Ah… I remember watching this anime around 2 years ago. It was one of those few anime, like Clannad and Valkyria Chronicles, that I will follow their releases very closely every week.

This is one of the best anime (to me) by Gonzo. Looking at the title, its pretty much obvious that the anime will be somewhat relevant to William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, though Gonzo have added some anime fantasy touches to it (but its not a bad thing!). I remember watching the Japanese trailer and was utterly captivated by the visual aspects of it. I was predicting that the anime will be around 10+ episodes long due to the amount of details being put in the animation. However, it proved me wrong and is instead 24 episodes long =).

Official Romeo × Juliet English Trailer

As you can see (or hear) from the trailer, the English voices are actually pretty decent for an anime. Also, it is not just a simple translation. Some extra effort was put into the dubbing in terms of the sentence structure and language. The characters in the anime were speaking in old English for some parts of the anime, which will probably add some sort of depth to the anime overall. I have never read Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet before, but when both of them pledged their love for each other, it felt as if that was an extract from the original story. It would be great if that is the case =).

I have mentioned some of the good points of the voice acting, however the trailer also showed some not so good, but at the same time common points in an English dub. It is the part where Romeo says “I love you”. Somehow most of the time, during scenes of romance, English voice actors can’t seem to nail those mushy words. I mean, looking at those words printed on a script or in a story book is pretty much nothing. But when it comes to portraying them through another person’s voice, it is a whole lot different.

This is a clip from the English dub version to give you guys a little sample of what you can expect of the voice acting in the other episodes of the anime.

Romeo × Juliet Opening Video – Inori ~You Raise Me Up~ by Lena Park

This is definitely one of the main reasons why I just love this anime so much — superb opening song and video. I’m sure you guys have your own favorite opening/ending videos that you don’t mind replaying over and over again. I have a few of them as well, and Romeo × Juliet’s opening video is one of them. The title of the song is Inori ~You Raise Me Up~ by Lena Park. If you are interested in purchasing the single, you can do so at CDJapan.

If you have not watch this anime before, I really really hope that you will at least try a few episodes of it. Of course if you don’t want to watch it, then that’s fine. Everybody have their own tastes right? =D