Version française
Version française
The adventures of Nanami, an 11 years old little girl, who sails the seas with her father. He is an oceanologist, and is in search of a mysterious animal, who is the subject of many legends: the luminous whale. They are accompanied by a killer whale, Tico, who has made friends with Nanami. But they are not the only ones who are looking for the whale: a group of industrialists want to catch it, in order to make a biochimical weapon(!!!). They are helped by professor Leconte, a scientist who used to study with Nanami's father, and would now use any means to achieve his research. Tico and his friends will encounter many adventures during their quest.
I must confess I was prejudiced against this series when I first watched it: I hadn't heard many compliments about it from the WMT fans. Just think: a meisaku that isn't adapted from a novel (meisaku, the Japanese name of the WMT refers to a piece of literature ) and that tells an adventure story! A bit as if Nippon Animation had forgotten, for the 20th birthday of the WMT, what the original purpose was. When you watch Tico, you indeed realise many elements that the World Masterpiece Theater usually contain are missing here. The series has no strong thread, the episodes often follow each others without real connection, and many characters appear for a short while, and do not come again until the end. The plot, which should be connected to the luminous whale, only begins being interesting at the very end of the series. In a word, Tico lacks unity. And many scenes are a bit too far-fetched. And the characters are often a bit too caricatured. And Tico's realisation varies in quality: some episodes have nice pictures and fluid animation, but some others... nothing like the classics of the middle eighties.
Well, I stop here my prosecution, because in spite of all this, I enjoyed the series. All what is written above is true, but the episodes, taken individually, are far from being bad. The rhythm is quick, and you never feel bored. Some scenes in the middle of the series are quite moving, some other are interesting, and make you think about serious problems (such as the responsibility of the researchers...). Moreover, all of them are accompanied by very a nice music: Tico's background music is one of the best I have ever heard in anime (Nippon Animation has BTW released it on a CD). The characters are a bit simple, but also very picturesque, what makes the series more entertaining.
In fact, the main problem with Tico is that it has been made as a WMT. It has indeed little to do with the other ones: it's too adventure oriented, with too many uncrebible action scenes. But the series is still very enjoyable: keep it for your long winter evenings...^_^
Tico arrived in France in 1996, on TF1. Unfortunately, TF1 stopped the broadcast near the middle of the series. People had to wait until September 1997 to see the entire anime on a big network (France 3). The series was then shown on ab cartoon / Manga (late 97, Summer 98, March and November-December 99, September-October 2001). The opening song is interpreted by Dorothée.
Tico has been rather successful in France. It is the only WMT, among with Little Princess Sara and tom Sawyer that has been mentioned in the French Anime Grand Prix (vote among the French anime fans organised by the magazine Animeland). It was the 29th TV series in 1996.
Tico was shown twice in Italy. The first time on Rete 4 during the summer 1995, and then on Italia 1 (last time in June-July 2000).
The group Neko Creation started to sub Tico a few years ago. The project seems to have been restarted after a long by the Stray Children.
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Frédéric Goëtzinger
(goetz@starnet.fr)
Opening date: March 23, 1998 - last update: September 23, 2001