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Claymores, women who fight monsters known as Yoma. Women who have been made half-yoma themselves in order to protect the human race, but face the eventual fate of becoming monsters themselves. Claymore follows the story of Clare, who has just been sent to deal with a Yoma threat in a small town, where she happens to come across a boy named Roki. Roki’s family had been killed by the Yoma hiding in his town, and had taken disguise in the body of his older brother. Unfortunately, the villagers decided to exile him, for fear that he may be a Yoma himself. Roki decides to follow Clare, who offers to take him to another village that will take him in, allowing him to see the life a Claymore leads. The pair end up in the holy city
of Rabona, where Clare is forced to hide her powers while looking for a Yoma
that has hidden itself in the church itself. But, due to suppressing her
powers, Clare ends up using too much in order to heal herself, almost making her
turn into a Yoma herself! |
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Clare's story takes a step back in time for the following episodes, where we meet another claymore known as Teresa, ranked #1 claymore of her time. Teresa had just killed a whole family of Yoma, before coming across a girl in a similar situation to Roki. Her family had been killed by the Yoma and the villagers were too scared to even help her. Despite Teresa’s warnings, and best efforts to lose her, the girl follows her on her journey to the next town, but she eventually grows fond of the girl, which helps her realise some of her own feelings. |
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Once this
little arc is over, we return to Clare and Roki, as Clare is grouped together
with 3 other Claymore, in order to take down a voracious eater, a monster far
stronger then a regular Yoma that could easily kill a single Claymore. But not
everything is as it seems, as some of the organisations little secrets are
revealed. |
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Claymore feels quite unique to me when looking at anime these
days, while a lot of other anime series out there try to be serious,
they would still give you the occasional laugh here and there. But
Claymore is strictly business, with only rare moments that
would possibly raise a chuckle. But that's not a bad thing, as it
seems to make Claymore seem more direct with its plot and
story and it does a terrific job of building the background of the
Claymores and their own laws. |
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The episodes that follow Teresa only further build the story, all towards helping you understand the reasons why Clare became a Claymore. You can also feel a relationship forming between Clare and Roki, though whether it will turn into anything serious is yet to be seen, but they have definitely started to form a bond with each other. I was particularly interested in the story of the organisation that controls the Claymore, while it seems odd that people who seem to be regular humans give orders to the half-yoma women, they hold secrets from the Claymores, and even the rest of the human race to keep a lid on what else they created and how much they really know about the Yoma, I'm sure a lot more of this will be revealed in time. I
found it hard to find anything wrong with this anime so far. I
was slightly bothered by some odd music that would come up from time
to time when something dark or creepy was going on, but that was
more me then anything. I think this is definitely an anime worth
taking the time to watch. A decent number of extras here. Along with the standard ‘Clean Opening/Closing’, you also get cast commentary on 2 of the episodes, a selection of audio clips from the English cast auditions and an interview with the director, Hiroyuki Tanaka. Ratings Feature:
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