Law of Ueki

Ok, today's review is in the field of manga and anime. Recently, in my country there was an imbecile, opps, a columnist in the daily Malay paper that sent in an article saying that ALL manga and anime, period, were associated with nudity and sex. (I know, and I agree, fellow manga/anime lovers out there, it's an outrage.) For the viewers information, there ARE manga and anime that are based on that, but they are considered a branch of their own. Anyway, my point is, there are many mangas and anime that are wholesome and good for people of all ages.





That being said, I now bring up the review of the anime, which is a good point for my argument above. The name of the anime is Ueki no Housoku, or The Law of Ueki. It was shown on Animax for some time and that was how I noticed it. Ok then, lets go to the story...

The story is about a boy called Ueki and his quest to attain the Blank Zai..... Oh ok, maybe some of you are lost already, so I'll start from the beginning. The god of this world was due to hand over his powers as god to the appointed successor. Being pressed to find a suitable candidate, he proclaimed that a contest be held between god candidates to decide exactly that. However, there was a catch : the candidates were to use secondary school students to do the fighting. Candidates will give ONLY one battle ability to their chosen student and the student would battle other ability-given students to win. Candidates are not allowed to help their students during battles. Zai (normal talents, ranging from the studying zai to girl magnet zai XD) are used as points, defeat another ability-given student and you get one zai, but hit non-gifted people and you lose a zai. Lose all your zai and you...disappear. The final student to stand will see his candidate become god, and he will receive the Blank Zai as a reward. The Blank Zai is a zai that is *obviously* blank, so you can put in anything you wish.

Ueki Kousuke (for Westerners, note that for the Japanese the surname is in front, just like Chinese names...) was selected by Kobayashi to become an ability user, with the power to change trash into trees, hence the 'green' themes of this anime. He is selected not because of his strength (though he has a lot of that), but because of his strong sense of justice that Kobayashi was looking for. He pledges to get the Blank Zai, to prevent anyone from using it to do harm.

Well, comments.... It is a good anime (I haven't read the manga, so I'm basing this post purely on the anime), with nice artwork and music (fantastic! Both opening songs are really nice, I have them =>) and seiyuu (voice actors, somebody correct me if I'm getting anything wrong). The voice of Ueki particularly is done by Paku Romi, who has done the voices of Temari in Naruto and Edward Elric in Fullmetal Alchemist. The storyline is darn funny, with Ueki being really dumb sometimes and Mori Ai whacking him non-stop for using his abilites to punish non-ability users who were commiting crimes and what-not. It is also a short anime, with only 51 episodes, so it's good for those who do not want really LONG animes to watch.

All in all, really enjoyable and moving anime, for those who like a bit of action and love to see the good guy beat the bad guy against all odds in the end. And as I said earlier, there's NO NUDITY! I mean it! Just clean fun with even a few moral values thrown in for the mix. I really recommend this. =>