Tag Archives: Blue Exorcist

Blue Exorcist: Beyond the Snow/The Blue Night Sagas Review

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Yeah that title is a mouthful right? Well in this case each cour got a different subtitle and that’s more or less how they list it on Wikipedia so I figured ehhhhh I’ll write it out like this. Get ready for a pretty long flashback saga thrown in. It’s important to be sure but you’ll probably be more eager to see what is going on in the present so in a sense this will definitely slow your roll quite a bit. We do get more action in this season although I still find myself wanting for more Rin battles. This must be what Edward fans felt like in FMA where you could go 20 episodes without the guy getting a real battle. Some MCs just don’t get all the screentime.

The first half of the season mainly focuses on Shura as we finally see her backstory. She vanishes one day in the present and Rin/Yukio are sent off to find her. There is still a bit of tension here as Yukio is still acting really shady and irrational. Even Rin who is one of the more oblivious guys out there is starting to pick up on this. With Shura being in danger there isn’t a whole lot of time to think about it but the situation will only continue to get worst at this rate. Shura is being controlled by a villain from her past known as Hachiro. Defeating him won’t be easy and it would appear that Shura may die anyway due to a contract. Can she be saved or will the heroes have to make a sacrifice here?

Once your soul is partially owned by a demon then you’re going to be in for a rough time. It really isn’t easy to save Shura as a result and she’s secretly known what was coming up ever since childhood and just didn’t tell anyone so they wouldn’t worry. It’s a heroic mindset so I don’t fault her for that. She probably could have left some kind of word for the rest of the characters so they wouldn’t chase after her but I’m not really sure what kind of wording you could have even tried to say that would have stopped them. Odds are they would see through most lies.

Shura has always been one of the more powerful fighters so it was nice to finally see her in the lead again. For the most part she is no match for Hachiro but she still gets some good action scenes. She is still used a bit for fanservice at times and even this life or death matter couldn’t help but still ship her a bit with Yukio. Definitely a really weak ship especially when Yukio is acting all crazy but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and say his actions here really were to help Shura. I like to think that he was totally faking everything he was saying even if it’s lightly implied that to a degree he meant part of it. Forming a pact would grant him more power which is something he desperately wants after all. This arc was able to continue his slow decent into darkness.

I can’t say Hachiro was one of the more interesting villains though. He’s certainly powerful but not particularly ambitious and it’s not like he has a super end game either. He’s someone you don’t want to cross but that’s about it. The heroes are way too lenient the whole time though and should have crushed him at the first opportunity. You will want to roll your eyes by the end of this arc. I would have liked to have seen Rin do more in the fight here but surprisingly he doesn’t play a pivotal role the way you might expect.

Rin still looks really solid throughout the anime though. He is really trying his best both in handling what the past brings in the next arc and even confronting his own feelings for Shiemi. It’s always best to take a pro active approach rather than sulking on the sidelines so that was really good. He may no look as good as he should in the fights by this point in the series but there are asterisks behind some of his worst showings so I cut him a tiny bit of slack here. By the next season I’m hopeful that we will be seeing more of prime Rin since he was down in the dumps for half of this season.

Unfortunately I can’t say that Yukio looks good at all here. At this point he is so jealous over Rin’s abilities that he is trying really dangerous methods to awaken his own. Even risking his life and basically coming close to ending it on the hopes that a life or death situation will manifest his powers. Yukio is willing to go to any level to wake them up including working with the Illuminati which is obviously a bad call. Not to mention pointing a gun at his friend Suguro. By this point in the series Yukio cannot be trusted at all and it’s a shame to see how far he has fallen.

It’s also a drop that has lasted whole seasons by this point so it’s certainly been a while since we’ve gotten to see him as a very heroic figure. Ah well, I guess that just wasn’t in the cards for him this time around. He is without a doubt getting stronger though so he will be hard to deal with. I expect that eventually he will be pulled back into the light, hopefully before he causes too much damage.

Aside from the Shura story, we also get the end of year celebration for the main characters. So we get a classic festival and interpersonal developments with the various characters. Not to mention that Lightning continues to discover more about the blue night massacre which is putting a lot of eyes on him. Lightning is a tough guy and not afraid to ruffle some feathers though, he just continues to work hard on that and doesn’t look back. I think he can be a bit too extreme at times to where he can feel like a villain but I can understand why he is tired of dealing with all the bureaucrats.

One thing to remember about this series is just how corrupt the government is. The “heroes” are working with Mephisto, a legendary demon after all. A lot of the issues they are dealing with in the present are due to crazy unethical experiments in the past. The whole second half of the season deals with a whole lot of that and the government doesn’t seem to have learned their lessons. They are still better than the villains who are trying to destroy everything but by no means are they innocent. You eventually need them to be taken down but right now that’s not really on Rin’s radar. The main characters will stop any evil in front of them but a systematic change is hard to do.

Rin’s various school friends are still around as well of course. Suguro helps Lightning out a lot and as a result he knows a whole lot more about the situation than most of the kids. Of course the more he learns, the more danger he gets put in. This is why Yukio targets him after all and at this point the guy definitely needs to watch his back as well. The villains can come from anywhere after all and Suguro isn’t the most powerful fighter by any means.

Meanwhile Shiemi is still dealing with romance issues. She is just unsure of what love really is and sorting out her feelings has been difficult. I appreciate that she is giving this some real thought rather than falling into anything too quickly. It’s not an easy concept to wrap your head around after all and once you have someone confessing to you, it just gets that much more complicated. It’s as if she’s on the clock now and has to decide much quicker than otherwise. There are so many kinds of feelings you can mistake for love as well so she needs to rule those out. She’s also started taking a route away from being a fighter which is a good decision, although now she’s being forced into a role that might put her in even more danger. Sometimes you just can’t win I suppose.

Shima is still working all the sides and continues to be an interesting wildcard. I can’t say I trust the guy at all though and none of the characters should. When you’re working all of the groups against each other, you have to be extra sure of where his real allegiance is or you will end up getting burned. He’s not the most powerful fighter so Rin could take him in a straight fight but the guy definitely feels like the assassin type so all he needs is a clean shot and he could still be a problem.

Then the second half starts and we have to take a break from the present right when things were getting real interesting. It’s time for Rin to learn the truth about everything that happened in the present. I know this flashback is a real big deal but it is the weakest part of the season in part because of how passive the main characters are. They just allow everything to happen rather than making moves to stop it all.

We see how Shiro grew up and joined the order. How he met a lady named Yuri who would be tasked with watching over Satan and would have a first row seat to how crazy the guy would get. It’s a very twisted dynamic to be sure and who would have guessed that Satan would turn out to be evil?? I would have liked the warning bells to have gone off within the organization a little bit sooner but they’re all just so arrogant and cocky that they could contain him. If there’s one demon you should not underestimate, it would surely be this guy right? Definitely not their best appearance and Satan definitely makes them pay for it.

There are a number of annoying things about the flashback but the would be romance with Shiro and Yuri has to be at the top of it. Ultimately he’s too gruff and stubborn to actually say that he likes her and allows her to keep on seeing Satan and basically sacrifice herself for the mission. Yuri also doesn’t seem to want to be a burden and so she takes on each mission even knowing about the danger. She also begins to care for Satan to a degree which was definitely a mistake. I was glad the series didn’t try to go out of its way to make him seem like a caring guy.

Satan may have started out as a baby but from the start his evil impulses are definitely there. It’s portrayed in a way where he would turn evil no matter who helped to raise him. It’s just in his very DNA and soul. You can’t fix that and I would say this is as clear as that’s going to get. At the same time I would say he loses whatever mystery is left within the guy. We just see him in a vulnerable/weakened position too often to take him seriously. He gets a whole lot of cringe scenes while growing up in the asylum and the fact that the humans were able to placate him for so long is rough. It’s the same thing that happened with Lucifer and I even dare say Mephisto gets hit with this. You can’t take them seriously when Lucifer and Satan are constantly spitting out blood and dying to be reincarnated later on. Then Mephisto takes a gunshot and winds up in the equivalent of the hospital? Yeah he’s probably trolling but cmon now.

Of the 3, Mephisto seems to be the most dangerous with his time manipulation but they all have full weaknesses. Mephisto at this point has been jobbing so hard for so long that I almost wonder if he still remembers how to be a fierce opponent. One thing’s for sure, he’s been playing the long game for a longer time than most other antagonists. He probably gets some kind of record for this. No matter what his end game plan is, I dare say I will find it to be way more convoluted than it needed to be.

I also would say Yuri having kids with him was definitely a mistake. The less said about this ship the better but the whole plot definitely makes you shake your head. Like I said, she took the job way too seriously and her feelings got way too confused the whole time. None of the characters make it out of the flashback saga unscathed. They all make their share of mistakes and all of them seem like self inflicted errors. Any of the characters could have handled it way differently like for Yuri abandoning the order, the Order could have just taken Satan down earlier and worried about the resurrection at another time, Shiro could have stepped in, etc.

The characters really allowed things to get out of hand and of course the ramifications of this are that we got the blue night disaster and all of the current events in Blue Exorcist. This also put Shiro further under Mephisto’s thumb which would really become a life debt. That’s probably one of the toughest things for the heroes in this series which is that they’re basically forced to work for the villains under penalty of death. Rin is really the only hope to shake off these chains if by now he is strong enough to change the world.

The animation for the show is good. Nothing amazing and I don’t think you will be seeing this on lists for best animation but the action works well enough. I expect that once we get a long Rin fight we will get to see the animation explode. When characters have fire powers, it really helps the animation to look extra sharp because the colors work well with the swordplay. If you mess up fire based fight scenes then the studio has a real problem I would say.

As for the soundtrack, they are still using a whole lot of the old tracks from previous seasons so there isn’t much new here. Neither one of the openings are particularly solid. I would say they are okay but definitely not game changers. They really aren’t doing anything innovative here unfortunately. It’s not bad or anything but I do hope they can spice things up a bit in the next season or just use some of the old tracks more. The electronic battle theme and the classic Blue Exorcist themes are right there begging to be used more!

While it feels like we are starting to approach the end of the series, it also feels like the title is dragging its feet a bit. Blue Exorcist has always had some weird pacing issues. It feels like the world is only partially fleshed out. The characters accept some rather odd situations without questioning it. Only Rin seems to know how twisted things are but half the time when he speaks up, Mephisto just threatens him to his face. There is no winning if the world is still ruled by demons and it’ll be interesting to see how Rin finds a solution to this. While trying to obtain more and more power is usually something the villains do, I think it is the heroes who need to crave it this time. That’s the only way they can overthrow the demons and really change things up.

At this point there really should not be much more time for school adventures. I like them as much as the next guy but the world is going crazier and crazier with the demons running amok throughout the country. I need to see some initiative for the heroes as they take them on directly. I also really need to see Rin taking a more prominent role. If they find a way to sideline him again in the next season then I’ll be shaking my head. It’s time for Blue Exorcist to get serious and give us some serious plot progression in the present timeline.

Overall, The season spends a lot of time in the flashback which definitely slows up the pacing. Most of it you can easily guess and piece together from the lore we already had so I think this could have been condensed a whole lot. I just want to know what’s going to happen in the present so the next season has the potential to be the most explosive yet. I would say as always, Blue Exorcist continues to be solid but still lacking things to make it a very good show. It’s a mix of characters and action. The series just has not been ready to turn the corner but perhaps that will change now. If you’re this deep into the series, you should definitely continue in order to stay current. It feels as though the series is starting to approach the climax so I doubt we will be getting another 4 seasons at this point.

Overall 6/10

Blue Exorcist: Shimane Illuminati Saga Review

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It’s time for the return of Blue Exorcist. This series has always been a bit of a mystery to me. On one hand, it’s a big Shonen title where the main character has to fight off his demonic urges and slay demons. It’s very much a classic king of plot but the execution is just so different. Sometimes in a good way but sometimes in a bad way. I’ve never really connected with the series as well as most other big Shonen titles and that doesn’t really change here either. It’s a good season but not great by any means. It’s not quite as interesting as it should be and the action always gets cut off way too quickly. Well, lets dive into this.

Yukio is still jealous of Rin’s abilities and now that he is getting a glimpse of his own demonic potential, he wants power. He continues to try and repress his desires but the facade is starting to crack and he doesn’t want to talk to anyone about it. There’s not much time to think about this though as the Illuminati attacks and kidnaps Kamiki. She is taken by Shima, a double agent working for this group. Naturally the Illuminati is led by Lucifer himself. Note that Lucifer is another son of Satan and brother to Mephisto. This group will be difficult to defeat especially Mephisto sandbagging as always and the Exorcist Order being generally useless. Rin and Yukio will have to take point in rescuing her but can they move on from this big betrayal?

Naturally this is a really huge deal if you have been following the series for a long time although the anime took so long to get up to this point that I wouldn’t be surprised if most people have already heard about this whole thing. It’s not exactly the biggest secret in the series, you know what I mean? The reactions to it are very odd though. The characters get over the betrayal way too easily which is a personal pet peeve of mine. This guy literally broke all of their trust and kidnapped Kamiki so she could be tortured over and over again like in the past by a group that is clearly evil.

I think this is more than a “Do better next time” kind of speech. He should be absolutely demolished, I’d expect him to be destroyed on sight the next time that he is seen. Is that harsh? Yeah maybe but I would also argue that it is absolutely deserved. The characters are constantly using kid gloves on Shima and it doesn’t really make sense. The show goes into the specifics here and throws some more twists into the mix but none of it overrides the fact that Kamiki was very close to being dead. She had her summons get destroyed and while they managed to come back later, she was consistently put in a rough spot.

It’s why undercover operations are often not a good idea. Even if it’s part of a mission, you can’t be putting your allies in danger or sitting back while others are attacked. If you let one person get murdered to save 100, then you are starting to make dangerous decisions that are in villain territory. So I never ended up liking Shima and still blame him for everything. I’m also a little upset at the other characters allowing him back in because that makes no sense to me. Definitely a massive L right there.

Rin also doesn’t look his best here. He’s going through the classic hero issue of not wanting to murder anyone so he holds back a lot but you can always knock someone out without murdering them. It also gets to be a little much when he is also nervous even when fighting mindless monsters. Just take the super slow zombies down, there’s nothing you can really do to save them at this point. It’s also an annoying part of Blue Exorcist because every time we’re primed for a big right with Rin, it either doesn’t happen or he holds back so hard that it’s not a real fight.

Realistically he should be mopping the floor with most of the characters but it just doesn’t happen. He’s also scared of his powers enough where he doesn’t train the way that he’s supposed to. How is he supposed to protect his friends when he’s holding back like this? The whole power system of the series isn’t great either. The prayer chants never seem to work and are incredibly impractical. Unless you have someone like Rin or Kamiki backing you up to buy you time, the villains are going to slam you. It just makes over half of the cast feel rather useless most of the time. Everyone should have some close quarter combat skills or at least a big summon you know?

Okay back to the characters, Yukio is super annoying here as well. Part of this isn’t his fault because the guy’s had to go through the same character arc multiple times since the anime only arc was retconned and of course I remember this from the manga. So it just gets old quick where he is messing up his priorities and becoming a liability. If he would just talk to Rin about what’s going on things would work out better. So I put all of the blame on Yukio since he’s taking himself down the wrong path. It’s not even like the villains are encouraging this, Yukio is really leading himself downhill all on his own.

As for the main heroine Shiemi, right now there’s a lot of drama going on with her. She seems to like Yukio but is starting to like Rin. Possible triangle forming there, we’ll have to see how it goes. For now Shiemi is still way too timid and I would like her to acknowledge her own strength more. Her grass summon is really not that bad and can at least buy her some time. She has no real offensive spells but at least she can play a support role.

In that way she is more balanced than Kamiki. Kamiki has her dual spirits but they don’t even listen to her half the time because they’re tremendously awful characters who refuse to honor any kind of loyalty to her despite having high respect for Kamiki’s mom and put her in big danger. Kamiki has basic spells beyond that but as I pointed out before, this never works anyway so it may as well be a pointless addition. I like Kamiki’s fiery spirit but hopefully she will work with the other heroes more next time and not try to be a loner. Being a loner only works when you have the power to back it up.

Suguro is the only one who actually gives Shima a hard time so I give him massive credit for that. He sticks up for the traitor so that he’s not executed or anything like that but still doesn’t trust him. That’s how it should be, I still don’t get how you could possibly trust him in any context after what happened. That just makes no sense to me. Suguro is really held back by the fact that he can’t fight at all without the talismans so I hope he gets something soon.

Miwa tends to be a bit of an annoying character. Kind of wishy washy and never too sure of himself. Unlike Shiemi he has no great powers to help him out so right now he’s on the lower side from the cast members. Shura doesn’t do much beyond her obligatory teasing of Yukio. She is mainly injured for most of the season and when she is conscious she is being threatened by Mephisto. Honestly she is in such a terrible spot half the time. She needs to find a way to get stronger so she can actually have some freedom.

As the big villain in the Illuminati you’d figure that Lucifer would get a lot of hype but he’s very underwhelming for now. He’s super sickly and constantly coughing up blood and running out of energy. I feel like Mephisto could wipe him out of existence with ease and is just messing around because he can. It looks like the heroes are going to wait until Lucifer finds a cure and can fight at full power before they make their move so the Exorcists are as inept as always. I’ll need to see more of Lucifer to take him seriously.

His main general was one of those fat psycho doctors which doesn’t do his group any justice. That guy was super annoying so I was glad when he was taken out. Definitely one of the worst villains in the series. The backstory for Kamiki’s family was definitely a sad one. This season sure had more of an emotional feel than the last one. No offense to Suguro but his family drama wasn’t nearly as impactful. This one hits a bit harder because of how so much of it felt inevitable with no real escape.

Finally with Mephisto, he is still a solid villain but the kind of figure who could go way down depending on how his plan goes. Right now we don’t really know what he even wants to do. He clearly has enough power to bring the world to its knees so why doesn’t he? He has deals with the shady council of Exorcists but why would he even need such weaklings? We’ll find out in time but if he ends up getting one shotted or the plan doesn’t go well then retroactively it will make him such a terrible villain. Usually the more convoluted and far out your plan is, the more things that can go wrong. So he will really have to convince me here.

In general a lot of the story is still shrouded in secrecy. In part I would say that’s because we’re seeing things from the point of view of the main characters who are out of the loop on everything. We don’t really have any characters who are on the inside to give us full coverage into what’s going on. You like to think that the Exorcists have a bunch of trump cards at their disposal but I have my doubts on this. Right now it just feels like the demons have all of the advantages and the heroes’ only chance is to trust one which is rough. Rin is their only chance.

In terms of animation, the show can look good but it can also be rough at times. It’s clear that this didn’t exactly get a massive budget. It’s a shame because none of the fights look all that amazing. The best battle in the series is probably Rin vs Shima and part of that is probably more for narrative reasons than animation. I’m glad we at least get some action but it again feels like the show could be doing so much more. In the last season the big boss was a giant monster and of course we get more of that here too.

I want the show to just embrace its Shonen roots and give us some massive action scenes. Lets get some really cool feats in here and some awesome stuff you know? At least the soundtrack is really good as always. This is one area where the show has always excelled. I thought the theme song was really catchy and I also like a lot of the individual tracks. My favorite theme from season 1 only shows up like once but the new themes are good too. There’s a solid amount of variety and I felt like this got the biggest budget in the show.

While the show may not always deliver on the action front, I do think it does pretty well on the slice of life and comedy aspects. It’s a show where we actually get to see the heroes in school quite a lot. We see them learning and everything as there tends to be a lot of downtime. The gag of Rin dressing up like Shima was absolutely top tier as well. That gag actually works really well and made for a lot of fun moments. The obligatory beach type episode was also not as fanservicey as it could have been.

In general the show doesn’t go too far into that but some of the outfits are definitely geared in that direction. The romance is on the weaker side though as it all tends to feel a bit melodramatic. I feel like it’s going in a similar direction to Seraph of the End with the characters trying to hold in their emotions and everything but Seraph of the End pulls it off so much better because of how direct it is. This one’s trying to sort of be half in and half out so the romance is more annoying than anything.

Overall, Blue Exorcist had some good fights and plot twists but it’s just hard to get into the series the way the author wants you to. It feels like its just taking too much time to move forward in the plot. The fact that all of the heroes have to work with the villains because they are too weak to oppose him is also annoying. I mean it’s interesting in a sense but there doesn’t seem to be a way for them to surpass Mephisto. The power system of this world just makes that impossible for all of them except Rin who needs to get his head straight. It’s almost like a horror film where the heroes don’t stand a chance. The only other title I can think of like this is Seraph of the End where the heroes are always super doomed but at least the power system is much more supernatural so you could easily write in massive power boosts. We’ll see where the series goes from here though, hopefully Rin can finally start fighting more. There is already an exhausting amount of world building so lets move on to the big plot developments now. Either way the show does go fast though and the characters are entertaining so that will have to do for now.

Overall 6/10

7 traits that make for a bad villain

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I’ve written editorials on what makes for a good hero and what makes for a good villain. Now we’re going to look at what are traits you want your villains to avoid. These can turn you into a bad villain. Now there are really two kinds of villains. Ones who are meant to be taken seriously like Lex Luthor or Frieza and then there are the fun ones like Dr. Cortex or Drakken. The criteria for these villains can be quite different. In this editorial I’m mainly talking about serious villains to consider that in mind as I bring up the following points. Characters are quite layered so just because you may have some of these traits does not mean you are automatically a bad villain. However you do want to typically avoid these.

1. “I want to marry the princess!”

This is a huge one. In general what I’m talking about here is a villain’s motive. It can’t be something so superficial like this. Villains like Jafar from Aladdin or Claude from The Hunchback of Notre Dame come to mind. When a villain’s motive is like this it immediately makes it hard to take them seriously or even find them likable. I’m focusing more on the negative aspect of the motive here as I’ve already spoken at length about what a good motive is on the last editorial. Your motive just can’t be so petty/shallow. Another variation of this would be something like just being super evil for no reason. You can just be evil like wanting to destroy the world or something. That’s pretty legit but if you’re just torturing heroes and stabbing guys for no reason then it comes across as unnecessarily edgy.

2. The villain’s insane for a purpose that isn’t compelling
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Insanity in small doses or even large doses can make for interesting villains. Look at Joker, he’s a pretty iconic villain who is insane in all the right ways. His rants actually have a purpose to them and while he is crazy, he still has general goals that you can find pretty interesting like tearing down society to prove that anyone can crack at any time. Now, he’s been through so many writers that this can vary but for the most part it’s good. Then you have a villain like Toga who is insane but not in a cool way. Her fascination with Deku is definitely quite out there and she doesn’t seem to quite understand why it’s so odd. Her origin story shows that she has been like this for a very long time. So to be most accurate, it’s not that being insane is automatically a negative trait but it tends to backfire so you want to be careful about it. Being insanely after another character like this is not the motivation you want for your villain.

3. The villain acts very subserviently to another
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This is a big no no. You absolutely can’t grovel to another villain or constantly ask for forgiveness. This is a really easy way to make yourself a joke when it comes to big time villains. Whether you’re the big boss or a henchman you have to conduct yourself with a certain amount of class and decorum. You can’t go around being scared of the others. In some cases a villain might even allow himself to get beaten up by the others. Leo Lionheart is an example of a villain who is constantly pandering to his bosses. He spends his entire screen time being absolutely terrified of Salem and her crew. there’s no way to find a villain like this particularly likable. He’s just not made of the right stuff and this kind of groveling and terror is an immediate turnoff. Should have at least made a break for it.

4. The villain has a grotesque design
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Now design is something that’s important for any character so this is a bit of an easy one. Particularly for villains sometimes you want to have a villain who is super deformed or grotesque to add to the fear factor but it’s not a good idea. For one thing, having that many scars means that people have been beating you up for ages or if it’s just too crazy then it’s going to be hard to look at the villain as it is. Freddy Krueger is the perfect example of this. It’s a grotesque design for sure and hurts his chances of being likable. I mean, he’s got a ton going in the wrong way for him so he was never close as it is but this does not help his case in the slightest. Mojo is a character who had more potential. At the very least he has a lot of fun lines and the guy can fight pretty well. It is hard to get past his design and mannerisms at times though. If they tone that down a bit he could become one of the all time greats.

5. The villain is fairly mindless
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A villain needs to have an amazing design to make this work. Otherwise if you’re a mindless villain it’s going to really be hard to be likable at all. When you’re just a giant villain who can’t talk or act then are you even a character or just an obstacle? That’s the question you have to ask for someone like the Impure King from Blue Exorcist. It’s hard to find him likable or even that interesting. He just stands around as the heroes slash away at him until he is burned into nothing. He had a great intro but didn’t do anything with it. You can’t have a villain like this or at least you should try to avoid it. The same goes for villains who are usually smart but suddenly turn into a power type and lose all of their intelligence, it’s just not a good idea.

6. The villain throws a lot of pity parties
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Whenever a villain starts to try and blame everyone for the mess he’s caused then this really won’t work out well. One big example of this is Reiner from Attack on Titan. Bear in mind that Reiner is directly responsible for murdering countless people during the Titan attacks. He tries to justify this many different ways and one of which is by trying to say that he didn’t even have a choice. He has a crazy speech against Eren to which Eren points out that the whole thing is ludicrous. It was a pretty hype scene but didn’t do anything for Reiner. His character starts to go downhill fast from this point. You absolutely cannot have the villain feeling bad for himself. It’s not going to end well. Villains need confidence and conviction to go through with their plans. Now, Reiner was caught up in a tough situation and he made a choice. It’s better to make a choice than not to do anything but then he’s got to live with it and can’t garner any sympathy from anyone.

7. The villain suddenly decides he doesn’t want to go through with the plan
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This is a classic for minions or even big bosses They’ll do all kinds of evil things throughout a series but then suddenly they have second thoughts about the whole thing. “Maybe we’re going too far” or something like that when they’ve been totally on board the whole time. It always seems rather sudden and just out of character. You can also just call it chickening out. It’s different from having an honor code where you have some things that you’ll just never do. Backing out of a plan where you fully knew what it entailed is something else entirely. In this case with Emma from Godzilla, it’s just that she didn’t think things through. It’s almost worse when you think about it because she was so confident in her plan initially. Just listen to her plan. It made no sense and the start and it doesn’t make any sense now.


So these are my top 7 traits to avoid. Naturally there are others like just making sure your villain isn’t a creep like Nobuyuki from Sword Art Online but if you avoid these 7 traits you’re definitely in a really good position to go places. Naturally for there to be great villains you’re bound to run into run of the mill villains or even downright bad ones. It’s just the way things work but the more good villains the better right? It’s always interesting dissecting what makes a character interesting or unlikable like this. I’d say it’s more fun writing about the best ones though but you gotta see both sides of the coin. That means the final editorial in this series will be about what makes for a bad Hero but that’s not til December. In November the monthly editorial will be a simpler one about how I score media. What does a 7/10 mean to me and how do you achieve that? Look forward to that editorial next month!

Blue Exorcist: Kyoto Saga Review

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It’s time to look at the next installment in Blue Exorcist. This is a pretty unique season two because for starters it completely ignores the second half of the first season. That’s because the first season diverged and ultimately went to filler. It’s a pretty interesting tactic but one that makes sense and more titles should give it a try. That said, I don’t mind series going all the way back to the starting point because it means more adaptions of hype fights. That said, one problem here is that most of the characters have slid way back in terms of character development. It’s a solid show but definitely one that has its flaws.

The show starts with Rin and Yukio stopping a kidnapper from getting away. The guy seems rather skilled though and was able to easily best Yukio before escaping. This compounds with Yukio’s inferiority complex over Rin getting all the power and friends which causes a bit of a rift between them although Rin is oblivious and Yukio tries not to show it. They each go their separate ways as Yukio is called to a mission in the mountains while Rin goes with his friends to a temple mission. The problem is that nobody likes Rin anymore after the events of the forest arc. Even the super nice childhood friend seems to have turned on him.

Rin does his best to cope with this though. At the temple things aren’t quite as they seem. The two main factions are feuding with each other and the leader always skips meeting. They suspect he may be a traitor now which would be devastating. See, the temple is in charge of protecting two eyes because should they ever be brought together then a giant monster would appear and end the planet. Rin wants to help but he is not allowed to do so on account of his devil powers. Will the heroes be able to get past all of their individual dramas in order to help save the day?

As you can see, this season does bring up a lot of plot points from the past and they are necessary to fully get what’s happening here. The show has a lot of flashbacks though so you’ll be up to speed real quick. Here’s why part of the season can feel like a retread though. In the first season once it turned to filler, the series decided to delve into Yukio’s character quite a bit. It makes sense because the manga had been building up this plot since the start and if the anime was doing its own thing anyway they may as well finish it right?

In the first show Yukio briefly turned evil due to mind control and such and he finally got to properly have a talk with Rin. They squared away their differences and vowed to get stronger in their own ways. While the filler arc wasn’t all that great (Trying to turn the Devil into a sympathetic guy who didn’t know any better is still pretty crazy) this plot was handled reasonably well. It’s about at the same level as how the real one went although Yukio not flat out turning evil here is a plus.

The other plot was about Rin’s friends not trusting him after he saved their lives in the forest. (By the way the friends are pretty awful about this in every possible context. If Rin didn’t step up and fight the guy then they all would have been murdered. The friends are so petty the whole time that it’s crazy) That one was handled in the first show as well so the got back to being on good terms. This show has to go through all of that again since they are back to square 1. It’s not that the show does any of this poorly though. Other shows also handle the same plots over and over again with changes like the Fate series as you go through the different paths. It’s rare that you see it in a classic Jump anime though.

All right, that’s enough about the similarities. The whole thing is pretty fun to look at though. Ultimately it makes sense why the series would ignore it and do things the canon way. The series is only 12 episodes so it definitely goes by you in a blast. It’s very nostalgic seeing the old characters and part of what helps seal that effect is they grabbed all of the classic themes. The Blue Exorcist series had a terrific OST so this was a smart play. I’d liked to have seen more of Rin’s theme as it only gets played once or twice but he doesn’t get to fight much here so I suppose that makes sense. I also like the 90’s techno/jazz theme that plays. It’s hard to describe that one but it’s always sounded pretty great and gets you pumped for what’s about to happen.

The animation is definitely on point as well. I always like how they draw the blue flames here. They pop out at you and the same goes for the fire blasts as well. All of the shots look crisp and modern so I’ve definitely got no qualms about this. On a technical level the show definitely holds its own and maintains a consistent quality throughout.

Rin’s still a pretty solid lead. That’s a good thing because at times it feels like he is holding the entire show on his shoulders as far as the cast is concerned. He’s definitely the most interesting character and always puts up a brave front. One subplot here is that Rin has lost a lot of his confidence after his friends undermining him the whole time but he tries to never let this show. To an extent I feel like it was also the sword trolling him or someone preventing him from using it though. I feel like he should have been able to use it sooner. Regardless, Rin always dives into action and definitely handles the situations pretty well.

Shiemi is the main heroine here but she doesn’t manage to stack up as well as most. The reason for this is even she is unable to stay by Rin’s side and is a big reason as to why he has lost confidence. Later on it’s played more like she was too nervous to talk to him but it was hard for her to rebound from this. In comparison Izumo handles things a lot better. She’s already mean to everyone and isn’t afraid to talk to Rin throughout the adventure. She treats him the same way as normal and at least that helps Rin’s experience feel a little more normal at times. Izumo is also portrayed as one of the most skilled exorcists here. She is quick to help heal the monks and also thinks fast during the invasion. From the supporting cast she was definitely the best one.

Ryuji is more of a mixed bag but I would definitely put him on the lower side. He mainly just gets in Rin’s way and gets the lead into trouble on quite a few occasions. It would help if he could fight a bit more or something but most of the main characters can’t really fight for beans. He had his big moments at the end of the season since this is his arc so I think he’ll be a much better character in the next season. At least he ended strong right?

Konekomaru is definitely the worst character though. He’s the one most actively afraid of Rin and getting everyone else to fear the lead as well. The guy never really minds his own business. Look, I would cut the characters a little more slack if I could see why they were scared of Rin but I’m not really buying it. He totally saved them all. Konekomaru just needs to remember that. He’s also one of the most reluctant to go and help Rin when it counted.

Shima is also pretty sketchy although not specifically for Rin. The guy just never wants to risk his life so he’ll run for safety even if it means that all of his friends will die. There’s no real way to support him after something like that. I did appreciate that he was a little quicker to start being cool with Rin again though.

Yukio is still pretty jealous of Rin’s abilities for most of the series. He covers It up by acting calm and collected but as Shura pointed out that makes it a lot easier for demons to manipulate him. Todo plays a ton of mind games with him for most of the series although Yukio ultimately stays strong. He looks better than his first series self in that respect. I liked the magic trap that he used near the end of the series. It was pretty well thought out and at least helped him start to make a comeback. Todo was a supremely difficult opponent to stop so any measure that slowed him down is solid.

So right now I don’t really care for Yukio but hopefully he’ll be on the upwards trend now. He is still keeping secrets from Rin though so I can’t see that ending well. Mainly Yukio’s worst scene here was leaving Rin to die and even trying to stop him from using the sword. For a proper redemption arc we need Yukio to step in and save Rin next time or at least defend him when the chips are down. That’ll go a long way to raising him up the ranks.

Then we have Todo who is the big villain of the arc. The guy definitely does pretty well here as he holds off multiple exorcists and even eats two different spirits. This gives him incredible powers in addition to what he already had. The heroes really had a hard time taking him on to the point where he probably should have crushed them almost instantly based on the speed we saw from him. The guy was just out of their league and when you mix in his regeneration abilities this makes the matter even worse. He was a fun villain. Ultimately I don’t think that guy will be super well remembered but this series hasn’t really had many good villains so almost by default he’s my favorite villain in the series right now.

The show does suffer from a bit of fan service at times. For the most part it’s nothing crazy but it seems like the mentor’s only role at times. Shura’s whole attack on Mephisto is one of those scenes because everyone knew the plan had 0 chance of success. If anything it just makes her look pretty terrible. Is she really so scared of this guy? Why even pick the fight if this was out it was going to end? She also doesn’t look too impressive considering she’s a mentor since Rin is able to shake her a few times and in the final fight she helps a bit, but not a ton.

It’s always a bit dicey to have a villain like Mephisto working with the heroes when he’s way stronger than them and they know it. I don’t see how they can all get along so well. I don’t think the dynamic works to be honest. He puts them into a ton of danger and helps the demons out a lot. Why is the guy still here? While the heroes are very weak compared to the villains, I wouldn’t yet call it a hopeless situation for them. The reason being that there isn’t really much of a villain group yet. The villains just do whatever they want and usually almost beat the heroes. This random monster (Well the Impure King is a pretty cool name and I guess he’s not totally random but there could be a lot of other monsters like this guy around) is apparently pretty strong but for one monster to basically have the whole order in check is a bad sign for them. Without Rin the heroes would be doomed and they should really start to realize that soon.

We get quite a few characters from the two sects over at the temple although most of them won’t stand out. Mamushi gets a big role since she gets involved in the conspiracy. She appears to be a bit gullible the whole time but is certainly dedicated to the cause. I do think she had good reason to doubt that Tatsuma was on the level though. She was a fun character. Then you have Juzo who was my favorite character from the group. He had some good fire abilities and took more of a leadership role compared to the others. That being said, I do think it was a bit odd that he tried to stop Mamushi from saving the eye. At that point nobody knew who the traitor was, but it was about to be burned in flames and the whole point is that they need to protect it right? Seemed like an odd moment in the show and the defense for doing that was real weak. Finally we also have Tatsuma as a character with a big role but he’s pretty terrible from start to finish. The guy was just impossible to redeem by the end and his actions still make no sense if you ask me. Stirring up trouble and getting the sects to suspect each other of treason was not the right way to handle this.


Overall, It’s nice to see Blue Exorcist back. The manga seemed to start diving off the deep end and going nowhere fast but anime is a solid medium that can make things more exciting. The directing here seems solid so I’m sure they could pull more seasons off. It seems a bit unlikely right now since this one came out a while ago, but there’s always a chance for another season. Considering that this one had to work with almost no fights and was still entertaining I think the next one should be in a good position.

Overall 6/10

Blue Exorcist Review

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Blue Exorcist is a pretty short show and I can’t say that it ever became supremely popular, but it’s definitely a title that I was aware of for some time. The publicity that it did get was pretty good and the posters always looked fun. What can beat a fire swordsman as you main character? The premise itself definitely had a lot of potential and I love this kind of action show. Blue Exorcist isn’t an all star title and it can’t really claim to be the best at anything, but it’s a pretty fun ride from start to finish.

The plot involved a kid by the name of Rin Okumura. He is the son of Satan, but his life’s mission is to destroy all of the demons since Satan murdered his foster Dad and a lot of the monks. To do this, Rin must become a high ranked Exorcist so it’s time to get down on his studies. Meanwhile, he meets up with a bunch of other people who want to become Exorcists in one form or another. Their teacher is very shady though as he is a high ranking demon himself and nobody really seems to mind. It’s not as if the humans can really do anything about it, but it is rather odd. Will Rin be able to accomplish his goal or is he doomed? Well, if you’re familiar with Shonen titles like Naruto, (I wanna be Hokage) One Piece, (I want to be the Pirate King) or the other Journey manga, you’ll realize that the odds of this happening in 26 episodes are slim. Still, we gotta hope that Rin can make it to the end or at least get Satan to repent of his evil ways.

It’s easy to compare Rin to Kirito in many ways. They both use a blue color scheme during their battles (Animation wise anyway) and they’re both sword fighters. They actually managed to snag Kirito’s voice actor for Rin (Or vice versa) which was pretty cool. (He’s still the best voice actor in the business and it was a great time for viewers since Blue Exorcist, Sword Art Online, and Attack on Titan were airing at the same time) Kirito is typically a lot more humble and quiet while Rin certainly does not fall into those traits, but they still feel pretty similar personality wise. In a fight, I think Kirito would probably have the significant edge, but it’s possible that Rin ends up surpassing him in the manga. I would almost say that it’s likely, but the pacing for power ups can be slow.

Back on topic, Rin is a very good main character. He’s certainly a lot better than you may expect from the posters. He’s not afraid to get into a fight to stick up for his brother, Yukio, and he doesn’t back down from a fight. He just says what’s on his mind instead of thinking about it and his intentions are always good. He’s probably the most reasonable character in the whole series even if he’s quick to leap into any situation. Rin’s basically the kind of guy that you would want to be friends with. He’ll always stick up for you and help with any tricky situation. He’s just a good guy through and through.

Yukio is one of the main characters in the show and he had the potential to be a very good character. Unfortunately, his character development goes in a circle instead of occurring on a straight path. A running theme is that he is jealous of Rin’s personality and abilities. Other times, Yukio just admires those traits. While Rin can use his demonic abilities to fight, Yukio is stuck using bullets so it can be tough for him. You can certainly sympathize with Yukio’s plight at times, but he makes it difficult at other points. I think he crossed the line when he attacked Rin in one of the last episodes and then tried to destroy his demon cat. Yukio basically betrayed everyone at the end and I definitely didn’t agree with his reasoning. Part of the problem is also that Yukio is very gullible. It should be noted that many of Yukio’s worst moments occur in filler. So, he can be a good character at times, but he is usually too antagonistic to be likable.

Ryuji is the rival, but he is just too weak to be taken seriously. It doesn’t help that Rin is already hardcore enough to be the main character and the rival. Ryuji turns against Rin so many times that it’s scary. He sticks up for him at some points, but he is pretty unfair to Rin at several points. I was glad to see Rin show him up when Ryuji made his debut. Ryuji has his verses that he recites against the demons, but it is usually ineffective. I have to say that he isn’t a good character, but he beats some of the other supporting characters, which is pretty scary.

Shiemi is the main heroine. Unfortunately, she can’t really fight. She has a grass familiar with her who makes grass and vines appear to block other opponents. It is pretty useful, but this means that Shiemi is completely defenseless without it. She always wants to help out, but she ultimately ends up getting in the way a lot. She has company since the other characters besides Rin are pretty weak as well. Ultimately, she just isn’t as interesting as she could be. Her character was just not very developed and she was a little too desperate to make friends right til the very end.

Izumo is probably the toughest character from Rin’s main friends. She isn’t much of a fighter on her own, but she can summon a pair of cats/dogs who help her out in the tough times that she gets involved in. Naturally, they are helpless against all of the decent villIns, but at least she won’t have to ne afraid of the minions. She got a decent amount of character development and she managed not to betray Rin unlike some pf his other friends. I liked her more than the other supporting characters, which may not be saying much, but it’s a start.
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Konekomaru is easily the worst friend of Rin’s. He was the first in line to betray Rin and he tries to turn everyone against him. Rin is the son of Satan after all and Satan destroyed a lot of people close to Konekomaru. It is pretty tragic and he should keep his beef against Satan, but Rin had been helping out for the whole series. I just can’t consider this guy to be a true friend and it was pretty tough to bounce back from that. Evidently, too tough for Konekomaru.

Shura joins the squad during the latter part of the anime. Technically, this may be slightly before the halfway mark, but she certainly feels like she was introduced late since everyone else was already established. Her introduction involves an intriguing plot twist and she looks good since she goes up against a powerful foe in the form of Amaimon. This is a Gamechanger. I already mentioned that none of the supporting characters could really do anything against the stronger demons. Well, that was until Shura came along. She is debatably stronger than Rin or at least a match for him. I would likely choose Rin in a no holds barred fight, but it would be a close fight. Shura works for the government, but she is still a pretty good character. She is openly rebellious to the corrupt figures although it can be frustrating to see her just accept their decisions. She talks tough, but she will rarely oppose the government openly. She is also used for fanservice at times, which isn’t cool. She is still a step up from the others though.

There is also a quiet kid with sock puppets and you have to wonder what was going on with him. He never really talks and he makes sure to disappear when the fighting starts. Maybe he is just a random classmate? That could be the case, but the anime gives him a lot of foreshadowing. He gets some ominous lines at the end and you get the feeling that he knows more than he is letting on. It is just one of the plot lines that goes nowhere. I don’t mind all that much since I dislike the character so far, but I’m sure that his true personality would have been a little more interesting.

Shiro is the man who raised Rin and Yukio. He was a very powerful Exorcist and he seemed like he had a bright future. It was literally bright since he was engulfed in blue flames, but that is not what he had in mind. He was a pretty good character. Shiro certainly wasn’t great, but he was fairly likable. He protected the heroes for quite a long time and he made the heroic choices when necessary. If only more of the old Shonen mentors could be like him instead if Jiraiya.

The Paladin is one of the characters who never got to really get any closure on his development. We don’t really know much about him other than the fact that he’s a very strong warrior. He took Rin down without a whole lot of effort and he basically just does whatever the government wants. He has a cool design and I actually like his character for the most part. He didn’t look good in the filler though so overall he would only be about average. He’s still someone to keep an eye out for since he is one of the few humans to be very powerful.

Mephisto Pheles is a character who is hard to understand. If this is intentional, then the anime did a good job. On the considerable chance that it was accidental, then it is not very impressive. Mephisto switches from hero to villain several times as the show goes on. We learn that he helped to save Rin a while back yet he repeatedly tries to destroy him. (I suppose that we can say that he knew Rin wouldn’t die, but this would be dicey to say the least) Does Mephisto want to destroy the human world or Hell? He doesn’t even attempt to stop one of the villains from his plan to destroy Hell so I guess he doesn’t feel any loyalty to his fellow demons. On the other hand, he keeps causing trouble for the human world so maybe he wants to rule it. His goals are not very clear cut so it is entirely possible that he just likes to cause chaos so that he can see what happens next. All villains should have some kind of understood goal by the end in my opinion. (There are probably some exceptions) He also has a good time operating as a hero though so maybe Mephisto flips a coin to decide how he will act on that day. It is heavily implied that he is much stronger than any of the heroes so he could probably end any resistance made by the Exorcists in an instant.

Amaimon doesn’t appear a whole lot, but he makes each appearance count. He gets a cliffhanger for his first appearance and his big three episodes each revolve around big fights with Rin. He is one of the strongest Demons since he is one of the 4(?) Kings. He is a hand to hand fighter, which works out great for us since those fights always tend to be fun. He seems like he just wants to enjoy the human world’s unique features (Like the food) as he finds some solid fights. There aren’t many fighters who really get him intrigued, but he likes to mess with Rin so that keeps him entertained for a while. While Amaimon adds a lot to the show thanks to his fight scenes, I don’t really care for his personality. He doesn’t have a lot of development as a villain and the voice probably prevents me from taking him seriously.

Igor is one of the characters who shows up and he also shifts from being a villain to a hero to a villain as the series goes on. He works for Mephisto Pheles so that makes sense. I definitely consider him to be a villain since he did attempt to murder Rin, but I would also call Mephisto Pheles a villain as well. I don’t trust guys who keep changing sides all of the time. Igor has a rather emotional subplot towards the end of the series, but he mostly tries to stay pretty detached. He has a grudge against demons due to a certain incident, which definitely changed how he acted. He’s a very interesting character and it’s always enjoyable to see him on screen.
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The animation is pretty sharp. It doesn’t use any fancy animation techniques and there aren’t many scenes that will get a lot of buzz for this area, but you can instantly tell that this is a relatively new anime. I was sold on the animation right from the first episode and it really does the blue flames justice. This is the kind of show that could have been hurt by bad or average animation so it’s good that it was able to pull through. The fight scenes can look really great when they occur. They are fairly rare, but we get two big fights with Amaimon and a short sparring match with Shura. Rin and Yukio have a bit of a tussle, but I can’t really call it a fight. Anytime Rin enters his demon mode, you can be sure that something cool will happen. One fight that didn’t involve Rin, but was still cool was when Yukio fought Igor early on in the series. That was definitely pretty fun and the normal danger scenes can still be very entertaining. You’ll never find yourself bored in any of the canon episodes so I can safely say that the director did a great job with the pacing.

The openings are pretty good although the first one is significantly better than the second. I like the main theme a lot and there’s another one that’s pretty good for the battles. My favorite theme may actually be the one that seems to be inspired from the 90’s Xmen show. It’s hard to describe it, but it occasionally plays for a fight scene or for an emotional moment. One time where I remember it popping up is when Rin first meets the giant cat. On the whole, the soundtrack is pretty average, but having 2-3 really good songs is enough to give the whole soundtrack a much needed boost. It certainly won’t wreck any scenes like One Piece. (The big offender that always comes to mind when I think of battle music that takes away from a fight) If you think about it, having 2 terrific themes can make any soundtrack good since they will be popping up quite a lot as the show goes on.

The show didn’t have a whole lot of room for filler so I guess the writers felt that they needed to really remind us how dangerous it can be. The episode sees our heroes head to the beach to fight a Kraken type of opponent and it is a pretty terrible episode. It features a filler character who can’t fight, but he wants to avenge his Dad. His Dad was seemingly destroyed by the beast. Along the way we have a lot of not funny situations that will just make you dislike the kid even more. The ending is clever in a way, but the episode was already sunk by that point. The episode itself would definitely be counted as a negative for me. One bad episode (Within reason) may not affect a show like Naruto (Which can afford about 20-40 bad episodes) but for a 26 episode like Blue Exorcist, you’re probably not going to forget it anytime soon.

The show started to fall off the rails in the final episodes (Enough so that it’s noticeable, but the episodes weren’t downright cringeworthy so that it would really hurt the score) so I shall quickly talk about why it didn’t work. The set up is that a guy who claims to be Rin and Yukio’s uncle appears and he tells Yukio about how he can turn Rin into a normal human. (This is already impossible since he was born from a demon…but let’s keep going!) The casualties will only number a few trillion as he wants to destroy every demon in existence. (Will Rin really be spared?…..) Yukio quickly agrees, even if it means destroying Rin’s friend and hurting the familiars who have been helping the heroes the entire series. Yukio even turns against Rin during one critical juncture. Alas, Rin also gets kidnapped in a pretty sad moment where he couldn’t land a single hit on the Paladin. Then, the Paladin admits that he’s just a pawn of the government and he watches as they start to drain the power away from Rin. Rin has a healing factor, but it’s being exploited to gather the power needed to open the portal enough for the bomb to go through. I’ll stop there so you can watch to see how it goes, but the whole thing is pretty sad.

One character gets a power up out of this, but it’s hardly a good one. This also means that we don’t have a real final fight since the filler writers couldn’t think of a good one. One of the subplots in this arc was also not very good. The writers try to make Satan a sympathetic hero who is simply misunderstood. Remember all of the people that he murdered? He didn’t mean too…he was just trying to find the right vessel to allow him to stay in the human world. He did taunt them as he burned them to death, but maybe we misheard him. He gets like an episode or two just to show how much of a hero he is. He only wants peace and he believes in love at first sight. The problem is that most Earthly bodies begin to catch fire once he goes into them. Luckily, this is where Rin comes along! Any development that Satan has is quickly thrown out the window as he reverts to his villainous ways in the final seconds. Let’s face it, making Satan a likable hero is just not possible. Nobody can take that seriously and the only believable way to make a demon like that good is to help one from birth. (Like in Beelzebub) The writers were really grasping at straws here. As bad as that was, the whole Yukio subplot is what really drove this arc into the ground.

One reason why there is not a lot of hope for the heroes in the series is because the humans are simply outmatched by the demons. Rin, (Who is a demon anyway) Shura, Yukio, and the Paladin are the only capable fighters for the good side. Mephisto Pheles can potentially defeat all of them and he also has Amaimon and many other powerful demons to help him. Not to mention that most of the strong fighters in the demon world haven’t even bothered to appear yet. The heroes have a barrier to stop high level demons from appearing in the human world, but Mephisto likes to invite them for the lolz. (Villain move or simply a test for the heroes?) Normal demons can take down most of the humans and a simple cat was able to take on the Police squads. It seems like the demons are toying with the humans or they just don’t care about invading the human world. The filler episodes strongly point to the latter being the case. Most of the demons just want to either live in peace or just stay on their planet. The vocal minority are the ones who try to destroy the humans. Once again, it just makes the humans look bad since they tend to start a lot of the conflicts. It reminds me of how D.A.T.S. ran things for a little while.
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Overall, Blue Exorcist is just a really fun show. Some episodes can be a little lighter on the action than we are used to, but the characters quickly become interesting enough to hold their own episodes without that element. The show does have some moments of fanservice here and there and the final episodes really cripple Yukio’s character development. Quite a few plot lines go unanswered as the show ends and you’re left waiting for a sequel. We also do get cheated out of the final boss fight, which wasn’t cool. I basically just threw in all of the negatives at the beginning of the paragraph so it may sound pretty negative, but they are still overpowered by the positives. The solid action and the great characters coupled with its fast moving plot still make Blue Exorcist a winner. It’s a very interesting series where you just enjoy seeing their day to day missions. After all, they’ll never actually destroy Satan right? I definitely recommend this title if you just want to watch something action packed and easy to get into. At 26 episodes, you’ll be finished with this title in a breeze and then you can compare it to Sword Art Online like me! Also, you should prepare yourself because the series ends with a cliffhanger that will likely never be resolved.

Overall 7/10