Pluto Review

Posted on November 1, 2023 by dreager1

It’s time to look at the Netflix adaption for one of the most legendary manga of all time. At the very least it’s a title that everyone has heard of over the years and for good reason. It’s the return of Astro Boy! Now granted I’m pretty sure this is a completely different continuity than the rest of the Astro Boy stuff although maybe it just takes place in the future. For now I’m guessing it’s the former, but it’s still a lot of fun to see him running around. This is basically a full on mystery thriller and it works really well.

So the plot starts by introducing us to the setting. It’s the future and robots have been continuing to evolve to the point where they are basically comparable to humans now. It’s actually very difficult to tell them apart at first glance because that’s how identical they are in the present state. There is one law of robotics which keeps humanity safe though and that is that they cannot murder a human. Seriously it is completely impossible…or so it would seem.

People are in a panic now because a human and a robot have both just been destroyed. In each case a pair of horns was stabbed onto the corpse and the way in which the murders happened seem to have only been possible by a robot. That would mean that a robot has actually murdered a human. If someone has found a way to make this possible…then nobody is safe. Panic will take over the streets and people are going to die. The government puts officer Gesicht of the FBI in charge of the case. He needs to find the culprit and put an end to this but is it already too late? Have the gears been put into motion to end the peace between humans and robots once and for all? The villain appears to be going after the 7 most powerful robots in the world, the final mechs of mass destruction and also the top researchers involved in a specific project.

So right off the bat it’s important to mention that this is a very dialogue heavy series. The mystery is absolutely at the forefront here with Gesicht trying to narrow down the search but there is also a lot of character moments for everyone. So sometimes you may take 30-40 minutes off from the mystery itself to explore other plots. In terms of action, there isn’t really much until the final episode so it’s important to keep in mind. One of my only negatives is in regard to that but we’ll get into that later on. This is still a great show all around and most importantly, it’s one that has a considerable amount of replay value.

You could easily watch this show again a little while after finishing it and see how much more you’re able to piece together the next time around. Granted the mystery tends to evolve as it goes on so your experience should not change too much. It’s also just fun to listen to the various debates regarding the robots and how things are currently going. When robots are this close to humans, do they basically get all of the rights a human gets or not? A lot of the show is pretty much a metaphor for that as robots keep being destroyed and the characters have to wonder if that’s equivalent to human lives or not. If it is, then a lot of them feel like they can never really atone for their sins.

A war happened many years before the series takes place but the effects loom rather large. Just about every character was affected by what happened there whether due to what they did or what they didn’t do. The war itself looks like it was an easy win for the heroes based on what we saw but of course that does nothing to reduce the amount of casualties dealt to the losing side the whole time. It was also a cautionary tale about why you don’t want robots of mass destruction running around.

Now the one weakness I mentioned earlier in regard to their not being a lot of action is that sometimes you will have incredible build up for a fight only for it to virtually be off screen’d. You’ll see maybe one blow but the fight will be over in a minute. That’s not good payoff even if you’re trying to show how powerful the villain is. I think you could definitely have worked around that with some fun action segments while still hiding the villain. Instead it has the opposite effect of making the hero look a bit too weak.

For example episode 1 did this the right way with North No. 2. The episode hypes this guy up to oblivion so when he finally fights there is a nice spectacle and while the fight isn’t long, it’s long enough to both add some hype to the villain while matching up with the build up to him. That was episode 1 so it’s not like the build up was crazy. Then we have the build up to Astro Boy. Wellllll…that build up ends up backfiring quite a lot. The ultimate confrontation ends up being extremely underwhelming to the point where you’re wondering if a scene or two got left on the chopping block. No way it should have been over quite that fast. It should have been a much longer fight and I’d argue the verdict also should have been different. But hey I can accept the outcome…with a longer fight and definitely a lot more damage involved. So in this case more action would have been a good thing.

Particularly since the animation is pretty decent. It’s not really at the level of any of the current shows or your average mainstream anime. Older titles like Naruto or One Piece for example will look a lot better but the colors still pop out and when we do get a brief action scene it looks impressive. I think they would have definitely been up to the task for a full on fight. Meanwhile the soundtrack is fairly low key for the most part. There are one or two battle themes that are really good though and they debut in the final episodes of the season. I’m going to need to find those on Youtube at some point.

The writing is really good here which is important since you can’t have a good mystery without good writing. There are a ton of solid twists all around here and the dialogue is always very engaging. It’s certainly the strength of the series and it goes without saying that the cast of characters is very solid. So without further adieu lets go ahead and start talking about them. First up is Gesicht since he is the main character after all. Gesicht is a good lead who always looks at things objectively and is very good at his job. He may not be as emotionless as he tries to appear but he really does always try to see the mission through.

Ultimately as the series goes on you can make the case that he gets a little less effective as the emotions come out but he comes out on top time and time again. Ultimately I’d say he had a pretty good run. The ending is even a little unexpected because I was fully prepared for the series to reverse on the final move. Pluto stays the course on all of its decisions though and this was just another one of them. Gesicht really moves the plot along and in just about every case where there is a disagreement I tended to be on his side.

Then we have Mont Blanc who unfortunately gets the shaft as far as the big 7 goes. He really doesn’t get to do much at all so there’s not much to say about him. He seemed like a nice guy. North No. 2 got a lot to do though and really had a good character arc going. It’s a shame we couldn’t see more of him in combat but the guy was very determined and once he set his sights on something he never let go. While his segment in the first episode may have gone on a bit long, you did always feel a sense of foreboding the whole time.

In terms of danger and suspense it has to be one of the highlights of the series when he goes off into battle. The beginnings of a mystery are always really intense for that reason because you still don’t know exactly what to expect. Next was Brando who was also a pretty solid robot. I think he should have been a little more straight with his family about the danger he was walking into though. I know it’s a hard conversation to have but they should be prepared for him to not walk out of this one alive. Otherwise it’s like they have a lot of hope with no idea of how it could backfire and that’s a lot more cruel.

Hercules is another really great robot and one of my favorites. He’s the kind of guy who is really honest and upfront with whoever he is talking too. He just says it like it is and the guy was really built for combat. He doesn’t shy away from any fights and never holds anything back. With that said, I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s the strongest of the 7 or anything because they were all built for combat. Apparently he’s roughly tied with Brando. I’d put both of them above Mont Blanc but under Epsilon, Atom, and North No. 2.

Then there is Epsilon who seems to be the most powerful by a wide margin. His photon abilities are really impressive both in how sharp they hit but also in terms of range. He’s basically able to level an entire city when he cuts loose and has impressive energy reserves. Even Pluto wouldn’t really stand a chance when Epsilon is going all out. It’s likely why they had to make him a pacifist because otherwise he’d really be cleaning up town. Ultimately Epsilon did a lot of good for the world like looking over the children and I don’t fault him for skipping out on the war. Ultimately it sounds like that was a good move.

We never get a ton of context for the war in general though. From what we do know it is definitely important that some people fought at least since it was a war that needed to be won. The weapons of mass destruction may not have been there but the perfect A.I. could have destroyed everyone. Of course that nearly happens anyway but the whole thing still made sense. Finally we have Atom. Yeah I keep calling him Astro Boy but technically in this show they only use the term Atom. He’s an impressive character who really talks things through and has a good amount of power.

If I take away the fact that I’m already a fan of the character then it’s true that he doesn’t look quite as impressive here. Ultimately he doesn’t have a ton of screentime for action but the final episode helps to make up for that. He gets a good amount of action there and gets to really start showing off his stuff. It would have been cool if they could have given him his iconic arm cannon though. Now that would have been awesome but I guess he’d be too overpowered. Ultimately he has to fight against the cycle of violence and make some really tough calls but he always comes out on top. Atom is the kind of guy that you can really trust through it all.

His sister Uran doesn’t get as much of a role but she still has her influential moments. She is able to detect sadness across a large distance which is a really helpful ability to have. It’d be cool if she could have fought as well though. Another supporting character is Helena who is Gesicht’s wife. She gets a lot of credit for never getting annoyed at how often he has to go to work or guilt tripping him over it. She’s extremely patient and it’s nice to see a character who is super supportive like that.

One character stood above the rest as my favorite by the end though and his name is Brau. This guy has an interesting backstory (Pluto in general as so much context from the past that I think you could make an awesome prequel out of it) and is extremely intelligent. The guy is fairly modest but to me he seems like the most advanced robot in the series. I don’t even know how they would have caught him back in the day. This guy’s dialogue is always fantastic in every scene and he really steals the show. You always get the feeling he’s 10 steps ahead and it’s why the heroes should feel very lucky that he’s not evil. If he was then they would all be doomed.

We have a few scientists who get a big role here. One of them is Dr. Hoffman who is a nice guy in general but he loses some major points for keeping secrets from Gesicht. The decisions may have been out of his hands but he still owed the guy the truth. He should have told him everything he knew as soon as possible. Most of the scientists tend to be more on the shady side though. You also have Tenma who is a super genius, maybe the smartest human in the series. Even he keeps a lot of secrets though and his experimental methods of treatment may work but they always have a heavy cost.

The guy always seems like he’s trying to do his best though. He’s just more willing to get his hands dirty to complete the job rather than freezing like the others. Ochanomizu is more of an idealistic character so he’s always trying to do the right thing but at times it does limit him. He basically has to ask Tenma for help when the going gets tough as a result.

Then we have the genius Abullah who also gets a pretty big role here. The guy makes for a very interesting character and he is probably the only one who’s actually keeping up with Tenma for the most part. Tenma still has the edge but this guy’s close. We can’t forget about Roosevelt, but his role really isn’t all that huge. He gets some good lines to be sure but I do think what hurts him here is that he doesn’t feel as smart as he thinks he is. Roosevelt clearly thinks he is number 1 but I’d say it’s clear that Brau is smarter. Also a weakness of having very little screentime is that we don’t get to see him winning for very long. He’s got a solid design but there’s not too much to say for him.

Adolf on the other hand gets a pretty big role. This guy may panic a lot and doesn’t always make the right calls but you do feel his presence. I thought he made for a good antagonist even if his motives are pretty bad. He keeps talking about how his brother was completely butchered and didn’t deserve to die the way that he did….as if it was a long torture before death or something. Nah it was a big energy blast which I’d argue is one of the best ways to go out since it would be pretty painless. Also we see just how deranged and psychotic the brother was so of course he was going to be taken out. You just never at any point come close to sympathizing with Adolf. I don’t think the series was necessarily trying for that though so it works out.

As I mentioned earlier with robots being this close to humans the debate is in how this works with the law and such. I would say it’s equivalent so when you see this guy going around murdering a bunch of robotic kids, well he’s a psychotic mass murderer so when he gets shot down I wasn’t exactly sad about it. I also think the show was heavily leaning into this as you can see from how serious the characters treated it. I would say that’s 100% correct. The instant robots can have feelings and genuine sentience like that, they absolutely get all the rights as humans.

Finally we have Pluto and he does make for a really impressive antagonist although as a character I wasn’t a huge fan. There’s a lot of twists about him so I can’t go too into detail on that but he’s not really my kind of villain in a lot of ways. I love the design, it’s really intimidating all the way through and you don’t want to have to fight the guy. When he’s not battling he isn’t nearly as impressive though. So keep him in battle mode the whole time and then you’re really set. I was also glad that by the end we actually got to see the full design since he’s hidden away for most of the series.

In general the series has a fairly melancholy vibe to it. The characters have all been through so much by this point that even the thought of possibly dying doesn’t scare them or anything like that. In another series where everyone might be yelling a ton as more and more bodies pile up, everyone here uses logic and calmly tries to get to the bottom of this. For the most part the only yelling is in the final episode with the big fight and that makes a lot of sense. It really was a great fight so while the show may not have had a ton of action, they saved up the budget to go all out here.

Overall, Pluto is a pretty great show. There’s a lot of depth here and great emotional moments. While the show does start to lose some steam towards the end, that’s normal for a mystery title. After all most of the fun is in solving the mystery so once that’s done then it’s like you’ve finished the main part of a quest. That said, the final episode does have a great fight and ultimately this felt like an excellent adventure. Making every episode around an hour was a great way to jam a ton of content in here. It may have “only” been 8 episodes but it felt like much more as a result. I definitely recommend checking this one out.

Overall 8/10

Gamera Rebirth Review

Posted on September 16, 2023 by dreager1

After all these years Gamera has finally returned to take names and show everyone why he is known as one of the all time powerful Kaiju. From the start this was being marketed as a show where there would be a Kaiju battle in every episode which was a really good thing. There are a whole lot of green flags to be found here. Ultimately it is a good show…but I would say one with fairly extensive issues keeping it from being a great title.

The show is only 6 episodes long but each one is double length so that helps. We kick things off with a trio of kids, Boco, Junichi, and Joe. They’ve been friends for a long while but Boco is worried that they may drift apart after summer vacation ends so he wants to build a communication device. It’s nearly finished when the trio are attacked by a bully named Brody who beats them up severely and steals all their money. The heroes want revenge but then the kaiju known as Gyaos attacks and before you know it all of the kids are wrapped up in some kind of massive government project. Will they ever be able to go back to the simple days of just being kids?

Right off the bat I can tell you that giving the kids such a big role was a mistake. They are the weakest part of the show and take up so much screentime that you can’t get around them. You’re supposed to sympathize with the kids on their trials and gradually see how they can even teach the adults a few lessons. Instead you just find them annoying. The only interesting thing about then comes in the 5th episode. It was hinted at earlier but that’s where we get the answers and even by then you’d prefer it was handled differently.

As the main character Boco can be a bit too emotional. He is pro Gamera all the way which actually isn’t bad but he gets rather intense about this to the point where he won’t hear any other sides of the argument. He blows up at Joe pretty much unprompted which was unfortunate. Their friendship was so tight and yet he was willing to ruin it like that. I’m glad he wanted to stick up for himself near the beginning but ultimately what that would have most likely have done was just get them all murdered.

Junichi is the smart one of the group and she’s always ready to come up with a plan. So for the most part she’s solid but then also starts to get emotional and lose perspective near the end. She definitely didn’t handle some of the twists very well. I would say the only kid who was pretty solid the whole time was Joe. He tries to watch over the other two as best as he can but it’s not an easy job. He ends up getting badly beaten for his efforts but I like that he always tries. He easily had the most heart out of the group and was willing to do whatever it took to save the day. That’s the kind of hero you want to see.

Then you have Brody and well the guy starts out as a big bully beating up literal kids for their money. Sure he’s a kid too but definitely older than the others. Gradually he realizes that this isn’t good and calms down to the point where he ends up being the reasonable one at times like when talking to Boco. I think they all got used to him a little too quickly considering how they met though. You’d think they would hold a grudge for a while after that.

What about the adults? Well there are two main ones. The first is James, a guy who reluctantly works for the foundation. He makes it clear from the start that he is after his own interests and the company doesn’t really care. My main problem with this guy is he talks so tough and is constantly postering but always falls down when the going gets tough. He looks horrible in episode 3 and from there on he definitely never really does great. The guy is emotionally manipulated and constantly outsmarted. I also don’t trust that he would make the right call in the end. While he plays off the hero card near the end, it’s only because a very specific event happened.

Otherwise I think he’d have been totally find still being a villain stooge all the way to the end. He was willing to abandon the kids more than once and is generally not a good guy. Now that could work if you put him as the villain the whole time but he’s not really portrayed as the villain either. The janky animation does end up giving him a lot of fun facial expressions but that’s not exactly going to save the character.

The best human by far is Emiko and she really has no competition. She has a really solid drive and is determined to get to her goal no matter what. I like the resilience she has and it’s this kind of single minded motivation that you would usually just see in the main character. I wouldn’t have minded if the show made her the main character instead of the others. She could absolutely pull it off, I have no doubts about that at all. She gets a lot of great moments near the end.

Now in terms of the animation, it’s definitely on the sub par side. The humans don’t look great and all of the movements are really stiff. Nobody walks normally and it’s like these are pre rendered models for a video game that can’t actually move freely. It’s just a bit bizarre and reminds you why it should have been hand drawn. I will say at least that the kaiju scenes are really solid though. I like all of the energy blasts and there is good movement there. In particular the best fight was easily with Guiron. That guy could really jump and he dished out a lot of serious damage to Gamera the whole time. The guy earned his rep of being an immensely powerful Kaiju. Gamera very nearly lost that fight.

The soundtrack is mostly forgettable but I do appreciate that the show has a real theme song. The ending theme is also really solid and I like Gamera’s main theme. So that’s 3 good themes and since the show is only 6 episodes long anyway, I’d consider that to be a success. The technicals here were on point when it counted even if again the animation could have been a little better.

The writing is definitely more on the weak side. Giving Joe a potty mouth was definitely a really odd decision considering that he’s still a kid. Probably 90% of the swearing tends to come from him. I guess it’s to show us how serious business the show is but really? I do appreciate the show’s restraint in the fight scenes though. Initially I was expecting tons of blood and viciousness in the fights to show us how intense Gamera is but for the most part the fights are still stylized and using a lot of energy blasts. It can get a little violent at times but never super over the top and out of line or anything like that.

Gamera definitely looks impressive throughout when you consider that he is fighting all of these Kaiju back to back with minimal time to heal. For example in one fight he loses an arm so then for the rest of the fights he still doesn’t have it back. There’s good consistency there and you can tell that even for a Kaiju at his level there is only so much durability/stamina that he has. At full power I don’t think that any of these Kaiju would be doing a whole lot to him. He has a lot of attacks at his disposal like the fire blasts and spinning while in the shell. It’s always real fun to see him fight.

Gyaos is also a really fun Kaiju here. His moveset may be a bit more simple but he’s always been an iconic Gamera villain so I was glad to see him get his shine. He really does well against the government too. Then there’s Jiger who is still the most forgettable Gamera villain. She’s strong sure but there’s just not a whole lot to her. There’s nothing iconic compared to say Guiron. Guiron is awesome because his design is fantastic and then his whole fighting style is built around the design. If that’s not hype then I don’t know what is! Viras and Zigra are also fun to have around.

In general it’s a great showcase of most of the big Gamera villains. It would be nice to see Legion and Irys of course but I can see why they are mostly focusing on the older villains for max nostalgia. The show tends to be at its best with the fights and in the early episodes I’d have loved to focus on just that and not the kids. Now the plot really gets going in episode 5 though and that’s when the human stuff got really interesting. I was half expecting Ultraman and Godzilla to show up with all the twists we were seeing. The show just made the universe 100X more interesting in a flash.

Unfortunately episode 6 opts to close some of these plot lines rather quickly which is a shame because that had a lot of potential for season 2. There is still an after credits scene so make sure you watch that. It is a big plot line for season 2 and I liked the scene but I would have kept my options open a little more. I really wanted the moon plot to continue and there were a ton of possibilities with different groups going at it. You can always add more of course but I think this show left a lot of meat on the bone. It should have leaned a lot harder into the mystery angle of the show and less on the kids growing up and trying to be helpful.

Overall, Gamera Rebirth is definitely a good show but one that is heavily held back by the kids. Their scenes can be rather brutal or boring might be a better phrase there. You would just be waiting for them to leave already and their massive amounts of screentime remove most of the replay value out of this show. You’d probably just want to fast forward to the Kaiju battles each time. It’s too bad because the adults tend to have a very interesting subplot going. I was interested in hearing what they were planning at least and learning more about the Kaiju. There’s a pretty interesting backstory here and again episode 5 adds a whole lot of intrigue and different things to think about. It just takes a little long to get there but if you like Kaiju action then you should not miss this one. It’s not like we get a ton of Kaiju shows out there after all so you want to enjoy them while you can.

Overall 6/10

One Piece Season 1 Review

Posted on September 16, 2023 by dreager1

It’s time to finally talk about the live action One Piece series. One Piece, more commonly known as One Peak is considered to be one of the all time greatest manga/anime series. It just keeps on going and shows no signs of stopping. It was inevitable that a live action version would come out at some point and that moment is finally here. It’s definitely a great first season and I’d say that it lived up to the hype. Of course at the end of the day there did have to be some cuts in order to make it work but the whole thing came out well.

The story focuses around a kid named Monkey D. Luffy. He ate a devil fruit which turned him into a rubber man. He now seeks to become the King of the Pirates and find the legendary treasure known as the One Piece. To this end he will need to gather up a crew, around 10 people will do. Of course this won’t be easy as all those who stand in his way have the same goal and also have frightening powers of his own. Every great hero must start somewhere though and Luffy is now prepared to go for the goal and make his dream a reality. There are 8 episodes in this season and for the most part they adapt oneshot stories but there are multi parters here and of course the whole thing is narratively connected.

All right so lets quickly talk about how the actors fit the characters. Whenever you see characters in live action you either see them as cosplayers or really embodying the character. I would say that they really nailed Zoro, Buggy, and Usopp. I’m actually still the most mixed about Luffy because to me in a lot of ways he just still doesn’t look/feel like the Luffy from the show. Still a really fun character but I’m not seeing it yet. Sanji and Nami I’m more on the fence about but I think they work well enough. Not as much to say about the side characters, Shanks crew doesn’t look too impressive yet but Mihawk and Garp are excellent! Koby’s also fitting but since I don’t like the character much I wouldn’t have minded if he changed.

Now lets break down each of the episodes a bit. The first one is the intro episode so of course we get to meet Luffy, Nami, Zoro, and Koby who will end up being main characters for the whole adventure. Their paths all cross as they are trying for different goals. Nami is a burglar who steals from the navy, Zoro is a legendary pirate hunter and Luffy of course wants to be the pirate king. Koby wants to be a marine and change the world but he’s a little too nervous to pull that off. The episode does a good job of introducing every character, having them meet up, and then giving us a group fight. It’s a huge advantage of every episode being 40+ minutes like this because then you have enough time to pull this off.

The episode also sets the tone for the rest of the series with a lot of solid humor/banter along with the fights. Zoro steals the show right away with how cool he is. The guy is super skilled and yes at this point he would clearly beat Luffy in a fight. Not any shade against Luffy though, the rival is always supposed to start out stronger. The 3 characters already have a pretty good dynamic here as well even if it’s hard to call them a true team by this point. As in the anime I did think Zoro didn’t play this too smart by letting himself be captured though. It was obvious that these corrupt guys weren’t going to honor their word and let him know so it was a poor trap to get caught in.

The episode also starts the trend where just about every episode will have some kind of flashback/backstory for the character in the episode. Additionally there will always be a cutaway to Koby and the marines as the kid learns just how corrupt they can be. It works fairly well even if I would say this isn’t always necessary. Sometimes you’re engaged with the present scenes enough where you just don’t want to travel back in time. Fortunately the flashbacks tend to be interesting but I will admit they are always the weakest part of every episode and I’d be ready to jump back into the present.

The next episode brings in the debut of Buggy The Clown. The heroes are still trying their best to get along when this guy shows up and unveils his true powers. He can split his body into a bunch of pieces so it’s hard to actually hit him. It’s what makes him a very intense villain though and he is played very seriously here at first. Of course he’s got some One Piece humor in him but the guy is actively terrorizing a whole town which is still pretty dark. We see that the town was totally destroyed too so this series isn’t afraid to get serious when it needs to be.

The heroes still aren’t getting along super well at this point but they’re making improvements. By the end of this episode I’d say the team is fairly well united. One funny moment though was when Nami tried to run away but then stopped right as she exited the tent so they captured her again. I know she was shocked but still you can’t just stop right there, at least keep running until you can hide. Luffy also came really close to death in this episode but writing him out was a good way to let Zoro and Nami bond. The Strawhats are a close unit so it’s good to build up each character dynamic outside of Luffy as well.

Then we get to the first multi parter with Usopp jumping into action. He’s basically someone who lies a whole lot to impress Kaya, the girl that he likes. The problem is that at this point nobody believes a word that he says…and why would they right? The guy is constantly lying so I wouldn’t believe him either. He would tell the village that pirates are coming every year and now that they are actually here…it’s too late. Fortunately Luffy and friends show up in time to help.

The main villain here is Kuro and I was curious how they would handle his lightning fast speed. The show actually does handle it well as it vanishes from sight but unfortunately this does throw a lot of power level issues into the mix. He’s so fast that the heroes can’t possibly react to him and so he forgets his speed at convenient moments. I’m glad that the show kept his speed but they should have come up with a better way for the heroes to beat him. I’m not saying it would be easy but it should absolutely be possible. I was also glad that Zoro got to have a brief fight here but since he was injured the guy naturally couldn’t go all out as needed and then you had the knock out gas.

Usopp was actually handled more seriously than I’m used to seeing him. In the manga the guy’s always a total coward while that doesn’t really come into play here. The show seems to remember this later on so in the final episodes they dial that up. I’d like to see him stay relatively brave since it just makes him more of a quality character but it’s one of those things I suppose. He does decently well in the show even if the other members are more likable.

Then we enter the Baratie with the debut of Sanji. As one of the power hitters of the team it was nice to see him show up. The show does a great job of showing off his combat skills right off the gate and of course he can still cook a mean dish. He is definitely adapted really well and already we’ve got some banter between him and Zoro which is absolutely crucial. This arc is massively important in the show because it also ends up bringing in Mihawk. So Zoro does sort of steal Sanji’s arc a bit but it’s all worth it. I was worried Mihawk would be toned down a lot but he still managed to cut a whole ship in two with a casual slash which was really impressive. That’s absolutely what you want to see from a fighter like this.

Sanji fits right in with the crew and the origin story is still pretty intense here. We also get the beginnings of the Arlong arc so that was an intense way to begin building up to the climax. I definitely didn’t have any real issues with this arc. You do wonder how badly Zoro would have packed up Arlong and crew if he was at full strength though. His swords can pierce the fishmen so mix that in with his speed and technique and he’d be all set. He may not be ready for Mihawk yet but few are.

Then we get to the final episodes involving Arlong and his gang. Nami’s origin story is definitely still really intense here and we see Arlong bribing marines which is a good way to continue to show how corrupt they can be. The action here is intense and while we don’t get some of the really iconic moments from the show, we do get most of the important ones. I would say this is probably the only part where the show’s power levels got a little annoying though. Throughout the show Luffy has looked almost downright weak at times. He gets through his battles but only barely and just by throwing basic punches. This catches up to him when Arlong beats him up.

Here’s the problem, in the manga one of the whole points of the climax was Luffy not knowing what was going on but deciding to beat up Arlong anyway. He knew that was something he could do. In the show his line is almost the exact opposite about how he knows he can’t stop Arlong but he can stop his plans. So I feel like they read that scene backwards and a big part of how impressive this was is because Luffy was that dude. He could ultimately beat up anyone who got in his way in the East Blue. At least until we get to Crocodile, Luffy wasn’t going down.

In the show here Luffy is way more of an underdog which I feel is going to backfire a bit. Right now we’re supposed to feel confident in his abilities and I don’t. I don’t mind him losing to Garp later because of course he should. Garp’s out of his league but the same shouldn’t be true for Arlong. As a villain Arlong’s not bad. I don’t think the effects/design work as well as the other villains but he was tough and that’s what counts. He still manages to be a pretty solid villain all around.

Now the character I never really ended up getting behind was Koby. He gets a lot of shine in this series with a ton of extra screentime but in the end he’s still just so nervous and hesitant. Even when he finally “mans up” and has those big scenes, I couldn’t get by him. I’m hoping he’ll improve in the next season as there is a clear character arc here. I just need it to speed up. Likewise I can’t say I’m a big fan of Helmeppo right now. I prefer him to Koby but he’s still a little too petty. Garp is great though. He may be making poor decisions all around but I like his confidence and at least he has some kind of a honor code going for him.

If I had any issue with the live action series, one minor one can be the camera work. The series reallllllly loves its zoom ins so the camera is constantly in their faces. I sort of get what they’re trying to do in terms of dramatic effect but I think it’s all a bit overdone if you ask me. Those kinds of shots should really be used sparingly if yo want them to have impact. Otherwise the visuals are solid. They really did a good job with the powers and costumes so props to the show there.

The soundtrack is definitely limited but fortunately there was one track which really stood out and as a result ended up buffing the soundtrack as a whole. This was Buggy’s theme. It has some really hype opera type sounds whenever he appears and that was great. Always perfect for a cliffhanger and the show has quite a few really solid ones. The fights are a lot of fun. I would say ironically Luffy easily has the weakest fights mainly because they have no choreography next to Zoro and Sanji’s, but they’re still fun to watch. The best fights tend to be Zoro’s and you can tell a lot of thought was put into them. I dare say his best fight may have even been the very first one where he took down a member of the organization.

A fun part about the show diverging a bit is experiencing those cool what ifs. For example in this version Arlong and Luffy go at it in the Baratie which is considerably different from the manga. I was also glad that Luffy didn’t just roll over or get one shotted even if he was not doing great in the fight. Let them have a proper battle before the rematch since in theory Luffy has no power ups in between rounds so it should be close if we expect him to win later on. Mihawk’s expanded role was also done really excellently here. Also a nice touch was how they unveil every character’s bounties. That was really cool.

The pacing is good and I can definitely see the show doing each of the arcs justice. Naturally there are a lot of things, scenes, and characters who have to be trimmed to pull this off with any realistic hopes of success but I’ll take it. The positive of getting to see this in a more mainstream setting is always fun. After all I’ll have the anime for my straight adaption with all the superb animation. This is just a more surreal way to see how you can translate this and I still say this was a great job all around. I was very satisfied all the way through.

Overall, One Piece is a show that absolutely surpassed my expectations. It’s not just a good adaption but a great show on its own. It’s very interesting to watch and you will be having a good time all the way through. It never drags on and this is really the sign of a quality title. If you are someone who has never seen One Piece before then you will definitely be able to still enjoy the show a lot and that’s the sign of a really solid title. Just watch it the same way you would watch something like Breaking Bad or Seinfeld as a brand new title and there’s something for those new audiences as well as fans. I look forward to seeing how season 2 shakes out since it will naturally be more difficult as we get to the more powerful villains and expanded cast. I’m confident they can pull it off though. With how great the effects look here with the colors taken right out of the manga, seeing the other characters is gonna be great!

Overall 8/10

Blame! Review

Posted on July 9, 2023 by dreager1

Blame! is one of those manga that is definitely super unique. You really won’t see very many things like it. So it’s pretty cool that this got a movie and in some ways it even clears the manga. On average the manga does have higher highs but it also has lower lows with some of the intensity going on there. This one hits a fairly safe peak and stays there. I think it would have looked a whole lot more impressive with proper hand drawn action of course and you could have made this longer but in the end it was a satisfying watch.

The main guy’s name seems to be spelled differently every time I see it. I’m used to something like Kyrii, but here it’s Killy but I’m pretty positive it was spelled differently within the film. I guess it doesn’t matter in the end and I’ll go with Killy. So the movie starts by explaining that humanity fell a long time ago. The world now belongs to the robots. The “Builders” are the robots which continue increasing the size of the world to no end. The problem with this of course is that these are basically empty buildings and floors with no food or anything and so humanity keeps falling more and more to hunger. You can travel for days just to get enough food for one meal.

The film follows a girl named Zuru as she tries to help her village by finding food but it isn’t easy. She leads an expedition to get something at least but most of her group are murdered by the nearby robots. The only silver lining is that she bumped into Killy who is clearly very powerful. If the village can get him to stick around then maybe they’ll be saved. However, Killy has bigger goals in mind and aims to save the entire world if he can just find the net terminal gene. Is it possible that this is actually located within the village?

The apocalyptic world is a very good setting for this story and the film does properly capture the atmosphere from the manga. The robots are for all intents and purposes limitless since the master computer can create hundreds in seconds and installs new bases with every expansion. Basic robots are enough to destroy dozens of humans and the specific material needed to destroy them is very limited. By the start of the film the heroes have already lost most of their ammo. The exception to this is Killy who has a super gun with unlimited ammo but the drawback is that it does zap some of his energy every time he uses it.

The humans really figure that they are only delaying the inevitable and that there is no true victory at the end of the tunnel. It’s a rather depressing thought but it is impressive that they have lasted this long so far. A good chunk of the film is really about building upon this atmosphere and so I wouldn’t expect too much action. We get a big climax near the end and some quick action at the beginning but that’s about it. There are long sections where no fighting happens but fortunately the characters and setting are enough to keep the film afloat.

From the characters Killy is definitely the best character I’d say. It’s clear that at this point he doesn’t have much humanity as he’s basically emotionless and can barely even talk at times. He will say his general idea but that’s about it. He’s not exactly a conversationalist and is really just interested in saving the world. Think of him like the Terminator in that respect. Ultimately he is someone you want on your side though and he quickly goes back to help the humans when they’re in trouble. He ultimately prioritizes saving the world over side missions but he won’t abandon anyone right in front of him. That’s really all you can ask for from a guy in this kind of rough situation.

He does save a ton of lives directly by beating the enemies and indirectly by giving the village enough food to tide them over for a few months. Then Cibo is the other big character here as she is someone who managed to survive for thousands of years long enough for Killy to return. That can’t have been easy so that’s impressive. She’s really handy to have around since she can interact with the robots and has impressive hacking abilities. Cibo is the brains to Killy’s brawn and without her the village would not have been in a good spot. She’s also a lot of fun to have around. She may mostly be emotionless like Killy but she talks a lot more and is someone you can count on.

For the most part the villagers are just around but they’re all likable enough. When they’re wearing the robot suits it can be tough to tell them apart. Outside of the suits they all just want to help the village out. Zuru steps up when the going gets tough and takes the leadership role. This is definitely appreciated since otherwise the village wouldn’t have really had a good plan. The village elder was also good as he made the right call in banking on Killy. After all if the village doesn’t do anything they will eventually die so you may as well take a risk now right? Some of the other villagers tend to panic and don’t do as well so their performance varies.

Then as I mentioned earlier we do get a good fight near the end. Sanakan is the final boss here and she’s one of the more impressive villains in the manga as well. She can hold her own against Killy and then some as her strength and speed both appear superior to his. He has a better weapon which does help to equalize things a bit. What makes Sanakan stand out is how she can actually plan things out and knows how to infiltrate a hero base. The rest of the robots are terrifying but still mindless so you can work around them. That’s not so easy with someone like Sanakan who can use tactics against you.

This worked really well as the climax to this film. It was a fitting way to end as Killy had to fight for humanity’s survival and the fiery backdrop felt appropriate for a final boss. In the end I wouldn’t say the animation for the film is all that great but it’s clear that they tried hard for this fight. The CG can just be a little stiff and it doesn’t have the same intensity that a hand drawn film would have had.

I think CG works well enough for robots as it’s still at a disadvantage but not as much as with the humans. That said, it’s not enough to hurt the film. You can always still tell what is happening and that’s the important part. The soundtrack is a bit more bland, I couldn’t really tell you any of the tracks or even say that I recall them much. For a sci-fi film like this you can absolutely do better.

Overall, Blame! is a pretty fun film and a lot of that is due to the premise and story. With any animation style you’d probably have a good time here and the CG works well enough. Killy is a solid hero to root for and that climax was really intense. This is a film that you won’t be forgetting anytime soon and it would be fun to see it get some sequels and see how that goes. In the meantime while you may be left with some questions, I would say you should get most of it since the film breaks down the story well. In the end robots will always claim the advantage over humanity at some point. It’s only a question of when.

Overall 7/10

Black Clover: Sword of the Wizard King Review

Posted on June 17, 2023 by dreager1

I’ve been waiting ages for this film. When they first announced that Black Clover was finally getting a movie I was definitely hyped. This is one of the best franchises out there and the king of Shonen Jump. There’s a reason why we call it G.O.A.T. Clover. Getting that on a movie budget was certain to be an all star product and the film does not disappoint in any way. It’s basically a lock for film of the year so you can basically skip everything else. Nothing’s touching this and now I just need to wait until we get the next season already.

The movie starts by showing Conrad’s fight against the magic knights. He puts up a terrific fight but ultimately Julius manages to take him down with time magic and he’s locked away. Julius’ eyes even flash black for an instant when he uses his ultimate spell which was intense. We fast forward 10 years to where a tournament is being held and Yuno will finally be able to fight against Asta. Ultimately this isn’t to be though as Conrad shows up in the present along with 3 other Wizard Kings from the past. The 4 of them have decided to destroy the entire world so that they can remake it as a better one. Asta won’t let this happen though and he commands the magic knights to unite and fight. Can they really defeat a whole squad of Wizard Kings though?

One of the hype parts about this of course is that the enemies are all Wizard Kings. They’re characters who are well fleshed out with their own goals and desires as well as being ultra powerful. To become the Wizard King you need an incredible amount of power after all so it’s not like just anyone can do this. Sort of like how I said Naruto surpassed the Hokage at least by the Pain arc at worst, Ichigo surpassed the Captains by the early part of the Arrancar saga, and Luffy surpassed the admirals by Marineford, I would say Asta surpassed the Captains fairly early on. You could say Yami is an exception but he wipes everyone else out pre time skip. Now this is where the rubber meets the road and we can see exactly how that turns out.

The movie doesn’t cop out with their abilities either and each king looks fantastically strong. Sure they do have the advantage of unlimited mana thanks to the super sword running around but even without that their individual techniques are on point. The movie is close to 2 hours and almost the whole thing is the big fight scene. This is what I love to see, the pacing is nonstop with action around every corner. Not every movie could handle something like that and it’s fairly rare because a lot of time you still need to develop the OC characters and have a lot of time to regroup. Here you hit the ground running.

There are numerous times in each fight where the villain or hero is about to lose and then the second wind comes in. That’s super hype to be sure because these Wizard Kings have determination on their side as well. They’re not going to give up so the heroes have to completely put them down. I’ll go more into their goals later on although it’s not as convincing of a case as even someone like Thanos. It’s a more surface level argument for world peace that doesn’t have too much nuance since the film makers likely didn’t want you to doubt the heroes at all. Probably for the best but of course the side effect is that these Wizard Kings do feel a little crazy.

Another really strong part of the film is the animation. Even outside of the fight scenes everyone looks really crisp. The character models are really on point and this is a full 2023 film on all sides. It’s just great how smooth everything is and it’s the kind of film I could quickly re-watch right now. The replay value is incredible and the choreography is on point. The super form for the main villain is also great and they didn’t hold back on the beam effects. By the end this feels like something out of DBZ.

Then we have the soundtrack and I think it goes without saying that this is going to be another 10/10 ost. You have the insert song from the anime, a song that I believe was new, and then a ton of battle themes. The soundtrack is very fast paced which fits the film since it was very fast paced as well. The production values were really high throughout and of course the writing and story is very good as well. Asta gets his usual inspirational moments and Noelle also gets her moments to shine. You can’t help but be inspired during their speeches.

Okay so lets talk about the villains. First up is the main villain Conrad. So he wants to make the world more equal because he’s seen how mean the nobles are in how they pick on the commoners. They murder, insult, humiliate, and basically enslave those without magic and right now the kingdom isn’t doing much to change that. As he’s mentioned there have been incremental improvements but it’s always small things and the world itself doesn’t change much. The main TV show has delved into this as well and so he figures that at this point they just need to end the world. It does mean to an extent that he did give up though.

Now you do get it because in a lot of cases things don’t always get a lot better even when the hero wins in the end. Look at all the crazy stuff that still goes on in Naruto. I do think Asta will do a better job of changing everything because that has been such a huge topic in the forefront as opposed to being a subplot but yeah that’s Conrad’s ideal and motive for this. I liked that Asta also engaged him on the actual points of this like how nobody will accept the end result after watching their comrades die in front of them.

Even if you could absolutely guarantee world peace, if it involves a massive genocide like this, then it will never end up convincing people. You’re doing more than cracking a few eggs, you’re basically just being the villain. At the end of the day I’m always about saving the 1 person over the 100 as a philosophy. You must never sacrifice anyone and of course this isn’t even a subtle case, it’s just him murdering a whole ton of people and so you’ll never waver as you root for Asta. I’m sure that each of the Wizard Kings saw some super twisted things in order for them to agree with Conrad like this but at the end of the day it all comes down to them losing hope and giving up when they shouldn’t have.

Conrad’s abilities are pretty handy with his key magic. It feels a little broken if anything with how long range it is but that’s probably why he became the King. It may not be fair but having a super cool ability gives you a huge push towards becoming the Wizard King and that’s how it’s always been. His final form is epic and the whole time he really puts up a good fight. He has a solid plan as well and shows good tactics throughout the film. I’ve said this a few times already but the movie never forgets that these are Wizard Kings that we’re dealing with and so they get a lot of respect.

The only Wizard King who was a bit off was Jester. Mainly because this guy just seems super evil and unstable the whole time. Sure he agrees with the plan for probably the same reasons but he just feels evil throughout. His dialogue is what you would expect from the Midnight Sun, not someone who used to be the leader. His abilities are still really handy with the barriers though. Barriers have a whole lot of positives to them like how agile you can make them. They’re flexible and can keep on adapting to attacks. This guy really doesn’t give up either and from all of the Wizard Kings you could make the case that he’s the only one to never really lose. He could have absolutely kept on going.

Then there is Princia who I dare say is the most powerful out of all the Wizard Kings. Take away amps like the swords and put all of them together in a fair fight and I’m going with her. First off she can summon an army of really powerful fighters and then once you get past them, it turns out that she is a close quarters fighter as well who can hold her own with the country’s strongest, Mereoleona. The fact that the fight was so close there really showed off what she could do. I don’t think any of the others would have been able to have held their own in quite the same way. She was also a fun character and had a solid personality. You could actually see why she was a good person at one point and ultimately just got jaded.

Finally we have Edward who is probably the weakest. Mainly because he relies on summons and ice but has nothing else once you get past that. This is relative of course, he’s still an incredibly powerful Wizard King but not as intimidating as the others. He has a good code of honor and isn’t just going crazy with power so I can really respect that. He has a good exchange with Noelle and ultimately keeps his honor to the end. He doesn’t crack or go crazy at the end which is really good because a King should maintain grace to the end.

As for the heroes, everyone gets something to do here but of course some get more screen time than anything. For the Black Bulls, I thought Finral actually looked really solid here. His reaction times were good enough to block a hit from Conrad and he was critical throughout in getting the heroes out of danger. Of course Noelle looks fantastic in showing off her high power level and also making an impassioned speech to remind Edward of what he stood for. Noelle doesn’t give up and the series continues to do a great job of keeping her in the same conversation as Yuno and Asta.

The various captains all get to fight but Yami is really the only one with a sizable role and even then it’s a bit smaller than you would expect. He doesn’t look quite as powerful as you might think as well but I guess at this point he’s finally being surpassed. His fans should still be satisfied with his appearance here. Mereoleona looks excellent as expected. She’s the most impressive grownup here from the heroes side. Her powers continue to get more and more intense every time she fights and it’s clear that she has no upper limit. She will just continue to fight until the end and almost no other character can burn as brightly.

Yuno looks great here as well as he saves Asta on more than one occasion and keeps going after the villains. He has enough stamina to outlast all of the Captains as well. I would say that even in the film it feels like Asta has left him in the dust to an extent because Yuno just doesn’t have the KO power that Asta has but his normal abilities are still do good that he can continue to hold his own. As always I like Yuno’s confidence and his positive rivalry with Asta. They really do a good job of building each other up as always.

Finally I’ve already talked about Asta but just to confirm he is amazing as always. His speeches really land and he’s the kind of guy that you want to represent your kingdom. He’s the last to go down and will keep trying to make the world a better place. Naturally there are a ton of other character helping out including a cameo so watch it for yourself to see all the fun characters. This feels like a true event movie in the best ways with how high the stakes are.

Now lets talk about the negatives of the film. Well…yeah I had no issues with the film so that’s it for this section.

Overall, Sword of the Wizard King is a film that I highly recommend you check out. They did a fantastic job of showcasing the skills of all the heroes while establishing these villains as top tier threats. The Clover Kingdom is so loaded with powerful fighters that the enemies have to be able to hold these own and that wasn’t a problem for these guys. The movie really goes by in an instant so you need to watch this as soon as possible. The only rough part is having to wait for the next product which can still take a while but hopefully not too long. When the series comes back though, I will be ready!

Overall 9/10

Levius Review

Posted on April 22, 2023 by dreager1

Levius is one of those series that I certainly hadn’t heard of before watching but it was quite the solid show. I’m always up for a good boxing title as it goes without saying that it would have a lot of action thrown into the mix. This one has a solid story to back it up as well and the last fight was quite a bit longer than I expected and that’s a good thing. It was quite climactic and usually you don’t see something like that outside of Shonen Jump so that was pretty cool. All in all it’s a great show with solid pacing and you should have a good time all the way through.

The show starts off by showing a city being reduced to rubble and machines kidnap a bunch of people in the area. In particular one girl was calling for help but Levius was too young and didn’t have the power to save her. This haunts him to the present where he is now a boxer. His destroyed arm was replaced with a metal one but he has decided to keep the other one. It puts him at a disadvantage against fighters who use two metal arms but it has sentimental value to him. He aims to gradually become the world’s greatest boxer but his coach Zacks suspects there is more to his dream than that. One day that girl appears again and Levius is determined to save her this time around. Will his strength in boxing be enough?

Now the show does have a plot outside of the boxing stuff but I would say boxing is absolutely still the main focus and as it should be since that’s likely why you’re here in the first place. The world building is more used to help set up Levius’ big reunion with the girl A.J. (Will just keep as AJ for easier typing) It does open up the possibility for a lot of interesting plots in the future but at the same time Levius is just a boxer. He’s not a CIA agent or anything so odds are that he won’t actually be getting mixed up in any of that. Unless a potential season 2 took a really big shift in story the global issues would be a different character’s concern. It’s actually an interesting angle as you assume there are a lot of big battles going on in the outside but we just don’t see them. Picture an end of the world event going on in Transformers but instead we’re following some big races.

The closest this ties in is the fact that AJ’s suit and mech is created by the guy in charge of the evil machine company. His name is Clown which is kind of fun. That’s his last name but it’s still his name. Imagine walking around and when someone calls you a clown you don’t know if it’s an insult or your name? I thought this guy made for an interesting villain but at the same time he wasn’t quite as good as he could have been. What I mean by that is he gives off the aura of being a great fighter and has a lot of mystery to him but in the end he goes out like a chump. It’s going to take some more time for him to build up his hype again. I still feel like he should be able to fight very well and must be powerful but we have yet to see any real proof of this.

Now the cast here is pretty small but that works well enough since the show is so short. It’s only 12 episodes after all so this lets them really dive into the characters. First up is Levius and he’s a solid hero. He’s the kind of guy who will jump in to protect someone even if it could cost him the match. His best moment was definitely when he went into the ring to save Hugo when his opponent was going too far. Levius was also making sure that any plan the heroes went with would be one where AJ was saved since he wasn’t going to resort to murder. He’s a very stand up guy and a determined lead to boot. He went through various fights without having any leads towards his true goal without ever losing hope. He’s also a nice guy too and when he has to let someone down he does it gently.

There’s really nothing to dislike about the guy. He’s a very well rounded main character. Then you have his uncle/coach Zacks who is also solid. Zacks used to be a fighter himself so he makes for a good coach. He knows what it’s like in the ring and always does his best to give good advice. It can be frustrating being the coach because sometimes the boxer just won’t listen to you even when you’re right but he still tries hard. Zacks has a big moment near the very end of the series which definitely helped to make him stand out. He actually contributed in a very direct way which made him stand out.

The mechanic Bill was also good even if he started to crack a bit towards the end. The pressure was nearly too much for him and so his emotionless façade broke down. Ultimately very few characters can truly be emotionless to the very end. Often times they will end up overflowing when the going gets tough which is always the tough part about internalizing. Bill was very good at his job though and even if he couldn’t get it done in the end, he came close and still gave Levius a whole lot of help.

Then you have Natalia who is a fun rival but her power level is a bit lower than I would have liked. The whole show I was expecting her to get some kind of a big win considering just how confident she is. Unfortunately it turns out that she is a bit delusional and can’t compete with Levius. Now she is still a good fighter as she was climbing up the ranks quickly but he defeated her early on and she just never improved from there. She has some more street smarts than he does and comes in handy for training but I would have liked a big moment for her that involved combat. Natalia is a lot of fun but she ultimately seems to be all bark and no bite.

After that you have the other 3 boxers who had a big role. First up is Malcolm and he’s known as a very dirty fighter who will do whatever it takes to win. The guy also murders all of his opponents. No that’s not a figure of speech, he literally makes sure to attack hard enough to always destroy his opponent to the point where that’s his reputation. Yes this is a futuristic form of boxing where everyone has on mecha armaments but even so he doesn’t have to do that. Malcolm is proud of himself for murdering everyone though and that’s why it’s hard to forget this later on when the show tries to paint on more of a sympathetic edge to the guy. I’m just not buying it, you don’t go from being a mass murderer to then forgetting about it. That’s not how this works.

The show sort of glosses this over a bit I’d say. He does end up donating to charities later on but it’s just a bit late for that. He makes for a good villain but it’s hard to see him as anything more than that. A hero or an anti-hero? I don’t think it’s quite deserved yet. He was certainly an impressive boxer though so nobody can really doubt his abilities in the ring. Those were definitely for real.

Then we have Hugo who was my favorite character in the series. The guy is just a very straight laced boxer who goes in and tries to take his opponents down by force. There are no tricks or gimmicks here, the guy just fights very logically and with a lot of force. He puts up a tremendous fight against AJ and really never wanted to give up. It was super impressive so while the guy may not have appeared a whole ton, he left a good impression. This is the kind of guy that you want to have on your side.

Finally we have AJ herself. She has the coolest mech suit in the series to be sure. It just looks really impressive and since she has the best tech developers behind her, her equipment is the most efficient as well. Her own natural fighting moves are really good too. Without the enhancements I don’t see her taking on Hugo or Levius but with them she’s basically unstoppable. I would even say they probably made her a bit too strong because you really don’t see Levius holding his own here. AJ was just too powerful with each hit dealing massive damage.

Throw in the speed as well and Levius was outmatched. I sort of buy into the whole taking advantage of her rage and making her sloppy at different points in the fight but lasting long enough to pull that off is where I have my doubts. Still a great fight though and the perfect way to end off the series. It was everything the show had built it up to be and it would be difficult for any sequel fight to top this one. Especially since it was basically 3 episodes long.

As for the animation, it is CGI so it’s not quite going to hold its own against the big hand drawn titles but I thought it looked well enough. They did a good job with the fights and the character models are on point. It definitely beats some other CG titles that I’ve seen in the past. Then with the soundtrack it’s good but not super memorable. I thought there were some decent action tunes mixed in there and the theme song was decent but on this aspect it’s a little more forgettable.

The show always does a good job of nailing the build up to the fights. I like the way the arena looks and you feel that excited crowd atmosphere for every fight. We get good cliffhangers during the episodes and the pacing is on point. The dialogue/writing are good as well and so the show can hold its own even when the action scenes aren’t happening. It even takes some time for more emotional type moments with the characters as they want Levius to abandon the fight several times when his opponent seems too powerful.

Ultimately Levius doesn’t waver which is why once again he is such a great character. No matter who is trying to get him to quit the guy just won’t listen. Above all else he has his own moral compass and knows what he needs to do in order to win. The show also doesn’t waste much time on the past. We get quick flashbacks for Natalia, Bill, and Zacks but it’s always very quick since they know we’re more interested in what’s going on in the present. Everything else can really just wait until another time.

If I have just one minor issue here it would be that the third last episode overdid it with the flashbacks a bit. It felt like half the episode was the characters remembering things and considering how short the show is, I don’t think almost any of them were necessary. You could have one or two quick ones if you want for narrative reasons but that episode was spamming them. I figure maybe they wanted a very specific episode ending cliffhanger and so this was for the pacing but it felt a little bit forced.

On one more positive note, I like how in detail they went on the actual boxing training. We got to see them practice the moves that Levius would be using in the actual matches. Each time it felt like there was actual coaching and adjustments happening which was nice. It’s not overdone or anything, it just helps add extra context and detail to the fights. I thought it worked out really well all around. The spin punch for example was a really fun technique and I also liked the side step technique Levius learned later on. The blur effect and the squeaky sound effect was satisfying. Moreover it felt like a technique that really could be effective with some practice and not something the show just made up on the fly.

In the end, if I was in this future there is no way I’d ever want to be a boxer though. It feels like you are constantly at risk of dying there and your opponent will get off completely free each time since it’s still just within the rules. One realistic element they included here is about bribing the association though. One boxer lands a hit on the referee but because of her group’s pull there are no penalties or anything like that. It’s pretty crazy but that’s the power of widespread influence I suppose.

Overall, Levius is a great show. What really seals it is how solid the fights are and the characters hold their own as well. You’ll have a lot of fun watching the show and it has a good amount of replay value. The ending is very satisfying so there really aren’t any weak points here. It’s also a very safe recommendation to anyone whether they be action fans or looking for a good story. The series has 0 fanservice in it which is always impressive and so the writers are confident enough in their story to keep everyone’s attention the whole time. This show really does all the right things and will be remembered fondly. It’s crazy to think about how this was all G3 level fighters, just wait until we reach G1! I’d definitely recommend checking this show out.

Overall 8/10

Knights of the Zodiac: Saint Seiya – Battle for Sanctuary Review

Posted on April 1, 2023 by dreager1

It’s time to jump back into the world of Saint Seiya. It’s definitely impressive how many times we get to see the classic arc of the Bronze Saints running through the temples. This one does a good job of redoing the saga. Ultimately while the CG will always have its limits against the classic hand drawn style, it does a good job with the colors and action. It’s also setting up some original storylines for this version which is a good way to differentiate itself from the original story. All in all, whether you’re a fan of Saint Seiya or not you should still have a great time here.

Well last time things ended on a rather intense note as Athena was stabbed with an arrow. Basically this was no ordinary arrow and any attempt to pull it out of her would destroy the goddess immediately. The only one who can take this out is the Pope but he is the one trying to murder Athena. Seiya and friends have no choice but to go and invade the 12 castles and reach the Pope in Sanctuary. To do this they will have to defeat the 12 Gold Saints, the strongest fighters in history. Can they pull this off or are they already doomed? They won’t know until they try and as they are true heroes they won’t back down until they have made this a reality. It is time for their ultimate battle.

One of the fun things about this arc is how it’s basically nonstop action. The heroes go from one fight to the next without much in the way of breaks. It’s also what makes their victories even more impressive because they are fighting the strongest foes in existence and they are doing this without stopping to catch their breath or anything like that. Of course you know that Seiya is ready for such a challenge but what about the others? They haven’t had a chance to do much of anything in the Netflix version up to now. Well, you will be glad to know that they look better here even if Seiya is still the one doing most of the work.

One of the original storylines I mentioned involves Genet who didn’t just get written out of the story this time. Instead she continues to act as a knight and has been added to the Marin subplot. She gets an original scene involving confronting her master and at the rate we’re going she may get even more screen time in season 3. This change works pretty well as it’s a very natural way of expanding the cast and I think she has a lot of potential here. Hopefully she really gets to show her stuff and even takes down a strong opponent. I’m not asking for a gold saint in particular but beating a silver saint for example would be great.

One addition that didn’t work as well was Virgo Shaka’s skeleton minions. I didn’t really see the point of these guys. I suppose they were there to temporarily split up the saints again but it felt more like the show was stalling for time than anything. Like they were just here so that the season could end at a specific point. Perhaps that is exactly the case but they weren’t very interesting villains and of course one turned huge. That’s the CG dream after all, to throw in a giant boss. Even the movie did that but there was just no point for these guys and I couldn’t take them seriously. Since it didn’t come at the expense of the main story though I was okay with this.

Tauros looks impressive here as he takes out all of the saints aside from Seiya in one shot. Those guys were definitely found lacking when it counted but they did a good job of showing Seiya overcoming the odds. One thing I’ve really liked here is how he grows wings of energy when he powers up. It’s a really nice touch as the Pegasus saint and also makes him stand out. So I thought that was a really good idea right off the bat. I also like the way the cosmos is portrayed visually. When Seiya powers up you can really tell if he’s burning the cosmos at a higher level or if he can go even further based on if it’s just blue or blue and red. So the fight was satisfying.

The show also gave a better reason for why he and Mu aren’t helping out more. Because in this show they actually are helping out but then they get taken out by the Pope. It’s little details like this which the show executes well. It’s effectively looking at some of the criticisms of the arc and making changes to make things work a little better. Even the whole prophecy angle about how Athena will cause everyone to die is better than them blindly following the Pope. Not by a large margin mind you since I still blame them a whole lot but it’s still something. Every bit counts here.

Then we have the Gemini armor who crushed Hyoga rather quickly (This is a really bad season for Hyoga I have to say. He got wrecked by Aldebaran, then he got wrecked by Gemini, and then he got destroyed by Camus. The guy could not catch a break here) and then we get the good fight with Andromeda. It was certainly Andromeda’s stand out moment in the season so far as she made the most of her chain. I may not be the biggest fan of the chain in general but it still does turn up when it counts. The Gemini armor is also fun with how he makes the illusions and changes the fights up. You can’t approach him the way you would an ordinary foe.

Not much to say about Camus since he shows up and takes care of business immediately but I like how cold and calculating he is. The guy may not be heroic but you can imagine him protecting his temple with ease. Deathmask is still the biggest disgrace to the Saints. I can’t believe this guy was ever allowed to be a Gold Saint because you’d expect them not to employ actual mass murderers right? It would have been nice if they threw in a line about how the Pope only recently brought him in as a gold saint. That would have done wonders for the saints in general. Of course it was nice to see Shiryu crush him either way.

Then we got the really big fight with Aiolia which was always a standout battle. This guy’s light speed punches are incredible and he just keeps making them faster and faster. It’s a fight where Seiya has to keep on getting stronger and it’s fair to say that Aiolia has to be one of the most powerful Gold Saints. He at least does his brother proud in deciding to finally question the Pope and seek out answers. Unfortunately it doesn’t go great but the attempt was nice. He’s one of the few Gold Saints who is actually likable as a person rather than just as a villain to be defeated. We also get to see Aiolia take on Milo and considering how weakened Aiolia is, it was impressive to see him going toe to toe like that. I doubt many other Saints could have pulled that off.

Of course then we get to Virgo Shaka who is always very impressive with his power level. Many consider him to be the most powerful Golden Saint and those who don’t say he is second to Gemini Saga. You can make good arguments either way although I always do give Gemini Saga the edge here. His raw power is just so incredible but Virgo Shaka is clearly giving everyone a good fight. Fortunately Phoenix Ikki shows up for his big fight in the season. (Yeah I’m not going to call him Nero) Definitely one of the standout fights in the whole season with a lot of back and forth as we see exactly why Phoenix’s cloth is so legendary. No other cloth can regenerate like his and Ikki is basically immortal due to being the Phoenix saint. It’s a very potent combo to be sure and keeps him in the fight at all times.

Then we end with Seiya taking on Milo which was a cool way to end the season. Basically once again Seiya is the last one able to fight and you can bet that he won’t be going down easy. His dedication has earned him a spot as one of Jump’s top heroes. Meanwhile the other old bronze saints get to show up to protect Athena but in general that subplot does feel a bit out of place. The randoms of Sanctuary are treated as pure comic relief and it was a bit off putting just how extreme they were. It was like the show was trying a little too hard to be funny. I think Saint Seiya can certainly inject some humor into the mix if they want to but you have to be a little more subtle than this. You’re more likely to roll your eyes than actually chuckle at the characters. They are also insultingly weak so there is no salvaging them there.

Now with the animation the CG here is pretty good as I mentioned above. The colors are sharp and so the fights work well. There is more actual choreography and movement here than last time so the fights feel like they have a lot more substance. The theme song is still great here and so the show flows well on a technical level. The 12 episodes really fly by and I don’t really have any big negatives for the show. It adapts the source material pretty well and for the most part the additions only serve to enhance the story. The one exception would be the skull knights under Virgo Shaka and the comic relief soldiers who attack Athena. Those still aren’t bad enough to really hurt the series either.

It’s only natural that this beats season 1 also because it’s adapting source material that’s a lot more hype. 1 had a lot of great content to be sure but the Gold Saint fights are legendary for good reason. There are so many engaging moments here so each episode is a blast and a half. The cliffhanger here is also super effective and really works well to end things off. You can already recognize the formula to the fights so you sort of know how it’ll play out but that doesn’t take away from it being an emotional moment. Saint Seiya pretty much invented the classic format of being knocked down but getting back up again. It’s all about determination and these characters have that in spades.

Throughout the show all of the bronze saints are great. Andromeda can fight when she needs to, Hyoga always has his confidence even if he gets stomped a lot, and Shiryu is always fighting at a high level. He probably starts on a higher base level than Seiya. The difference is that Seiya has the best durability and continues to get stronger as the fight goes on so by the end he is always super powerful. His confidence feels the most earned from the group and he also takes this the most personally in protecting Athena so he just refuses to go down. Of course we saw a lot of that in season 1 already so I’m focusing more on Ikki here.

This is the first time we get to see Ikki as a hero and it’s really an incredible moment. Ikki can always be trusted to show up and protect Andromeda when it counts. He may have lost his way for a while there but now he is back to being the very dependable big brother that he always was. His fighting style is also noticeably different from the other Saints which helps him stand out. He’s all about outlasting the opponent and trading blows while Seiya tries to go for speed. Ikki just knows that the longer the fight goes on the more the advantage is on his side and it’s a smart strategy considering his abilities.

Overall, Saint Seiya is a franchise that keeps on expanding and you love to see it. I definitely won’t be forgetting this series anytime soon. Hopefully season 3 doesn’t take too much longer to come out but in the meantime you should definitely check this one out either way. It’s got a lot of top tier fights and a solid story so there is no reason to miss out on it. The show has no weaknesses which is rare to say about a show and the only sad thing is that it’s only 12 episodes. They cover a lot of ground here though. Hard to say what my next Saint Seiya review will be at this point but stay tuned as there is always something else on the horizon!

Overall 8/10

Knights of the Zodiac: Saint Seiya Review

Posted on February 18, 2023 by dreager1

Saint Seiya is one of those franchises that just keeps getting better and better with age. The fights are always incredible and the characters are timeless. It is really like the original DBZ from back in the day. When Netflix announced a CG series I would say the two reactions I had was “Not CG!!!!” and “Glad we’re getting Seiya back”. At the end of the day I would have preferred some top level animation for a fun reboot but I’ll still take this so we have more content in the franchise. The show actually changes quite a few things up which is why I would call it an alternate retelling. The names are different, some attacks aren’t translated and the government gets involved this time. I actually think the show should continue to change things rather than being a totally straight adaption. It allows the series to really duck the usual comparisons that it would get right away and helps it to stand on its own as a stand alone show. That said I would have liked it if the names had stayed the same since they take a lot of getting used to.

So the series starts off with a Gold Saint appearing in Seiya’s home and kidnapping his sister after taking down some government workers. Seiya and his sister Patricia have the ability of the cosmos which allows them to perform superhuman feats that should be next to impossible. Unfortunately that was not enough to take down a Gold Saint warrior. Those fighters are way too powerful. Years pass by and Seiya figures his sister is dead as he has been unable to get any leads on her or on the mysterious gold saint. That’s when he is taken in by Sienna and her grand father who explain the lore about powerful Saints which will save the goddess Athena from the evil gods. Seiya doesn’t buy any of this hogwash for a second but they explain that it is the only lead to his sister so he’s in. Basically he first has to earn a bronze armor of his own and then he must compete in a tournament with other Saints. The difficult part here is that there is a guy named Vander who wants the power of the Saints for himself to save the world. Seiya and friends will have to watch out for this guy or be crushed in the process.

The season is pretty quick so we don’t really get to the Gold Saints much as this is mainly pre arc. At times it can feel like the series is going a bit fast to tackle everything but it goes at a good speed for the fights which is the important part. I mentioned that there were some changes here so lets look at the biggest one. It’s the inclusion of Vander who believes he is trying to save the world from utter destruction. He’s one of those villains who has some good ideas but unfortunately the heroes don’t really get to talk to him much initially and the guy goes off the deep end very quickly so he can’t be reasoned with.

I understand why he is skeptical to just let the Saints handle everything because what if they lose? In fact the prophecy claims that the Saints will lose this time and Earth will be destroyed so maybe taking matters into his own hands wouldn’t be such a bad idea. In fact he has done quite well so far in building a whole army of Saints which can even overpower Bronze Knights. He did this by himself with a small group so imagine if he had a bunch of real resources at his disposal? The bio engineered Saints have a great supply of cosmos and incredible defenses. They can draw on more power from the generator as needed too. If only Vander could have played ball and tried to meet the Knights in the middle then Earth would have been in great shape for the fights to come. Instead Earth is more defenseless than ever before now.

I also liked seeing the government show up to get some fights although the show could have done better with the power levels. There is one moment where the government shows up in a helicopter/plane and the Saints start talking about how they’ve got no shot and are going to be obliterated..only to destroy it in one shot as always. I don’t care what guns they have on those planes, one good hit from a Saint will break it every time so there is nothing to be afraid of. The characters always seem to think that a vehicle is safe only for a Saint to break it in the next scene. You’re better off on the ground at that rate.

I’ll never be able to take the government or any other human faction seriously against the Saints because they are so outmatched but at the same time it is nice to see them. I do think with the world going into danger soon it makes sense to show the real life impacts f that and that’s something that the show did pretty well. I hope to see this continue more. Also as a side note, I like how Seiya grows actual wings when he powers up his cosmo like a real Pegasus. It is a fun visual that makes a lot of sense if you ask me.

The soundtrack here is pretty solid. The opening is a lot of fun and works as a great remix. It gets you pumped for what’s about to happen. Within the actual show the osts are good too but my only issue so far is that there isn’t a lot of variety. You’re going to be hearing the same songs playing quite a few times the more you go through the episodes. I think just adding a handful of other themes would have helped prevent it from feeling like they were cycling through the same tunes all the time.

As for the graphics, well I would say the CG here is pretty good. It definitely looks like a video game and what enhances this even further is how each character jumps into a pre set animation cycle whenever they go into their final smash. Remember playing Marvel vs Capcom and activating your final smash only for someone to activate theirs a second later so yours does no damage while they get all the hits in. That’s basically what happens here on a number of occasions. Where the animation struggles a bit is during the actual combat. Often times the projectile attacks will look cool but the show doesn’t have a whole lot of choreography for most of the fights. This results in faster battles than you would expect. Battles are very important in Saint Seiya so I’m hoping we can get this upgraded a bit in the second season. Having animation that looks good is really important but having great fights is equally critical.

As always Seiya is a great main character. He is determined to save his sister and fights off all kinds of odds in order to do so. He’s the kind of guy you want to have on your side because he will never give up and he will continue to fight to the last man. He always surpasses his limits and gets a lot of great character development even over the course of these first episodes. He was always willing to defend those in trouble but by the end he has really begun to understand what it means to be a knight of Athena. Can’t wait to see more of him soon.

Meanwhile Andromeda is a girl in this version which was a pretty big deal back in the day. Ultimately her personality isn’t much different though. Perhaps she is a little bolder but that’s about it. Although by default I actually prefer her to the usual version for that reason since Andromeda was never my favorite Saint. She gets her whole plot with Phoenix here but for the most part isn’t winning many big battles outside of that. I should mention right now that Seiya easily steals the show and gets the most to do here, the rest of the Saints aren’t able to do much of anything. I mean they’re strong and we see them do cool things during their debut appearances but Seiya gets almost all of the fights to himself. He’s the guy you call in to fight all the real enemies and it shows what a gap there is between him and everyone else.

Cygnus is extra confident and mean in this one which is nice. He’s got an edge to his fighting style and even comes close to murdering Athena at one point. He does mellow out super quickly though. I think it would have been more effective if he had lost to Phoenix or something which caused him to really change his ways. Alternately I would have just kept him as being really gruff for the whole season and think that would have worked well. Regardless he’s a quality character and a good addition to the team. Definitely someone you don’t want to mess with and he is supposed to be one of the more powerful Saints with how he could keep up with Dragon and Seiya while the others couldn’t.

Dragon has always been one of the most consistent Saints. He has a lot of power as well as great discipline which allows him to attack and defend at the right times. He has his unbreakable shield and unstoppable fist which makes for a tough combo. He gets his big fight here while blind which was always impressive and gave Seiya a good match. Dragon is probably the most honorable member of the Saints and is always determined to fight for justice. He doesn’t like cheap tricks or winning in any way that isn’t 100% fair so it’s easy to like him.

Then we have Phoenix as one of the big bosses for the show. He had a very intense backstory so you can really see how he cracked. The guy was put through the wringer back during his childhood and really never caught a break. The show doesn’t hold back with the ordeals he had to go through and so now he just isn’t the hero that he once was. Of course in part due to the hellish training he had to go through, Phoenix is considerably more powerful than the other bronze saints. It’s always impressive just how strong he is and he never ceases to amaze during the battles. His fights are always cool and he has the best looking attacks. His fire techniques don’t stop and he’s easy to root for even when he isn’t the most heroic out there. That’s just how he rolls.

Meanwhile Sienna makes for a good Athena. She has the most powerful warriors on the planet trying to murder her and yet she doesn’t live her life in fear. She’s doing her best to hang in there and continue to fight the good fight which is admirable. She even gets to use her magic powers to block opponent attacks at times. I still wish she could fight more since Hades and Poseidon have no problem shattering worlds and firing off big energy blasts. You can’t tell me that Athena doesn’t have that kind of power within her somewhere right? Like it wouldn’t make sense that she couldn’t fight because in theory she has more cosmo than almost every other character in the series.

This is where I have to throw in that as always Aiolos is the best Knight here. He understood that murdering a literal baby was wrong and made sure to save her life even though he paid the ultimate price for it. That’s absolutely what you have to do if you consider yourself to be a true hero. I don’t see any of the other Gold Saints doing that to be honest. The Bronze Saints would but you still would expect the Golds to be better. One change this series did to try and make this not feel as bad is there’s a prophecy ~~that the pope made up~~ which says that Athena will lose the war. So he tells them that they should just murder her and fight the war on their own. This plan doesn’t make much sense though because you are just making your side even weaker and will lose by a greater amount now. Cmon that’s just easy match but the Gold Saint have about as much integrity as your average pickpocket so they are easily taken in.

It’s good that we have future arcs where they look good because this is why they always make me just shake my head at how villainous and unreasonable they are the whole time. I’ll at least give Aiolia some props because he is able to listen to reason after Seiya messes him up a bit. He also did seem to save Seiya’s sister although he’s intentionally vague about the whole thing. He really should have at least tried to tell him something about her instead of being cryptic. Would have made things easier later on I would expect. The rest of the Gold Saints are total sellouts as you’d expect.

Same with the Silver Saints to be honest. They show up to get absolutely devastated the whole times. The one who can read minds was fun though because that’s always such a good ability. I always like seeing how the heroes can get around that. Do they have to shut their mind off or just move really quickly? To date Yusuke Urameshi had the absolute best way of dealing with that. Man that series has so many good moments and Seiya is on that level which is why this series is so great. Even the weaker villains like Misty are able to see through basic traps and give the heroes trouble. I do like that because even if they aren’t the nicest folks, they had to go through a lot of diligent training to get to silver rank so it makes sense that they could do this much.

Then you have Shaina who really wants to beat Seiya up. Ultimately her character arc feels a bit rushed as the show gets through her scenes quickly but she’s fun as always. I liked her rivalry with Seiya even if it ends up being one sided very quickly. Seiya just improves too fast for anyone to keep up with him. There is also Marin who trains Seiya but I never liked her quite as much. I think she could have been better at assisting Seiya and giving him backup when needed. She is always using trickery and just overthinking everything though. Just team up with him already and the heroes can have another fighter in their group.

Finally we get to two of the other bronze saints who get a role. First up is Cassios who has a lot of raw strength but that’s all that he has going for him. It’s naturally not going to be enough against someone like Seiya whose punches break the speed barrier and will eventually go faster than light. That’s not the kind of power that you can really hope to deal with easily. He just isn’t that kind of fighter. Then there is Unicorn who has his little rivalry with Seiya as always but unfortunately he doesn’t get a ton of screen time. See I would have liked to have seen him absolutely giving Seiya the work or one quick fight between them. I always thought he was a lot of fun at least but he’s more of a comic relief character here and doesn’t get a big role.

The season ends with a massive cliffhanger that gets you hyped up for what will be coming next. That’s always a good way to end things off so I’m pretty psyched for what will be happening soon. At the end of the day this was a very fun show with a lot of action and quality visuals. Perhaps it isn’t the remake that people had been waiting for but if it had to be CG then doing this alternate version was absolutely the way to go. It keeps you on your toes and takes some interesting approaches to modernizing the story. I just think they should keep doing that in the next seasons too as you then have to keep your guard up to see what will really be happening next.

Overall, Whether you call this series Knights of the Zodiac or Saint Seiya, it will always be a really big franchise. The names can be hard to keep track of so just think of them by the names of their cloth/armors since those never end up changing. The show has no real weak points which is the main reason why I rank it so highly. The story is very engaging and I never got bored while watching this. If anything it just ends way too quickly so you wish there were more episodes right off the bat. Still the series did continue and will keep on going so at least there is nothing to worry about there. It’s certainly one of the upsides about starting a series once it has already been going on for a while. I’d definitely recommend checking this one out, it’s pretty nostalgic to see Seiya’s first fights again and the show isn’t lost in the shadow of the original.

Overall 8/10

Kuromukuro Review

Posted on January 25, 2023 by dreager1

It’s time for an anime that mixes sci-fi with classic samurai characters. This one never seemed to get all that big as I’ve never seen it mentioned at all online but it’s a pretty good show. The action is on point and the story is good although the ending definitely has a massive cliffhanger so some may be wary in jumping in with no season 2 in sight. That said, the ending is really hype for that reason as well. You’ve got a well balanced experience here.

The show starts with Kennosuke fighting off alien invaders in his mecha with the princess but a giant explosion occurs and she seemingly dies/possibly gets whisked away into a portal while he falls back into the planet. 450 years later he is woken up by a girl named Yukina who looks just like the princess that he used to serve and she was able to activate his robot to wake up from its stasis. She is just a normal girl and doesn’t understand what is going on here but neither one has much time to think things through as we find out that the aliens are returning. Their goals are unknown but humanity will need to be ready if they want to survive and that means training up more pilots. Many years have passed so we should have great robots now but will they be enough?

The show’s got a reasonably large cast for a 26 episode show and it covers a whole lot here. While I say that the characters don’t have a chance for downtime initially, they do get that time later on in the series. So we have a lot of fights but also some day to day adventures for some slice of life adventures. The series is very character driven in addition to having the action scenes ready and there is even some romance thrown in here as well with a lot of characters getting involved.

I would say the title is at its best when dealing with the main alien invasion though. One thing that helped to add some more layers here is that there isn’t just one alien race involved. There’s a mysterious man with a mask who claims to be from a different alien race and he actually looks more like an ogre than what the main aliens that Kennosuke claims are the enemies. In fact those look like humans so the main characters have to determine if Kennosuke is actually being honest with them or if he’s hiding something. Naturally any secrets can hurt the morale and unity of the troops so you need to know that sooner than later.

Lets start with the technical elements though. The animation is very sharp for the human scenes. The colors pop out and there is always a lot of movement going on. The robot suits can be a little clunkier but you still get a lot of fun battles which only get more impressive as they start growing wings and using swords. I have yet to see an unimpressive aerial battle with robots and this was no exception. The fights do get good here and I didn’t walk away with any real complaints on the animation. It remains consistent throughout the whole run.

The soundtrack is a little more on the forgettable side. It’s not bad per say but the opening is a little underwhelming and you will have a hard time really remembering any of the tunes in the episodes. I actually looked up the ost while writing this review to check some of them out and some of the tracks are good but they will mostly blend together in the background as opposed to dominating the scene.

Kuromukuro can have a bit of a fanservice issue at times though. Mainly this tends to always occur when Yukina’s classmate Mika shows up. It’s a shame because Mika is easily one of the best characters in the series as a loyal friend always ready to help out and cheer everyone up. So she would have been cool without those scenes and it distracts from her quality moments. There was also an odd massage scene that seemed to be going out of its way to be a bit iffy when they could have just played the scene straight as a good recovery method. Naturally there is no fanservice during the fights so this really just shows up during the downtime so it’s not super frequent but does happen enough to be noticeable.

Now with the aliens running around a common trope is that the government will make the wrong choice and turn on the heroes right? That happens all the time here and for a while you figure maybe this will be the exception but the government looks really awful by the end of the series. It’s unfortunate because they last for quite a while but in the end they basically just decide to self sabotage themselves. The show doesn’t portray this as the ultimate betrayal you would expect it to be and the ending is still rather light as there isn’t much that the teens can do about all of this but most of the adults here lost all my respect by the end. Only certain characters who took a stand and made their choice were exempt. It’s no wonder Earth falls so easily in pretty much every sci-fi story.

Okay back to the story though. So Kennosuke has sworn to protect the princess for his entire life and so he still wants to find her but in the meantime he vows to protect Yukina as well since she looks like the princess. Also, as she woke the robot up, they are now linked as pilot and support for the mech. It can only work at 100% power with two riders and nobody else can connect so in a way their destinies are connected now. Some characters aren’t so thrilled about this but what are you going to do right?

It starts off as more of a monster of the week setup but gradually we meet the main villain cabal and get more of an ongoing story here. For example there is a mysterious lady named Muetta who looks just like the princess but is working for the villains. What’s going on there? Then you have a guy from school who likes Yukina and is super jealous of Kennosuke but is also feeling a huge lack of confidence because Kennosuke is just so much more powerful and talented. This guy can’t hope to beat him in a fight so what else can he do? So starts some of the drama.

In general I would say the romance here isn’t great. There are quite a lot of them going on here like with the classmates even outside of the main romance. The problem is that for a lot of these it’s too soon. Take Kennosuke, he liked the princess and then falls for Yukina who looks just like the highness but is he really liking her then or just seeing the princess in her? The show actually deals with this fully so I’ll give it some props there. The reason why I also give the romance some more credit is it doesn’t go 0-100 and even by the end of the series it’s still ongoing and now years have passed. So they’ve actually had time to develop even if Kennosuke can still be a little iffy about the cosplay pictures.

The romance with Mika and the shy kid Jose was more on the cringe side. I mean that’s his whole thing like when he tried to make an emotional message appear in a video he shot for the class and nobody noticed. I never ended up liking Jose though, he tries really hard but didn’t have a ton of personality by the end. The rest of the slice of life elements could be fun enough though. Perhaps filming a movie dragged on a little bit but playing sports and going on field trips was a nice way to explore the characters more. It was successful enough in that the whole class (The named characters at least) remain memorable even after you have finished the show. You won’t forget any of them.

In terms of balance it would probably be nice if the heroes had more resources though. They seem completely doomed if the villains got serious about fighting them. Keep in mind that it’s Earth against the whole villain empire which is apparently many, many planets strong. The only reason Earth hasn’t been wiped off the planet is because they want some resources and because the villains are too proud to ask for backup. See, there are 5-6 main villains in the cabal and they figure asking for back-up would cause them to lose face…so they just don’t ask. I mean perhaps they would be blown up so it may be a smart move but Earth really gets lucky all the time because they aren’t ready for a huge fight which is made clear every time the villains attack. If Kennosuke wasn’t around they would have gotten eliminated rather quickly.

Now lets jump into the characters. First up we have Kennouke who is a loyal samurai. He doesn’t know much about the modern world so he has the classic fish out of water arc but manages to not be very annoying about it. Considering all the hoops the government has him jump through, he does his best to comply. He’ll still stick with his sense of justice though. The only time he wavers a bit in a bad way is with dealing with Muetta since she looks so much like the princess. He froze up when it counted which was unfortunate but beyond that I wouldn’t say that he made any real mistakes. His fighting abilities are the real deal as well.

He does try to keep Yukina away from danger a lot but aside from the fact that it makes sense in a historical setting since you would usually try to keep women and children away from the battlefield, he also knows that she can’t fight and they’re up against aliens who show no mercy. So it’s totally reasonable on his end but of course the choice is quickly taken out of his hands considering that he can’t even pilot the robot without her. He tries to fight one while on foot but that doesn’t go very well. I tend to like characters that are very honorable and so Kennosuke made for a good lead.

Meanwhile Yukina is a solid heroine. At first the whole thing is a little too much for her and so naturally she wants out but once she sees that this is really happening then she gets on board. Yukina does her best to help out, even fighting when necessary. She may not stand out as much as some of the other characters but her bravery can keep pace with them and I don’t really have any negatives for her. I was also glad that she flat out rejected Ryoto as opposed to keeping him guessing.

Ryoto is the guy who likes Yukina but you know that he’s doomed from the start because he’s not the main guy. Apparently he also used to lightly bully/tease her back in the day based on some of the character dialogue although it was all prior to the series starting. This guy tries his best to get her to notice him but ultimately she just says that’s not going to happen and by the end of the series he has slowly started to accept this. He didn’t have a whole lot of purpose in the series but at least he was never selfish about the whole thing. He didn’t try to sabotage the heroes or do anything petty. He was upset with Kennosuke the whole time of course but that was about it.

Jundai is another one of the classmates who gets a fairly big role. He likes filming everything which is his big gimmick. Unfortunately there isn’t a whole lot to him beyond that. He also tries filming Mika a bit when she’s not aware of it which quickly dropped him all the way down. That’s usually not part of his character but one time is all it takes. I already talked about Mika being a fun character so not much more to say about that. She never doubted Yukina or Kennosuke no matter what others said and she helped him get used to modern day life without making a big deal of it all.

Marina is the school counselor but she’s woefully unprepared for virtually every situation in the series. She really wants to be helpful but just has a super tough time with it because she’s too scared to actually talk with people straight on. I wouldn’t say she ever got to be a very great character for me personally. If she was more confident that would have gone a long way.

Then we have Sophie who is a prodigy and is very good at using her mecha even though she is still a student and not yet a professional. She has actual practice with the sword and this translates into her piloting skills. She seems to like Kennosuke initially but gradually gets out of the race as the series goes on. She usually keeps a calm head and is always a reliable ally to have. Since most of the supporting characters didn’t end up being too helpful in the actual fights, it was good to have someone who could really fight here.

Hiromi is a character who could have easily ended up not being very good but the show handled her well. She is Yukina’s mother and also one of the chief scientists. That means she is often put in a position where she has to side with the government and can’t trust Kennosuke all that much. She is also always very busy so Yukina feels like she is neglectful. In some shows this may be the case but this time I actually thought she did a good job of always being there for Yukina. Later on when she is forced to really have to choose between the government and her daughter, she wisely picks Yukina. That was where she solidified herself as one of the better characters here. There comes a time in every character’s life when they have to make a choice and you always want to make sure you make the right one.

Tom and Liu are two of the professionals who lead the defense force. They are quickly rendered moot once Kennosuke shows up but to their defense they are still a tough combination and hold their own against the villains. Tom is the hot heads of the group while Liu tries to hold him back and is definitely the calm member. They make for a good duo but you do feel like their role in the show isn’t huge either way. You could probably cut them out and not much would change.

Takehito is another character who doesn’t appear all that much. He’s Yukina’s father and seemingly died a long time ago in the woods but it’s hard to tell if the aliens got him or something else. As the show goes on we do learn what really happened to him but I can tell you that it’s a little underwhelming. Ultimately I didn’t think his plot ended up being all that engaging. It’s mainly used for world building which is great of course but it tends to be more on the dry side so you’re always waiting to see the main characters again.

The same is true of Zell to a large extent. He’s the mysterious alien from a third party faction and at least he has the whole intrigue on his side. Is he friend or foe? You have to decide how much you actually trust him as the series goes on. Sure, he did end up saving the heroes once or twice but sometimes that’s just a tactic to try and get into their good graces so you can’t afford to let your guard down. In the end i thought he was okay. A bit soft spoken for my tastes though and he tends to fade into the background instead of stealing the scenes that he’s in.

Then we have Sabastian who is Sophie’s butler and you might expect him to have a small role but he ends up doing quite a lot by the end. He can fight and knows how to pilot a robot. He takes his job of protecting Sophie very seriously and you end up being impressed by the commitment that he puts into this. Most butlers would have absolutely faltered before he did. Meanwhile you have Koharu as a nice little character. She’s Yukina’s sister so she’s too young to do much here but helps make Kennosuke feel at home and is generally a nice person.

Then you have Arthur who is the big government general but he looks pretty bad. Mainly my issue with him is the fact that Kennosuke helps out so much and the guy still won’t trust him at all. More specifically, it’s fine if he doesn’t trust him so long as he doesn’t do anything about it, but he handcuffs, arrests, zaps, and ultimately keeps betraying Kennosuke at every turn. This guy is actively working against his planet’s own defenses after a while. A key moment in this is when he sends out the robot army against Kennosuke.

Keep in mind that the planet only has maybe 3-4 active robot fighters at any given time and so each one Kennosuke is forced to damage is just leaving the planet in further ruins. Arthur always just appears as very shortsighted and he just looks awful at the end of the series. The characters probably should have just did a full revolt by the end of it all. With him as the leader they aren’t going far.

Now as for the villains, the most important one is probably Muetta. After all there’s the mystery of her looking like the princess which is a big deal. She’s a fun fighter and can fight in close quarters as well as in her mech. She has some amnesia so she doesn’t remember a whole lot…makes it easy to theorize some things. She added a fun bit of mystery to the series so it was definitely fun to have her around.

Lefil is the leader of the villain cabal but unfortunatley he doesn’t live up to the hype. 90% of his screen time is sitting upon his massive thrown and talking tough but when it comes time to put his money where his mouth is, the guy falls short. He just isn’t able to keep up. Sure he is technically a good fighter but the show really needed to depict him doing a little more to justify his position at the top of the foodchain.

Meanwhile Mirasa gets a big role because of how jealous she is of Muetta. Mirasa wants to be known as the top villain and so she goes around lying and trying to take Muetta down. After a while keeping up the lie of Muetta having died is rather difficult since Muetta is still running around. Mirasa really digs her own grave here and while it’s always fun to have villains in-fighting and creating their own factions, I was rooting for anyone to take her down. Mirasa just felt very petty.

The rest of the villains mostly don’t have big character arcs or anything like that. Imusa and Hedo mostly just blend in with the others but the way Hedo goes out was almost funny so he loses extra points there. Finishing yourself off is almost never the right way to move up the ranks. Fusunani at least had the moment of busting out of jail and taking a lot of names to bump him up the list. That was a very impressive sequence. Finally Yoruba had a flying mecha which was really impressive since that is exactly the kind of suit you want to have to fight the more impressive opponents.

Yeah there were quite a few characters here and it helps to get the feeling across that this is a true war. It’s an alien invasion that the main characters are fighting off and so of course you should have a number of different villains to go up against. Having just one or two just wouldn’t feel right. I would definitely be hyped for a sequel to this someday though. How I see it, they are going to have to introduce a bunch of new characters and weapons for the heroes to stand any chance here.

Without going into details, there is quite the large time skip at the end and considering that Kennosuke was heavily outnumbered I’d assume that logically he’s dead by the enemy’s hands. If we get a sequel I’m sure he will be alive so best bet is they captured him but if somehow he’s winning I won’t be able to buy that. He has trouble just fighting a 2 vs 1 battle, how can he handle hundreds of these guys? The ending doesn’t paint a very hopeful picture for his odds even with Yukina getting ready. At least she can fight pretty well now too but there’s a big gap between fighting very well and conquering historic odds.

Overall, You should have a good time with Kuromukuro. I’d consider it to be a fairly strong Sci-Fi adventure. It gives you a lot of time to really get to know the characters which is something that many shows don’t have time for. The battles are always a lot of fun but it’s also nice to be able to just hang out with the characters. There is plenty of time for this in titles like Naruto and Bleach which is part of why they’re so huge but titles under 30 episodes usually don’t have as much time for it. There’s a good balance here and that’s why I’d say it’s a fundamentally sound show all around. I’d recommend checking it out even if the government will annoy you the whole time.

Overall 7/10

Romantic Killer Review

Posted on January 14, 2023 by dreager1

Romantic Killer is a bit of a different romance title but you can probably guess that from the title. The main heroine isn’t going to make things easy and that’s why she refers to herself as the Anti-Heroine. It’s a nice spin on things which you’ll see once I get to the plot. The ending doesn’t drop the ball on this either so it stays true to the plot and I would say this is a pretty good adventure.

So the show starts by introducing us to Anzu who is really having a great life so far. She has a nice pet cat, her collection of video games, and a whole lot of chocolate! Yeah life is pretty much perfect but one day a fairy named Riri infiltrates Anzu’s home and announces that Anzu’s top 3 possessions in life will be taken away from her. Anzu can no longer eat chocolate, her cat has been taken away, and her video games are also gone. The only way to get these back is to fall in love with a guy. Yes, Anzu is being blackmailed into falling in love by this fairy who basically says that she is doing it for Anzu’s own good. Anzu refuses and says she will not get a boyfriend no matter what happen and Riri puts this to the test by using her magic to summon a bunch of guys in the most contrived situations in order to break Anzu. Can she stay strong?

I think part of the big thing that separates this from the other shows is how Anzu is so completely against getting a boyfriend. In a lot of these shows the heroine technically wants to find a guy but it’s either tough to confess her feelings or things just weren’t working well. Here, Anzu is against this but you are supporting her because of the situation.

If a fairy shows up to ruin your life and said you would only get it back by getting a boyfriend, wouldn’t you want to rebel? You want to control your life and how things go but letting yourself get manipulated is not a good idea. You’re completely rooting for Anzu because of this without a doubt. You could even say that there is a tragic angle to this as it means that Anzu really can’t give any of the guys a fair shake as a result. I can’t say I felt bad for them though…this is just how it goes sometimes.

The show’s almost like a competition between Riri and Anzu or you could also think of it like a video game. Every time Anzu stops one guy she is met with an even tougher challenge in the next level. Since Riri has magic it’s also not like there is any chance of this stopping anytime soon. The game is set up against Anzu for sure because there is no end date to this. In theory Anzu could be doomed to not have her possessions forever which is pretty rough to think about. So time is on Riri’s side as Anzu’s resolve could theoretically start to shake the more the days/months/years go on.

It goes without saying that I don’t like Riri for this reason. She is just trying to force Anzu into love which is absolutely the wrong approach. I know Riri is merely an employee working for some really tough bosses who will do whatever they want but Riri still has a choice not to do this. The only possible way I could defend Riri is if she gave Anzu some kind of a chance and a reward to even things out. For example, declaring that Anzu has lost her 3 possessions for a full year and if she makes it through that period without a boyfriend then she will get something extra. I dunno, a million dollars or something. That would really raise the stakes.

I’d say Riri is also annoying because you can’t count on her when the going gets tough. Things get serious near the end of the series as we get a real villain and some life or death stakes and suddenly Riri’s magic isn’t so helpful. Either the wand is dirty or she’s too slow to help but it’s just annoying. Seriously what’s the point of magic if you can only show up in time to annoy everyone?

Riri also sometimes acts against her best interests by getting Anzu into tricky situations that make the other guys a bit wary. I suppose the long con here is getting the other guys jealous enough to make a move but eh…..doesn’t seem worth it. There’s really no point in Riri shapeshifting into a guy except to make things tough on Anzu and cause misunderstandings. At least Riri does one nice thing by the end but that’s about it.

Now for Anzu, well I was quite pleased with her character from the start. You absolutely empathize with her because her top 3 hobbies are very relatable. Who doesn’t like to just enjoy time with their pet, video games, and eating some chocolate on the side? Those are the top 3 hobbies out there and so when they are taken away you can understand her anguish. The fact that she immediately takes such a hard stance against having a boyfriend was brilliant.

Throughout the show she conducts herself well. One thing I appreciated is that she isn’t rude about it. Anzu is quite straight forward about not wanting to get romantically entangled with anyone but is still willing to be their friend and just a nice person in general. It would have been so easy to make the main heroine a jerk but the show doesn’t do that.

Anzu is also potentially putting herself at a disadvantage by letting herself be close to these guys but she just wants to do the right thing and that’s great. Doing the right thing is its own reward after all. Anzu can also fight a little bit as needed even if she doesn’t get to go hand to hand against the main villain. That would have been nice but she stood in there and didn’t give up.

She is also able to talk back to any bullies and defends her friends. We get a quick flashback later on in the series with her best friend Saki and see how Anzu just squashed all of the bad rumors. Anzu doesn’t let any injustice happen on her watch and this continues into the present when she tells off the girls who were going after Tsukasa.

A lot of times when a girl asks if the heroine can let her meet up with the main guy, the heroine relents. Usually it’s a mix of “Well, he’s not my boyfriend so I don’t care.” or “Sure, I don’t see any harm in that.”. This was better as she just said she wouldn’t be a party to any of this and wouldn’t set up anything since Tsukasa obviously didn’t want to hang out with these characters. Anzu speaks her mind which is a big upgrade from many characters.

Her friend Saki doesn’t get a whole lot to do here since most of the show is about Anzu meeting up with the various guys but she did good in her limited screen time. She had a really rough backstory that also shows why she is so close to Anzu now. She really rebounded from how things used to be to still be popular and nice in the present instead of jaded about everyone.

Now lets talk about the guys. As they’re all effectively boss battles, I’ll describe them like video game fighters. I should note that Riri does make sure to mention that she isn’t mind controlling anyone. That would have been a very dubious moment after all so while she dos create circumstances to play matchmaker, the characters all do actually like Anzu of their own accord. This was a good move by the way as all of the romances would have really been doomed otherwise.

Of course I can’t say that I was really on board with any of the romances here either way. I stand with Anzu in staying strong against these guys since the fairy is trying to play matchmaker with blackmail the whole time. So without that then maybe they’d have a chance but nah that’s game over until the deal is over.

So first up we have Tsukasa. He’s the cool guy in school who is mega popular but really cold to any girls that are around. He’s got a tragic backstory and his best asset is the fact that he is always around. Put it this way, Riri flooded his house so now Tsukasa has to live with Anzu for a while. That means since they are together a whole lot there isn’t a way to really avoid him.

It would be difficult not to become friends after that and so keeping the line drawn is the tough part. For Tsukasa it’s easy to see why he falls for Anzu because up until now he’s always been around a lot of very judgmental people. Anzu is the only one who treats him as just an ordinary guy and is super casual around him instead of putting on a persona.

Then you have to also factor in Tsukasa’s childhood tragedy involving a stalker named Yukana. basically Tsukasa was traumatized by her because of how unhinged she was. She would buy him clothes and follow him around and ultimately even drugged him. He was very fortunate that things didn’t escalate past that. So he’s unable to really feel free outside as he doesn’t want her to find him again.

He easily has the most amount of screen time and development so even though there are a few guys here and it’s more of an ensemble show, it’s fair to say that he is the main guy here. The climax even revolves around him so at the end of the day you figure that while he is the first boss battle of the show, he also works as the final boss. Anzu has to be careful around him.

Then we’ve got Junta and his biggest attribute to watch out for is that he’s the Childhood friend. He moved away for a while but he’s back now and is ready to try and make a move. He’s loved Anzu for many years and never got over her but of course she never really noticed this. I mean that’s on Junta for not saying anything though. When you’ve got a crush you have to either silently get over it or let the other party know but staying silent is the only way to really lose.

Junta is great at sports and is a super nice guy. As the nicest member of the guys that is another aspect of his to watch out for. He gives everyone a fair shake but can be stern when needed. He lacks self confidence which may make it easy to give him sympathy points though so that’s something else to watch out for. On one hand, the fact that he’s liked her for years helps in the romance angle because it’s not super sudden like Tsukasa. It’s more of a believable romance even if Anzu never noticed him before.

Of course at the same time ending the plot as an unrequited love while tragic always makes things a bit more compelling as you get to see him slowly accept that just being a normal friend really isn’t that bad. If he was a bit bolder then I would like him more but I rarely like the characters who really aren’t confident like this. He tends to throw in the towel early until he’s given a motivational speech.

Then you have the third main guy here named Hijiri. Well he’s rich which is always a very tempting attribute in any character. If Anzu ends up with him then she will be set for life and will never have to worry about anything ever again. You should never marry for riches of course…but it is probably the single most tempting thing aside from pure love.

Hijiri is used to everyone throwing themselves at him so of course the fact that Anzu isn’t interested at all just makes him want her even more. He has a tough time acting normal though and tends to throw around insults by mistake and can be generally annoying. Showing him how to live life as a normal person is something Anzu might feel instinctively so she has to worry about that. Of course she also has to be careful that she doesn’t just feel bad for him since he’ll be crushed. Pity dates are never a good idea.

Those are all of the main guys. There are a few supporting characters like Tsukasa’s friend Makoto who is around but it’s not like he’s ever involved in the romance. There is one extra guy for romance but his role is really small. His name is Ryuya and he’s really just annoying. He’s another childhood friend who liked Anzu but unlike Junta who was too shy to make a move and stayed quiet, he ended up teasing her a lot because of his crush.

You don’t see that happening as much nowadays but I do remember it being a really big thing for a while where they say you would tease and bully the person you like accidentally because you didn’t know how to interact with them normally. I gotta admit I always thought this was a super lame excuse. Seriously, your way of dealing with your feelings is to be mean to the person you like?

That’s just awful so nah I wasn’t going to root for him. Ryuya is super petty and nearly messes up the reunion for everyone by getting into his feels like this. It’s just not a good look for him at all. Maybe a tiny part of you feels bad for him…but it’s a super tiny part that is almost nonexistent. Anzu didn’t take any of it seriously at least and barely even remembers him so he should have just taken it in stride and kept it moving. They could totally be friends in the present without all the awkwardness but he really makes a spectacle of himself for a while there.

Finally we have some of the supporting characters from Tsukasa’s plot like his sister Arisa. She’s probably the only super nice member of the family. His father is a bit crazy as he blames Tsukasa for everything and unfortunately his mother tends to be a bit more passive about the whole thing. This really forced Tsukasa to have to move out and live on his own.

In part this would help him avoid the stalker but it’s also because he wasn’t getting any real support here. His father seemed to have a very old fashioned idea that if there were issues with a girl then it means that the guy led her on. He never even tries to hear Tsukasa’s side of the story and blames him entirely. This even continues on to the present. I wasn’t expecting him to stay as a villain in the present but it gave Anzu another really good moment.

Considering how much he went through, Tsukasa definitely turned out well. I also can’t say that he really made any big mistakes with how he handled the stalker situation. It’s really hard to know just how to handle something like that but he tried ignoring her, talking to her directly, but nothing would work. With someone like that who is clever enough not to break laws too openly escape can feel like the only real option. Especially since even once the courts get involved it doesn’t deter her.

Yukana is the stalker and the final boss of the series. It was nice to have some action at the end here for sure and when she took out the knife you knew things were going to get intense. It is crazy that with such a big cast, one person can make so many waves but the whole situation is handled pretty realistically. The show is mainly comedic but the whole stalker situation is handled super seriously. Riri at least helped a bit in summoning everyone at one point to deal with some bullies (Who had the least believable redemption arc in the franchise. They looked awful and were actually going to beat up Anzu so they shouldn’t have been forgiven so easily. I thought they should have been arrested personally) but Riri’s reasoning for not taking down Yukana directly was really weak.

Riri does need Anzu alive and well to get the mission completed so Yukana is an active threat. Ergo it should be reasonable to take her down but Riri is not convinced and can’t make a move without that confirmation. It’s definitely annoying and feels a bit contrived since otherwise there would not really be a big climax like this. With magic ending it all would be easy.

The humor in the series works well. I would say that it is rarely laugh out loud levels of funny but you can appreciate the humor. I liked how fake they made the first dating sim look which helped to illustrate just what Anzu thought of the whole thing. A whole show with those graphics could actually be rather fun. You can also appreciate this from the guy’s point of view here as well since they all like her and she just has no interest in returning those feelings.

Think of it like everyone falling for the popular girl in school. Usually in the movies there is the main guy who ends up breaking past the pack and they get together so this show is more like if there was no guy. Everyone here are the bit players in the average movie who are doing their best to get her to notice them and it’s all to no avail. None of their feelings are being returned and that’s just how it goes sometimes.

Meanwhile the animation for the show is good too. I get the feeling that it wouldn’t work too well with a lot of movement because it feels a bit rigid but at the same time the colors really stand out. Everyone has eyes that are really sharp and the colors are on point. For a show like this where there won’t be big action scenes I think it makes sense to focus on the artwork than on pure animation. Because of that the visuals will really age well even several years from now. It’s why all of the screenshots look so sharp here as well. The soundtrack is more on the forgettable side though. I really couldn’t recall a single tune by the time the show was over but I want to say that it did work well while watching the show.

There is an interesting gimmick where any bugs are turned into different cakes in the show. It’s super random but I’d say that it works because of that. It’s almost like the show is throwing in some photoshop and you can’t go wrong with that. I guess Anzu needed one weakness as well since otherwise she was shredding all obstacles. So since she is scared of bugs that throws the guys a little lifeline to use.

Overall, Romantic Killer is a pretty fun show and I definitely had a good amount of fun with it. It succeeds by focusing more on the challenge and comedic aspects than the actual romance. The serious stuff was handled well too but to me the comedic moments are when the show is at its best. I’d be down with a season 2 to see how this continues on and if they stick to those fundamentals then I think it would be in good shape. In theory Anzu should still be trying to stay strong and it would focus more on the guys doing their best to win her over. It would make for a fairly unique spin on the whole romance genre and if it balances in the humor like this one did then I think it would be a success. Of course the ending is always really important for a show like this as well so they do need to make sure to stick the landing. I believe the show can pull this off though. The ending here could have easily been dodgy but it wasn’t so that worked out.

Overall 7/10

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