Audience reviews
14 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
AnimeIsAMistake7
I first heard about flag more than a decade ago at the time of writing this and I put it on my plan to watch and summarily forgot about it. While part of me regrets that decision, another part wonders if I would have truly appreciated it as much as I did when I watched it now. Flag is definitely not an anime for everyone, even beyond the 'just give it a chance' mantra. I feel like this anime was very much made for specific type of people and if you are not them then it is unlikely that you will enjoy Flag as much as I have. I will try to explain what about Flag made me fall in love with it and what audiences are probably most likely to enjoy it in the hopes that my review will cut straight to the heart of the matter in helping you decide whether you should watch it or not. If you are a fan…
Read at the sourceimmosha
Novel execution for an anime, but baffling premise.
Flag is probably most well known for presenting its entire narrative through first person POV shots, mostly through found footage by the two journalist protagonists' cameras or cameras placed conveniently on war machines. It's certainly an admirable approach and contributes meaningfully to the theme of journalistic importance, but this limitation can find itself in tricky corners.
The main narrative point of this story is for main character Shirasu to document a UN special forces team to recover a symbolic flag that she had previously taken a photo of. While the world-building may have been more appreciated in other contexts, the overt usage of decked-out killing machines, elaborately militarized religious cults, and clandestine operati…
Read at the sourcektulu007
FLAG is an ONA from mid '06 to early '07. It was handled by The Answer studio. That's right, the studio behind Golgo 13. It's also an original work. So, that'll be interesting.
Story:
Our narrative takes place in a fictional war torn country named for a yoga pose. A young photographer named Shirasu Saeko manages to capture a strong moment of hope in a brilliant photograph. This results in the flag in the photo becoming a symbol of peace. There's just one problem, it gets stolen. Shirasu is chosen to work with UN's special forces in their efforts to scour Uddiyana and regain the flag.
The biggest problem with the series is that it has two protagonists, for good reason, but it can repeat information from each of their perspectives with very little difference. Which just feels like a poi…
Read at the sourceUnconfidence
This series was pretty perfect. The character development was deep but neither melodramatic nor overextended. Every scene feels like the dialogue means something. The contraposition of military and philosophical warfare concepts was very well-done. Also, the way they imagined mechs is both realistic and imaginative at the same time. If you're looking for an anime which really delves into a nuanced understanding of military, politics, character, and technology, FLAG is right up your alley. I feel like this is an underwatched and underrated gem of anime, and will recommend it highly to anyone who likes anime of any kind, really.
Read at the sourceZephSilver
Plumes of smoke rise out of New York City's skyline as three soot-covered firefighters hoist the American flag out of the World Trade Center's rubble. Political tension pervades Tiananmen Square; pedestrians look on with bated breath as a man turns himself into a human blockade, denying passage to a line of tanks. A devoted monk sits in a meditative position in the busy streets of Saigon, consumed by a raging fire, silently protesting as civilians and civil servants gather around. At the end of World War II, a sailor embraces a woman, locking lips in the middle of Times Square amongst officers and citizens as they celebrate a momentous victory.
These are all instances captured on film, images that could convey meaning, regardless of personal connection or circumstances.
"A picture is wo…
Read at the sourceEonir
"The camera has been watching."
"The countless acts of human folly and brutality on countless battlefields..."
"The camera has been watching."
I have recently seen the series a second time, ten years after I watched it originally. I remember the series growing very slowly on me, ending with a big twist.
By the time I watched it the second time, I matured a bit. I have noticed a lot more nuance than the first time, despite the ten year gap. I laughed and I cried when watching the show both times. I can recommend it even to mature viewers who have no contact with anime as a medium.
This show has perfectly portrayed the ideological clash of motivated individuals working in a conservative environment led by bureaucrats. It's not unlike the feeling you have when working within a company. Y…
Read at the sourcedantewilcox
Flag is a wonderful piece of art that does not fail to deliver on its premise. The art is wonderful and fresh, while the characters feel incredibly realistic. It stumbles rarely over its narrative and creates an engaging atmosphere that drew me in at the very beginning.
There definitely are times when the sound seems out of place (subbed), but the scarcity of music provided excellent breathing room for the characters and the use of photography throughout the series.
As more of an aesthetic complaint, the intro did not seem to fit with the tone of the show entirely, but I would be hard-pressed to name any anime that has an intro that matches its show.
One thing I must applaud about the show is its diversity of cast. In so many shows, the setting is almost exclusively Japan, with the cast…
Read at the sourcenizar00
finished flag yesterday and i have one thing to say it was a masterpiece made by the same director of armored troopers votomos ,Gasaraki and Fang of the Sun Dougram Ryōsuke Takahashi :
-the plot and characters : the story is about a tow free journalist Shirasu and her senpai that where involved religious conflict in udeiana , with UNF trying to stop this conflict in this mess shirasu takes a picture of a flag that later becomes the symbol that created a road to peace in that country , that about what i can give as summery for the plot without spoilers , the plot is well paced its not to fast or too slow every ep gives a great amount of content from character development , interaction and plot development , the story is character driving as every element is explained by ether character int…
Read at the sourcemahoganycow
There's this old saying: “You can't polish a turd.” Someone (probably a grandparent; it's hard to beat cranky old people in the “brutal honesty” department) relayed that valuable piece of information to me at some point in my young life, and I've found it to be a crude but immutable truth, in art and fiction as much as in anything else. The best way I can describe Flag is to say that it's a great example of attempted turd polishing. It boasts a unique visual presentation and some downright incredible animation, but at the end of the day a weak narrative, poor cast, and muddled themes stick out from it like sore thumbs.
The story is this: In the near future, a civil war is erupting in a fictional country in Asia. Before the events of the series occur, photographer Saeko Shirasu takes a pic…
Read at the sourceggultra2764
Being a fictional documentary of sorts in depicting hostile tensions between terrorist factions and the UN military to try establishing a peace treaty in a small country, Flag did enough to impress me in its 13 episode run. It offers a unique and original narrative style by showing pictures and the point-of-view from the video cameras of two photo-journalists as they cover the mounting tensions of a terrorist faction's plot to hijack a peace treaty signing and try driving their country into civil war from stealing a flag that was symbolic of the desire that many of the people in the country have in wanting peace. The series splits its exploration between Saeko accompanying a special forces squad of the UN military tasked with retrieving the flag and her older partner, Keiichi Akagi, explor…
Read at the sourceReckoner
If there is one thing that should be immediately praised about the anime FLAG is its daring approach to the animated medium. The entire story, revolving around two photo-journalists in a fictional war zone that resembles the middle east/south-east Asia, is seen through either their camera lens, cameras of vehicles, or sometimes someone else's camera. This approach while certainly unique requires a certain level of suspension of disbelief though. You have to believe that every living moment of this series that they have their cameras opened and pointing at people, but nonetheless, for those interested this suspension of disbelief should be trivial and come rather easily to the audience.
This stylistic approach really lends the anime itself to being very gritty, pulling you into the world i…
Read at the sourceMS06FZ
A new "real robot" show from the creator of Dougram, VOTOMS and others is always a nice proposition and in my opinion FLAG doesn't disappoint.
It uses a pretty unique viewpoint, with every moment shown not from the perspective of a narrator, but instead from that of the characters. Be it a camera, a gunsight or a radar screen, you're seeing what the characters see. It makes the combat a lot more visceral than even the most hard sci-fi real robot shows, because you're on the ground and seeing the fighting right there. An early skirmish in which the lead mech engages a small insurgent force is given a shocking power thanks to the viewpoint - the gunsight of the mech's minigun. All you hear is the sound of the gun firing and the pilot reporting the status of the mech, and all you see is smok…
Read at the sourcesantetjan
To us foreigners, it perhaps can't get any more Japanese than Flag: in essence, this series is about two Japanese and their cameras.
Set in the near future, in a fictional nation that very strongly looks as if it should be positioned on the India-China border, somewhere in the Kashmir region, Flag recounts the story of the civil conflict that crippled said nation and of the UN sponsored peace talks following a photograph (containing the Flag the series is named after) that became a powerful symbol of cooperation between the parties involved. It follows the photographer of said photo, who is officially installed as reporter of a special UN strike force created to recapture the flag in question after it was stolen by insurgents in order to damage the peace talks, while at the same time follo…
Read at the sourceBeatnik
Flag is a pretty unique venture. It's researched reasonably well, and is set in our world. The world with the laws of physics and politics. More interesting than the reality-based content though, is the form. This show is set entirely within the eye of the camera.
When we're not watching the narrative through a lens; we're seeing photos or computer displays. There is no scene set outside of the camera, and that in itself is a bold creative choice, although it is stretched very thin, in that we have to assume these people are such camera junkies they take them everywhere and never turn them off, no matter what they're doing or where they are. It's a bit too much to accept, but the directorial concept is so cool that you just shrug off any unrealistic scenarios and run with it.
The story f…
Read at the source