiba and they go on a search for the Flower Girl that is hidden in the city.
Meanwhile, Tsume runs into a younger wolf named Hoboe and saves him from an old wolf hunter. Hoboe follows him around like a little kid, which gets on Tsume’s nerves. Finally Tsume gets fed up with him and his childish ways, and chases him off.
Kiba and Hige locate the hidden Flower Girl deep within the city’s castle, but they were too late. They came in the middle of her being kidnapped by a unknown villain with a golden eye. Hige and Kiba try to save the Flower Girl named Cheza from his clutches, but they fail and are forced to retreat and try to find where he took her. uring their retreat they run into Hoboe and Tsume and they join them in the search for Paradise and the Flower girl Cheza They travel from town to town searching for where Cheva’s kidnapper, Lord Darcia the Third. They go to great lengths to obtain Cheza and protect her from Lord Darcia’s troops as she leads them on the path to Paradise.
The plot was really confusing. I had a hard time following the story line and the subplots that some of the characters had. The story line was great if you sat down and tried to figure it out. Reminded me of the Dark Tower series by Stephen King.
The main characters of this anime are cleverly named after different wolf parts in Japanese. Each of them have a short background story that is revealed at the very end of the series, making it a little useless. The main wolves breakdown as such:
Hoboe seemed like a girl. He was a little too caring towards Tsume and annoyingly followed him around.
Tsume was too over dramatic and tried to be a badass lone wolf (lawl pun). His past was explained in the very last episode that was an (go die) “ah hah!” moment. Tsume’s past should of been explained prior to the end of the series. It really explains why he tried to distance himself from the make-shift pack.
Hige was actually semi-normal. He had a nonchalant attitude towards everything, except for his feelings for Blue towards the end.
Kiba was just flat out dead set on getting to Paradise. He was the selected one to open the door to Paradise.
This series was a show that you really have to get into to enjoy it. Paying attention to minuet details is the key to watching this show. The show starts out really slow and gets rather confusing, and it doesn’t really explain anyone’s past or any history. They throw you head first in to the storyline and take you along. Overall, this show was very emotionally straining with very heart breaking events that will leave a hole in your heart for this series.