12th Feb: A new policy is being put in place for TRS threads: If there is no evidence provided in the Opening Post that the page is broken, the thread will be nuked immediately. See Everything You Wanted To Know About Changing Names for what constitutes evidence.
5th Feb: Echo Chamber Season 1 blooper reel on Youtube here
Haji and Saya, with a Chiropteran in the background.
Saya Otonashi is seemingly an Ordinary High School Student in Okinawa, aside from her amnesia and anemia. All she wants is to compete in track and spend time with her American adopted father George and her (also adopted) brothers, moody Kai and innocent Riku. However, Saya's world changes forever when she's attacked by a Chiropteran, a hulking, bat-like humanoid monster. This prompts a rescue by Haji, a mysterious, handsome stoic who seems devoted to protecting Saya. Haji kisses Saya, forces her to drink his blood, then gives Saya a sword coated with her own blood. This event cause a strange transformation in Saya; her eyes glow red and she becomes a fighting machine, quickly killing the Chiropteran. Afterwards, answers are refused while even more strange accidents occur all around Saya; eventually, she is forced into leaving her home to help a secret organization called Red Shield stop a mysterious entity only known as Diva. However, not everything is black and white, and Saya soon begins to doubt her reasons to fight, her allies, and her own humanity.Blood+ is a 50 episode long anime which is loosely based on the OAV Blood: The Last Vampire; the film and the series share the basic premise, the characters of Saya, David and Lewis (all of whom are re-imagined in Blood+), and the Chiropterans, but otherwise have little in common. With a beautiful soundtrack, a dark and smoothly flowing storyline, and empathetic characters, Blood+ is a memorable and wonderful series.
Abnormal Ammo: The ignition rounds Kai uses latter in the series. Shoot the explosive rounds into a Chiropteran followed by the primer shot and suddenly guns become slightly less useless.
Anti-Villain: Solomon is the most obvious example. Nathan also can be seen this way, though really his true motivations and goals are so murky that he's pretty hard to pin down.
Arm Cannon: A biological variant. The Schiff and people with Schiff limbs grafted on can launch crystal spikes.
Artificial Limbs: Karl got a mechanical replacement for his injured right arm after the Vietnam war. Later on he and James would get Schiff limbs attached to replace limbs they had amputated.
Badass Adorable: Lulu wields an oversized axe and fights monsters with ease, but is still a young girl who likes watching children's cartoons.
Badass in a Nice Suit: Chevaliers in general and David. Considering how often these clothes get destroyed, one wonders how much of their budget Red Shield and Cinq Fleche earmark for new suits.
Bavarian Fire Drill: How Okamura planned on infiltrating the Cinq Fleche dance, by abusing his press pass and looking like he was supposed to be there. It didn't work.
Also, technically speaking, Diva's rape of Riku, seeing as he's the adopted brother of her identical twin sister.
Break the Cutie: Saya gets broken twice thanks to her amnesia
And how about Riku? Sucks to be him.
Also, Hagi.Through a flashback, it is shown that the reason he went from being somewhat stoic to made of stone was because his blood turned his One True Love and reason for living into a murdering psychopath who forgot who he was and cut his arm off during her rampage.
Breather Episode: The return to Okinawa after Vietnam and the shopping trip in New York.
Brown Note: Diva's singing can get deadly under the right circumstances
Bury Your Gays: Subverted in that Nathan survives 'til the very end, outliving his boss, associates, underlings and several main characters. After Saya cuts him in half. No explanation given as to how.
Nathan makes a passing statement that implies that he is not actually Diva's chevalier, but actually the chevalier of Saya and Diva's mother. Saya's blood might not have ever been a threat to him. If this is true, Nathan would be completely impossible to kill, unless Saya and Diva's aunt (who must have existed since Chiropteran queens are always twins) is still out there somewhere.
He's killed in the manga after he murders Diva due to pent up rage from Diva's indifference over James' death.
Children Are Innocent: Riku. Face it, if Kai was the one who had his blood drained by Diva and became Saya's Chevalier only to get raped and killed by Diva, it wouldn't be quite as traumatic for the cast or the audience.
Creepy Child: Err, well creepy Vietnamese children who were exposed to Delta 67. The end result was mini chiropterans who were just Nightmare Fuel Unleaded.
Deus ex Machina: The final battle with James. Sure, it makes sense that he would be afflicted by Thorn with his Schiff grafts, but the timing was just a little too convenient for our heroes...
Diagonal Cut: How Saya dispatched a lot of Chiropterans over the course of the series.
Did Not Do the Research: There're some mistakes in the part where the gang goes to Vietnam and infiltrate the all-female school. First, the students and teachers are mostly foreigners around the Eastern Asia region so this is obvisously an international school. But why would an international school's uniform be Ao Dai (Vietnamese traditional dress?
Min and Mui are hardly popular names over there. They could be referring to Minh or My for all we know.
Drama-Preserving Handicap: For her final confrontation with Diva Saya was being gradually weakened since she was starting to enter her hibernation cycle. If not for that her superior fighting skills would have ended the fight in seconds.
Dress Hits Floor: The pivotal scene between Diva and Riku in the episode 'Boy Meets Girl'.
Subverted. All of the Chevaliers appear to be Extreme Doormats, but they actually aren't. Ultimately, Haji wants to fulfill Saya's wish, but he doesn't coddle to her every whim and is perfectly capable of disagreeing with her in order to protect her. The other Chevaliers are almost the opposite. They spoil Diva by giving her every little thing she wants, but they are primarily motivated by selfishness and continually manipulate her for their own benefit.
Face Heel Turn: Dr. Collins betrays Red Shield to work for Cinq Fléches, taking Julia with him. Julia eventually [1] rejoins Red Shield, with some prodding from David.
Face Stealer: Chevaliers and Queens have the ability to take the form of somebody whose blood they have drunk. Diva uses it for extra Squick when she goes around looking like Riku.
Fantastic Racism: James' hatred of the Schiff. Particularly ironic, given that he is a black American. Becomes even more ironic when James is saved from certain death...by replacing most of his body with Schiff parts. Of course, this makes it worse; self-hatred makes him lash out, and he blames the Schiff for the fact that Diva is disgusted with James's own Schiff transplants.
Feed the Mole: Amshel tells Solomon Diva will be at Christina Island to shoot a video in a week. The latter told Red Shield, who arrived on the island. By that time, Diva left the island. James was waiting for them.
Flash Step: Chevaliers, Queens, the Schiff and Corpse Corps.
Flechette Storm: Karl's Schiff arm allows him to rapidly fire huge spikes from his hand.
Fluffy the Terrible: The Delta-67 strain Chiropterans are referred to as "mice".
For Science: Amshel's ultimate motivation behind being Diva's Chevalier and the Delta-67 project is because he wants to better study Chiropterans.
For Want of a Nail: Saya and Diva are twin sisters. Joel raised Saya like a daughter, whereas Amshel kept Diva locked in a tower, treating her like an experiment. When Saya receives this history lesson, she can't help but sympathize with Diva, knowing full well that they could just as easily wound up with their roles switched.
Freudian Excuse: Diva's so fucked up because she spent her life as a test subject locked in a tower. And only received anything like human contact from a person that saw her as a specimen. Her feud with Saya stems from the fact that she seeks revenge for how their adoptive father, the first Joel Goldschmidt, callously neglected her at the same time he raised Saya in freedom and luxury.
Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: Kai tries to snap David out of his Heroic BSOD after Red Shield's HQ sunk by pouring out his booze and punching him in the gut.
Go-Go Enslavement: After losing consciousness because of a fight, Saya is abducted by Solomon and stripped of her clothes in her sleep. He claims it was because they were ruined. However, he gives her a nice gown after she does wake up.
Good Old Ways: Haji, and Riku once he becomes Saya's Chevalier, if only in clothing styles.
Good Thing You Can Heal: Sapient Chiropterans in general. Saya takes advantage of it in a battle against Karl running herself through to stab Karl and poison him with her blood. Diva once got shot on purpose just so Amshel would buy her a new dress. And Haji seems to get Impaled with Extreme Prejudice at least every other fight.
Guns Are Worthless: Bullets might slow a Chiropteran down, but to kill them you need Saya — or at least her blood. Beheading and incineration also work, but these aren't exactly things that can be accomplished with firearms, and are generally nigh-impossible for ordinary humans to pull off anyway.
Encasing them in concrete and sinking them to the bottom of the ocean seems to be the preferred method of dealing with them semi-permanently. Of course, this only works if you can manage to trap them into a strong cage before pouring in the concrete.
Happily Adopted: Saya, Kai and Riku when living with George. Too bad it didn't last.
In the epilogue, Diva's children living with Kai.
Heel Face Turn: the Schiff, and later Solomon Goldsmith.
Hold Me: Moses and Carmen when they choose to burn up in the sun instead of succumbing to Thorn
Hope Spot: Saya, Kai, and Riku play a game of catch as the sun sets. They talk about going home to Okinawa together, when all is said and done. Moments later, Diva shows up and...oh God...
Idiot Ball: Early in the series, Kai follows Saya to Hanoi after getting his ass handed to him by a simple Red Shield operative, and being shown that he would be worse than useless in a fight against the supernatural fiends Saya fights on a day-to-day basis. Even worse, he drags their younger brother along with him. He then proceeds to barge in during the middle of a dangerous fight and purposefully snaps her out of berserker mode for no apparent reason because he can't stand to see his adoptive imouto Saya as a bloodthirsty killing machine.
Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Happens to Haji repeatedly. Also Amshel, who got impaled by the spire on top of the Chrysler Building. He got better, at least for enough time to get himself Killed Off for Real.
Improbable Weapon User: Haji goes around hitting people with a cello case. With a cello in it.
Instant Expert: Saya is initially confused by her sudden aptitude for sword fighting and languages. Subverted in the fact that she isn't learning new skills, just remembering ones she already had.
Instrument of Murder: Haji borders on this trope. He regularly uses his cello case as a weapon/shield. The cello itself is only used to perform music. One does have to wonder how it hasn't been smashed to pieces inside his case though.
Intimate Healing: To heal, queens recieve blood from their Chevaliers. This is typically a fairly intimate process. See also Kiss of Life, below.
first subverted, given that one does not expect Riku to survive his first encounter with Diva, then tragically untwisted, given that one does expect him to survive his second encounter with her.
Averted in the manga where he lives.
Charles in the manga.
Red Eyes, Take Warning: Saya's eyes are a dull shade of red, but turn bright, glowing red when she uses her vampiric abilities. Diva, the main antagonist, has blue eyes which also glow brightly when she's serious
Kiss of Life: Played with; to awaken Saya's Chiropteran powers to save her from the first Delta-series Chiropteran she encounters, Haji gives her some of his blood by putting it into his mouth and kissing her. This is later revealed to be a sort of Meaningful Echo of how she turned him into a Chevalier in the first place, giving him some of her blood to save his life after he fell off a cliff-which ironically was her fault, since she tried to grab a flower over the edge just to give it as a birthday present to the first Joel.
Kiss of the Vampire: Several of the reactions, Nathan's in particular, suggest that a queen's bite can be quite... pleasurable.
Knife Nut: In addition to his cello case, Hagi has a seemingly unlimited supply of throwing knives.
Laser-Guided Karma: Played straight for both sides. In their final showdown, Diva and Saya stab each other with their blood, which normally would have killed both of them, but Saya survives because Diva's pregnancy made her blood lose its potency.
Light Is Not Good: Solomon, who wears white and has an angelic appearance (that is, until he leaves Diva's side, however, even that has nothing to do with any sense that trying to kill off all or most of humanity is wrong. He just decided that he liked Saya more.
Lighter and Softer: The manga - pretty much nobody dies, in stark comparison to the anime.
The Load: Played straight and averted with Kai and Riku. At the beginning of the series, neither have much fighting skill and mostly hindered Red Shield. On many occasions, though, they gave Saya some required emotional support in order to fulfill her tasks. After the destruction of Red Shield, Kai trains and becomes an important part of the team, being able to fight as well as counsel those in distress.
Made of Indestructium: What fanon believes Hagi's cello is made of. Otherwise it should have been smashed to pieces hundreds of times over while he is using his cello case as a weapon.
Cinq Fleche employs a few of others such as Boris (creator of the Schiff) and Van (who worked to perfect Delta 67)
Major Injury Underreaction: Avoided. Several Chevaliers avoid any major reactions when they undergo injuries. These injuries include Solomon and Haji having arms sliced off and Solomon having a giant hole ripped through his stomach. However, many of these aren't major injuries in the first place as they heal extremely quickly.
May Contain Evil: Cinq Fleche distributed a bunch of food products laced with Delta 67.
Master Swordsman: Early in the series, Van and other Cinq Fleches referred to Saya as the "Samurai-man" because of her remarkable skill with swordplay and the fact her blood petrifies Chiropterans.
Possible example with the name Hagi. In Japanese 'Haji' can mean 'shame' or 'guilt'. This is meaningful as it is a possible explanation for why he becomes such a Stoic after the Vietnam incident. Indeed, Word Of God states that feeling responsible for what happened is the reason he is a more subdued character by the time Saya meets him again in the first episode.
Nigh Invulnerability: Queens and their Chevaliers are capable of quickly healing almost any wound. This includes being impaled through the stomach with a tree trunk, stabbed with many large sharp implements and having arms cut off. If bad turns to worse and they are poisoned by Saya's blood, Chevaliers have the option to amputate themselves and obtain replacement limbs.
No Celebrities Were Harmed: Two American politicians are based on Donald Rumsfeld and Condoleeza Rice; also note the hidden references to the Rothschild family in the names of the Chevalier. And "David" looks just a bit familiar, especially to fans of another David.
No Social Skills: The Schiff due to being created to be used as living weapons. The very concept of asking somebody for something instead of taking it by force was completely alien to them.
Nuke 'Em: though actual nukes aren't used, the US military's primary method of dealing with Chiropterans is "Option D", aka "turn the place into a smoking crater".
The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Saya considers it her personal duty to kill Diva, not merely because she's the best suited for the job, but also because she was the one who released Diva in the first place.
The Ophelia: Diva really has the whole package going for her. Long hair, prone to sing songy babbling, broken princess.
Our Vampires Are Different: Definitely one of the better uses of this trope and one that shows some real creativity. It's really a complete reinvention of the vampire archetype; they are a completely different species (rather than merely former humans*
Ok, the Chevaliers are, but they can't exist without the queens.
), with a hive-like social hierarchy and reproductive method.
It's worth noting that the Schiff, artificial chiropterans developed in a laboratory, are about as close as this series gets to traditional vampires. They look human, have superhuman strength and speed, need blood to survive, and burst into flames if they're exposed to direct sunlight for more than a few seconds.
R-Rated Opening: The first episode begins with a flashback of Saya temporarily becoming Ax Crazy and going on a killing spree through a Vietnamese village.
Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Diva's first action when Saya let her out was to kill Joel and his staff. Things probably wouldn't have been so bad if she didn't extend it to all of humanity.
George and David's Odd Friendship back when he was alive.
Red Right Hand: Subverted; Haji's right hand does give away his true nature as a Chevalier, and freaks Saya out when she first sees it, but he is still a heroic character.
Played straight with Karl's hand, which was injured when he fought Saya in the Vietnam war.
Spell My Name with an S: Is it Haji or Hagi? No one seems to know for sure. Same goes for the Schiff/Sif.
And Karl or Carl.
Spoiled Brat: Saya initially thanks to Joel's superficial attempts at parrenting. Meeting Haji got her to mellow out into Spoiled Sweet.
Spoiler Opening: If you pay attention to the background before the chorus starts in the first opening, you'll see a significant plot point for the last 13 episodes of the series.
Stealth Pun: A feature found on some swords is commonly known as a "blood groove", but rarely so literally as in this series.
Stuff Blowing Up: The preferred method of dealing with accidents is 'Option D', which means dropping missiles on the affected area. On a smaller scale, Kai uses special bullets which ultimately cause parts of Chiropterans to explode.
Super Empowering: Drinking a Queen's blood will turn somebody into a Chevalier.
Super Soldier: The Delta-series and the Schiff were failed experiments in creating artificial Chevaliers to serve as super soldiers. Ultimately, they succeeded with the Corpse Corps.
Stalker with a Crush: Solomon and Karl both have this for Saya, although to different degrees. Solomon wants Saya to love him, while Karl wants to kill her while she kills him. Diva had also developed this kind of obsession with Riku after she met him.
This was also Mao's initial reason for following Kai across the world.
Those Two Guys: Kakimoto and Kato, Kai and Mao's friends back in Okinawa. Their relevancy to the overall plot is about the same as air.
Thicker Than Water: Subverted. One may expect Saya to abandon her adopted brothers after discovering she's a Chiropteran and live with them. Instead, she decides to stay and fight as she feels the former are more important to her.
Through His Stomach: David has a fondness for the horribly bitter coffee Julia brews.
Time Skip: After the destruction of Red Shield's headquarters
Riku in the manga after the time skip, especially after learning of Charles' death, and Saya's plans for Diva.
Tragic Keepsake: Kai wielding George's handgun, Joel's dysfunctional watch, Saya's sword when it becomes reforged with a crystal from her adopted father, and Kai's necklace which contains a crystal from Riku.
True Companions: The members of Red Shield, especially later in the series.
Violence is the Only Option: Subverted. When Kai brings Irene back with him to just ask Saya if the Schiff can have some of her blood, Saya's response is to attack Irene. Kai and David talk her out of it and she agrees to give her blood to help Irene. And then the rest of the Schiff show up and think Irene has been captured and they start fighting again. This time it is Irene who talks them down.
Weak, but Skilled: Since Saya and Hagi get their blood from transfusions instead of eating humans like Diva and her Chevaliers, they aren't as physically powerful. They can still go toe to toe with them thanks to martial skills and teamwork.
We Are Team Cannon Fodder: Red Shield agents. The name is even a nod to this, their blood and flesh will become a shield for Saya so she can slay the Chiropterans.
Willfully Weak: Haji chooses not to use his higher end Chevalier powers because his initial usage terrified Saya. His right hand being stuck in claw form is a source of shame for him.
Wrecked Weapon: Amshel broke Saya's sword in their initial confrontation. When she got it reforged, David had a crystal that came from George added to the hilt.
Yakuza: Mao steals from her gangster father so she can follow the heroes around the world.
You Are Worth Hell: Expressed by Solomon and Hagi towards Saya. Solomon threw away everything to try to be with her and Hagi doesn't regret his long life as a human pincushion either.
You Shall Not Pass: Haji does his damnedest to perform one of these in episode 21, "Sour Grapes," against the Schiff. And again, more successfully, in the finale.
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