I think you should watch it
The first half may have a lot of plotlines that seem frivolous or melodramatic, but it provides great contrast for the actual masterpiece second half. If you're even a little entertained, watch until the end.
The story takes place in the years preceding and during the French Revolution. It's historical fiction: emphasis on fiction, a lot of the shit even with real people just didn't happen. So consider all the characters as just characters. I think the anime does a great job at development: character development and world development. Slowly over the course of 40 episodes you can see France change and the characters change with it. Oscar starts off as a noble and very loyal to the queen, but she's also a person with an extremely upstanding moral character, which, without giving too much away, doesn't lead to her staying that way.
It feels like a 70s anime for sure, but also the best 70s anime to exist.
I think Oscar may be my favorite anime character ever.
The first half may have a lot of plotlines that seem frivolous or melodramatic
The funny thing is that if you look into it most of these melodramatic plotlines actualy happened and French nobles and aristocrats really were like that. You watch and you go "this seems far fetched and made up" but they were petty , vain and overly melodramatic like that. Sure the the presentation in the show and some extra details make it extra melodramatic but most of it is based on real shit these people did and say
But agreed. Great show with an amazing aesthetic (especially if you watch it i crisp BD quality from some torrent and not shitty compressed dvd quality on YT or some streaming site). Second half is directed by Osamu Dezaki who is considered the most influential and one of the best directors in anime's history. His other 70s anime (Gamba, Treasure Island(Takarajima) , Nobody's boy Remi (Ie Naki Ko), Aim for the Ace and Ashita no Joe) are equaly well made and directed as RoV and well worth a watch. Also im sure a lor of people here would love his other adaptation of a manga by the same author as RoV, Oniisama E... . Lots and Lots of amazing looking lesbian melodramma on that one
I've wanted to watch Joe for a while, I really liked the first episode when I watched it a while back. Pretty long series though, 79 episodes and then 47 for the second season. That's also kind of why I haven't watched Legend of the Galactic Heroes yet. But whatever, I should start watching it anyways. Maybe alongside something else so it doesn't feel like as big of a commitment.
For Joe you only need to watch till 54 of the first season and then go to the second one. Beggining of Season 2 covers the same content most of S1 post ep 54 of S1 with better animation and without filler. Also make sure you torrent the amazing looking HD remaster S1 got recently . Miles ahead of the DVD rips that were the only way to watch till recently
It's an amazing show but
E28 spoiler
The sexual assault scene and the way the aftermath was handled was done so horribly imo, and it almost made me drop the show despite everything else being fantastic.
I love how it portrays the buildup to the revolution, instead of just going "everything is fine, then the people rebelled" you see a progressively worsening situation and the nobility idling and not really caring about what happens.
That scene was completely unnecessary too, even the characters involved decide to forget about it. Could strip it out of the show and nothing would change.
I also got bothered by the fake miscarriage plot in episode 15 literally never being brought up again, and after episode 19 certain events got brushed aside for Fersen shit for a while and
spoiler
Polignac and Rosalie's arc kind of became an anticlimax and happened mostly off-screen
But otherwise I think the show was really great and the ending was especially so good it made me forget about problems I had earlier in the series
It's an amazing show and I 100% agree that even if the first half can be a bit tedious, it establishes all the characters to a degree that is crucial for all the big events that happen later in the series. I feel like at one point I was questioning if they were even going to touch on the French Revolution because the melodrama was just so on point you'd not expect them to just go through with it. From my understanding this show is responsible for a fascination with France in Japan and people expect France to be extremely different from what they actually see in reality. I also believe that Oscar went on to become the inspiration for a fairly common yuri trope of the ouji-type girl. Even if you're not particularly into the show on the merits of it just being flat out a masterpiece, if you have any interest in the cultural history of anime, you see a lot of stuff that would go on to be tropes and character types.
If I had one wish to improve it even though it's just a personal gripe
spoiler
I would've just had Rosalie and Oscar be the romantic couple rather than the guy Oscar picked in the end, though it still worked out.
I've heard that the manga is pretty solid, too. I'm actually trying to decide if I want to watch the anime for Rose of Versailles or finish off Macross as a franchise (Delta TV and movies) after I finish Space Battleship Yamato.
Since all almost all Macross is standalone there is no harm in putting stuff on hold between entries. Since Yamato is space opera/sci-fi doing a historical melodrama afterwards in RoV maybe would be more refreshing than a Macross entry
https://animepahe.ru/anime/bc9d7baf-85a1-a87d-79a1-e08925ae9276?page=1
This site has it in great quality
