El Cazador de la Bruja: Too little, too late

I'm not a negative guy, so instead of criticizing El Cazador for having no buildup or payoff, I'll offer three suggestions for improving it.

1. Cut the show to 13 episodes

Back when I gave El Cazador de la Bruja a generous B- for its midterm grade, I was under the assumption that show strategically got all the filler out of the way during the first half so that the second half would be nonstop action. I was totally wrong. Towards the end of an action series, shitty sidequests about chasing random animals are totally unacceptable.


Episode 22

Furthermore, when characters don't have anything important to say, questionable dialogue ensues:



90% of relevant scenes took place in the first episode and episodes 23-25. Add the obligatory hot springs episode, some character development episodes, a few background info episodes, every scene with Jody "Blue-Eyes" Hayward, and 13 episodes would be more than enough.


Acceptable filler.

2. Decerebrate Ellis

Following in the footsteps of Noir and Madlax, El Cazador was supposed to be a girls-with-guns anime. Instead, it turned out to be a girl-with-guns-teamed-up-with-a-useless-girl-who-fails-to-do-anything-productive anime. She was almost as useless as me in my operating systems programming group with MF.

Ellis had potential. Her badass witch powers (El Cazador de la Bruja means The Hunter of the Witch) could've made things exciting, but she was only able to use them when she was psychologically traumatized, which regrettably only happened about 4 or 5 times in the whole show. That's why I suggest decerebrating her.

Decerebration is the removal of the cerebrum, the portion of the brain where thought and higher function reside. It's my understanding that scientists perform decerebration experiments on animals all the time, and the decerebrated animals go berserk. Surely the same would happen to Ellis (or she'd die, as certain medical authorities inform me). Regardless, it couldn't possibly make Ellis any less boring.

Useless characters are occasionally acceptable if they're complemented with the right character type, but Ellis didn't have that luxury. Her partner was Nadie, the levelheaded type.

Levelheaded works well with reckless, hyperactive, violent, or otherwise badass. It doesn't work with useless.



3. Make Jody "Blue-Eyes" Hayward the main character


Blue Eyes from El Cazador by ~darkness127 on deviantART

I've said a lot of controversial things on this website, but none of them come close to the statement I'm about to make:

Blue-Eyes is the hottest anime character EVER!

If you think that's outrageous, you must either be a pedophile or prefer men. I haven't called a single anime character hot in the 21-month history of this website, so when I'm calling Blue-Eyes hot, I mean it. How hot is she? I'd says she's about 30,000 Kelvin with a luminosity of one million solar units.

Instead of solving the mystery of Ellis' past, El Cazador should be about solving the mystery of Blue-Eyes's hotness. Everything about Blue-Eyes is hot, except for her nickname. Lets just ignore the fact that half of the cast has blue eyes.



Blue-Eyes: hot secretary by day, hotter secretary by night.





Why don't the OL's (Japanese term for office lady) get more love in anime? The only fetishes you see these days are maid, nurse, and catgirl. Secretaries are so much better. They can bring you coffee and explain the laws of thermodynamics:



She can excite my molecules.

The best part about secretaries in anime is that they won't sue you for sexual harassment.




Mmmm...enhanced interrogation techniques...

Blue-Eyes is of witch descent, so you wouldn't even have to change the title to make her the main character. I demand a spinoff series/OVA. Fanart and fanfics are fine too.

Well developed minor characters
Simultaneous subplots
Unforeseeable plot twists
Comical victimization
Recurring random character(s)
Badass mid-episode transitions
Soundtrack by Yuki Kajiura
Catchy dance sequence
Themes of Hatred/Suffering/Revenge
Topics of Hatred/Suffering/Revenge
Lesbians
Hilarious ambiguously gay dude
Stylish visual effects
Dinosaurs
Tournament Competition
Rivalry
Graphic violence
A character vaguely resembling myself
Mangled English
Mangled Spanish
Pimp in a white suit
Time Travel
Interdimensional travel
Supernatural Power
Fight in a Ballroom/Casino/Cathedral/Theatre
Catch phrases
Obligatory hot springs episode
Alternate universe filler
Self-parody

Final Grade: C

Without the soundtrack by Yuki Kajiura, you're looking at a C-.


6992 pedophiles think Ellis anyone is hotter than Blue-Eyes