Soultaker

The cast of this 10-part TV series expands as more villains, "Flickers," and mutants, including Nakahara, whose cutesy design and manner clash with the overall gothic tone, join Kyosuke Date and the hard-bitten Shiro. In "Beyond the Human Realm," Kyosuke discovers he may not be the child of the parents who raised him, but the mutant offspring of scientist Tsubaki Tokisaka and the sinister director of the hospital, Dr. Richard Vincent. Kyosuke discusses these questions while battling enemies in both his human and monster forms. Director Akiyuki Shinbo throws in computer graphics, weird camera angles, dream sequences, monochromatic images, negative frames, crucifixes, and still artwork, but the story remains so minimal and the exposition so fragmented that each episode of Soultaker feels like more and more about less and less. Rated 16 Up: Graphic violence, grotesque imagery, brief nudity, profanity, tobacco use. --Charles Solomon