Title : Romeo x Juliet
Genre : drama, fantasy, romance
Production : Studio GONZO
Episodes : 24
Vintage : 2007

‘Romeo and Juliet’ is my favorite from all the Shakespearean stories. I was surprised to see that it was created into an anime and had my doubts whether it would be good or not. I must admit that I was amazed by the series, although everything happens in an alternative universe, everything is done extremely well, from graphics to music and voice characters.

The story is based upon the original work of Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet,’ but occurs in a fantasy world. Although all names are same as in the original play, the anime was made to fit in an alternate universe with a lot of fantasy elements. The drama is ever present and climaxes towards the end with the well-known to all result of the two star-crossed lovers. Most characters are named after some of Shakespeare’s most famous characters in other of his stories, like Ophelia from ‘Hamlet’, Regan and Cordelia from ‘King Lear’, Emilia from ‘Othello’ and Petrucio from ‘The taming of the Shrew’. There is also the caricature of William Shakespeare that is part of the series and is portrayed as a close friend of Juliet.

The anime was aired on CBC from April to September 2007 and ran a full course of 24 episodes. Studio GONZO holds the reigns of production, along side them Oizaki Fumitoshi signatures the direction of the series and the Character design was made by Harada Daiki. The music of the series was created by the well-known video-game music composer Sakimoto Hitoshi, whose best work is the original score of Final Fantasy XII.

Overall, this anime is worth watching. I know its a very sad story and knowing the end people wont think twice about seeing it, but its something different and fresh from the book’s heavy atmosphere. I think that the anime is in some ways much better than reading the actual Shakespearean story, but people might disagree with me.

What do you think? We would love to discuss your thoughts about the anime.
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Sources : Anime News Network, Wikipedia, Anime Covers Fan