Why You Shouldn't Turn Your Nose Up At Escaflowne

Studio: Sunrise  |  Released: 1996  |  Streaming on: Funimation

Anime Review - The Vision of Escaflowne

Hey Everyone, today we thought we'd talk about the anime The Vision of Escaflowne!

Aside from InuYasha, another favourite of ours, the Vision of Escaflowne was one of the first Isekai animes we ever saw. But instead of travelling back in time like the former, our main protagonist Hitomi Kanzaki gets accidentally transported to a completely different planet called Gaea by a mysterious boy named Van Fanel, who just so happens to be the next King of a country called Fanelia. No “oh I learnt about this in history class” moments to help you here. So less Timeless and Outlander, and more Wizard of Oz. Granted Gaea isn’t much different from Earth in appearance, and neither are the main inhabitants who look exactly like earthlings, but its fauna and other inhabitants sure look different, seriously what is this?

Porpoise Man? We love it!

The creators of The Vision of Escaflowne wanted to produce a show that blended robot-mechas and divine powers with a pinch of fantasy elements. They also wanted that show to appeal to both male and female audiences, so they also added in some Shoujo-romance in there as well. So think Mobile Suit Gundam SEED, but instead of it taking place in space, it takes place in medieval Europe and sometimes Asia.

And even though these civilizations view science as magic, and those practicing in it are called sorcerers, they have some pretty advanced technology like the guymelefs (aka. mechas) and floating fortresses that are powered by these gem-like crystals called Energists.

Thanks to them we get to see some pretty epic mecha battles.



Mechanical designer Kimitoshi Yamane (who we’ve mentioned previously in our Cowboy Bebop video) probably did some of his coolest work while working on The Vision of Escaflowne.

The original purpose behind the creation of the guymelefs in the story was to give people a way to fight off dragons. Now that dragons are no longer much of a threat, the people of Gaea now use them to fight against each other.

What makes these guymelef mechas so interesting is that they work more like battle suits of armour for knights, moving and functioning in the same way the knights would themselves were they wearing fitted armour. This means that the guymelefs are also equipped with weapons like swords, and spears, and other medieval weaponry. Each guymelef is also styled differently to show which country and which knight it belongs to, just as medieval knights’ suits of armour used to do so in the middle ages. 

With the most impressive guymelef being the Escaflowne which is piloted by Van Fanel. I mean it turns into a DRAGON people! That FLIES! It doesn’t really get any better than that or more fantasy.  

So Fantasy - Check
Cool Robot-Mechas - Check
A Different take on an Isekai - Check
Plenty of Shoujo Romance - Check and Check

Is it any wonder why we loved it so much? 😊

The one gripe we have about this great series though, which we have to talk about, is the noses! Those long-pointy Pinocchio noses. Nobuteru Yuuki, as the character designer, we’re looking at you - how was this a good idea?! And Kazuki Akane you share some blame for signing off on them as the director!



Do the noses still bother us today after all these years? Honestly not really, maybe like 10%. Did they bother us the first couple of times watching it though? YES 100% it was practically excruciating. Should you let that stop you from missing out on a classic, NO absolutely not.

So don’t turn your noses up at The Vision of Escaflowne - we’re glad we didn’t.

And feel free to check out our video on The Vision of Escaflowne below for more details:

~ Stay Obsessed