Pandora Hearts - Oz Bezarious and his shorts

Japan continues its fascination with alice in wonderland, but takes the long way round to making an adaptation with this recent series.

Well Thats not fair really. Pandora hearts is not an Alice in Wonderland adaptation. It may maker various and prolific references to the book, its characters and themes, but its by no means an adaptation. its like saying a film about monks is a bible adaptation. anyway, getting back on track,
pandora hearts is a fantasy tale about how all hell breaks loose when a boy by the name of Oz( y’know… the other fantasy world with an epic journey and a young girl in a pinnafore…) comes of age.
Oz Bezarious is the heir to one of the duke houses in his kingdom but for some innexplicable reason is thrown in a magical prison known as the abyss on his birthday. Alice breaks Oz out of prison and then our tartan shorted lead begins his whirl wind adventure.
Now those in the know in the world of anime will be a tad confused. Not really by the story line, its magic or even the poor boys dress sense. No. I’m talking about the demographic. You see these sprawling epics are typically the domain of what is nknown as shonen or boys manga/anime if you will and the Alice In Wonderland inspired romance magical tranformation SailorMoon style stories are shoujo: for girlies. Which is not to say you can’t enjoy a well written and animated storyu about a boy kicking ass in the name of Alice, or even Sailor Moon. I’d rather not go into that one.

It starts off with an ominous exlosion in episode one, a dark bubble that consumes everything, much like the many times I’m seen an animated Tokyo swallowed by light, before turning to the present day where our main character is being what can only be described as a rascal, while exploring his massive estate, owned by his absent father. Through out  the first episode hear a lot about preparation for his coming of age ceremony but Oz is more interested in torturing his servant who is afraid of cats and falling through holes in the floor in the ancient mysterious castle in the hill.

Oz’s hijinks stir something u when he discovers an unmarked grave and a musical pocket watch. It all gets delightfully enigmatic in the last third of the episode when Oz encounters a murderous spooky girl seemingly roused by the song of the watch.

The story of the manga seems to be quite indepth with classes of enemies and allies to understand along the way, but the anime seems To be off to a good start. what troubles me is that the translation of the manga has been droped twice in the ast, which doesn’t bode well for the life span of this show. at least in the west.