User reviews

The entire movie is Seiya fighting everyone and the other knights just watching his sacrifice. It's very different from the classic animations. For someone who enjoy the other knights, like me, it's kinda boring.

I'm not the first Saint Seiya fan to review this, but i thought i'd give a different opinion on those i've seen.

-----Designs------ So let's start with designs. I applaud them for trying new designs for everything. The Cloths(armor) that the Saints wear have been upgraded to be more functional with a helmet that can fold down and up at will. It is a very interesting function, and i do like it. Although some of Kurumada's interesting details on the cloths are gone. Cloth boxes are now transported magically via a dog-tag that the Saints wear, which was a strange leap from the theme of "Only proper training and guts will make you strong" that was persistent in the original series. The movies tries to cater to the current younger Japanese generation, with a different kind of humor. Hence small trinkets and such are shown for some seconds in order to promote the film's merchandise.

I loved that they changed Milo into a woman however, as it did give the Goldies more variation, and Milo was a good candidate since he didn't have much personality except being stoic even in the original series.

However, several designs are designed in a very stereotypical way, such as Saga's dual colored Gemini cloth. Aldebaran, the Taurus Saint has a nose ring, etc. etc.

Environment wise it's decent until we get to the Sanctuary which has been transformed into a Chinese MMORPG setting, with stone buildings flying in the air here and there. That was just bad design in my honest opinion, and was very out of place from the ancient Greek inspired setting of the original series.

The big bad Saga transforming into a Final Fantasy boss in the end did not help things.

I love the animation however.

----Plot and characters---- So adapting something that took around 40 episodes into 90 minutes wasn't the smartest idea to begin with, hence there would be hick-ups in the plot. A smarter thing would have been to do the Galaxian Wars plot first, and then move on to the Sanctuary in a second film.

Saori's story was a nice idea, but didn't work quite properly as in the manga she already knew she was Athena before the beginning of the story.

Many, and i mean many character's stories were left out, or only had a tidbit to make a newcomer confused. It is a hard job to balance the five Bronzies, but it would have been better to focus on Athena, Saga and Seiya. The movie doesn't deliver on any of them quite well. Saga has basically no backstory to why he is evil, while in the manga his reason are elaborated much further.

----Music----- The score has it's peaks and bring a nice feeling to most of the scenes. They aren't however memorable.

The Movie's theme song "Hero" by Yoshiki is a nice tune, but contains some horrific lyrics about a person cutting their wrist in order for their hero to come. I'm surprised such a song actually went so far in production....

I've read some absurd negative reviews about this film, here on imdb, and I underline some negative reviews are truly absurd bordering on ridiculous.

Yesterday I saw this film in CGI, I was very surprised by the good CGI, the fluid animations, pleasant music, very surprised by the beautiful armor (they are really nice graphically), many good special effects, the plot is smooth and follows with pleasure, ultimately the film is not a masterpiece but it is not bad either, in fact I would say quite good. It's worth a watch because it's really well made in many ways.

Saint Seiya: Legend of Sanctuary, Good CGI movie...

I think this new take on the Saint Seiya franchise is not bad, while it felt rushed on the last 30 minutes, I think it was solid enough.

The designs, the CGI and the personalities were great. I was gladly surprised to see Aldebaran looking so bad ass, the relationship between the bronze saints were fun and a reminder of the personalities they had on the first season (while exaggerating some qualities for comedy) and the fights were eye-candy. Sadly I feel like it doesn't deliver so well for some fans because of all the changes to the original story (specially the end that felt rushed) but considering this is trying to get the whole anime season in one movie I think it was necessary and expected. Gotta be clear that that doesn't justify the lack of screen time from some fan favorites like Ikki who never got his time to shine in this movie while it had a really important role in the original plot, I think he was the biggest disappointment and probably one of reasons people were so harsh on this movie.

Also I think it was fresh to see some new ideas and some changes like the realization from the golden saints that there was something wrong happening, that the bronze saints may have been right and instead of waiting on their places they tried to actually do something to help.

Overall I was entertained, while the big fan in me was disappointed because I wanted to see so much more, after talking about it with my friends (who also left the theaters a bit disappointed) I realized that I actually really appreciate this film from what it is and while it's not perfect, it's a fun time and a good experience overall.

After watching this movie I am disappointed. A recommendation for different kind of watchers:

• If you are a Saint Seiya anime fan, please spare yourself from a painful time watching this movie.

• If you are not a fan, you might just survive the experience. The movie will just throw random stuff at you consistently during the 93 minutes it lasts.

• If you like cool CG and animation, by all means watch it. Kudos to all the CG and technical staff that participated in the making, their work is simply impressive. If there would have been a script on par with the technical work, this could have been a really good movie.

The producers should be totally ashamed. All beauty and values from the original saga has totally disappeared.

The story is not good but I understand it's hard to concentrate all the Sanctuary story into one movie... But what about those stupid clothes ? WTF !!! All saints are looking so stupid, I couldn't believe what I have seen.

I don't understand how they could buy the Saint Seiya license and how somebody could accept this.

I advise to all fans to don't go to see it and above all to not waste their money for this stupid movie.

Great visual, cgi , love the story and the designs, the armour is beautifull, despite benn short

If they are trying go make Saint Seiya the goal is go at least try. I don't think they even try. Is a disgrace! I have seen most of the anime series and I loved them all but this version is just simply disrespectful to the amazing series.

I am a big fan of SS, and the movie is excellent, the plot is very good, it has some parts that are a bit like weird, but overall the story is 80-90% good.

For non-fans it would be even better, as they wouldn't mind about changes in the story, the only drawback is that the whole concept of a saint is not explained in detail. But it is explained, you just have to pay attention lol.

Regarding the CGI, the movie is a freaking work of art from the beginning to the end. I was blown away of how well executed the characters are.

Just watch it. This movie is just as underrated as warcraft, they both are amazing.

I grew up watching saint seiya and I have always been a big fan of the TV show, but I have always hated the saint seiya movies in the past. The only thing I remember from the old saint seiya movies is the long long scenes of the bronze saints getting beat up much like the fillers in Dragon Ball Z when goku and others would scream for a whole episode while transforming to the next super saiyan stage.

Back to the movie, all the designs and small details(Sceneries, Architectures, Armours and the fight moves) in the animation were beautiful and very well thought out. People were right that there weren't much character "development" since its a 90 minutes movie, but the actions and dialogues did a very effective job of showing what each character was about. It is basically the same old straight forward but effective cartoon plot which I expected going in, so I have no idea why so many reviewers are complaining about it.

Every little detail might not be true to the original TV series, but the whole movie was very entertaining and the details well well thought out if you pay attention. So, if you are not a super hardcore saint seiya fan and are very much into well done animated film then you should probably give this a watch.

As far as I'm concerned this is the best Saint Seiya Movie EVER. Okay, it is lacking in:

• character development - fights - story arc - logic (lol)

HOWEVER the people moaning about the fact that it is not a 1:1 replica of the anime should take a trip back down memory lane (on Youtube for example) and realize that those were too lengthy, verbose and that most of the fights were left to the reader as an exercise.

At least here, the characters are likable, do not have a never ending death wish or bleed out at each opportunity. Plus the fights, although WAY TOO SHORT (I really wish for a director's cut for once even if the movie should be twice as long), are more dynamic and realistic (well, for a super hero movie that is) than they were back then. I could totally imagine a Hollywood movie (you know with real actors) - which I never could with the Anime - coming out of this. And for once, not a crappy one. Disney/Marvel... Pretty please? Or a TV show to develop what's missing - but unless they get loads of cash - Kickstarter anyone? - I don't know if they'll be able to keep up with the quality - because it is really very good - of this one.

It kinds of feel like the upcoming Big Hero 6 (judging from the trailers - Not out yet in France) in a way.

Just enjoy it as it is.

This movie is really good.

The animation was quite impressive and the plot did a fine job summarizing the first story arc of a very long anime series.

However, the hardcore fans who hate this movie are mad at the fact that this isn't a carbon-copy remake of the anime or the manga...Yet those fans are the same people who believe a series like Saint Seiya should be adapted in live-action by Hollywood: Give me a break, Saint Seiya fans! Do you really believe that Hollywood will do a proper and more faithful adaptation of your beloved manga/anime series than this one?

Honestly, all the negative reviews are so childish, so embarrasing. Nothing more than lazy nitpicks made by an entitled (And frankly unpleaseable) fandom that is stuck in the past in an unhealthy manner.

I am a big fan, I loved the opportunity to see the heroes in full CGI, great!!! The only thing I didn't like is the whole Saga fused with stones thing... that was out of nowhere... they should have kept it as a crazy warrior with an armor as it was originally... Anyway it was great, I have repeated it more than 3 times, still like the effects and stuff/

I saw this film and I really liked the CGI, a cute film.

The direction is very accurate and there are many characters, graphically they are very beautiful. The graphics are fantastic, just fantastic. It looks a lot like the graphics from the "CGI Harlock" movie.

Overall the film is entertaining, excellent CGI, beautiful music, many characters, many graphically stunning, many beautiful armours, many powers that resemble the powers of the X-Man, there are fights, there is humour, there is liveliness, in short, an interesting and good CGI product, I would have liked to see a second film, a sequel to this first one.

So i read some of the other reviews above and people saying this was rush or either saying the movie had no explanation at all is really annoying sometimes. For example if you are not a Saint Seiya fans then the new viewers don't know whats happening, i can see where that is coming from. You have to also compare it to Final Fantasy 7 advent children also. That movie doesn't explain what was also happening much in the story unless you already play the game from PS1. I never owned a PS1 so i never played FF7. Also matter to me was that the movie in FF7 AC was Kadaji saying, "mother". WHO THE HELL IS THIS MOTHER! I'm new to Final fantasy as people are new to Saint Seiya. This is a must watch movie for Saint Seiya fans!