Hell yeah, they're dancing in the vampire bund!!!

Katt: Gotta love how I said that I would for sure blog the final two episodes of this series…and then skipped episode 11. Go me! And I notice that I have a tendency of not blogging the most exciting episodes of this series. Well, since episode 12 is the finale, it’s guaranteed to be interesting!

In these final two episodes, so many the plot twists were squeezed in. I have to wonder whether it would have been better to have cut down on the drama a bit and focus on one major plot point, maybe reaching a solid conclusion? Maybe? Instead, we’re introduced to a few bizarre turns and even bigger questions – and then given the ending line, “And the pledge would remain unbroken for the rest of their story,” essentially laughing in our faces and saying: yeah, they get their happy ending but you don’t get to see all of the crazy stuff that happens before they get there! Assholes. I digress, though… I liked how certain things were handled and was annoyed at other  things, so this final blog post will be used to vent my opinions on different aspects of this final arc and, specifically, final episode.

The role of Mei Ren

Mei Ren, Mei Ren… I still can’t decide what to make of your role in this anime. At first I thought that her addition was pretty neat, but that was when her mysteries were yet unknown to us and to Akira. Once those mysteries were exposed, I kinda lost interest. Because she was nothing more than an anime addition, her story only had the chance to be heard in these last two episodes (actually, only in the last episode, really). It was extremely intriguing, had a lot of potential for both dark and heartwarming value. We only got to see snippets of that potential in her monologues and very brief flashbacks – what a tease!

Her role as Rozenmann’s assassin/Mina’s double’s servant/agent for the Telomere was overwhelming. It felt like they were trying to cram a whole lot of explanations into one little character, and as a result left us with even more questions than they would have if they kept Mei Ren out. Oh, and let’s make her a beast person too, just for good measure. If they had given her more time to develop all of these many, many sides of her, then fine - but no, she got two measly episodes!!

Akira’s last ~hidden memory~

This. Oh my lord, this. WHY? It is just so…was it really necessary? Really? If they were going for the “Akira and Mina lived happily ever after” ending, then it would have been perfectly logical to have ended on the note of Akira saving Mina from the harassment of the Three Clans/her arranged marriage. Instead, they introduce a random twist in which there are two Minas and Akira (and Mei Ren, apparently) is the only person with this knowledge. And in the end, both Minas still exist, leaving this sudden issue completely unresolved. I will only accept this ridiculousness if they intend to make a sequel to this series; if not, this plot twist is superfluous and just plain annoying!

Mina’s dealings with the Three Clans

What I did undeniably love about this last episode was Mina’s attitude throughout the whole ordeal. She remained incredibly composed while watching the spectacle of Akira’s final battle, only faltering towards the end when her hand was shown to be quivering. She still manages to steady herself, watch the conclusion, and then address her bretheren with that cold, powerful vampire leader attitude of hers. My favourite part of this is when, after she walks away with total composure, Mina breaks into an eager run towards the entrance where Akira will be arriving. A big part of Dance in the Vampire Bund is establishing which Mina is the true Mina (and I don’t mean that in the ‘there are two Minas’ way – I’m ignoring that plot twist), and this simple, excited action says it all to me.

The concluding promise

I said it at the beginning, but I’ll say it again for good measure: HELL YES THEY DANCED IN THE VAMPIRE BUND! …Yes, the silly inclusion of the title within the characters’ actions makes me happy. I’m a dork, I know.

In all seriousness, the ending was nice in a cheesy way – which isn’t always bad. It fit the path that they took with this anime adaptation, following it through with a narrator focused on Akira and Mina’s fairy tale-esque romance. The added metaphor of the butterfly loving the flower came back nicely in the closing scene, as well, showing us that Mina isn’t an emotionless flower who can never return the butterly’s feelings; both she and Akira are butterflies, capable of returning each other’s affections and basking in love for their remaining days. Yep, I think that this ending calls for a big awwwww~

Katt sank her teeth into Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 12…8.5/10
Katt found, overall, Dance in the Vampire Bund’s blood tasted…7.5/10 – I think I would have preferred it so much more had I not read the manga previously. The expectations really messed with my enjoyment of the series.

When the visit's unannounced, you know they're evil.

Katt: I swear I had some sort of excuse as to why I didn’t blog this episode last week. It was a good excuse, too! But I don’t remember what it was. In any case, I only got around to watching this episode today, and since thus far episode 11 isn’t subbed yet, I will give a half-assed review of episode 10 in the meantime. And by half-assed, I mean a blog entry that won’t take waaay too much time out of my day (but an entry that will still be awesome…yeah, I’ll claim that).

In regard to plotline…

I am very, very happy to see that this oh-so short adaptation has managed to fit in the assassination arc. I was getting worried for a bit! I expect this to take up the last two episodes, but who knows with SHAFT? This arc, though, is undeniably key for development–in characters, in relationships, and in plotline. I will make sure to blog the final two episodes because they are sure to be (er, hopefully) good ones!

Whoops? Whoops what? What's under that big white bar?! I can't begin to imagiiine!

The censorship matter

While it wouldn’t be unheard of for my vision to be messed up, is it just me or is there really conspicuous fog/clouds appearing at moments where there should be boobies? Now I obviously don’t pick what anime I view based on whether or not I get to see naked chicks, but this censorship just looks awkward. Whether this was a Funimation add-on or not, it’s kinda distracting. (Also in the Dance with the Vampire Maid story, Yuzuru was referred to as 13… dude, there is no way that that kid is more than 10, maybe 11 years old. I think Nanami’s lying to make herself look better!)

Just so we’re clear – when it happens, I totally called it!!

Really, my main reason for bothering to write an entry on this episode was this: I need to call a plot twist now before it is revealed! I call that the armoured assassin (pictured above) is totally Mei Ren! I won’t explain the logic in relation to the manga because I wouldn’t want to expose any spoilers, but I’ll just sa that they seem to have made a point to make the assassin’s gender female.

Katt sank her teeth into Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 10…7/10
Katt’s blood craving for Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 11…9/10

I never acknowledge Dance with the Vampire Maid - so here's a screen of the maids' imagined version of Yuuki's novel.

Katt: So since Funimation has licensed Dance in the Vampire Bund, I’ve had to keep an eye out on their Youtube channel to see when they’ve posted their subs. Unfortunately, it’s taken a while; fortunately, at least I know that I like Funimation! I haven’t done research into what sort of ‘editing’ they’ve felt compelled to do – note to self: check out how some of the racy episodes have been altered when you get a chance. But okay, Funimation aside, episode 9 wraps up the Hysterica/Nanami arc quite neatly and gives us a transition into the next arc, which I assume will be the last one that the anime covers. We all know that I like to avoid doing plain ol’ plot summaries when I can, though, so I have found a theme in this episode that will tie the plot together instead! And that would be choice, in regard to the vampires in this series and their transformations (or births).

(more…)

Oh yeah, and a new enemy appeared - I'm just too distracted by the sexcapades to mention her.

Katt: It has been… a long time since I have blogged this series. For that, I’m sorry, but I totally would have blogged episode 7 had I remembered that there was no new episode last week–more time to blog, right? Instead, I forgot, and made Hanasakeru Seishounen’s finale my priority when episode 7 aired and then never went back to blog that missed episode. I’ll give it a speedy re-cap here to make up for that (not that a short blurb makes up for neglecting an entire post. Ah well).

(more…)

What you don't see are all of the other students awkwardly watching their 'moment'.

Katt: We have officially reached the halfway mark of this series and…um, we really haven’t even gotten through one arc, have we? Sigh. On the plus side, though, the ending of this episode implies that we’re finally getting to the heart of this vampires-in-the-school plot that has been building for what feels like a very long time. Add to that constant questioning of Mina’s intentions and, well, we’ve got an episode of this series that’s similar to all of the other ones, basically. As such, don’t expect anything extraordinary from this entry. But, uh, read and comment nonetheless? 

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They're silhouetted ominously, so you -know- they're evil!

Katt: Five episodes in and I’m still not sure what to make of this series. It’s keeping me entertained, that’s for certain, but I still for the life of me can’t understand what SHAFT is doing with this anime adaptation. At first it was all about twisting things around, then in the last episode they seemed to be going onto the manga path, and now, while still mostly following the manga, there are odd changes being made that I just don’t know what to think of. But okay, I’ll bite – I want to keep watching to see where they’re going with this. But you’re certainly making my blogging duties very difficult for me!

Main points in this episode: vampires have without a doubt infiltrated the school and are shaking things up, and Mina’s true personality is growing in its ambiguity. Mina is so  hard to read that she’ll get a section of her own in this entry, while the rest will be dedicated to looking at the development of the vampires-in-the-school arc of this story. And of course, it’s only natural for me to start by looking at a character~

?????–The mystery vampire girl who first appeared in episode 3 makes another appearance in this episode and I am as perplexed by this as I was when she first showed up. She is one of SHAFT’s added elements that did not exist in the manga, so I have no leads on how to look at her. Thus far she is just a nameless student at Akira’s school who has exposed vampires’ true weakness: hard candy to the face. Now I know what sort of ammo to keep handy when vampires become a threat in the real world. That aside, she is looking to be on the ‘good’ side (although good and bad are, at this point, just as ambiguous as Mina’s personality) based on how she 1) helped Akira out when Mina’s welcome at school was being threatened, and 2) saves the day when Akira and Yuki were in some serious gonna-get-eaten-by-vampires trouble.

So what of these schoolboy vampires?

It feels like ages since we saw Nanami getting ravaged by a gang of vampires…buuut it was really only a couple of episodes ago. Nonetheless, there was a distinct lack of follow-up on that matter until now. As it turns out, Nanami’s prolonged absence of school has provoked some scarily-accurate rumours that she was bitten by a vampire. These rumours become a truth when some photos are anonymously sent that show Nanami being attacked in the student council room; however, this attack is being blamed on Mina’s presence and that is something that has yet to be proven. These vampires causing mischief have yet to be shown as allied with any of this series’ main players.

Hints are starting to appear here and there, though, as to who these vampires are. We are shown a scene in which one of the feeble students in Akira’s class is invited to join a sketchy group of classmates who I can only assume have something to do with the bad vampires who have shown themselves on school grounds. Added proof? The vampires who attack Akira and Yuki later on in the episode are wearing uniforms from their school, which implies that these vampires are fellow students; methinks that they are the same ones who are off recruiting the weak-minded to join them.

Akira’s boy-buddy is shown to be very anti-vampire in this episode, though who could blame him when he was one of the first to see those incriminating photos? To him, Mina = vampire, vampires = attacking students, Mina = attacking students. Better suspicious than sorry, I suppose. While on the topic of Akira’s friends’ attitudes to vampires, Yuki’s stance has yet to be determined. She’s shown to be more welcoming than most people when she offers to be Mina’s partner in class while everyone else shies away. At the same time, she and Mina have an undeniable rivalry brought on in large part by their mutual fondness for Akira–which sounds kind of pathetic, but the Yuki’s added suspicion towards Mina for Nanami’s absence gives it another layer, makes Yuki less one-dimensional. She isn’t only about Akira.

At the same time, though… that scene! While it’s hard to help having a fondness for Akira/Mina, SHAFT’s added Akira/Yuki development is much loved by me! They are really working to flesh out their background a little more and to make their interactions less contrived. The scene where they’re drying their clothes after escaping the vampires was so fabulous for a whole bunch of reason. I mean, the sexual undertones was part of it, but also for the way that Yuki reacted when Akira looked at her. In the second episode, she grew angry when she thought Akira caught sight of a panty-shot; in this scene, there was a strong sense of comfort. Awkward, sure, but at ease all the same. Getting to know him for his new self, the self who is a werewolf who associates with vampires, hasn’t changed her view on him; if anything, she seems to think even more highly of him. Her crush felt like it was just dropped in the manga, and I am so pleased that that hasn’t been the case here!

Weighing in on Mina’s persona: the good and the bad

(+) Her oh-so moe cooking scene – Mina’s innocent side always makes her come off as a good guy, and this scene makes Mina looks sooo sweet and innocent. She doesn’t know how to cook at all, and yet she’ll try to her hardest just to make something good for Akira!

(-) She stole Akira’s ring – While it was probably out of jealousy and not some grand evil scheme, it still isn’t a very nice thing to do! Yuki has been quite kind to her, and this cruelty of showing off how she is now in possession of Yuki’s token to Akira is very harsh on Mina’s part.

(-) The “vampire way” of doing things – Mina’s conversation with the prime minister is very menacing, mostly for her warning that if things don’t go her way when she is nice and diplomatic, then she’ll move on to doing things the “vampire way”, implying that vampires are not good creatures at all.

(+) Remorse – After her meeting with the prime minister is over, however, Mina shows a great deal of remorse when she calls Akira. It comes off as though all of her threats are just acts and that the true Mina doesn’t want to be so cruel. Oh, and calling Akira is another of those reminders that Mina can be quite innocent and vulnerable.

(-) …Um, did she just kidnap a young child?! – It’s quite self-explanatory why this is bad.

A lot of topics opened up in this episode and basically none have reached any conclusions: Who is that mystery girl? What are these vampires doing in the school? Is Yuki actually a romantic rival? Is Mina good or bad? We’re going to have to keep watching to find out!

Katt sank her teeth into Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 5…9/10
Katt’s blood craving for Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 6…9/10

A world where vampires explode in blue.

Katt: Man, I was getting so comfortable with this series being subbed by Thursday afternoons–this week, it’s Saturday morning and I’ve only just gotten to watch the latest episode. Way to throw off my schedule and make me do homework on a Thursday afternoon instead of blogging…mind you, the homework was playing a video game, but still! That was the time when I was supposed to be in a Dance in the Vampire Bund mood, but nooo. Okay, enough rambling on my part. Time to suck it up and write an entry.

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I'm glad someone at Akira's school shares my fondness for moustache-drawing.

Katt: I am less enthused about coming home to watch Dance in the Vampire Bund this week; I think school is starting to take its toll on me. Before I was like, “Yeah, weekend! I can be a dork and watch anime!” Now it’s, “Yeah, weekend! I can go home and sleep!” …Maybe I’m just old? In any case, I know that I can’t procrastinate in writing this entry or else I just won’t end up blogging DitVB at all–and we can’t have that, so here we go.

(more…)

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a naked man and a loli!

Katt: Is this how I’m going to get to start all of my weekends? Coming home and watching Dance in the Vampire Bund? Awesome. Last week I was really shocked to find that I was completely in the minority of manga fans because I so thoroughly enjoyed the first episode; it was only after making my post that I browsed forums and found that most fans were very, very pissed. Some will be more open-minded than others, I suppose? On that note, my open-mindedness was tested a further in this second episode and I’ll admit that it’s starting to crack. But I’ll bring that up later on as I run through this more appropriate beginning to Dance in the Vampire Bund.

First of all, we have an OP now! I barely remember the music. All I remember is thinking, “Ahaha, Mina’s dancing in the vampire bund!” …Yeah. That’s probably a statement on the music, but it certainly didn’t make me cringe or anything. The episode itself serves as an introduction to the second storyline of Dance in the Vampire Bund–the first being vampire society and the bund itself, and the second being the relationship between Mina and Akira. For this, we for some reason got a narrator, so lemme take a moment to introduce her:

Yuki Saegusa–Simply put, that chick who has a crush on Akira. What a cruel, cruel thing to do, making her narrate the tale of Mina and Akira; though it is suitable to make her this story’s narrator for a reason that I’ll assume will be touched on later. As of now she has nothing to do with the vampire world and just serves as a figure to tie Akira to the drudgery of reality, a.k.a. school life. She really is a sweetheart but absolutely pales in comparison Mina (paling next to a vampire? Oh irony).

So since this is an Akira/Mina-centric episode, I will make this an Akira/Mina-centric post and see what the past, present, and future look like for these two protagonists~

Their past: the promise

It took a while to reach the point of understanding Akira and Mina’s past together thanks to the spontaneously added plot element of ‘oh by the way Akira has amnesia’. For anime-only fans this is probably all well and good, but as a manga fan this was where my open mindedness failed me. I just cannot grasp the purpose of Akira having been in an accident and lost his memories a year prior to the series’ present. Is this a way to el!aborate on the past with justification? A way to waste an episode because there is evidently soooo many episodes to spare (yes, that was sarcasm)? Agh, I just don’t get it! Akira’s awakening was absolutely unnecessary! …But wait, how did I get into a rant on the present? I’m supposed to be talking about the past.

See, Akira and Mina met many years ago, back when Akira was the age that Mina looks now–and also looked back then. Akira happened upon Mina while she was crying and, in his childhood innocence, tried to comfort her and get her to stop crying even though he had no idea why she was upset. He did cheer her up, too, although we have little access into Mina’s thoughts at this point so we don’t know why she was distressed and what is was about Akira that changed that. Right now, all we know is that in his attempt to cheer Mina up, Akira made a promise to protect her that has carried over into the present bond that these two feel.

Their present: naked loli time

The nature of Akira and Mina’s relationship at this point is a little ambiguous. It is a bizarre, bizarre combination of innocence and overt sexuality. Wait what? Those two can be combined? Apparently so. Even before Akira’s memories come back, Mina uses that loli body to its fullest and plays around with the implications of nudity by having Akira take her clothes off and rub sun-resistant gel on her skin; it’s made extremely strange thanks to the fact that Mina appears as a child. In a sense it reminds me of Gary Snyder’s poem “The Bath”, which is sort of an ode to the human body as it describes a family bathing together–not odd at all, to have parents wash a child, but the details bring an element of sexuality to it too. In the context of Dance in the Vampire Bund, the sexuality is brought in by the fact that Mina might look like a kid, but she has the mind of an adult. Having Akira undress her and rub her down was less about having someone ‘take care of’ her like it would be for a child, and more about titillation.

There’s an innocence to their interactions too, though. In Mina’s most serious moments when it comes to Akira, she drops the facade of her teasing games and reverts to sweet actions: crying out of joy from seeing Akira in person after so many years, or giving him a light kiss on the cheek as a goodbye. It’s genuine and on a deeper level than her grown-up attitude in a kid’s body; Mina’s character is great for marrying the rationality of an adult with the emotionality of a child, which we really all do possess. Akira’s attitude after he overcomes his amnesia are also demonstrative of the purer side of his and Mina’s connection. He might be naked when he’s holding Mina in the final scene, but it’s easy to forget because that isn’t made into the focus. There are more important things at play here when these two characters finally have the same memories and feel the same attachment to one another.

Werewooolf! Nananananananana werewoooolf!

Their future: queen and her bodyguard

My psychic powers tell me that Akira’s going to become Princess Mina’s right-hand werewolf from here on out. That’s right: I can see into the future. Now that our two protagonists have united we will hopefully get a unified way of looking at things and finally get to see the inside of the bund, not to mention more of Mina’s other followers that we were introduced to in the first episode. Oh, and perhaps a little elaboration as to why Akira is suddenly a werewolf? Whatever we learn next, there will definitely be a newfound inseparability between Mina and Akira as the plot moves forward.

And yes, I went through this entire post ignoring the appearance of the ridiculous giant spider vampire(?). I know that people are going to be freaking out about that one just like they did for the chameleon in the last episode, but I will just except them as the plot devices that they are. It’s the main characters that should be focused on because their greatness overshadows the monster-vampires’, um…stupidity. From here on out, I am anticipating that this series will get back on track with where it should be (i.e. with Akira having all of his memories) and everyone will be happy. Yay? Yay.

Katt sunk her teeth into Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 2…7/10
Katt’s blood craving for Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 3…8.5/10

Bzzt, you're wrong!

Katt: I am in a good mood today–I had just one class, got home and saw that Tea had sent me a link to the BECK live action trailer (want it noooow! <3), and then saw that Dance in the Vampire Bund’s first episode has been subbed…and it was awesome! But I’m getting ahead of myself. I’m just a little giddy because, after it being decided that I’d be the one to blog this series, I starting reading the manga and have really gotten into it. In this first episode, SHAFT has already started doing their thing and twisting the plot around, so lemme look at how this introductory episode was presented~

In terms of the plot of this episode, I’m not going to go into my thoughts on it all too much. The main intention here was to have the vampires’ existence revealed to humankind and to have the establishment of “the vampire bund” announced. And while I’m not going into details on it, I loooove how this was done. In the manga it was very straightforward, with Mina appearing to the press and announcing the vampire existence and the bund, yada yada yada; here, the build up with the debate on whether or not vampires are real on a gameshow, showing the different attitudes that people have, and ending with vampires being exposed for what they are…it was really, really engaging and creative! While I do love the manga for what it is, I am so happy with the changes that were made. Sure, it’s different from the original source, but it works!

Our main players

While the Dance in the Vampire Bund manga introduces the male protagonist first, this episode is compleeeetely different in that it initally focuses on totally irrelevant characters and then moves on to Princess Mina and her entourage. Of course, we get a sneak peek at our main boy, which I’ll point out as I do a quick run-through of the characters we’ve seen so far…without spoiling the plot. (Honestly, with how things have been introduced, I am not even sure how the characters’ stories are working at this point so I wouldn’t be able to spoil things anyway!)

Mina Tepes–The vampire princess and, yes, a total loli. Don’t let appearances fool you, though, because as we can already see, Mina’s mind does not at all match her childlike looks. While she plays up the cutesy act when she’s nothing more than ‘the little foreign girl’ in the television studio audience, that persona fades away by the time that she exposes herself as the true ruler of the vampires. She is absolutely aware of her authority over her race and her undeniable physical superiority over humans, even if she looks frail enough to be slaughtered by a rampant sheep or something equally ridiculous.

Vera–Not yet introduced by name, unless I missed it, this lady with the voluptuous bosom is one of Mina’s personal guardians. Introducing herself as the vampire queen was a complete farce, most likely because with her appearance, it would be more persuasive than if Mina had appeared in public right away. She is indeed a vampire, and a strong one at that, but still not comparable to Mina.

Romulus–a.k.a. that guy who comes to the rescue and has a vague and quick exchange with Mina about some ‘Akira’ guy. Wow, wait, what am I saying here if I’m not bringing in spoilers? Well, I’ll just say that he has a significant rank when it comes to defending Mina. Quite the cold exterior, but every decision that he makes is done with the best intentions for those who he cares about.

Akira Kaburagi–What, you mean that random kid in the street who they asked, “Do vampires exist?” to which he replied, “No”? Yeah, that kid. He is just as signficant a character as Mina in this series and I admittedly find his introduction in the anime very puzzling. The manga begins from Akira’s perspective, and he is well aware of the existence of vampires; I’d say that his response was just an act to go along with the whole gameshow fun, but considering Mina’s reaction of tearing up, that can’t be the case. Where, oh where, are Akira’s memories? And what is he supposed to be remembering?

Establishing what a vampire is in this series

Every vampire series will show a different side of vampirism, so I’m sure some people are wondering if the vampires of this series are going to appeal to them. There are already a few hints in this episode that give us an idea of what they’re like so I’m going to have some fun and look at those. Mind you, there are still plenty of facts to introduce (although how far is SHAFT really going to get into this series with only 12 episodes??); consider my observations here to be just the basics.

Appearances: All of the vampires so far seem to cater to visions of beauty in the vampire race; whether they just happened to be hot when they were transformed or if their appearances altered upon infection is something that has yet to be answered. There are also questions of ageing risen by the fact that Mina looks so young. Was she born of a union between vampires and her body is very gradually growing up, or was she transformed while in a child form and will never change (à la Claudia, from Interview with the Vampire, who Mina very much resembles with her combination of mature mind and young body). Also in regard to appearance, the mutation of the bishie actor into a hideous cameleon prompts Mina to mention that vampires each have a “true form” that reflects their inner selves, so there is some sort of shapeshifting that can occur, though their control over what they shift into is dependant on their innermost intentions.

Weaknesses: There was a lot of discussion of vampires’ weaknesses in the gameshow sequence of this episode, though none of that necessarily applied to the real vampires. It was mostly for giggles, especially the mangaka character’s self-aware answer that he did away with most of the traditional vampire weaknesses in his work because it makes them too fragile. The only thing we saw for certain was a strength, in that the actor!vampire was able to have his arm chopped off and survive just fine, and also reattached it later. For weaknesses, as of now, the main ones implied are 1) destruction by the sun, as shown when Vera-as-vampire-queen says that the vampire arm would react badly to sunlight, and 2) loyalty to their blood roots, as shown when Mina–queen of all vampires and likely carrying the blood of all vampires’ common ancestor–could will the rampant vampire to stop his attack and die just by her command. This kind of thing is seen in Vampire Knight, too, when the vampires who have been transformed by a pureblood’s bite cannot attack the one who turned them.

Human Attitudes: Lastly, a little bit of fun with the human perceptions of vampires in this episode. I found it so entertaining how each member of the judges’ panel had a different opinion on the existence of vampires: there was the logical-minded one, the terrified one, the girl who finds them sexy, the one who plays up to such a perception, and the one who makes a profit from their popularity. Based on the audience’s reactions of ‘kyaaa~’ whenever the vampire actor tried to be sexy, it’s safe to say that this world (or at least the TV studio) is meant to reflect much of today’s consumers who drool over anything vampire-related, above all for the sexuality associated with vampirism. It’s completely the attitude of ‘vampires are hot’ and I am eager to see how much SHAFT uses that one for their own advantage, because the Dance in the Vampire Bund manga has plenty of sexuality in it.

Katt has sunk her teeth into Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 1…9/10
Katt’s blood craving for Dance in the Vampire Bund episode 2 is…8.5/10

“Mina”, an allusion to one of the main characters in Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Of course, that Mina wasn’t a vampire, although she was beginning to come dangerously close to becoming one. And “descendant of Vlad”? That would be a reference to Vlad the Impaler, who Stoker’s Dracula is supposedly based upon. I remember reading in the manga notes that the last name “Tepes” had some significance, too, but I can’t remember it…