Slayers Revolution Review

Posted on June 13, 2015 by dreager1

I’m closing in on the end of the Slayers franchise. It’s been a fun ride and this is certainly one of the definitive fantasy franchises out there. Revolution is certainly a lot newer than the other TV shows and you can tell as the animation is much brighter and more colorful compared to the old ones. Gone is the classic 90’s style and you can say hello to the 2000’s. The budget is consistently good for the animation and it is a lot of fun to see the classic cast return.

Slayers Revolution is only 13 episodes so that means that the plot can move at a much quicker pace than it usually would. A mysterious rabbit with hands for ears appears one day and starts destroying magical tanks. The cops believe that Lina Inverse is behind this so they hire special investigator Wizer Frayon so arrest her. To prove her innocence ~~and get vengeance on the rabbit~~ Lina and friends decide to find him. That being said, forces beyond what they may comprehend are also at play in the shadows. A kingdom which fell to a plague is involved and an evil kingdom is seeking the use the Zanaffar armor to make themselves a legitimate threat to the rest of the world. Finally, what does Zellos have to do with all of this?

While the series is only 13 episodes, it still makes time for some filler episodes. One of them involved a boulder contest as the heroes had to make the best golem possible to defeat the others and roll a ball up a legendary mountain. Pokota (The rabbit) decided to get involved as well for a fairly enjoyable one shot episode. Slayers has always been a series that had a lot of filler around to keep things from getting too serious with the main storyline. As far as the fillers go, they weren’t bad here and I at least did enjoy that one. The series is at its best when the show gets back to the plot though.

The beginning of the show is a little slow, but it starts to get more exciting as it shows up. Especially once the assassin, Zuuma, shows up. He’s fairly powerful for an opponent and then the heroes set sail for the evil kingdom to settle things once and for all. The final 5-6 episodes are essentially one long climax that takes a few pauses before continuing each time. The climax can certainly hold its own against any of the older titles. (It can’t win though, but it can hold its own) You’ll want to be ready for the giant monster at the end!

The series does a good job of mixing comedy with action as per usual. I’d say that Slayers has been modernized in a good way in that it is still similar to how it used to be in a nostalgic way. You could even make the case that Revolution feels more like a Shonen than the previous titles at times since the action was really nonstop for almost half of the series at the end. While Next still had some of the best fight scenes in the franchise, the sheer power of the animation keeps it close here.

As I mentioned earlier, the animation never lets up and it’s worlds beyond what we saw in the previous shows. One look at the theme song will show you that this series means business and that’s especially good news for all of the energy attacks, which have never looked so vibrant. As this is J.C. Staff, I’m not surprised since they are certainly one of the best animation companies on the block. I look forward to seeing how great the next show looks.

As for the humor, Slayers is typically funny and this series does a good job with that for the most part. The only downer in that area is the fact that the chest jokes are still present and more prevalent than ever as the villains always use this to taunt Lina before she blows them up. Still, while it is annoying, it’s probably the tamest form of fanservice that you can even have in a show and isn’t really enough to hurt the score. It also vanishes once we are around halfway through the series, which was certainly nice to see.

As always, Lina Inverse makes for a pretty great main character. She’s easily the strongest member from the main heroes and her Lord of Nightmare’s techniques really make her a threat for any opponent. She never uses the Giga Slave as the risks are probably too great, but she has many other spells at her disposal to tip the scales. While I would have liked for her to have beaten up Zellos to show how skilled she is, Lina always has a plan up her sleeve. It’s hard to find a more likable main character than Lina and I’m confident that she will always be a likable protagonist at this point. When I think of epic anime heroines, Lina is certainly near the top.

Gourry is true to form as you would expect. He’s still a fun character to root for and you’ll feel bad for him since he no longer has the Sword of Light. For most of the series, that does prevent him from being useful and he tends to be in the way during a fight scene. He tries hard, but it’s tough to manage when you have a sword that breaks over and over again. He gets a great fight scene at the end of the show to make up for this tough and he certainly outranks most of the supporting cast members.

Zelgadis used to be the intense rival character of the show, but he’s typically played for laughs in the current seasons. He has a lot of serious moments as well, but he’s so weak that you really can’t take him seriously. While teaming up with Amelia, he was barely able to beat a puppet. His skills have definitely stopped improving and they may have regressed over the years. At this point, he’s easily the weakest member of the main group, but I suppose that he means well.

Amelia is certainly a more likable character than Zelgadis and her search for peace and justice is one of the reasons why the character is so endearing. It’s also good to see a fighter using magic as a close combat type of attack instead of just shooting energy blasts all the time. She’s still not quite as strong as Lina, which we saw in the filler episode where the two fought, but Amelia has become a dependable fighter in her own right. Unlike Lina and her other pals, Amelia never allows herself to be corrupted and tries to help everyone that she can.

Zellos makes an appearance in this season and his role was actually a little larger than I would have guessed. He mostly sticks to the shadows, but actually gets to fight at one point when he challenges Lina and her friends. That was great since we haven’t seen him fight in a very long time. He easily overpowered them and showed why the main characters would always be outranked. Even if their spells can destroy him, they can never hit because of the large gap in speed. Zellos was a fun villain to have in this series and he’s certainly gone up since Next. The new voice an intriguing switch and I’ll have to get used to just about all of the new voices, but it’s not like I’ll have to get used to them for very long at this rate. I expect to see him in the next season as well.

Sylphiel appears briefly for the final fight, which will be cool for long time fans. As in the first show, she starts off with a very impressive scene as she blocks a blast from the legendary Zanaffar. After that, she quickly forgets how to be a fighter though and goes back to fainting and being in distress. It’s odd as the exact same thing happened in the first season. Maybe that’s just her gimmick. She obviously has a lot of combat potential, but it’ll likely never be explored. She’s a good character, but a longer action scene would have helped a lot.

Pokota is one of the new main characters for this season and it’s safe to say that he’s not holding back in terms of personality. It doesn’t really work for me even though the show was trying to go for the tough guy routine. I can’t take him seriously in his present form and his quest to destroy the magic tanks felt pretty futile since they can be manufactured so easily. He has a tragic past and a few twists as well, but he didn’t really add anything to the show. He’s great at running and somehow knows how to use the Dragon Slave, but he was never very helpful when actual villains arrived. It’s a classic example of a character who’s great against heroes, but bad against villains. Sort of like the police in your average super hero film. They can sometimes have the edge against Batman, but fail to stop random muggers. Pokota certainly didn’t do wonders for the cast, but he should be a little better in the next season since he’ll have mellowed out a little.

Duclis is one of the big villains and his plot ties into Pokota’s. Duclis wants to make the world pay for abandoning his people in their time of need and gets a giant monster ready to destroy everyone. Towards the end, he loses confidence in his goal and basically just decides to leave everything up to fate. He had a solid design and his light saber was cool, but he’s certainly not one of the more interesting villains around. I also wouldn’t say that he was a great threat power wise although he was a decent fighter. The show hyped up a fight between him and Lina, but it got interrupted before it could start, which was regrettable.

Gioconda was probably the worst villain here though as she was fairly generic. She just wanted to become richer and richer with every passing year. A noble goal, but when you’re already a multi billionaire…what use is more money? She already had her own kingdom, army, and castles. I just wonder why she would need more money or power, but goals don’t always have to make sense I suppose. She’s a decent fighter when she has a weapon, but I’m confident that Gourry would have had the edge if he had the Sword of Light. As it stands, he was holding back anyway. Gioconda’s android was much more memorable and she also seemed to be a better fighter as she could heal.

Zuuma is an assassin who really wants to destroy Lina Inverse. He is a human who knows quite a few good spells and his shadow magic can nullify all other spells. That’s definitely a very handy technique to have against someone like Lina since he would have the edge over her in a sword fight. He did a good job of handling the whole team and I have a feeling that he’s going to do quite well in the next season as well. He was certainly the best villain here and a great addition to the overall cast.

Zanaffar is the big monster who appears at the end of the show and works quite well as the final boss. He can actually talk, which was certainly a good thing and his abilities were impressive. He is impervious to most spells and he has a giant laser blast which can deal massive amounts of damage. I don’t think that he could be Shabranigdo, but he could give the other giant monsters a decent fight. His lack of speed is probably the main thing that holds him back, but that’s where his immunity to magic comes in. He’s a solid all around boss when you really think about it.

As I mentioned earlier, the best part of the series is the last 5-6 episodes, but the best episode of the batch would probably be the 3 on 3 fight in the Gladiator Ring. That was a lot of fun and we got to see how some of the fighters handle themselves individually. Because Lina is always surrounded by her friends, we rarely get to see her fight on her own. It’s why I was sad that she didn’t end up fighting Duclis. If that’s one thing that Slayers Revolution needed more of, it was one on one fights. Next actually had several of them and I suppose that it is one of the perks of being about double the size of this show. The pros easily outweigh the cons for long running series and I’d gladly take another 10 fillers if it meant that we would get 3 more episodes with some great fight scenes. A longer Gourry vs Zuuma fight would have been great as well since you could tell that it would be a really fun rivalry.

As for the soundtrack, Slayers Revolution certainly doesn’t disappoint there. The theme song is easily the best one in the franchise and the theme is quite catchy. It plays during the climax of the arc and certainly fits in quite well. The ending theme is also solid and the music that appears during the show is good as well. While not amazing, there were two themes during the episodes that I certainly liked. One was the danger approaching theme (Not the title, but that’s the best way to describe it) which occurred whenever things were looking bad for the heroes and the normal battle theme was also decently good. The theme song is what really helps the series as the soundtrack can be a little bland otherwise, but certainly still good and it fits for the series. It fits so well that a lot of the tunes have been present for the whole franchise.

Slayers also ends this season with a lot of cliffhangers to ideally be wrapped up in the next installment. The Android who helped Lina and friends seems to be part of a bigger scheme and the Rezo jars are still around the world. If they are all destroyed, Rezo will die as well. We also can’t forget the fact that the heroes need to find Rezo and fast if they are to awaken Pokota’s people. These plots and more, you can bet that the next show is going to have a lot of action and even Zuuma shall return if you saw the after credits scene. He has the jar and he has the power. The heroes barely stopped him last time and unless Gourry is able to keep on using the Sword of Light, the heroes could be outclassed.

Overall, Slayers Revolution was quite good and the 13 episode set up worked well for the series. One thing that hurt Slayers Try a little was the large amounts of filler that the series had, which kept you from getting too invested in the story. Part of the appeal of Slayers is the random adventures that they have, but I prefer to have all of the filler before the main plot or after it so that it isn’t interrupted too much. That rarely happens though and it still works out all right, but the short length of the series forced it to go at a rapid pace. Whether you have seen the other Slayer titles or not, this is a fun fantasy/action anime to check out. I would highly recommend still watching the other Slayers shows if you liked this one though as you will see their origin stories and learn a lot more about the universe as a whole. There are a lot of wink-wink moments to season 1 for the fans and it’s always fun to know the references. I’ll be checking out the next show soon and we’ll see if it can manage to top this one.

Overall 7/10

Slayers Try Review

Posted on April 25, 2015 by dreager1

It has been a while, but I am finally back with a review for the third Slayers series! I enjoyed the first series and then the second upped the ante in just about every way. Slayers Next will likely be remembered as the pinnacle of the Slayers franchise, but there is still more to come. Slayers Try…tries a little too hard to be a mix of Slayers and Slayers Next by adding some powerful threats, but also trying to go back to the days of random adventures like in the first series. It is a mix that backfires quite a bit like GT, but still ends up being a good show.

Lina Inverse and her gang of heroic crooks are fairly happy about how their latest victory went. They decided to split up for a while and maybe they would bump into each other at some point in the future. Well, this happens sooner than they may have expected! Aside from Sylphiel, the gang meets up with Zelgadis who is still trying to learn the secret of how to transform himself. He’ll never accomplish this goal, but at least he is still trying. Zelgadis decides to stay with Lina and pals after they meet a mysterious figure who goes by the name, Filia.

Filia tells the heroes that they are destined to save the world! Lina refuses, but Filia explains that the heroes are her last hope as all of the best heroes don’t want to do this task. Lina and the gang are forced into accepting the quest under threat of imminent destruction (Lina’s sister is too powerful for them) and they must now….stop this threat. The problem is that they have no idea how to stop the danger that is approaching since the heroes don’t even know what kind of trouble to expect. They only have Filia’s guesses and intuition to guide them! I may as well say that the threat is caused by Overworlder’s (gods) who seek to change the status quo and unleash ultimate darkness across the world!

Typically, it only takes me one paragraph to describe the plot, but a lot has happened so two was necessary here. The lack of plot can be a little eerie, but it works into Try’s gameplan. It want to be episodic like the first series, but with serious stakes like the second one. This is still a dicey mix to achieve and I should explain why it doesn’t work out. The classic way to handle this would be to have the episodic parts for the first half and then to throw in a plot. This has worked in many shows like Trigun, Cardfight Vanguard, Digimon Savers, etc. The problem is that Try threw in the plot as early in as episode 1 and then ditches it towards the middle of the show. We get 6-15 filler episodes in the show.

All right, let’s not guess here. A quick Wikipedia search tells me that we have 7 “filler” episodes. The quotations are necessary as they technically have canon elements. We have a 2 part episode involving a holy grail weapon, which shows us that dark magic can be destroyed for the first time in the series. It is what inspires Lina’s final attack on the monster in the final episodes. 2-3 of the other filler episodes involve finding the characters after they failed in the fake climax, but I would still count them. That’s also not counting the episodes that were 15-18 minutes of filler with a plot heavy beginning/ending.

So, this really disrupted the pacing. The episodes where the heroes were on the boat were easily the worst ones. Slayers has always been a roller coaster series of ups and downs, but it has typically been more steady than this one. Try’s best episodes rank up there with the best of Next while the worst ones are some of the worst in the franchise. Not really because of anything relating to content, but they simply felt boring and unnecessary. Case in point, the two part episode about getting 2 Kingdoms to make peace with each other. I feel like we’ve seen this plot so many times already and I really didn’t understand what the point of it all was. It destroys whatever tension you had thanks to the villains showing up.

Luckily, that’s where the good episodes come into play. For just about the whole series, I was positive that this show was going to get a 6. Then we got the good climax, which made this more of a real battle. The fights in this series could take up a whole episode at times, which was great. The final batch of episodes is really one big fight that keeps on restarting and it is good to see the feats from both the heroes and the villains. There is no shortage of action and excitement in the climax of the series and we also got a nice batch of fights during the middle of the series as well. During these two high points, you would never be able to tell that this was the same series that we had started with.

Lina Inverse is the main character and she is once again leading the charges against those who would stand in her way. As a human, Lina is essentially the enemy of all other races so she needs to have a strong personality to combat these threats. Lina has also grown more powerful over the course of these adventures. While she used to not be able to deal any real damage to the big threats, now she has two aces up her sleeve. The Ragna Blade and the Giga Slave. These two attacks have been shown to work on almost any opponent with virtually no exceptions. It likely couldn’t completely KO a Dark Lord (The Blade anyway) but these attacks have allowed Lina to stay on the offensive. Her speed is not increased and I’ll mention that a little more towards the end of the review, but this is still a great improvement. Now, she can back up her tough talk!

Lina’s endearing personality is what makes her a great lead. She certainly won’t take any insults from someone without a fight. Whether it is an ally or an enemy, she will quickly unleash her full power. Lina is still not your average hero as she will occasionally blow up villages and mountains by mistake, but she does end up saving the world so hopefully it all balances out. Slayers wouldn’t be nearly as interesting without her in the lead.

Gourry is Lina’s partner and he’s always been a very interesting character to watch even if he is very unlikable. It is a bit of a tricky puzzle eh? The first episodes of this show continue to prove why he will never be likable, but at least he does provide the show with a lot of its humor. He never understands the gravity of a situation, but that doesn’t stop him from trying his best. Gourry always has his game face on and with his Sword of Light, he can deal some heavy damage to just about anyone. He did go up against Valgaav after all! He’s about the same from the past two series, which is good. If they made him likable, then that would be even better.

Amelia’s role here is certainly smaller than in the first two series. She is still a member of royalty, but she doesn’t get her own adventures this time. She’s simply tagging along for the ride like Zelgadis. She’s still a nice character and she gets her hits in at times. It’s hard to say who the weak link of the team is at this point as it is between her and Zelgadis. It is very close, but she tries her best and fills the team with optimism. They certainly need at least one hero on the team right?

Zelgadis continues to lose more and more of his dignity. I’d bet dollars to donuts that the writers for Try did not like him as a character. He is literally used as bait, an anchor, and simply tossed around when it is time for jokes. He may have been a decent character in the original series and almost decent in Next, but now he’s just a really bad character. I find it almost impossible to like him. It is too bad since he gets a lot of scenes that are supposed to make you say “Snap, this guy’s cool!” That is not my reaction to the scenes and I can’t think of a single moment where Zelgadis actually did a critical thing here. Not a single scene……his fans will not be pleased.

Filia is the new addition to the group and she ends up replacing Sylphiel. She is a gold dragon and her powers are impressive during her first appearance. As a gold dragon, her speed was so great that none of the main characters could land a hit on her. (An accurate depiction of speed…impossible!) Unfortunately, that’s where the buck stops as she is not really useful against any other opponents for the rest of the series. She evidently has some useful abilities like super strength and her spells, but the enemies are always one step ahead of her. It’s too bad as the exact same thing happened to Sylphiel.

As far as personality goes, she has a little Amelia in her. Filia thinks of herself as a bit of a hero so she is always dismayed when the heroes engage in criminal activities. She also does a lot of soul searching as the series goes on because of what her fellow golden dragons did. Perhaps she takes this a little too personally as she had nothing to do with most of their evil deeds. It is regrettable, but she doesn’t need to lose all hope over it. She nearly jeopardizes the final battle as she proved to be indecisive. Her rivalry with Xellos is fun though and while she is no match for him in a fight, perhaps she can defeat him in the battle of burns. (Burns=Insulting an opponent so well that you metaphysically burned them) As far as the main cast goes, it is: Lina>>Amelia>>Filia>>Sylphiel>>Zelgadis>>Gourry>>>>>>>Xellos. So, Filia’s rank isn’t all that bad. She could certainly better, but her personality fits in well with the team and doesn’t get old quite as quickly as Zelgadis’ gimmick. It’s also good to have a little more muscle power on the team.

Ah…now it’s time to talk about Xellos. A seriously disliked him from his very first appearance. While he will likely never look quite as bad as in Next, he’s still not my kind of character. For starters, he is constantly betraying the heroes to advance on his own goals. He is a monster through and through so he does remind the heroes that they should never trust him. Just because he makes that clear from the start, doesn’t make it any less sad when he betrays them again. Xellos has physically attacked the team during their scuffles and while he typically holds back so they aren’t very injured, he has come close to destroying the world. The heroes really need to treat him like a total enemy and stop pulling their punches. The sad thing is that Xellos could easily destroy the heroes in an instant if he so desires. He is really just toying with them and that can’t help the egos of the heroes all that much. As a villain, it can be fun to see Xellos act so smug and insult all of the other villains, but I wish that the show would totally keep him on the villain side. It would make him much more bearable. Still, it we’re just talking about this series, he is not that bad. I’ll never consider him as a villain though. How would the rankings change if we just counted this series? I suppose that he would jump over Gourry and Zelgadis. It’s possible that he could also pass Sylphiel, but it would be close.

All right, it is time to talk about the best villain in the show. He is also potentially the best character in the series as well. I’m talking about Valgaav! Valgaav is a mix of monster and dragon so his abilities are quite formidable. He is one of the only opponents to be on the winning side against Xellos and he takes on a good portion of the cast at once. That is before the final power up that he gets, which made him virtually unstoppable. He is a villain who had a tragic past and he loves jumping into peril. He’s simply my kind of villain and he acts like other all stars. (Grimmjow comes to mind) All of his fights are interesting and I’m glad that he didn’t decide to listen to Almayce like the average pawn. If Valgaav wanted to do something, then he would just go and do it! He had a nice blend of emotional moments as well as intense ones. Really, when it all boils down to it, Valgaav is probably the best character in the franchise. I thought about it for a bit and there is really no better character. It is a shame since he will likely never appear again, but at least he got a grand role in this series. Thanks to his final power up, you can definitely make the claim that he is the strongest character in the series. The Lord of Nightmares may contest that though. Valgaav got to prove that he was stronger than the other three villains, which is a good enough start for me! Maybe we’ll get a spinoff/prequel about him someday..maybe. (His origin isn’t exactly something that I’m very interested in though so I’d want it to take place right before Try) Valgaav also gave us the very first, big fight of Try so his debut was a very memorable one.

Almayce is the big villain for most of the series, but it is safe to say that he overestimated his power. He’s actually weaker than the other three big villains of the series although it seems like he could potentially still defeat Xellos. So, maybe he also outranks two of the other opponents, but it is hard to say. His design is great and he looked like a very menacing villain for a while. The problem is that he doesn’t know where he stands. On one hand, he is certainly a villain as he is constantly hurting people and endangering lives. On the other hand, he is trying to save the planet while getting rid of Dark Star…..I’ll just count him as a villain.

Because he is constantly switching sides, Almayce loses sight of what is happening and that’s when the villains make their move. Almayce went down rather easily even though he should have been expecting someone to destroy him. He was causing trouble for both the heroes and the other villains. It would have been cool to have seen him fight more, but he still made for a fun boss to oppose the heroes.

Erulogs joins the fray towards the end of the series along with Sirius. It was odd to see him join in as the series was already heading to a close, but the more villains the better right? I liked him more than Sirius, less than Valgaav, and slightly more than Almayce. His abilities were very impressive as the heroes could not hold a candle to his power. He felt like the average DBZ villain and that is always a good thing. It is too bad that he didn’t get more of a role.

It was still bigger than the role of Sirius though. Sirius is the more rational of the two villains and he wants to learn as much as he can. He also doesn’t mind sparing the Earth as long as it won’t hurt his chances of survival. He is a villain that the heroes can work with and his abilities are still impressive. He doesn’t seem to be as tough as Erulogs, but he is still tough enough to keep the heroes back. While his design was not too good, his personality made him a decent villain.

It is worth mentioning the Dragon King Elder because he is so terrible that it becomes laughable towards the end. Not literally as this guy did single handily bring two different species of dragons to their extinction. (Filia may be the only dragon in existence anymore. Certainly the only Gold one left and the ancient ones are gone as well) The Elder wants the gold dragons to rule over all, but his life comes first and foremost. He is defiant to the end as he dies while explaining that he regrets nothing and he would do it all over again. He betrays his heroes to the villains and doesn’t seem to have a whole lot of common sense. It is regrettable that he became the leader of the Golden Dragons since he definitely did not have their best interests at heart.

Dark Star is the big villain for this series and he lives up to the hype. It is always fun to meet another Dark Lord from the tree of power. Shabranigdo is still the most impressive beast, but Dark Star is no slouch in the power department. Simply by flapping his wings, he can bring the heroes to the verge of death and he can shoot a variety of energy blasts. Dark Star’s flight speed is incredible and he’s a known planet destroyer. Everything about this villain is cool and hie design is actually like the symbiote from Marvel. At least the face resembles Venom. Dark Star is virtually unstoppable and his only weakness are the legendary weapons of light. Without them, you can essentially confirm the destruction of your planet. Spells don’t hurt him because Dark Star’s soul is in another plane of existence so physical attacks are the only way to challenge him. Dark Star made for a great end boss to the series and he’s probably the second best monster villain behind Shabranigdo.

Aside from the serious villains, we also got some low ranking ones to mention. Jillas was mostly played for laughs, but he actually got a serious subplot towards and the end and it hit you right in the feels. (Feels=Emotions. So, if something hits you in the feels, it’s like metaphysically hitting your sad or happy emotion and triggering that feeling inside of you. That’s how I’ve always thought of it anyway.) He has to leave his family at the end to help defend the planet and he also decides to finally move away from his thoughts of revenge. While most of the characters in the series have magical abilities, Jillas is stuck with his sheer intelligence. He is good at making bombs, but that certainly won’t carry him very far against the kinds of villains that are present here. He was fairly likable though at times and he was much better than his partner.

Gravos is an ogre type of demon and he never becomes likable. The writers don’t even try to make him sympathetic aside from an incredibly brief origin story. He means well I suppose as he is just following orders, but he isn’t nearly as interesting as Jillas. At least Jillas has his motivations and desires to keep him going, but Gravos is more of a two dimensional villain. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it doesn’t exactly help me like his character either.

While the series is typically very light toned, there are a few moments of violence that clash with the rest of the series. The battle between Xellos and Valgaav was pretty brutal and likewise for the origin stories of Jillas and Gravos. This happened in the previous two Slayers series as well as everything would be very chipper until a sudden violent scene makes you take a double look. It’s nothing over the top though and it is typically quick so you don’t need to dwell on it, but the violence is certainly around. The dragons get extinct…twice, and they certainly don’t go down without a fight. Xellos vs Valgaav is still the one that will stick out the most simply because the show still plays Xellos off as a hero of sorts and this is certainly not heroic behavior. He is a monster and he is technically a villain, but the heroes barely treat him as such.

It is also about time for me to quickly address the plot hax that is present here. Now, this is a problem is virtually all forms of media and in almost all titles. Still, the plot hax is especially prevalent here as Lina and her friends are a group of humans who are trying to stop extremely powerful forces. No matter how many great spells they get like the Ragna Blade, there is no way that Lina and friends should last a minute against such powerful foes. Almost all of the high level monsters and gods are shown to move at hyper speeds. Lina is still a human and can’t run much faster than a normal one. At most, she is Captain America level in speed and power. She should still get speedblitzed at the beginning of every match.

The Slayers verse seems to place a lot of emphasis on physical power and none on speed, which is a little misguided. Raw power does not matter if you cannot hit the opponent and that’s my main problem with the title. Lina should be way too slow for any of her attacks to be useful here and she still manages to get in some good hits at times. It’s just a little odd and certainly unbelievable, but it is simply the route that the show has gone. Perhaps the writers feel that Lina and her pals would be less relatable if they had special powers aside from their spells. It’s their choice I suppose.

The animation is a step down from Next, but it still looks good. I’m assuming that the budget was likely reduced, but the series still has enough juice in it for some epic action scenes. The rest of the series is just a little more pale and dated than the vibrantly colorful Next. The fights are the important part though and the long action scenes are as good as you could have hoped for here. The heroes give it their all now that they can finally fight a little more: Gourry with his improved Sword of Light mastery, Lina with her Ragna Blade, Zelgadis with his sword, etc.

There’s not much to say about the soundtrack since it is the same as in the previous two shows. As for the theme song, it is all right, but it could be better. It is just not as exciting and moving as it could have been, but it is not a bad theme song either. Perhaps the end themes of the Slayers movies have simply spoiled me as they would certainly work better as a theme song than what we got here. The theme song is also a little misleading. As the overall soundtrack has not changed, Slayers Try sounds just as good as the first two installments.

Overall, Slayers Try is a good series. I was hesitant to give it the full 7 as it did have its share of issues with the pacing and just not being quite as fun as the first two series, but it comes very close to reaching that mark. The soundtrack has not changed and the animation has only dipped a little. The main team of Lina and Gourry is still one of the driving forces of the show. The ending certainly feels like it could have been the end of the franchise, but it still would have been a sad one as I disagreed with Gourry’s decision. We got to meet some more powerful beasts from the Slayers verse and I look forward to eventually seeing an ultimate confrontation between the humans, dragons, monsters, and gods. My money is certainly on the monsters, but it would be a good fight. The balance between humor and action can be awkward, especially when mixed. Xellos being defeated by a song towards the end was a little random, but I’ll assume that he is just trolling as per usual. Jumping from serious moments to comedy ones is a delicate art that is hard to master. Slayers Next probably did the best job, but Slayers Try gave it a fair effort. I recommend checking this series out if you want a good fantasy title and while you don’t need to watch the first two series first, I would still recommend doing so. At least, Slayers Next, since one of the main villains wants to destroy the heroes because of what happened there.

Overall 6/10

Yugioh Zexal Review

Posted on March 29, 2015 by dreager1

Yugioh is currently the greatest franchise of all time. It has exceled in every area and that is a feat which is nearly impossible to match. It currently possesses the greatest movie of all time and the greatest TV show of all time. Yugioh also has another 9 star show in 5Ds and a great title in the original. The video games have been terrific and R/Duelist ensure that the manga section is elite as well. From this, you can probably see why Zexal has so much pressure on it. Zexal probably has the worst rep from all of the main shows, but it is debatable as many people do not like GX with a passion. Zexal ended up being a great show, but it is safe to say that it could never end up reaching the same level as any of the previous three shows. A fate similar to that if Cardfight G at the moment.

The show takes place many years after 5Ds. Technically, it may not be in continuity, but there are enough nods that we can essentially place it in the timeline. Just in an unofficial way like Avengers Assemble. The story follows a kid named Yuma as he goes through his days striving to high five the sky. He is a terrible duelist, but he never gives up and has a lot of fun. One day, he gets a pendant and a spirit named Astral appears. The spirit has lost his memories and needs to recover the 100 Number Cards to get them back. Naturally, Yuma decides to help and Astral decides to make him a better duelist along the way.

The first arc mainly deals with a large tournament. Mr. Heartland is one of the organizers and it is safe to say that he is corrupt. His boss wants to do something shifty with the numbers and he coerces number hunter, Kite, to join the fray as well. Throw in a bunch of other characters and we’ve got quite a tournament. Can Yuma defeat all of these fighters!?

The second arc deals with the Barian Emperors. They have arrived on Earth and wish to destroy Astral and his world along with him. Yuma will have to level up his dueling abilities even more if he is going to defeat them, but things get personal when he finds out that there may be a traitor or two in his midst. His bonds of friendship are shaken to the core. How can Yuma fight for his friends when they may not even be his friends!? The stakes get higher in this arc and it is also a lot darker. I definitely can’t forget the arc opener…that was intense!

Zexal distinguishes itself from the other Yugioh series with how exaggerated the dueling is. Not that the stakes are the highest or anything like that, but you can do almost anything in a single turn. Need to summon 6-8 monsters at once? Not a problem! Need to do the triple fusion to build the overlay network and summon your favorite monster on the first turn? No worries, you can even deal some damage while you are at it. The combos are seriously overpowered here. It is to the point where you need a dynamite hand from the start or else you are doomed. Luckily, the duelists have luck and Shining Draw skills on their side.

To counter all of the monster combos, we have constant traps at the ready. There are likely more trap battles here than in the rest of the franchise. Duelists are constantly playing spell and trap cards so often that it feels like a classic DBZ fight! “Are you done?” “Almost, but first I activate…” This happens soooo many times during the series. I thought it was overdone, but I suppose that spell and trap cards are fun to use. It makes for sone great boasts during the duel.

There are quite a few deux ex machinas to be found as Yuma will unveil a new card at just the right time! He also got some new cards when he first leveled up into his Super Saiyan form. A pretty good bonus if you ask me! This is regrettable, but I know that it is pretty hard to avoid considering how strong the villains are at times. The new cards are typically fun, which is always good.

The new gimmick that is added to the actual duels is that you can now Exceed summon. It is similar to fusion and it’s almost the same thing. The main difference is that your monsters need to be the same level. You don’t need to tune them or activate a card to fuse the monsters, the levels just have to align and then you’ve got a new monster at the ready to help out! It’s not a bad gimmick and it’s fairly easy to use. It’s a lot better than Cardfight G’s gimmick, but it’s probably not quite as fun as Synchro Summoning. Also, the show’s exaggerated play style points out the holes in this technique as you can seriously take advantage of the new way of summoning. It was still a fun addition to watch while it was around though.

Zexal’s animation is big, bold, and bright. Similar to how the 90’s comics loved their exaggerated panels and colorful designs, Zexal takes a similar approach. Other anime that have basically done this include Saint Seiya Omega and Digimon Fusion. It is certainly not my favorite style and I prefer something more streamlined like Yugioh GX, but I suppose that it works well enough. The animation is still pretty good even if it is not great. Some episodes spared no expense like Kite’s first duel or some of the big budget battles that would pop up now and again. You certainly would not mistake this for being an older title and it took advantage of the many energy attacks that were present. Unfortunately, a lot of the monsters still manage to be in total CGI, which looks significantly less impressive. Nothing beats watching a hand drawn monster appear to take names and beat up on the opponents. It’s a lot more satisfying to watch after all.

Zexal’s soundtrack is certainly one area where it does not impress. Most of the themes are fairly generic and you will forget them very easily. Most of the tunes aren’t bad, but it just felt like no real effort was put into them. That being said, you will probably start to like them by the time you are done with the show. You will have heard them many times after all and since the array of themes is rather limited, they have to keep playing them for each battle.

Kite is the best character of the show so we may as well talk about him first. He is Yuma’s true rival in the show although you can make the case for Shark as well. Kite uses a Photon deck and what is unique about it is that he rarely exceed summons. He prefers to fight with more traditional techniques like tribute summoning. His Neo Galaxy Eyes dragon is a true beast and a worthy opponent to come up against. I liked Kite right from the start and his ability to manipulate the flow of time was excellent. He provided the show with a good enemy and he is probably the only human who was able to help a lot in the final battle while on his own. It doesn’t get much better than facing someone while in outer space!

Shark was Yuma’s first rival although I would argue that Kite fits the roll a little better. Shark duels rather early on in the series, but then he takes a backseat for a while. It is hard to say why, but if just felt like Shark wasn’t around as often as the others until the Barian arc. He did have quite a few important duels and he was in the climax so I am not sure why I get that feeling. Either way, by the end of the series he is easily in second or third as far as the most influential characters go. (Minus Astral)

Shark is a good rival. He lost rather quickly as a lot of shows like to have the hero beat the rival in the first episodes, but things went up for him from there. He was definitely one of the more likable heroes. Then, the final arc happened. Let’s just say that the “I fight for my friends” idea was thrown out the window. Shark was torn between his loyalties to Earth and his real home. Ultimately, he decides to choose the latter and that would have been ok if handled differently.

The problem is that there is no good reason for Shark’s last few decisions. He wants to protect some people, but he is conveniently forgetting that those people have been causing damage and mayhem in the city. He should also know that Yuma and co are not planning on doing anything drastic so they could all talk about this. Unfortunately, Astral is also very frustratingly extreme on the issue, which does not help. The whole climax could have been avoided if Shark had simply agreed with Yuma. That way everyone would coexist in peace. Astral’s clan wanted war as well, but it would be easy for Yuma to calm them down since he did save them a while back. Ah well, Shark still proves himself to be a very good duelist and he still did help out a lot. He is easily one of the best heroes for the first arc and he is an intimidating fighter in the final one. We can’t really call him a hero anymore though since he destroyed another hero and attempted to destroy an entire race.

Yuma is the main character of the show and he upholds the tradition of most Yugioh leads having a name that begins with a Y. Jaden may have not confirmed to this tradition, but he is Jaden. His skills allow him to write his own legacy. Yuma is pretty bad at dueling when the show first starts. He is probably worse than normal Yugi was at the time although it is probably debatable. As the series progresses, Yuma becomes a pro in his own right. I would certainly still consider Yugi, Jaden, and Yusei to be better duelists, but Yuma’s deck is probably better than Yugi’s (Minus the God Cards) and Yusei’s. Yuma’s many variations of Utopia will serve him well. Yuma’s deck has an incredible number of cards as new ones keep on popping up whenever he is in a pinch.

Yuma is the only lead in Yugioh who gets multiple super forms as the series progresses. His first form is probably the best as he becomes a Super Saiyan! That was definitely pretty awesome. Naturally, his forms come with their own special abilities like Shining Draw. Shining Draw is very useful as it allows you to draw any card that you want. This naturally shifts the balance of power in any duel. I am inclined to believe that Yuma also gets a degree of flight, super strength, and speed, but it is a little hard to verify.

As for his personality, Yuma is a decent lead. I prefer my main characters to be more confident and talented, but Yuma still has other good traits. He never gives up on his friends as shown in his final duels with Vector, Shark, and Astral. He’s definitely a hero and Yuma would never destroy a villain. He tries to see the good inside of every character. Yuma may take it to extremes, but at least you know that you can certainly trust him in a pinch! When he is serious, Yuma can be a real threat as a duelist and his skill progression was handled rather well. If he could have fewer comic relief scenes at times, he would be an even better lead.

Astral is a ghost who accompanies Yuma for the duration of the series. He lost his memories and he needs Yuma to get them back. The two heroes have a number of good adventures, but Astral still keeps his original goal in mind. He wants the complete destruction of Barian World. Nothing Yuma says will change his mind so they eventually engage in a duel. It is rather disappointing to see how low Astral has gotten in that final duel. There is a twist which suggests that Astral may have just been testing Yuma, but I still wonder about that. If Yuma had not that the proven the heart of the cards was with him, I think we may have had to say goodbye to Barian World.

Astral’s gimmick is that he’s new to Earth so he asks a lot of questions and makes observations. I don’t tend to care for a character like that and Astral may be a pro, but he’s the kind of guy who rarely makes his own decisions and simply listens to the corrupt men in charge. He never ended up being a good character for me, but he could have been a lot worse. At least he fought when the going got tough.

Dr. Faker was one of the first big villains of the series. He was never a favorite of mine, but he had a pretty nifty super form. He also gave us one of the best battles of the series, which was a lot of fun. That being said, he just didn’t have a great design and lacked the personality needed to make a villain really threatening. I would say that Vetrix was an improvement, but not really. Zexal really struggled with the villains in the first part of the series. Vetrix’s voice took away any mystery that he could have had. His deck was pretty handy though and it was certainly dangerous. That just didn’t make him a great villain.

I’m afraid that Yuma’s friends weren’t great. Bronk was your average bully who wasn’t good at dueling, but eventually became Yuma’s friend. Unfortunately, his skills never got better. Flip, Caswell, and Cathy were around, but they never helped out or became likable characters either. Tori is the main heroine of the series and she does her best to cheer Yuma on, but the show missed its big opportunity by never really letting her duel. This means that she was relegated to the background and never had much of an impact on the story.

Rio is Shark’s sister and she doesn’t really get to appear until the start of the second part of the show. She is a very good duelist and a nice supporting character to have around. Finally, we had a friend who could duel! Unfortunately, that was around when the twist about the Barian Emperors came around so her days as a hero were very limited. She was a tough duelist until the end though and her ice deck was fun.

Dextra was one of the allies/rivals from the early part of the series along with Nistro. They faded away in the final arc, but they still tried to help. Dextra was a good character although she never got to do all that much and her overall fight record wasn’t that great. Nistro talks a good game, but his actual skills aren’t quite as good as he would like to think. He still put up a good fight against one of the Barian Emperors, but he was doomed from the start.

Quattro tries to be like a rival to Shark in the series. He doesn’t duel the guy enough for us to really count it, but that’s what his personality is like. He mellows out after the first arc though and manages to be more likable than Trey, but not quite as cool as Quinton. It’s almost hard to imagine how he could have become so nice after he was so evil at first, but it just shows that he had some fast character development. He was a fun supporting character.

I didn’t really care for Trey though. He was the nice guy of the group, but he was tricked rather easily and this leads to disagreements with Yuma. He does help Yuma out of a few jams though so his helpfulness should not be overlooked. Most of the other heroes aren’t quite as useful when push comes to shove. Quinton is still the best of the group and it isn’t just because he has one of the coolest number cards. He’s a good duelist right up until the end and he puts up a good fight against Mizar, which is more than most of the other characters can say. He has an air of confidence about him and that makes Quinton a worthy hero to have on one’s side.

Dumon is one of the nicer Barian Emperors. He’s actually very reasonable and if the other emperors weren’t always looking for a fight, the heroes could have likely made peace through him. It wasn’t to be though and unfortunately, Dumon is also one of the weaker ones. His deck simply wasn’t very imaginative, but his design was cool. Mizar is easily one of the cooler Barian Emperors and I remember how epic his first appearance was. After having to watch Girag for so long, I was thrilled to have someone around who could fight. It was also the first time that Shark, Kite, and Yuma had gathered together in quite a while. Mizar’s Galaxy Eyes made for a great monster and while he may have been cannon fodder for the final boss, Mizar never backed down.

Girag is one of the Barian Emperors and he’s one of the main reasons why the show got off to a slow start at first. (Minus the first episode) It’s really hard to take him seriously and he’s actually a fairly weak duelist. His number isn’t very impressive and he spends a lot of time getting taken out or simply relying on minions. It’s a good thing that he had other emperors to back him up. Alito was a decent one who used to be a bit of a boxer. His deck was the most normal out of the emperors as he didn’t rely on a lot of fancy tricks to win. He simply hit hard and hit fast. Alito’s certainly a little gullible and it can be sad to see him turn on Yuma so suddenly, but he ultimately realizes that he has to fight to win. Behind Mizar and Vector and Nash and Rio……he is the best one…which is sort of saying something right?

We also can’t forget Dark Astral. He was a pretty fun villain to have. It was also a fun plot since we didn’t know that numbers could have a will of their own before that moment occurred. He got several power ups and proved to be a thorn in the side of the heroes for quite some time. I liked his character a lot and his ending wasn’t very satisfying, but you certainly can’t say that he didn’t have a lot of action before that. He got to fight quite a few times and he displayed a whole lot of power while he was around. He was a very threatening villain to be sure.

Eliphas was one of the big members of Astral World and the only one who could fight aside from Astral. His design was very good and you could certainly tell that he was a threat to any duelist. His cards weren’t very overpowered or anything, he was simply a very good duelist. It was fun to see him upgrade his monsters over and over again to be sure. He’s a rather unreasonable character and one of the main reasons why Astral ended up making some bad decisions. I certainly can’t call Eliphas a hero, but he made for a fun villain although his appearances were brief.

Mr. Heartland is one of those characters who will leave you in suspense for a while. He appears a lot in the show, but he rarely ever gets to duel. He gets an intriguing super form in Zexal II, but it certainly didn’t help me become a fan of him. He was another uninteresting villain. Meanwhile, Yuma’s Dad seemed like a good character, but his plot never really went anywhere. It seems like he’s still alive of course, but he just never checks in on Yuma. He prefers to help from the shadows, but he certainly could have helped the heroes save the planet if he had wanted too. I’m not sure how much of a duelist he is, but I’m willing to bet that he was a powerful one.

Vector is one of the biggest villains and also one of the best ones. He uses trickery to make the heroes lower their guards before striking. He’s an excellent duelist as well so you shouldn’t underestimate him either. In terms of raw power, he was easily one of the biggest threats that Yuma had to face. It’s a good thing for the hero that they’re just facing each other in a duel right? Vector spends most of the season pretending to be Yuma’s ally and his scheme works rather well. It’s pretty disheartening for the heroes to find a traitor in their midst, but that’s just how smooth Vector is. His Barian form was certainly cool. Shark should have been a little more alert when around this guy, but in the end, the heroes were ready for his tricks. Without him, it would have been very hard to have taken the Barian Emperors seriously. I’d say that Shark is still the best villain, but it’s between Vector and the upcoming villain for second place.

Don Thousand is the ultimate villain of this series and he was an epic way to end the series. He wasn’t the actual final boss that Yuma had to face, but he felt like it. His true form looks like something you would see out of Toriko and his deck doesn’t disappoint in how powerful it is. Don Thousand can actually rewrite reality thanks to one of his spell cards so he can change your card into another one. It’s the kind of ability that is almost impossible to stop and it’s a lot of fun to see how powerful a card can be. He can certainly hold his own against any other final boss in the Yugioh franchise and he’s also one of the cooler ones. It was seriously fun to watch him duel.

One area where Zexal surpassed the other Yugioh series was in how many filler or “filler” episodes that it had. Some of the battles may have technically been important for the number cards, but they were effectively filler. This happens for most of Yuma’s early tournament battles as well as his early days and even the Barian Emperor had some when Yuma had to fight random people who were taken over by Barian Force. The filler episodes certainly slowed the pacing down and weren’t as exciting as the big episodes. As such, you need to be a big fan of the actual dueling or that will hurt the experience for you a bit. We have a whole episode about Yuma dueling a guy who liked tomatoes and Yuma has to eat them during the duel. It’s pretty surreal.

As with most Yugioh series, the tone is very light at first, but then things get serious towards the end. It’s almost a tradition at this point that the whole supporting cast has to be eliminated towards the end. It happened in GX, and now it happened here. Okay…that’s two out of 4 series, but we’ll see what happens once Arc V arrives. Either way, the stakes were certainly very high. Perhaps not quite as much as GX, which was the original, but still higher than you would have guessed from the beginning.

The climax of each arc is also pretty great as you would expect. I actually preferred the first big battle as it was Kite, Shark, and Yuma against the villain in season 1. Season 2 couldn’t top that so it was just Shark and Yuma against the villain. Still really epic of course, but nothing beats a 3 on 1 duel. The animation and tension greatly improved in Zexal II so it really did put out all of the stops. One of the reasons why Yugioh always has such a great climax is because it already established all of the characters early on in the series. This means that you will be caring about each duel at the end and the stakes keep getting higher and higher. Also, I still have to say that the first episode of Zexal II was brilliant, so brilliant that it holds up against the climax as well.

Zexal is well over 100 episodes, which is a pretty good size. It’s shorter than 5D’s, which was shorter than GX, which was shorter than the original Yugioh, but I’m satisfied as long as we continue to crack 100 episodes. As I already mentioned, it’s not quite as good as the first three shows either, but it’s still a great show. It’s simply tough to top those legends as the first three Yugioh series were basically all stars. The main reason why Zexal can’t top them is because the soundtrack, animation, and duels are typically not as good as say, 5D’s. Ah well, it’s not the newest kid on the block now so a little pressure will leave it for a while.

Overall, Yugioh Zexal is a great show despite its flaws. It easily cracked the 8 stars rating and exceeded expectations that may have been had after the first episodes. We got lot of great duels. The animation was very good and the soundtrack had some good moments although it was certainly unimpressive. Zexal may be at the bottom of the hill for now, but once Arc V starts in America, it should be able to move up a spot. At the very least, I don’t see it passing Zexal until it has 50+ episodes. If you liked the other Yugioh titles, I recommend this one. The card fighting can be a tad exaggerated in their constant traps, but it will be a long, yet fun ride. Even if you just want a fun action title that is fairly light, this is a good bet. Watch out for the statue reference to GX.

Overall 8/10

Cardfight Vanguard Review

Posted on February 7, 2015 by dreager1

Cardfight Vanguard has quickly risen up the anime ranks and it is currently the third greatest show of all time. The series controversially decided to leave the old cast so that we could get a sequel series in the form of Cardfight Vanguard G. I have no doubt that it will be a great sequel, but I can’t help thinking that they’ve made a grave mistake. It’ll be extremely difficult to pass this series. If you’re looking for action and good visuals, you’ve definitely come to the right place!

The first season is around 60-70 episodes and it starts the franchise off on a high note. The world is engrossed with a mysterious game called Cardfight Vanguard. Aichi Sendou is your average student who is a little on the timid side, but he’s always liked the game. A bully steals his card, but then gets it taken from the local pro so Aichi is forced to duel this kid. His name is Toshiki Kai and Aichi crushes him in the first episode. Of course, that means that Aichi is now on everyone’s radar! The show stays on a day by day schedule for a while until the plot really begins. Kai had a friend who goes by the name of Ren. Ren has now unlocked Psyqualia, which allows you to win any game of Cardfight. This is practically cheating so Aichi needs to put him in his place, but that will be difficult. He enters a lot of tournaments and gains experience, but defeating Ren and crushing his evil ambitions may get dangerous. Aichi is also getting tempted to join the dark side.

Season 2 began the Asia Circuit and once again, life was back to normal. Everyone just had fun playing Vanguard and things seemed right with the world. This couldn’t last as Aichi woke up one day to find that his deck was erased from history. The whole clan had been wiped out or so it would seem. None of his friends have any memory of it. Aichi’s only chance is to win the VF circuit so that he could meet Takuto and force him to spill the beans. Takuto is suspect number one since he always has an evil grin, happens to be rich, and just looked downright sinister. Aichi teams up with Kamui and Misaki, but this isn’t quite the dream team that you would expect because Kai has joined up with Ren on another team. No worries, Ren’s a good guy now, but this will make Aichi’s journey a lot more difficult. Throw in new teams like I.T. Genius and Leon’s group and the journey will definitely get intense. The climax also involves a mysterious entity that sticks around for the next 90-100 episodes.

Next up was the Link Joker arc and it’s easily the best arc in the entire franchise as well as being one of the best arcs in anime history. I would probably say that it is the second best arc of all time behind GX’s Yubel story. The theme song perfectly sums up the plot as Aichi appears with his friends and then they start to disappear. See, a mysterious foe known as Link Joker has appeared on the planet Cray (I’ll talk about that later) and it is eliminating all of the clans. The infection spreads to the human world and it takes over Takuto, using him to take over Kai. Kai is now going across the planet as he defeats many fighters. When a character loses to someone with Link Joker’s power, they are reversed. Being “reversed” means that the person now works for Link Joker and their dueling abilities are greatly strengthened. One by one, most of Aichi’s friends are corrupted by this force and he will have to finally win on his own. His friends have provided him with strength in the past and now Aichi will get to return the favor. Still, can he beat a foe who was able to beat Kai (Arc 1 Boss), Ren (Season 1 Boss), I.T. Genius, (Season 2 Sub Boss) and almost all of Aichi’s other friends? This will definitely be Aichi’s toughest challenge. It’s also the final season of this saga that is dubbed, but at least it got to end on a high note.

Finally, the anime took a pretty big turn as the final arc is pretty different from the others. Aichi has disappeared..the main character is gone! Kai realizes that nobody else remembers who Aichi is (Sounds like season 2’s plot a little eh?) and that people only remember if he defeats them in a Cardfight. He recovers the memories of Misaki, Miwa, and Kamui. Before they can help the other friends, a group called the Quatre Knights appears and warns them not to interfere. The heroes are crushed by these new villains and they will need to get a lot stronger if they want to win. They will have to do this on their own since letting the other friends in on the action will put them in danger. Kai has been through a lot of tough duels, but this will be his toughest challenge yet. The question is…what happened to Aichi and why are these Quatre Knights able to use super powers? It’s time to find out!

Before I go into the characters or why the show is so awesome or even about the planet Cray, let’s go through some of the more basic positives. One of them is the stunning animation. It really looks dynamite and it puts a lot of other current shows to shame. NarutocoughShippudencough. The colors are all very vibrant and I really like just about all of the character designs. You can bet that I won’t be forgetting Aichi or Kai anytime soon. Aichi’s new look for the final 2 episodes of the show is more than a little dicey, but it’s only 2 episodes and I liked his first 3-5 designs so I’d say that the show more than filled the bill there. Watching the monsters duke it out is great and they look very intimidating. Watching the Link Joker arc will let you see just how intense a cardfight can really get. It’s pretty amazing just how great everything looks.

Naturally, this wouldn’t be a proper 9 star rating without an elite soundtrack right? I’m confident that it could have theoretically gotten a 9 anyway, but soundtracks are so pivotal for shows that I’m glad Cardfight brought us such a good one. The themes are great right from season 1 and we also get a signature theme for Link Joker in the third season. I can’t think of any new tunes from seasons 2 and 4, but I’m sure that they brought in something. The battle themes really make sense and some characters like Kamui have their own themes, which makes their battles feel more unique. The show also had 8 openings and they are all good. Some are definitely better than others and I don’t think that the first opening of Link Joker aged very well. That’s quickly countered by the other two Link Joker openings, which are downright amazing. Season 4’s second theme is pretty incredible as well. Once again, Cardfight manages to never let us down in any of the areas that really matter.

All right, let’s take a look at the cast. Aichi Sendou is the main character and he definitely gets a lot of character development as the series progresses. He goes from being a total rookie to being one of the most respected and talented individuals to ever play Cardfight Vanguard. His confidence also goes up through the series and we see him become very heroic and noble once the Link Joker arc occurs. He’s essentially the perfect main character and he’s basically flawless. Aichi can be a little naive as he believes that anyone who plays the game must be a good person deep down, but at least he always tries to see the best in everyone. His role in season 4 is controversial to say the least, but I’ll discuss that later on. All in all, it’s really tough for a lead to pass Aichi and he’ll forever be known as one of the elite characters.

Toshiki Kai is the rival of the series and he eventually becomes the main character for the final season. It’s a pretty big step up since it’s rare for the rival to steal the spotlight from the lead. He starts out as a loner who is obsessed with being the best player in the world, but through his own strength. He doesn’t wasn’t Psyqualia or any shortcuts to get more power. He has a brilliant speech in his two part battle against Takuto, but the ending gets a little dicey for him. His character development is much like Sasuke’s, but you could argue that it’s a little more emotional. Kai’s easily my favorite character in the series and he does a good job of playing the rival role. He maybe gets a little too into the friendship angle in season 4, but he more than makes up for this once he duels the opponents. He is easily one of the best rivals of all time.

Misaki started out as the senior member of Aichi’s little group. Kai was the mean loner, Aichi was the heroic rookie, and Kamui was the inexperienced kid who always rushed in first. The dynamic definitely made the team feel complete. Unfortunately, Misaki started to get the shaft towards the end of the series. After the pre arc in season 3, she only got a few duels and she didn’t even get to win any of them in season 4. She definitely ended on a relatively low note. Her dueling abilities never seemed to be very impressive as her skills seemed to halt after the VF circuit. It’s entirely possible that Kamui and Naoki surpassed her. She’s a good ally to have on the team and her strategic style of playing the game was unique. Misaki may not have had much to do at the end, but she’s probably one of the best main Cardfighting heroines that we’ve seen so far.

Kamui rounds out Team Q4. You could say that he’s the lucky member as he gets to be a main character for the sequel series as well as this one. He does get phased out during season 3 in favor or Naoki, but he still gets a mini arc there, which isn’t bad. His hot headed personality definitely makes him a fun character to root for. Unfortunately, he does have a subplot where he has fallen into romance with one girl while another tries to divert his attention to her. That subplot I definitely could have done without and it never goes anywhere so it really was pointless in the end. Kamui may not always have the skills to back up his tough talk, but he’s definitely an exceptional fighter in his own right. He was one of the few characters to get his own theme, which is pretty impressive.

Ren is the main villain of season 1 and he may remind you of Creed from Black Cat, at least his attire. He was corrupted by the abilities granted to him by Psyqualia and he will use these new talents to take over the world. This skill has allowed him to surpass even the great Toshiki Kai so you can imagine why he is so feared at this point. In season 2, he becomes more of a rival. He interacts with Aichi, but he’s more of a rival/friend to Kai as they used to be when they were kids. Perhaps to make up for his evil ways, Ren is now extremely polite and nice. His character definitely did a complete 180 to how he was before the Psyqualia. That’s how he stays until the series ends. Ren still keeps his dominant Cardfighting abilities though and while he may not be stronger than Kai anymore, they are certainly at the same level and continue to pass each other.

Leon has a pretty sad history and it resulted in him going with a dark power to survive this ordeal. He makes for a pretty climactic boss in season 2 and his skills are to be feared. After that, he helps out a lot in the climax of season 3 and he even trains the heroes in the final season. He’s a rival figure like Ren and I would say that this mainly applies to Aichi this time. Leon rarely interacts with Kai and they don’t even get to fight in season 3. That would have been great, but it’s safe to say that Leon was outmatched. I consider Leon to be a little weaker than Ren and it was cool to see Leon face off against his future self. There are some plot elements that makes this a little dicey, but it was a daring strategy that was fun to see. It shows that you always have to duel with your best effort since the future is now. Leon’s wind gimmick is also a pretty good one as it never gets annoying or too obvious.

Kourin is the main member of Ultra Rare as she certainly appears a lot more than the other two members. She is a mysterious figure who arrives to challenge the heroes randomly during the first 2 seasons. She works for a mysterious man named Takuto and she is also a master Vanguard player even though she is supposed to be a pop idol who shouldn’t even know much about the game. She eventually rises up to become a main character during season 3 and a lot of twists start to occur. Kourin definitely gets one of the saddest conclusions to a character arc from anyone in the show. Things just don’t end on a happy note for her and it can be tough on her fans. She was a good character from start to finish, which is why it’s regrettable that she couldn’t stick around. Her final deck is very dangerous and even Kai has a lot of trouble with it.

Naoki goes from being a character who missed the first 2 seasons to ultimately being one of the most important supporting characters. His role is probably the most important aside from Kai once he is introduced. He just started playing the game so he is a rookie, but that doesn’t stop him from challenging pros like Kai and Aichi. He improves at a rapid pace as he duels the other opponents and he’s a serious contender for world tournaments by the end. He’s more of a hot head than Kamui and he used to be known as a bit of a delinquent so he definitely doesn’t back down from the villains. He does a good job of standing up to his opponents and his confidence never wavers. His deck may not be as flashy as some of the other characters, but he gets the job done. While his appearance does start to throw Kamui and Misaki out of the show, it’s hard not to like him. The show did a good job of making him likable so quickly considering that he entered the show pretty late.

Shingo is another new character who debuted alongside Naoki and he’s not even close to as talented as Naoki. He loves reading about Vanguard, but that doesn’t always translate well into pure skill. You could say that he is more of a beginner at this point and even by the end he is not a serious threat to any of the villains. He continues to insist that he is a better cardfighter than Naoki, but nobody ever really buys that. His dedication to the game is impressive I suppose, but I definitely wouldn’t have minded if he had not been introduced. Shingo’s a good example of a supporting character who came in too late and didn’t end up becoming likable.

Morikawa is one of Aichi’s pals from season 1 and he eventually becomes more of a guest star figure who pops up once in a while. He’s always very confident and it can be easy to root for him, but his obsession with Kourin definitely hurts any chance that he had of really being a likable character. It turns out that he is actually pretty good at the game when he doesn’t have to create a deck. (So he would fit in pretty well over in Buddyfight) but that’s more of a comedy gag than anything. He never gets any serious moments so he really is used as the comic relief of the show. Admirable, but he could have been better. At least having one cool moment or big fight would have been epic.

Miwa has been Kai’s best friend for quite a while and he always helps the rival when he is in a pinch. Whenever Kai is in a pinch, Miwa is ready to step in and help. His duels are always full of passion and Miwa tends to bring a well rehearsed speech with him, but he is almost always doomed to be defeated. It’s too bad since he’s a likable character, but he rarely ever gets to win. I can’t think of a single high stakes duel where he was able to be the victor and that’s pretty sad. Nobody wants to lose all of the time and Miwa is shown to be a very good duelist, he just happens to always fight top tier opponents.

Emi is Aichi’s sister and she’s a supporting character who appears quite a few times. She never gets a big moment where she has to face one of the villains or anything like that, but it’s good that she likes Vanguard. It’s possible that she could eventually get a big role in Cardfight G since she is probably a very good player by now. Likewise, Manager Shin is another character who is always around, but never gets to duel. He likes to crack jokes and keep the atmospheare light so that the heroes can bounce back a little easier after they are crushed in Cardfights. It would be good if he could at least fight a little though since he’s so far out of the loop that he can barely even give moral support.

Rekka is one of the other members of Ultra Rare and while her role is not huge, it’s of a decent size. She gets a good amount of duels and she even becomes a temporary rival for Misaki. Her abilities are definitely potent even if her deck doesn’t appear to be very good. She’s always pretty cheerful and in that sense she’s similar to Ratie Curti. She does like to taunt her opponents once she’s safely in the lead though so it’s definitely not all nice when facing her. She makes for a good antagonist.

Suiko is the third member of Ultra Rare and you’ll ultimately wonder what the point of her addition was. She mostly just trolls the other two members and she rarely ever gets to duel. She’s meant to be the mysterious member of the group, but since that plot ultimately doesn’t go anywhere, it just ends up feeling a little pointless. I definitely did not care for her character.

Takuto is the leader of Ultra Rare and he’s a pretty sinister figure. He wants to help the Planet Cray so he’s always involving people in his plots. He actually erased the memories of the Ultra Rare members, which is how he brought them over to his side. It reminds you that this guy can’t be trusted and he’s definitely a villain. Takuto also doesn’t let Aichi know why the Royal Paladins were taken away and it’s definitely hard to forget that. When Takuto is taken over in season 3, it’s hard to feel bad for the guy. Takuto ends up being one of the strongest cardfighters to end up playing the game, but it doesn’t help his personality. As long as you remember to think of him as a villain, he’s not bad. He’s definitely pretty threatening and his evil voice is intense. It’s like a DBZ moment as he continues to power up.

Tetsu is the muscle of Ren’s organization and he’s always ready for a good fight. His skills are definitely formidable and while he is not at Kai’s level, he can win some tournaments on his own. He grew up with Ren and Kai so it’s only natural that he inheiret some skills. He does whatever Ren wants and I think that he should have tried to stop his ally when Ren went off the deep end. Tetsu definitely isn’t perfect, but he’s a nice guy deep down, which is what counts. He’s certainly not evil and he makes sure not to drag innocents into Ren’s plans.

Asuka is the third member of the team and she always wants to impress Ren with her circus themed deck. It doesn’t make for very entertaining duels, but Asuka is definitely a talented fighter. She goes up against Misaki a few times and she typically seems like the more impressive Vanguard player. She doesn’t really level up or switch decks though so she always appears to be at the same level. It’s a high level so that’s good, but it would be nice to see her get some development and a new deck to boot. Her infatuation with Ren can be a bit much, but she’s likable otherwise.

Koutei is the leader of Team Caesar and he’s pretty great. He’s extremely optimistic and whenever he makes a speech, the theme song tends to play in the background. He uses a Mecha deck and it has really helped him through the years. He makes it to the final round almost every year and it’s just his bad luck that Ren is always around. It’s a bit of a running gag that he always loses the fights that matter, but he manages to stay really confident despite all this. He never lets anything get him down and he’s a shining beacon throughout the series. I definitely became a fan of his rather quickly and it’s always a thrill to see him duel. It’s no exaggeration to say that he’s one of the best characters in the series!

Yuri is on Koutei’s team and she ends up being yet another rival for Misaki. Misaki ultimately ended up with 3 rivals, which is pretty impressive since some characters like Kamui never got to have a true rival. Yuri is the tough member of the group and while she is not as strong as Koutei, she was good enough to make it to the finals in the team tournament. Koutei always blew that opportunity since he simply cannot beat Ren so Yuri always did her part. She’s a pretty good character and her bond with the other members is a strong one. The third member is the one who doesn’t really have a point here. His name is Gai, but he is usually pushed around by Yuri and he’s actually not a very good duelist. You could say that he is basically just along for the ride….no wonder his role is so small eh?

Gouki is the leader of Team Handsome and he is only a threat for a couple of episodes in the early part of season 1. He’s fairly weak, but he can be considered tough when you are just starting out in the world. You can compare him to Iruka from Naruto. Naruto probably couldn’t defeat Iruka when he was just starting out, but by the time he got to the Chunin Exams you could make the case that it could actually be a close fight. Gouki definitely helps Aichi improve his skills, but he doesn’t do much after that. He was never my favorite character so I wasn’t sad to see him go, but he was still pretty decent.

Chris is the leader of team genius and he’s the only member who really matters. His two sidekicks never really get to do anything and while they talk tough, I was not impressed with them. Chris unlocks the power of Psyqualia, which greatly improves his game. While one of his partners is distracted with romance and the other one’s desire to be the best isn’t very strong, Chris is the capable leader of the group. He always shows up when there is trouble and he proves to be a tough obstacle when he is reversed. I never liked him as a character though because he is a little too full of himself and he doesn’t seem like he can back it up. He’s too inexperienced to compete with the other big leaguers like Kai, Leon, or Ren. He’s naturally still a pro, but he’s definitely not the best one.

Gaillard is the (unofficial) leader of the Quatre Knights and his abilities are exceptional. Not only is he one of the best European fighters on the planet, but he has supernatural abilities that come from his ring. He has the ability to create blue fire and he can create his own environments for when he is cardfighting. The loser receives “judgment” which means that they suffer a severe burning. Gaillard can be pretty unreasonable at times, but he does everything in the name of justice and he believes that he is doing the right thing. He makes for a good rival to Kai in season 4 and it would be cool to see him appear again. Gaillard could very well be in the top 5 strongest characters in the series and it would be fun to see him fight someone like Ren or Leon.

Neve is another member of the group and his powers involve thunder poles that zap his opponents. He may get to have the most impressive resume from the group since he never loses to anyone aside from Aichi Sendou. It’s all right to lose to the world champ so there’s definitely no shame there. Neve’s country is in the middle of a civil war so his circumstances are pretty dangerous. This has also helped him to close off his feelings for when he’s in the middle of a job and he always brings his A game to a cardfight. He’s certainly not as interesting as Gaillard, but he’s a great fighter.

Serra is the only member who doesn’t have any heroic ambitions for what he does and let’s just say that his sob story is a little sinister. In his family everyone had to fight in order to survive with the loser being thrown out and losing his finances. Serra beat everyone, which is how he survived and he is a tough cardfighter. It’s hard to gauge just how tough he is, but his skills do seem to be worthy for that of a Quatre Knight’s. You’ll likely be rooting against him whenever the guy is on screen and he is certainly the least likable member of the team.

Ratie Curti probably has the best backstory since she always liked donuts. When she first appears, you’ll probably be expecting her to troll the main characters before she beats them up, but she is just naturally happy. It can make losing to her all the more bitter as she’ll be having fun as you get stabbed by her vine powers. She’s doing what she needs too in order to save Planet Cray so she’s all right with taking down a few heroes. If they’re in her way, then it’s time for them to be removed. By the end of the show, she has learned more things and she will probably end up being a more likable character.

Now, you’re probably wondering what the rules for Cardfight are right? It’s significantly different compared to Yugioh, which is good since it means that Cardfight was able to make it into the world on its own merits. On your turn, you are able to “ride” (summon) a unit of your choice as the vanguard. You must start at 0 and every turn you are able to level it up. You can have up to 3 monsters in the front row at once and then you can put 3 in the back to power up the front row units. Whenever you attack with your avatar (center monster) you can flip over a card in the deck. If it has a symbol on the top right hand corner, then it will give you some kind of bonus effect based on what color it is. You may not want to always summon all of the cards in your hand either since those are used to block attacks when it is your opponent’s turn. Level 1 cards can perfectly nullify any attack if you discard another one. Those are the basic rules of the game.

More advanced techniques start to show themselves as the season goes on. You lose when you take 6 damage. There is a chance to not take a damage point when you flip over the card from your deck. Before putting it in the damage zone, check to see if it has a green chest on the top right. If it does, then you can recover one damage. You can also flip over 2 damage points to activate one of your counter blast’s. (A technique that a monster has) You don’t heal the 2 damage, but it’s still useful. A Limit Break requires you to flip 3 cards and it’s an even stronger ability. There are other abilities like riding the same monster on top of another one and using “Seek the Mate!” That’s the final ability used in the series and it’s definitely not the greatest one out there. The whole 4th season was about this, but I was never crazy about the addition. Basically, you can summon 2 monsters in the center circle instead of one, which makes for a better ability. So, it’s technically strong, but it’s just not as impressive as some of the other abilities.

Season 4 will definitely raise a lot of questions and I think that the show went a little too far in its quest to make Aichi look like the ultimate villain. Before now, Aichi was rather timid although he became commanding when the stakes were high. In season 4, Aichi travels the world recruiting powerful Cardfighters to help him and his personality definitely seems a little different. Even as he attempts to recruit Ren, he doesn’t seem like the Aichi that we remember from the old days. Where did he get the money for his constant road trips and how did he harness his Link Joker abilities to perfectly? Aichi created a large fortress on the moon and warped himself there while also giving Kourin back her memories before transporting her to the moon. He found out how to seal the Link Joker seed and also gave the Quatre Knights objects of power that gave them super abilities. It even allowed them to erase everyone’s memories. The abilities are pretty cool, but Aichi naturally loses them when he turns good, which is regrettable. I think the writers could have found some more realistic ways to make Aichi undergo this big character change, but the premise is pretty hard to swallow as it is so I suppose that there wasn’t a whole lot of things that the writers could do this time. He even bashes the concept of friendship and lets the heroes know that it can’t solve everything. The scene will make you take a step back as you quickly start to root against Aichi. (Although he does make for a great villain)

The writers do a good job of handling the victory speeches that the heroes make. Typically, a character wins when he makes a really heartwarming speech, but that is not always the case here. There are many times where the stakes are high and the main character makes a huge speech, (Sometimes even a 2 episode speech) but ultimately ends up losing the match. You’ll find yourself shocked at the outcome more than once and that’s definitely impressive. I think that this maybe goes a little too far in season 4 when the heroes manage to lose just about every fight, but it still ends up being pretty unexpected so I’ll give the writers some props there. By the end of the show, Aichi and Kai may be two of the greatest cardfighters on the planet, but the show wasn’t too cheesy and showed that the other characters are still pretty outclassed compared to the pros. I wanted Misaki and Kamui to win at least one match, but technically I suppose that they would be expected to lose such a fight.

Cardfight Vanguard’s writing is very good and that comes in handy for the early part of every season. As with Yugioh GX, the show typically has a very light themed atmosphere that quickly grows darker during the climax each season. So, we know what to expect when a season starts and it’s easy to wish that the plot can start. Typically, the plot won’t begin for maybe even the first 15+ episodes so it can be a long wait. If the wrong writers were involved, it could be a chore to see the heroes tackle their filler opponents. Luckily, the pre arcs are still a lot of fun. There are no real stakes in the duel, but the actual duels are still entertaining enough that you can watch them with ease.

Season 3’s start was probably the slowest as we had to get used to new characters like Naoki and Shingo while losing a fan favorite in the form of Kamui. It still did get better as it went along and it was fun to see the student council oppose the heroes. Season 1 and 2’s beginnings were also rather slow, but we got to see new characters and the heroes entered many tournaments. There are few shows that have as many tournaments as Cardfight and it’s always fun to see them enter these competitions. I’ve been a big fan of tournaments since before I even started watching anime and it’s a great way to develop the heroes while introducing potential rivals and enemies.

Cardfight Vanguard really did just about everything correctly in just about every area. It was able to introduce new main characters, which is always a risk and the progression of the main characters was rock solid. You can clearly see the development that they’ve had if you watch part of season 1 and then skip to season 4 or 3. You are able to grow up with the characters as you watch the show and it’s probably the most realistic cardfighting show that I’ve seen yet. (In a good way since realistic typically doesn’t translate into a positive thing) There is naturally a lot more to the show than can ever be covered in a review so that’s why you need to check it out to see everything for yourself.

The big question is..does this match up to Yugioh? I actually do think that this show beats all of the Yugioh series aside from GX so that’s a pretty great start to the franchise. I do prefer Yugioh’s actual gameplay since it’s a lot deeper and the luck factor is lessened. That being said, Cardfight’s pacing is a lot faster because of the simplistic rules and battles can easily be finished in one episode even if it’s a long fight. Since this is Cardfight’s first show, we should just count it as such and since it’s beating the classic Yugioh show, we can say that the Cardfight anime franchise has the lead at the moment. Yugioh is winning by sheer numbers, but let’s see how close it’ll be when both franchises have 5 shows. G is almost definitely going to lose to GX so we’ll need to see where Cardfight goes from there. Yugioh is likely not going to relax either as Arc V is still airing so the gap may never lessen. This means that Cardfight will likely never pass Yugioh, but at the same time, I don’t see any other card franchise ever passing Cardfight. We’ll have to see if Buddyfight ultimately gets to hold the third place spot or not.

Overall, Cardfight Vanguard is one of the greatest shows of all time. It has a fun cast and the animation is excellent. The soundtrack is certainly worthy of such an all star title and you’ll be at the edge of your seat in each season. The climax of each arc never disappoints and watching the characters develop their skills and personality is part of the joy of watching this title. I recommend this to anyone that wants to watch a fun anime with a lot of action and excitement. At around 200 episodes, it makes for a pretty satisfying watch.

Overall 9/10

Samurai Jack Review

Posted on January 31, 2015 by dreager1

Samurai Jack is a retro show that a lot of people like. It’s known as a classic and it probably rivals famous action cartoons like the Powerpuff Girls back in its prime. Unfortunately, it infamously ends with nothing actually being resolved so it can be a pretty disappointing way to end the series. It’s a good title, but the problem lies in the fact that most episodes are filler. Because of that, some episodes are really good and some are downright bad. It’s good to check out, but you’ll probably want to skip some of the filler episodes that couldn’t stack up to the rest.

The plot of the show is that a demon by the name of Aku has enslaved the planet. Samurai Jack’s parents (and effectively the whole planet as collateral) were taken from him by Aku and he has trained his whole life so that he can get some payback. Just when he was about to defeat Aku, Jack is sent to the future. Aku’s reign is now absolute and defeating him will be difficult. Still, Jack shall never give up and he will find a way to stop Aku! Even if it takes a lifetime.

The show made it through 4 seasons, but that doesn’t help its case as much as you would expect from the average show because of the fact that over 90% of the series is filler. There are good episodes and then there are bad ones. The final 3 episodes of the series are all pretty bad for example while you may have random ones in season 3 that are very good. It’s something that you have to take on a day by day basis and it can get pretty tricky. It’s why I don’t recommend such a format for any show.

It is intriguing to see just how big the planet is though. Jack comes across countries from all sorts of different time periods. A lot of them just don’t make sense when compared to others and that’s one of the things that makes the planet so much fun. One corner may still be in the 40’s while another one has tech from the year 3000+. It’s too bad that everyone doesn’t unite to stop Aku, but I have a feeling that it could have happened if the show ever got an ending. It was practically leading up to that as Jack went around the world helping people.

Samurai Jack is a pretty good protagonist. You could even say that he is great although he doesn’t always look as good as you would expect depending on the episode. He is tricked into losing his memory at one point and he does tend to let his guard down around female villains. Jack is an honorable swordsman so he never actually lets romance get to him, but he doesn’t try as hard to escape it as he should. His swordsmanship skills are top notch and Jack has been shown to take on whole armies in the past. It’s rare that he ever loses a fight and Jack always gives the match his best effort. It’s hard not to like such a fighter and the show likely wouldn’t be half as good without him. Once in a while, an episode won’t be from his point of view so it’s always fun to see how he looks from an antagonistic standpoint. There are at least 2 episodes where he is the main villain and those are always sad since the “heroes” usually have some kind of reason as to why they need to defeat him. Of course, they’re doomed so it is always for naught.

Aku is the main villain of the show and he is the kind of villain who isn’t for everyone, but will certainly get some fans. I am not a big fan of the villain. Aku can be pretty funny considering that he rules the planet with an iron grip, but that’s about it for qualities that I like. His goals are pretty generic and his “invincible” abilities never actually seem that great. It’s a little hard to see how he managed to defeat all of the heroes on the planet. Depending on the episode, he can be a cruel tyrant or a misunderstood anti-hero. He just doesn’t take anything seriously which is why his attitude tends to shift a lot, but the heroes can’t forgive his actions. He is still a villain no mater how heroic he may seem at times.

The Scotsman is really the only recurring member of the supporting cast in the show and I believe that he only appears in 3 episodes. It’s possible that it’s more like 4-5. Out of 52 that’s not bad….I suppose. He is Jack’s rival and a nice ally to have. He’s definitely not as powerful as Samurai Jack, but he gets by pretty well on his own. He has a machine gun and he’s a very physical fighter. His accent makes him easy to identify in a crowd. The Scotsman is very charismatic and it was fun having him in the show. I definitely wouldn’t mind seeing more of him.

One factor that does hurt the show quite a bit is the animation. I really don’t care for the style that is used here and it makes the show appear to be decades older than it actually is. You can basically see most of the animation shortcuts that are used without any effort. Considering that this was airing back during the good ole days of Pokemon, we know that the animation could have been significantly better. As it stands, the fight scenes were very good at their height, but we know that they would have been even better with the proper animation techniques behind them. It’s the main reason why this show wasn’t a 7 and who knows, an 8 may not have been out of the question with better animation although it would have been a bit of a stretch.

Due to its episodic nature, the series falls into many holes. Aside from the romance one, we also have the animal violence tropes that we always try to avoid. This happens in quite a few episodes and animals are enslaved in another. It’s the kind of thing that you never want to see in a show, but it typically pops up as a show gets more episodes. Whenever that happened it would be pretty sad and I would just hope that the show would get better next time.

On the bright side, there are many great episodes to counter those. Typically, the duel episodes are the best one. There are probably around 10 or so of those where the fight gets to last for nearly the whole episode. The train duel and the battle against the guardian of the portal come to mind, but there are many others. Even Jack’s battles against Aku and the Cyborgs tend to be pretty long. There are also heist episodes like one where Jack has to stop a James Bond figure from looting a pyramid before him.

Once again, that’s why having every episode be a stand alone with the occasional two parter is super risky. The quality of each episode really varies and ultimately this helps to keep it from the elusive 7. There are enough episodes that simply aren’t very good, which is enough to keep it from that spot. At it’s best, Samurai Jack is 8 star worthy and at its worst it’s probably a 3-4. I certainly would have liked more of an ongoing plot here.

The soundtrack really varies and it’s probably one of the most diverse ones that I’ve ever heard. It definitely gets a 5 star rating there since it’s usually pretty enjoyable. The themes tend to fit the episodes and they also help with the fights. The show is definitely more dramatic than your average cartoon and the fights can get really intense. The musical themes that accompany them help to solidify this image and it really helps the show.

There’s not a whole lot more to say about the show. It’s a good action show and it tries its hand at many different kinds of stories. It tends to feel pretty high quality and that’s always a good thing. It’s too bad that we never got a real ending, but there’s always a chance that we will get something at some point. We just have to keep on waiting and hope that they do come through with a new film or give us the ending via the comics.

Overall, Samurai Jack is a pretty fun show that really gets hurt by the amount of filler in it. It’s made that way though so you could also just not think of them as filler episodes and just consider the series as a bunch of short stories. There’s not necessarily much of a timeframe to be noted so the stories can take place at any time. It’s a show that feels like it’s not meant to ever end and you just get to see Jack go on all kinds of adventures. Some are good and some are not. If you’re looking for a good action show then I definitely recommend checking this one out. The fight scenes can definitely be really good and it has a good soundtrack. Updating the animation would certainly help its case a lot though. We’ll see if you like Samurai Jack as a character as much as I did.

Overall 6/10

The Avengers Earth’s Mightiest Heroes Review

Posted on January 27, 2015 by dreager1

The Avengers are one of the most well known superhero teams in comics. They had a film that broke the box office a few years back and they have now had 3 shows to date. Earth’s Mightiest Heroes was the best of the three and it is one that ranks very high up in the comic ranks. I definitely say that it is Marvel’s top show and it isn’t likely going to be surpassed anytime soon.

Season 1’s main plot is about the Avengers forming so that they can bring back a large group of super villains who escaped from Shield prisons all across the planet. It’s technically the plot of the show, but it’s mostly used as a backdrop. The season is pretty episodic, but it does begin a lot of plotlines that are explored in those episodes so it’s definitely better than the average pre arc. Ultron, Kang, and Loki all get multiparters as well as the Leader. There may not be much of an overreaching story arc, but most of the episodes have a cliffhanger scene at the very end so the transition from episode to episode is actually pretty great. Season 1 is a lot of fun and you can count on many excellent battles.

Season 2 decided to go for a big plot and one that featured the Skrulls deciding to invade the planet. They have taken many people in powerful positions so they are all set for their bid to conquer the human race. The Avengers have to get past several obstacles and the lack of trust in their teammates to even have a shot at taking down the Skrulls. Other highlights of the series includes the return of Ultron and Kang. It should be noted that the Kree also get a multi parter as they finally make their big move. This season can get a little dicey since we have to miss out on Hulk, Captain America, and Thor for various parts of the season, which makes for a limited roster. The Guardians of the Galaxy do get to appear though, which is pretty intense.

I will admit that I was one of the many Marvel fans who was not a huge fan of the designs for the show when they first popped up. The characters just looked a little off. Thor was actually one of the biggest offenders for me. His build just didn’t seem right and his arms were huge. The hammer looked so small when Thor was holding it and the handle should have been longer. That being said, you get used to it as you watch the show. I wasn’t a huge fan of Captain America’s design compared to United They Stand, but it is still a very good design in its own right. The Abomination was one of the characters who drew the short straw in terms of design.

I don’t know whether this is a result of the character designs or whether it was the overall animation, but the fight scenes were pretty over the top in a great way. Some of the energy blasts looked like they came out of an anime. The action scenes definitely shine in this series and they put most of the other Marvel shows to shame. The first few episodes tried some unique things with the animation, particularly Iron Man’s view from inside the suit. I think that the animation took a bit if a dip after the beginning, but it still looked pretty good overall. Season 2 certainly looks sharp and it was definitely an improvement. I wasn’t sure about this at first, but I definitely am now.

How does it stack up against the Justice League? I am afraid that it is not even remotely close. Justice League wins in all areas, but it should be noted that the show’s roster was comprised of heroes who were far cooler than the Avengers. The Avengers are cool of course, but they are no Justice League. Considering that the Justice League show also happens to be my favorite non anime tv show of all time, this isn’t bad for Avengers. It’s safe to say that no western Marvel show will ever be able to top Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. Now, let’s look at the show’s portrayal of the characters.

Iron Man is one of the main characters and he is a pretty good hero. He acts just like what you would expect from him. He is always ready with a witty comeback and his armors are fairly powerful. The show essentially takes all of Stark’s good qualities without bringing in his bad ones. He does a pretty good job of being team leader until he decides to give up the role. His fans should be pretty pleased with this incarnation of him. His battles against Kang and Dr Doom are matches that we have longed for and we finally get to see them play out here.

Captain America is our courageous leader once more. The writers really seem to like him so Cap gets quite a few wins under his belt. Even the mighty Terrax and the Super Skrull are powerless against him. Unfortunately, he misses the first few episodes of the series and a big chunk of them in the second half. This is sad for his fans of course, but he still gets a lot of screen time and he tends to look very good. It is basically a spot on incarnation of the legendary hero.

Thor looks better than he has ever looked in this series. He is portrayed as an intelligent warrior while still keeping his incredible strength and skill. He isn’t crazy about technology, but he is never obnoxious about it. His banter with Tony Stark on the subject can be pretty fun to watch. As with Superman in various DC shows, Thor does lose to an opponent who is weaker than him at times. Luckily this only happens a reasonably few times and he typically looks as strong as he should. He looks like the Thor of the 60’s and that’s a good thing.

Bruce Banner is pretty much a non factor here because the Hulk is in control for the whole series. Bruce only gets a cameo once in a while. As for the Hulk, his portrayal is pretty good here. He is decently smart and a very loyal friend to have. He gets a raw deal in season 2 since he is tricked by the Skrulls and forced to miss a lot of it. He looks pretty strong and he is portrayed as the strongest Avenger in physical strength. He is definitely a likable character.

The Wasp is a lot more cheerful than usual and it works for her character. She isn’t the strongest Avenger, but she can fight when necessary. This is easily the best portrayal of her that I have seen and it will be tough to too this version. Wasp never backs down from a fight and she even takes on the Vision. Even if her chances of victory are slim. Wasp will jump into battle anyway and it is why she is one of the better Avengers.

Antman had a big role in the original Avengers show, but then he began to fade into obscurity. The new Marvel film aims to change that..more for the superhero than for Pym. Pym actually doesn’t end up looking quite as good in EMH. It is to be expected since he isn’t the fearless leader anymore, but he is still an Avenger. He wants to rehabilitate the villains and he puts a lot of effort into this goal. Unfortunately, most of the villains don’t plan on changing sides anytime soon. He starts to think that the Avengers have lost sight of this and coupled with the Ultron incident causes him to leave the team. This causes his character to undergo a radical change as he becomes more of a hot head who tends to act overconfident. While I typically like this kind of character a lot, it comes off as a little forced and it is also hard to take him seriously. Antman was a good character in the show, but he was definitely outshined by the others.

Hawkeye had a tough road since it would be nearly impossible to pass his original animated version. That being said, he’s typically a likable character. It can be sad to see him get tricked and one upped by Black Widow for most of season 1, but he does manage to capture her on occasion. His skill with a bow is as excellent as ever and Hawkeye is always brimming with confidence. He couldn’t pass the original version, but this is still the Hawkeye that I remember. Black Widow is also pretty true to form as no side can really tell if she is working for them or if she has an ulterior motive. Her accent is at its strongest here and she rarely gets to operate with the Avengers since she’s a solo act from start to finish. She’s a pretty good agent, but Hawkeye is actually able to best her when they fight. Black Widow’s never been my favorite character, but she still looked decent here.

Black Panther joins the team pretty early on in the series, but he was never my favorite character. He’s a little too confident and he has no problem hacking into the Avengers mansion when he feels like it. He’s the definition of a “hype” character who constantly insults everyone and belittles them. He may only be human, but he always gets his hits in and he puts his kingdom before the Avengers. A noble gesture I’m sure, but he’s really just a copy of Captain America, but without the leader’s character development.

Ms. Marvel arrives in season 2 and she cannot be trusted as much as the other members since she also works for the government. She was quick to turn on the heroes when the government duties created a conflict. She is just trying to help her country of course, but the whole scene didn’t look very good. Ms. Marvel is a capable heroine who can still fight at the Hulk’s level so that’s pretty good and she is a solid character despite having her flaws. She does get a lot more screen time than the Vision, who is basically thrown in at the last minute. The Vision looks pretty good and very tough when he first appears. He gradually gets weaker, but it never goes too far as he still helps out a lot in the final battles. I didn’t really care for Vision’s big moment where he betrayed the Avengers, but he’s a good hero to have. I just wish that he had turned good in a different scene.

Graviton is the first major villain in the show and it’s why the series started out on a high note. His abilities are very impressive and it’s no stretch to say that he is the strongest villain in the entire series. There are many other powerful opponents who do make this very debatable. He’s a very likable villain and this show made me a fan of him. Seeing him take on the combined might of Thor, Hulk, and the other Avengers is incredible and it’s not something that I shall forget anytime soon. It’s too bad that he never got to appear again, but maybe next time.

Ultron is the villain that everyone was hyped for and he did not disappoint. He got a pretty great two parter when he first appeared and then his return was also pretty great. Naturally, his demise in both appearances is loaded with plot hax, but that’s just because the show did a good job of adapting his character. He looked about as strong as he should and he was thoroughly annihilating the Avengers. He has definitely been a great villain in all incarnations and I believe that Age of Ultron should be able to keep up this tradition.

Kang The Conqueror is probably my third favorite villain in the show so I definitely wanted to put him next to Ultron and Graviton. He may seem like a much weaker villain on the surface, but his tech definitely brings him up to their level. His array of barriers and energy attacks make him a very tough opponent to deal with and you can even say that it is impossible to beat him. He only loses when he lets his guard down and forgets to block or fight back. It’s the fate of being an overwhelmingly powerful villain in the midst of heroes who are strong, but not strong enough to legitimately defeat him.

Red Skull is certainly not as impressive as the first few villains and it’s surprising that it took so many episodes for him to finally appear in the present. He’s fairly generic and he’s definitely not a threat no matter how many inventions he gets a hold of. He does give us one of the better episodes in the series when he assembles his own crew, but it still doesn’t make him a good villain. He wants revenge on Captain America and that sums up his character arc.

Skull’s team consists of quite a few members. Dr. Sampson is one of them and he was not my favorite supporting character anyway. I did appreciate the fact that he didn’t blame the Hulk for what went down at the Cube and he actually dealt with his new powers pretty well. That being said, he’s just not a interesting character. The Falcon’s one shot role is probably disappointing for his fans. He actually had potential to be a good character and he was much better than the Falcon in Avengers Assemble. His appearance was just too short to really get a good grasp of how he was.

One of the final two members was the Winter Soldier. After Bucky vanished when Captain America fell into the ice, he was forced to work for Skull for decades. It’s easily the saddest sub plot in the series and he really didn’t have a choice since he was on his own and they effectively brainwashed him. He tries to atone for this once he gains his freedom back and this is probably the best incarnation of Bucky that we’ve seen so far. He’s pretty noble and you can tell that he is trying to be a better person.

Finally, we have Red Hulk. He gets a few appearances although his role is still not very large. He does get to fight Thor and the Hulk, which shows how powerful he is. I like him as an enemy although he’s not very interesting. Watching him sucker the Avengers into allowing him to join is pretty wince worthy, but a plot twist at the end definitely helps to negate those scenes.

The New Avengers are introduced to the scene in Kang’s big return. The villain managed to destroy the Avengers so an automated protocol quickly gathered up the new heroes. One of them was Luke Cage. He seems to know what he’s doing and his street manner of dealing with his obstacles is a nice change of pace from the politically correct superheroes who help him against the villains. He doesn’t get much of a role and he doubts himself pretty quickly, but Cage still has what it takes to be an Avenger. He’s a step up over Iron Fist, who is still cool, but really has no character development. He appears for a very short period of time and he’s pretty ineffective against Kang. His hand to hand skills are great and they would do well against most opponents, but it was simply a bad mach up against someone like Kang. We also got to see War Machine and I was not impressed. His weapons still look terrible compared to Iron Man’s and he was way too serious when the other heroes were just trying to have a good time. He arguably has more experience in the art of being a super hero than the first two fighters so he needs to lead by example.

Spider Man was also selected for the team and he also got an episode to himself before that so he’s all set on the character development area. He was adapted pretty faithfully as he tells a lot of jokes, but never manages to get hit. He’s the only member of the team who was able to dodge every single one of Kang’s attacks. His spider sense is his weapon and he just uses his jokes to keep the enemy off guard. This is the Spiderman that fans will remember from the good ole days and it’s good to see him getting the respect that he deserves. I was more than satisfied with his portrayal here.

Wolverine also gets to join the team and he’s definitely in character. Unfortunately, this means that he gets animal violence in his scene as he destroys a few dinosaurs. It’s the worst scene in the entire show and you can bet that it hurts his character. It’s hard to root for him after such a scene and he also doesn’t really help a lot when the team is fighting Kang. That just makes it worse since he wasn’t needed in the episode and the heroes still would have gotten the job done.

The Fantastic Four are recurring characters in the background of the show. The Thing gets more of a role than the others since he does join the New Avengers, but he doesn’t look particularly impressive when it comes down to strength. He’s pretty likable and you’ll be satisfied with his portrayal even if he looks like a second rate fighter. Reed Richards looks pretty great as he belittles everyone and puts up a brave front when Galactus appears. Human Torch and Sue Storm don’t get to do a whole lot, but they look pretty decent when they get to appear.

Nick Fury changes a lot as the show goes on. He fights on the front lines more in season 1 and then he turns into the MCU version of Fury in season 2. He’s pretty corrupt as you would expect from a Shield agent, but he has his moments where he can actually be likable. He was a capable leader for Shield (Not going to bother using the periods everywhere) while he was around. Maria Hill steps in for him once the Skrull invasion occurs. She is notably less tolerant with heroes than Fury was and she can definitely be a thorn in the side of the heroes. Hill does mean well and she is definitely a likable Shield agent, but her policy towards the heroes can definitely hold her back.

The Guardians of the Galaxy get to appear and this was before their film so the roster is much different. It’s vastly superior to the normal crowd as we have someone with Green Lantern’s abilities. Groot, Star Lord, and Rocket Raccoon are still around. I’m still not the biggest Rocket fan, but it is always good to see him jump into the action. Groot is simply Groot and still the worst member on the team. Star Lord was pretty reasonable and it was a very fun episode as we saw them match up against the Avengers before fighting Korvac. The Guardians are lucky that Thor was not there since the episode had the potential to be a stomp for the Avengers. Their portrayals all seemed pretty good.

Baron Zemo is another big Cap villain and he gets to team up with the Masters of Evil for a while. He never gets any super powers, but the Norn Stone makes him more of a threat in his final appearance. He’s still not my kind of villain though and he mostly just lives on by backstabbing all of the other villains. The series could do without him.

The Enchantress looks much more formidable than you would expect and she goes toe to toe with the Hulk and Thor in the series. Her magical abilities seem to be very well suited for offense and her speed is impressive. As a character, I’m still not a fan of hers as she always lets romance cloud her better judgment. Getting defeated by Zemo at the end is pretty bad for her and her loss in round 1 was bad as well. She lets her guard down a little too easily considering how powerful she is. Just wiping out her enemies would save her a lot of grief.

The Leader gets a multi part episode towards the beginning of the series, but then he vanishes. This is definitely one of his better portrayals, but he’s still not a great villain. His lack of attack power is just hard to get around. It’s actually why I am not a big fan of the Abomination in this show. He’s constantly portrayed as being much weaker than the Hulk and it undermines the notion that he could actually be a rival to the green Avenger. He never looks good, not even once as the series goes on and this very well could be the worst portrayal of him.

Wonder Man looks a lot different from his counterpart in the first Avenger show. He is always in his energy form and the villains basically have a hold of his life so it’s tough for him to go back to the Avengers. He has his hero moment and he ends on a high note, but he should have kept an open mind about Stark before. (Not that Tony was pretty polite when they met) He may have had a better fate.

Dr Doom gets a brief role in the Skrull arc, but it’s a critical one that really helps the heroes out. He is a political enemy so he still wants the Earth to be in one piece. His armor looks impressive as it can keep up with Tony’s and likewise with his intellect. It was definitely a good portrayal of the villain. He certainly looks better than Loki. Loki’s big two part episode to end season 1 wasn’t very interesting and I can’t say that I cared for any of his appearances. He is a difficult opponent to handle because of his trickery. His design is pretty unique and I’m not sure what the writers were going for, but I suppose that it works.

Galactus finally joins the fray in the final episode and it’s good to see him. He doesn’t actually have a mind this time, which does undermine him as a villain, but he is still pretty strong. It may be his worst portrayal to date, but he’s a decent villain. I just wish that he could have fought back against the heroes instead of just staying there and taking everything that they had to give. His heralds are also pretty souless and weak as small groups of Avengers are able to take them down with ease. It’s the price of filling an episode with so many villains and fights. Power levels have to go out of the window and there can be no form of character development.

Ronan appears for the Kree and he looks pretty good against the Avengers. Thor may not have been there, but he was still keeping the Hulk and Iron Man at bay for a while until Ms. Marvel finally took him down. He looked much better than he did in the FF cartoon. He’s certainly not one of my favorite villains, but he makes for a nice opponent for the heroes. The other notable Kree agent would be Captain Marvell and I really didn’t like that guy. He never knew when to pick a side and he only jumped in at the end once the battle with the Supreme Intelligence was over. His abilities seem pretty interesting, but he’s just not a good character.

Naturally, there are many more villains to be found in the show. We got a healthy amount of them and the only big one that the show missed was probably Count Nefaria. Some of the villains that I didn’t mention include: Purple Man, Whirlwind, The Absorbing Man, the FF villain who looks like an insect, but with a name that’s hard to spell, Bi Beast, and many more. The series is definitely a complete one and it’s one of the few shows with 50+ episodes that I’ve seen in its entirety more than once.

For some reason, the show really loves to throw in the Serpent Society for when they need a throwaway action scene. These guys are constantly breaking out of jail and I’m always sad to see them. They really don’t make for interesting action scenes and they’re extremely weak. It’s hard to picture them ever holding their own against the Avengers and they feel outclassed from start to finish. Their leader gets a bit of a role during the Captain America Escape episode, but I can’t say that I’m a fan of Viper either. She’s just a little too generic for me and she is interchangeable with just about any other villain.

Naturally, the show’s power levels are more than a little wonky. This is certainly a weakness that superhero shows tend to have. Anime spend more time on the power levels or at least manga based ones do. Here, you can go from having the Vision beating up on the Avengers without effort to being crushed by Thor. Iron Man’s durability also comes into question a whole lot as the scenes don’t always make a lot of sense. It’s not a huge deal, but it’s something that you’ll definitely think about as you watch the episodes. A little more speed would definitely come in handy for the Avengers and their enemies.

Unfortunately, the show does end with some loose ends. The main one is definitely the Surtur plot that the show had been hyping up in the background for quite a while. It got a whole episode devoted to the future arc with Beta Ray Bill and Odin. All of it was for naught unfortunately as the series ended. It definitely had a lot of potential so it’s too bad that the series ended when it did.

The show definitely deserves some props for having cliffhangers and new subplots in just about every episode. It’s one of the reasons why the show is able to separate itself from the average show. Including all of the classic plots and new characters, the show was definitely ambitious. It’s epic to think of how many things may have happened if it had reached 4-5 seasons. This really could have been a true rival for Justice League. It’s doubtful that it could have surpassed it, but more episodes would have cemented the show as the ultimate Marvel experience.

Earth’s Mightiest Heroes’ soundtrack is pretty amazing. It has the greatest theme song for any superhero show and that includes Justice League. It’s by far the greatest western theme song that I’ve heard and it can even match up against anime openings. That’s some great praise for the show and the themes in the episodes also sound good. A lot of western shows seem to believe that a soundtrack is not necessary, but it certainly augments any scene. Whether for better or worse, taking the plunge and adding a lot of good tunes is definitely the right move for a show and Avengers pulled it off.

Overall, Avengers Earth’s Mightiest Heroes is a pretty incredible show. It surpassed all of my expectations and it has a lot of replay value. It’s the kind of show that you can easily find yourself re watching since the battles are so much fun. It’s really too bad that this show was cancelled in place of Assemble since it’s many times better. This show had heart, solid animation, a good soundtrack, and the writing was very well done. This is one of those shows that you can possibly consider once in a life time since I have my doubts on whether superhero shows will be able to reach the level of greatness that they once had. Well, we’ll keep our hopes high I suppose. I recommend this to all comic book fans and to anyone that wants to start a good action show. This is definitely the cartoon to watch!

Overall 9/10

Fantastic Four World’s Greatest Heroes Review

Posted on January 10, 2015 by dreager1

Looks like it’s time to review one of the Marvel cartoons that fell under the radar. The Fantastic Four have had several shows, but they’ve never had the same amount of success as the Avengers or the X Men. I’ve seen episodes from two of the other series, but this is the first one where I got to watch the whole series from start to finish. It’s a decent show, but it makes many mistakes, which keeps it from being known as one of the better cartoons. You can certainly see why it was cancelled, but it’s still a good title to check out.

There aren’t any large story arcs in the show. There are plots that continue like villains who go in and out of jail and Dr Doom’s never ending plans to destroy the Fantastic Four once and for all, but nothing to really talk about in the plot selection. A lot of episodes are stand alone fights with the various villains. We also have the Kree subplot as they start to get pretty fed up with the group of heroes. The Fantastic Four antagonize just about everyone that they meet so they have a lot of enemies. Naturally, Dr Doom is at the top of the list.

There are 26 episodes, which is a decent episode count for a series. It’s not a whole lot when you compare it to the other Fantastic Four shows, but cracking the 20 episode barrier is always something to be proud of. That being said, the show was just not as high quality as we have come to expect back in the time that it aired. One of the main problems is actually the animation.

It’s some of the worst animation that I have ever seen for a superhero cartoon. We can make the case that the CGI Spiderman series looked worse, but it was CGI so that’s to be expected. The character designs here are just pretty off putting and the colors can get very chaotic. The show loves to make everything look red or green or blue depending on how the animators are feeling that day. It’s not very pleasing to the eyes and they just seem to be having too much fun trying to make the show unique. Focusing on the fight scenes would have been a better way to have kept the series afloat. I could not get used to this animation no matter how many episodes I saw.

The soundtrack is certainly better, but it’s still not very good. There’s one classic theme that plays whenever they are about to fight and it’s a pretty decent theme for the Fantastic Four. The problem is that the soundtrack is very limited so you’ll be hearing the same theme in just about every episode and typically more than once. It’s a good theme, but (almost) any theme will get old after a number of times. We need variety!

Those two factors hurt the show, but what hurt it even more is the overall cast. The Fantastic Four are known to argue and fight a whole lot, but they take it to a whole new level here. They are constantly talking and there is never a quiet scene in the entire show. Human Torch is like a music box that you just can’t close and he’s always on screen. The others love to contribute as well and the villains play their part. It wouldn’t be a problem if the lines were good, but that’s rarely the case. I’d definitely compare it to Avengers Assemble since just about every line here is supposed to be witty and make you smile. The scary part is that Avengers Assemble actually does a better job with this, but it could just be that I like the characters a little more there. Let’s look at the characters in more detail.

Mr Fantastic is easily the best character in the show. It’s not even close and I also liked the voice that was chosen for him. He really sounds like he’s full of himself and that’s the Reed Richards that I know. He’s always got a plan at the ready and he doesn’t back down. I’ve never seen an incarnation of Mr Fantastic that I did not like and I’m glad to see that this hasn’t changed so far. His powers still aren’t great for combat, but he definitely has his moments.

The Invisible Woman is not bad, but she definitely gives Mr Fantastic a lot of grief during the series. She blames him for the Human Torch’s disappearance at one point, which was fairly unreasonable. One thing that helps to counter this is that she’s easily the strongest member of the team. When she uses her powers effectively, there are few fighters who can really stop her and almost none of those are main FF characters. She runs the business side of the Baxter Building so she tends to talk to the various inhabitants a little more than the others. This means that she has to keep up a pleasant facade from time to time, but the other members know that she is always ready to fight. Sue Storm is probably the only member who can talk back to one of their meaner neighbors.

I’m definitely not a huge Thing fan and he doesn’t do himself any favors here. He’s a pretty nice guy as he just wants to watch his ball games in peace. Unfortunately, the Human Torch will never let that happen so they get into constant arguments. His side plot with Alisha can also drag on a lot since it never goes anywhere. I think there’s no real excuse for the heroes not to cure her blindness and she should also move somewhere that’s a little safer from the Puppet Master. Alisha’s not a bad character, but she’s always been one of my least favorite heroines. She simply doesn’t have a whole lot of character and she naturally doesn’t get any fight scenes. The Thing is the power hitter of the Fantastic Four, but you’d be surprised at how often he still manages to lose fights. The Mole Men’s minions are able to take him down and that was during a rage moment. This certainly isn’t Ben Grimm’s best collection of moments, but the show did adapt his character pretty faithfully. I’ll give the writers some props there.

The Human Torch is unfortunately the most annoying character of the group. For every good line that he has, he’ll have 10 wince worthy ones. The reason for this is the fact that he never stops talking. He continue going on and on until he’s knocked out by a villain. It’s nice to see his confidence and he does pretty well during some of the events, but this version of Johnny Storm is just a little too exaggerated. Naturally, he is given a rather high pitched voice to make him look even worse when he is knocked out. His fire abilities are definitely useful and I would argue that he could defeat the Thing, but there are also a lot of ways around his fire that make him a risky ally to have. He’s typically fun to watch, but he goes overboard way too often to be a really likable character this time.

The Skrulls naturally get to appear and the writers must have really disliked them. They are shown to have little to no actual intelligence. They are very obvious in their attempts to gather intel on the Fantastic Four and they are brushed aside rather easily once the fighting begins. They have never been the toughest of enemies, but they are typically intelligence. They are masters of espionage after all so they wouldn’t make the rookie mistakes that they exhibit in their appearances. It was a pretty good episode though, but their portrayal should have been a little better.

Namor makes a quick appearance in the show and naturally he is rivals with Mr Fantastic. They are constantly getting into arguments and trying to one up the other. Namor is not as bad as you would expect since he is typically a very unlikable character for me. He still shows some of those traits, but the focus is more on him being a leader than on his other qualities. That helps him a lot and he makes for a good guest star. It’s unfortunate for him that he has to ask the surface dwellers for assistance, but the Fantastic Four are always happy to oblige. I was more than satisfied with his portrayal.

Hulk looks pretty good here in his beast form and as Bruce Banner. It’s sad for Bruce since he’s always so close to getting a cure until things just don’t go his way. Considering how smart Reed is, you’d assume that he’d be able to cure him easily. The Hulk’s design isn’t very good, but he definitely looks tough. It’s safe to say that the Thing was completely outmatched in their skirmish and that’s how all of their fights should end up. Bruce Banner gets the short end of the stick as per usual, but his personality was pretty good and he was a likable guest star.

Ronan appears a few times and he has actually defected from the Kree this time. In the comics, that is pretty rare although I don’t necessarily mind the change. It means that he is now free to do as he pleases and he naturally challenges the Fantastic Four. His skill with his hammer is formidable and he has a nice fight against the Human Torch. I’ve never found him to be an incredibly powerful fighter, but against the Fantastic Four I would definitely give him some decent odds in a fight. He’s around the Thing’s level in strength here, if not a little weaker. He gave us one of the better episodes here in the form of a sort of Olympics competition against the Fantastic Four, which was pretty cool. He was definitely one of the better villains in the series.

The Mole Man is probably my least favorite villain in the series. He can’t fight and his design is pretty hard to look at. None of his plans should have any reasonable chance to succeed considering how weak his forces are. Unfortunately, he is one of the more popular Fantastic Four villains so he gets to appear several times. You end up feeling bad for his minions since they’ll never get to see the sun. He has to rely on his wit and cunning to win his fights since his staff can only get him so far. It’s always wince worthy to see him defeat the Fantastic Four.

The Impossible Man is one of those characters that I never like. His reality warping abilities are something that I never want to see in a show so a character whose whole gimmick is related to that is naturally not my kind of character. He mostly just comes to troll the heroes until they trick him into leaving. His episodes are typically more annoying than entertaining. Ant Man made a surprise guest star appearance in this show considering that he typically doesn’t get to be a guest star anywhere. His portrayal was pretty good and he definitely seems to know what he’s doing. There’s not all that much to say about him, but it would be nice to see him fight someday. Fighting minions doesn’t really count, he needs to take on a super villain!

Ironman gets to appear, which is pretty cool. Tony Stark’s portrayal is pretty great since he acts pretty fearless even as the Fantastic Four begin to threaten him. As Iron Man, he definitely proves to be an impressive fighter as you would expect. His armor does get hacked once again, but it is by Dr Doom so it’s pretty excusable. I liked the armor design here, which is a plus and he was definitely one of (if not) the best guest stars on the show. It’s too bad that he didn’t get to return since that would have been pretty cool.

The Super Skrull naturally gets to appear, which is good since he’s a very iconic Fantastic Four villain. I always liked the idea of a guy who had all of their individual abilities and he does not disappoint. He puts up a pretty decent fight and what he makes up for in personality, he makes up for in attitude. He’s never been a very deep character anyway so I hadn’t been expecting all that much. Still, he was a pretty cool villain thanks to his battles and appearance.

The Puppet Master is similar to the Mole Man in that he can’t really fight. He actually has a very overpowered ability, which enables him to control anyone that he has made a statue out of. Techncially, nobody can really counter such a technique so he cannot lose. Plot hax ensues and they get out of his plot, but it’s one of those cases where the writers just made him a little too good. That happens sometimes I suppose, but it’s why you’ve always got to be careful. Even with that ability, he’s just not likable. He’s a really old guy who’s out for vengeance…not a very original story.

She Hulk gets a guest star role and she shows why she is about as strong as the Thing. She is mainly here to remind us why the Thing is so important to the team, but she’s still pretty likable. She was always a pretty good replacement member on the team and she doesn’t rub it in. She’s a team player, but she’s naturally here for the money. It would have been cool for her to have had a real fight with the Thing, but maybe next time. I was just glad to have another guest star.

Terminus is the final villain in the series and it was an interesting decision to end with him. He’s incredibly powerful, but also incredibly slow, which helps to even it out. The heroes quickly despair when they see him until they remember that Reed will think of a plan. So, all of the pressure rests on Reed and it’s thanks to his quick thinking that the heroes survive. Terminus is pretty gullible and I can’t say that I like him, but I do like the idea of a giant mech running around New York. He makes for a good villain.

The Frightful Four appear as a foil to the Fantastic Four. They pretend to be heroes for a while, but we naturally don’t buy that for long. It’s one of the better episodes as they try to humiliate the Fantastic Four on TV until they eventually begin to fight. Mr Fantastic really lets loose and he gets a pretty epic line to end the episode. The members of the Frightful Four are decent. The Wizard is pretty smart after all, but they are rather simple villains. They’re around, but they aren’t on screen long enough to become likable. They make for good villains and that’s about all that you can say for them.

Diablo is a one shot character, but it’s cool to see him try to convince everyone that magic is real. He’s a villain who is hard to take seriously since his powers don’t have many offensive capabilities, but he really tries and that’s the important thing. He definitely isn’t a very interesting villain, but he only appeared once so it wasn’t a real problem. Annihilius is more interesting and I’m not even a fan of the guy. Annihilius also gets to appear in one of the episodes and things aren’t going well for him when his weapon is stolen. Let’s just say that a team up may be in order unless he can snatch the scepter back on his own. He’s not mindless per say, but he’s not one of the Fantastic Four’s more intelligent villains either. He’s a monster who will defend his territory and I guess that will have to be good enough for us. On the bright side, his design is pretty good.

Ultimately, the show definitely had some fun guest stars. It also had some pretty fun episodes like the olympic games and the one with the Frightful Four. From the 26 episodes, I’m sure that at least half of them are pretty good. There were just other episodes that were not so good and ones that were only decent. The problem is that some episodes can toe the line where they almost feel a little boring. It’s partially thanks to the intros as a lot of the episodes begin rather similarly with the Human Torch and Thing fighting. It can just be hard to really get into the feel of the episode, which hurts its chances. The series definitely has no real replay value since you will never care to watch it again. Other big shows like Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and Justice League don’t have that problem since you really want to watch them again. That’s probably due to the fact that this show has no good fights. It’s just the way that it was made, but you never feel the blows here. The lack of a plot only serves to amplify this and your first time around will likely be your last.

As far as Marvel cartoons go, this one still does beat Hulk Agents of Smash though so that’s a consolation win. It’s still not a bad show either since I would have given it a quick 4 in that case. It has its pros and cons and they basically cancel out in the long run. Watching an episode shouldn’t be considered as 20 minutes wasted, but it won’t leave you as fulfilled as other shows. Compared to most western shows at the moment, this would probably seem like an all star in comparison. Compared to most Marvel tunes, then it definitely seems to be under average.

Overall, The Fantastic Four were never the World’s Greatest Heroes so the title may have already started firing off some warning bells. The characters can be pretty annoying and it’s really hard to get invested into some of the episodes. They just aren’t very entertaining and the sub par animation does not help its case. That being said, we still do get a lot of fight scenes and we have a decent amount of guest stars. Some episodes are certainly better than others and at its best, the show can still be good. It’s just not very consistent and you are always playing with fire here. I recommend checking this show out if you’ve always wanted to see a new Fantastic Four cartoon, but otherwise I recommend watching the classic 90’s series instead. It’s a more accurate representation of the team and the comics that spawned them. On the bright side, you’ll get to see the Hulk duke it out with the Thing in this show!

Overall 5/10

Digimon Data Squad Review

Posted on January 9, 2015 by dreager1

For a while now, I’ve talked about how Cardfight Vanguard is my 2nd favorite show of all time behind Yugioh GX. Well, I’m going to have to back up a little there because I actually overlooked this show for a while. Data Squad is really the title that has earned second place so Cardfight will have to lower itself to the 3rd spot, which is still pretty respectable. This is definitely the best Digimon series and it hit all the right notes. There aren’t really any major negatives here and it could have gotten a 10 if that spot wasn’t already taken.

The series starts off with a main character who is very different from the former protagonists. He’s always looking for a fight and he beats up whole groups of villains with ease. He picks a fight with an Agumon and he manages to get the match to a tie. He learns that a Digimon group wants to take Agumon back to the Digital World…by destroying him. Marcus (The main character) doesn’t like this and he defends Agumon. Eventually, he joins the group…which was an interesting decision, but I’ll get into that later.

The plot really begins when a little kid by the name of Keenan appears. He was raised in the Digital World so he’s a little wild and the humans decide to eliminate some of the higher ups. Things get pretty hectic and there is a traitor around so Marcus and his team find themselves up against a Mega Level Digimon. This arc is mainly about exploring the Digital World and then the big Digital War against a certain scientist. This arc is very long and it takes up the first 30 or so episodes. There are a lot of twists and turns so I definitely didn’t describe the whole arc, but that’s the jist of it. (You can even divide the arc into mini arcs depending on how you look at it. Pre Arc, Digital World/Keenan Arc, and then Kurata War Arc)

That arc was great, but the next one was just as intense, if not better. It’s a lot shorter though, but the Royal Knights have assembled. The Digital King has ordered them to destroy the human world so Marcus and his allies will now have to fight the toughest Digimon in existence. The irony is that they are supposedly knights of justice so the final bosses actually aren’t villains this time. (Although I’ll still call them villains since they have decided to destroy the Earth. That basically makes them villains right?) It’ll be their toughest fight yet! Before I really talk about the show, let’s look at the characters here, since they are a large factor in why the show is so great. (For the most part)

Marcus is the main character of Digimon Data Squad and he is definitely as epic as you may expect. He’s like Ichigo Kurosaki or Yusuke Urameshi. He’s always looking for a fight and his confidence is unwavering. He doesn’t blindly follow the government and he’s a very loyal friend. He protects Agumon from the Data Squad members even though he had only known him for a few minutes. Marcus even manages to get some good hits in on Thomas when the latter decides to attack Marcus. Marcus also isn’t your average Digi tamer since he can fight on his own.

He has a pretty unique ability that lets him gather Digital DNA in his fist when he strikes a Digimon. Later on, he learns how to harness that power on his own, which makes him just about unstoppable in a fight. He can punch through just about anything and his blows even affect Mega level Digimon. It’s pretty awesome and it lets me take him seriously. It’d be tough for the average main character to talk as big as Marcus since he doesn’t have the physical strength to back it up, but Marcus can. That’s a critical point and Marcus never goes downhill. He may make a mistake or two as the series goes on, but he’s typically consistent in his wise choices. He’s easily one of the best main characters of all time. On a side note, Marcus switches his outfit for the final arc of the series and it’s pretty great. I’ll admit that I had been waiting for that one to show up since I find it to be a lot cooler than his original get up. Just another factor to help him out even more.

Thomas is the rival in this series. He is probably the best rival in the franchise so that’s pretty cool for him. Chris (Who looks a lot like Thomas) is a decently close second though. Thomas is rich so he has used his resources to become a very skilled agent. You could say that he is similar to Bruce Wayne in that respect. He has trained in the art of combat and he is skilled enough to take on a champ without all that much effort. To top it off, Thomas is also a genius. You can see where the Bruce Wayne comparisons come into play right? He’s a pretty fun rival although he’s meant to be very annoying at first. He always plays by the books, which means that he’s just a government lackey at first with no real character development. He gets better with that as the series goes on and he’s a very good character by the end. As a rival, he’s perfect for Marcus.

Yoshino is the main heroine of the series and she’s a pretty tough agent. Before Marcus rode into town, she was the squad’s premier agent since Thomas was typically away on official business. She managed pretty well on her own for all those years even though she doesn’t always look very impressive on screen. She’s pretty likable and I would place her over all of the heroines in the first two series and the one in Frontier. I think Nene and Rika are cooler though so she’s basically in the middle. That’s not bad and she’s about as good as I expected her to be. Maybe a little more so, but just barely. She gets the job done and while she tries to stop Marcus from going on his cool adventures, she doesn’t turn traitor like you night fear and rat him out to the big boss.

Agumon is a pretty good partner for Marcus. He’s technically cooler than the original Agumon, but there’s something about the classic one that makes me hesitate before putting this one higher on the totem pole. The other Agumon just had more heart I suppose and it’s hard to forget him. That being said, this Agumon is pretty good and he’s always ready for a fight. He certainly has his arguments for Marcus, but he’s typically a dependable ally to have. He regards Marcus as his leader so he acts as if he’s his minion for the most part. That just doesn’t apply to meal times where he can go all out. I always knew that it would be tough to pass Agumon’s original Digievolution route, but this Agumon actually succeeded in that task. I like all of the Shining Greymon forms and they really look great. The animators did a good job of bringing these forms to life and we even get to see the Burst Mode in all of its glory.

Gaomon is Thomas’ partner and he’s pretty good. He has the same voice as Might Guy, which can be distracting since it makes it hard to take Gaomon seriously. That being said, he’s still a pretty likable Digimon. Gaomon is definitely loyal to Thomas and he’s always ready to fight. He makes for a nice rival to Agumon. Gaomon also knows how to fight on his own even if his trainer is not present, which is a pretty big advantage over the typical opponent. His evolution forms are very good and I like just about all of them…although his champion form isn’t great. His ultimate and mega forms make up this.

Lalamon is Yoshino’s partner and she is definitely the worst partner from the main three. She can’t really fight that really hurts Yoshino’s chances of being a great fighter. Her champion form is no match for a random Digimon with no experience and it she loses in her first big fight. Lalamon gets her moments as the series goes on of course, but she never reaches the heights that the others do. Her strongest forms still aren’t as impressive as Agumon and Gaomon’s. You can argue that the same thing happened to Renamon’s Mega form since it was no Gallantmon, but at least it was still as impressive as Henry’s ultimate form. Lalamon definitely can’t say the same and she’s too much of a pacifist. She definitely could have used some development.

Keenan is definitely one of the worst characters in the series and I definitely wish that he had been cut out. His whole gimmick doesn’t make any sense. He was raised in the Digital World so his English skills are pretty broken. This means that he ends up talking like Tarzan, which is already a pretty annoying cliche if you ask me. “Me am Keenan” is an example of what a typical line from him is like. Why does this not make sense? Well, all of the Digimon can speak perfect English. I’ve never heard them make a mistake and they barely even use slang. So, Keenan shouldn’t have a problem with the language. Moreover, he’s just really annoying. He doesn’t know whether he should choose to side with the humans or the Digimon and this ends up with him not really being loyal to either side for a while. Marcus has to constantly defeat him until he finally sees the light. Once he is a hero, Keenan is still pretty annoying and I never liked him from start to finish.

Falcomon is Keenan’s partner and he’s not much better. He talks tough, but he’s rather weak. The only impressive moment that he has is his very first appearance and that’s just because the writers were trying to give him a lot of hype. It doesn’t really work and it doesn’t make him likable. Falcomon seems to be the intelligent and refined character from the way that he speaks, but he doesn’t have any really cool moments. It also helps that most of his Digi Evolutions aren’t that good either.

Commander Sampson is the leader of the D.A.T.S group and he can definitely be pretty iffy at times. As it is, I’m pretty suspicious of the group’s overall goal and he’s their leader so that doesn’t help his case. He talks tough to be sure, but he’s a part of the system so he has to listen to his higher ups at times. He’s a decent leader, but he’s definitely not my kind of character and I always side with Marcus against him. Kudamon is Sampson’s partner and he’s decent as well, but not always. He’s pretty skeptical of Marcus and he’s usually the voice of doubt. He does get to fight towards the end of both arcs so he is definitely strong. He’s still not my favorite Digimon, but he’s decent to have around. He beats the knights and the shell Digimon.

Homer Yushima is a fisherman who knows more than he lets on. It’s safe to say that he’s one of the most annoying characters in the series. He constantly taunts Marcus, but he is somehow able to avoid the hero’s punches. This guy could get 100 plot twists and I still wouldn’t like him. He’s just too cryptic and you know that he’s probably doing it on purpose. He could have helped out more if he decided to join the action instead of just fishing all the time.

Merukimon was one of the cooler opponents in the series and he was one of the first Mega level Digimon to battle the heroes. He’s rather large, but he’s still humanoid so that gives him points in my book. He has super strength and some good energy blasts at his disposal so he can give any fighter a run for their money. He rules the Digital World, or at least a fraction of it. Merukimon believes in peace and he tries not to go to war with the humans, but his subordinates and evil humans make this rather difficult. I don’t care for how his character arc ended since I just don’t see him losing so easily, but he had a pretty good run. He’s definitely a Digimon that you can respect.

Gotsumon is Merukimon’s right hand man, but he’s a pretty treacherous opponent. He wants a war to start between the Digimon and the humans. He will do just about anything to start this and I mostly just disregarded him as a comic relief character. That changed when he evolved into Meteormon and had some of the best speed feats of the series. It’s no stretch to say that this guy could be a match for Superman and I gained a lot of respect for him. Now, having a lot of power doesn’t mean that you’ll instantly become a likable character, but I can safely say that it did wonders for this guy.

SaberLeomon is an ally to Merukimon although they don’t always get along. His abilities are considerable and he definitely isn’t going to let the humans get away with doing what they please. He launches an attack on the human world and it’s a pretty epic episode. He’s clobbering the heroes and even Commander Sampson is forced to suggest a retreat. Marcus won’t have any of that, but it’s definitely a pretty cool moment. His end isn’t satisfying as with Merukimon’s fate, but he gave us a great battle and he had a cool personality. He’s like your average Shonen Jump rival and that’s always a good thing.

Gizumon is a robot that Kurata built and he’s part Digimon I believe. It brings up the good ole question of whether a human can build something to surpass anything. We saw in DBZ that Androids can be created who are stronger than Super Saiyans and now we have a robotic Digimon that can surpass a Mega. A single blast from this fighter can disintegrate most Digimon. It’s a little too overpowered if you ask me and it’s really hard to swallow this fact. I don’t think that it can beat a true Mega so it’s tough to see it beating up the heroes. Its speed and power are simply off the charts, but it has no true character development. It’s design is also lacking somewhat in coolness. I wasn’t a huge fan of this thing, but it’s definitely tough.

Belphemon is one of the big foes to appear in the series, but only for a very short amount of time. For the most part, it’s sort of Belphemon, but not really. Let’s just say that he’s not in full control of what he’s doing for about half of his screen time and then his time is pretty limited when he does show up. He’s definitely as cool as ever when he does appear though and I’ve always liked him as a villain. His design is basically perfect for an antagonist since he can fight in any style. Whether short range or long range, his attacks are guaranteed to deal some major damage.

Kurata is one of the most annoying villains in the series and he could be one of the worst in the franchise. He’s made to be a very unlikable character since he’s despicable in just about every way. If that was the aim of the writers, then they certainly succeeded. There just isn’t anything likable about this guy and you’re just waiting for him to be crushed the whole time. The only problem is that he lasts for quite a long time. He’s around for over half the series, which is a pretty impressive feat for a villain. The only other villain that I can think of from the top of my head who has achieved this (In a series with at least 26 episodes and two different arcs) is Aizen, but I’m sure that there are others. He is a brilliant scientist and inventor, but those just aren’t good enough reasons to actually end up liking the character.

Nanami is one of the three humans who have the ability to change into a Digimon. It’s a very handy ability to have and these fighters have an incredible theme that plays whenever they transform. Nanami is a genius so her rival from the main characters is naturally Thomas. She’s definitely a great fighter and her speed is really off the charts. Unlike Kurata, Nanami is a villain that you won’t mind rooting for since she is pretty interesting. I can’t bring myself to root for her since I’m a much bigger Thomas fan, but she isn’t an unlikable villain. It’s also cool to see her have a strategic battle with Thomas…even if she should have won that battle.

Kouki is the next member of the trio and he’s easily my favorite one. He’s Marcus’ rival so I suppose that this makes sense. He’s always eager to battle and his personality is similar to your average Shonen Jump Protagonist or eager rival like Grimmjow. He doesn’t really have any bad scenes and it’s nice to see someone else jump in to fight instead of it just being Marcus all the time. Their punch in the Digital Wormhole was a nice way to start off their arc and he grew on me pretty quickly. I’m hesitant to say that he was the best villain in the series, but I’m thinking that there is actually a strong possibility that he is. Kouki is just great!

Unfortunately, every group has its weak point and this one is no exception. Ivan is the third member of the group and he’s easy the worst one. He’s not very smart and he’s always trying to flirt with Yoshino, but failing epicly. He doesn’t really know how to think yet so he just says all of his thoughts out loud. This results in wince worthy scenes were you just have to hope that he’ll be quickly defeated. His super forms also aren’t quite as cool as Nanami’s or Kouki’s. I could definitely do without this guy and Yoshino deserves a better rival.

Craniamon gets the biggest role from all of the Royal Knights. He has the most impressive fight and he is probably the most likable member as well. He fights with a shield and a double edged blade. (Not really a sword though) His shield is said to be unbreakable so getting past him is very tricky. His one on one fight with Marcus and Agumon was one of the better fights in the series. He eventually learns that it is not right to follow a leader without any questions and his character development definitely carries him to new heights. Not only is he one of the strongest Digimon in the franchise, he’s also one of the more likable ones.

Unfortunately, the rest of the Royal Knights don’t get the same treatment. They have a cool moment where they all show up at once, but they don’t get a lot of development after that. In fact, most of them don’t even get to have climatic fights like Craniamon. Gallantmon looks pretty great in his appearances, but maybe a little too great. The heroes don’t really have an answer for him so one character is forced to make the ultimate sacrifice to turn this into a stalemate. Gallantmon doesn’t return until the very end when the fights are over.

Dynasmon is still a pretty cool figure, but all of his feats were in Frontier. The producers didn’t decide to challenge this and he is mostly relegated to the sideline. Likewise with Magnamon, whose role is very small. It’s interesting to see Magnamon since I’ve always considered him to be of a weaker tier than Royal Knights level. Good for him, but he is probably the weak link of the team…maybe. UltraforceVeedramon could be his rival in terms of power, but I have to say that he just looks a lot tougher. He would have had a really good fight I’m sure and his fans were probably disappointed.

Leopardmon got his own fight at least and his portrayal is…interesting. He’s the only Royal Knight that you could probably call pure evil. Might makes right according to him and he seems rather insane. I hope he is kicked off the team by the others and I have to wonder how he made it in the first place. This guy just seems a few graham crackers short of a smore if you know what I mean. He looks decent, but he also looks a lot weaker than the average Royal Knight.

LoadKnightmon is pretty lucky since he got a big role in Digimon Frontier and then he got a major fight against Thomas in Data Squad. I actually do like the design since it’s very robotic and stream lined. LoadKnightmon looks like he can be a real threat and it’s the kind of design that you might expect from something like Eureka Seven. He definitely doesn’t disappoint while in battle. This is why an extra 5-6 episodes for the series would have been good. If all of the Royal Knights had gotten big battles like LoadKnightmon and Craniamon, the ending would have been even more satisfying.

Omnimon is a perfect example of this since he is easily the strongest Royal Knight. (In theory anyway and I think it’s a safe assumption) He really should have gotten to fight since that would have been really cool. Marcus could have had his ultimate mega form battle with Omnimon and it would have been a battle for the ages. That was a missed opportunity, but I suppose that every show misses a chance somewhere along the line. Hopefully we get that fight someday.

King Drasil is the ultimate boss and his power is basically unlimited. It’s good to see that he can physically fight though since it would have been easy to have made him a high above being. His first form is pretty cool and I also liked his final mode. It wasn’t totally humanoid, but it was close enough so that he could still fight in close quarters combat if he had too. This guy got a lot of hype so it was fun to finally see him once and for all. It was a nice way to end the series.

Spencer Damon is Marcus’ father who vanished prior to the start of the series. He was apparently a nice guy and we learn more and more about him as the series progresses. Like Marcus, he can use digital data to amplify his attacks and do some real damage. He seemed to be even stronger than Marcus since his strength may have been on a planetary level. It’s a shame that we never really get to see him fight seriously on screen. The only time where we come close is in a flashback and the match is mostly off screen. This is one guy who could definitely hold his own series and it would have been cool to have seen him a little more before the series finally ended.

BanchoLeomon is a mysterious Mega Digimon who helps the heroes from time to time, but I definitely didn’t care for him. He’s pretty skilled and he’s a pure hand to hand fighter, but he’s just not my kind of character. An example of this is when he locks the main characters in a hut to train and then he refuses to let them out until they complete their training. You expect a strict instructor in these shows, but he goes too far. See, the Digimon partners of the main characters were getting blown away by some villains at the time and the heroes knew that they couldn’t last much longer. Knowing that, BanchoLeomon still refused to let them out and he didn’t mind letting their lives be snuffed out. Marcus quickly did something about that, but I never let BanchoLeomon off the hook. As far as I am concerned, he’s evil and someone who needs to be stopped.

Now, is D.A.T.S. is evil or just severely misguided? They decide that they have to destroy Digimon as quickly as they appear in the human world so that they don’t cause panic in the streets. Destroying a Digimon merely reverts them back to their baby form though so they aren’t really dead. That being said, you still wonder about this since they’re basically shooting first and asking questions later. The show tries to help them out by explaining that all Digimon go crazy when they go into the real world by mistake so they can’t be reasoned with. That being said, Mega Level Digimon seem to be an exception and likewise with the partners of the main humans. D.A.T.S. was quick to attack Agumon so it makes you wonder how many other heroic Digimon were taken down. They naturally mellowed out since Marcus joined (Since he makes sure to keep them on the side of justice) but it makes you wonder just how good they are. Governments and military groups never seem to be trust worthy in TV shows and this is no exception.

I think that Kurata probably gets away with a little too much during arc 1. He takes down a whole lot of Digimon and he basically forces them to retaliate. You really can’t blame the Digimon for wanting to destroy the Earth since the humans are constantly trying to harm them. Unfortunately, the heroes are ready to stop them so it’s a dicey predicament. The Digimon are in a no win situation since they can decide not to strike back and watch as their allies are defeated or they can attack and get bested by Marcus. So, you can definitely sympathize with these guys and it’s one of the only reasons why you can accept the Royal Knights deciding to destroy Earth. That being said, they are supposed to be completely just heroes so you expect more out of them. Also, where were they when Kurata was attacking the other Digimon? With their extreme speed, they should be able to help out a lot. I’ll assume that they were in statis or something.

Data Squad’s animation is definitely sound. It has a Shonen Jump feel to it that the other series just didn’t have. The previous installments looked good of course, but this one is just that much better. Tamers also had some good animation so it can hold its own, but I’d go as far as to say that Data Squad easily surpasses every other Digimon show in terms of animation. It helps that the fights are really intense here so the animators can take advantage of that of course. I’ll talk about the battles in a short while. Needless to say, the animation really shines throughout the series and especially during the final arc.

Another factor that was in the show’s favor is definitely the soundtrack. Digimon is a franchise that is very well know for its great soundtracks or at least in the English dub of each series. Data Squad takes it up another notch as at least 90% of its themes are fight related. Only 1 other show has managed to pull that off in the past and that was Yugioh GX. You can already tell that Data Squad is in some pretty good company here. From the cliff hanger music to the tense themes, Data Squad just nails them all. Even the “previously on Digimon” scenes become epic as the show plays a great battle theme. There’s never a dull moment in the series and the soundtrack really solidifies that fact.

The action scenes are another thing that separates this show from most anime. The battles are pretty reminiscent of DBZ and they’re very high tier. Digimon Frontier actually started this off since their fights felt like classic DBZ scuffles, but this show just takes it to the next level. The strongest fighters in this series are easily stronger than Frontier’s. (Don’t get the wrong idea, Frontier’s strongest fighters are still immensely powerful, but they would not be able to win this fight) The action scenes are intense regardless of how high tier they are though as the first fights with Marcus against rookies and champions are still exciting. This is thanks to the soundtrack mixed in with the animation. The hand to hand certainly helps since those fights are always excited. Brawling action is great to mix in with beam fights since it makes the battles that much more dynamic. We even get a classic scene where someone catches Marcus’ punch, which is an impressive feat in itself. As far as the power levels go, the top fighters from this series could take out many fighters in Naruto, Bleach, One Piece, and maybe even some DBZ fighters. Don’t underestimate these Digimon!

I already mentioned that this is my 2nd favorite show of all time so it probably goes without saying that it beats the other Digimon shows. That being said, they put up an admirable fight. As of this post, the Digimon rankings go: Digimon Data Squad–Digimon Tamers–Digimon Adventure–Digimon Frontier–Digimon Adventure 02–Digimon Fusion. The last two spots do tend to shift around sometimes though as it’s really close. Digimon Adventure 02 had the better writing, but the songs were terrible so it’s a tough call. Data Squad wins in characters, fight scenes, soundtrack, and animation so it’s basically got all of the areas covered. Like I said, it’s just about perfect.

If I had to mention a negative aside from Keenan, it would be that the ending is a little rushed. All of the Royal Knights should have gotten a chance to have a real fight. The series really could have used the extra 4 episodes to reach 52 so that they could fight. 4 episodes would certainly be enough or at least it would be enough to satisfy me. There’s a lot of action that you can fit in those 2 hours. It wasn’t to be though and when a little pacing problem is the show’s biggest concern, you know that you’re doing pretty well. The show gets by without resorting to fanservice tactics, which is another check on its overall score.

Every show has a moment where things get real. That moment where the show jumps from good to great or from mediocre to good depending on the title. The moment where the show peaks and that happens towards the end of arc 1 in this title. When the 3 humans who can biomerge into Digimon appear, that’s when Data Squad went from great to elite. It’s an intense scene and you won’t be able to tear yourself away from the screen when that happens. On a bright note, even the filler episodes are pretty entertaining. The boxer episode comes to mind and there were no big stakes, but it was still a pretty great episode. That’s because the writing for this show is pretty consistent.

Speaking of which, the ending leaves a lot of room for possible sequels. It would be great to see a certain character who’s returned join in on some action and Marcus is only just beginning to unlock his full powers. I would have liked a sequel to this show since the possibilities are really endless. Adventure is finally getting a sequel though so maybe there is still a chance for this show. As far as endings go, Data Squad’s is pretty great and it certainly beats most other titles in that regard. (Naruto)

Overall, Digimon Data Squad is just about perfect. It’s a show that has a lot of replay value and nearly everything went its way. The pacing is pretty good and the animation is sure to help you enjoy the fights a lot. The soundtrack is easily 5 star material and Marcus makes for a great lead. Keenan may not be a good character, but you can definitely overlook him on this epic experience. The show is ironically a few episodes shorter than the other seasons, but that’s okay. Over 40 episodes is still enough time for you to get used to the characters. I definitely recommend this show to any anime fan and especially if you are looking for a title with a lot of fights. It’ll be tough for any show to pass this one and that’s why my top 3 shows of all time are virtually set in stone at this point. 1. Yugioh GX. 2. Digimon Data Squad. 3. Cardfight Vanguard. Everything else can fight for the remaining spots on my top 10. Check this show out and tell me what you think! I’ll have to wait a while before I see Marcus in action again, but that should be pretty epic!

Overall 9/10

Scan 2 Go Review

Posted on December 20, 2014 by dreager1

Scan 2 Go is a show that I started a little over 2 years ago. It was a pretty solid series, but then it was pulled from TV…never to be shown again. Now, it has finally made it to Youtube so I got to blast through the final 7-8 episodes. Let’s just say that this is a great show that really manages to hit it out of the park in several areas. On the surface it’s just another awesome toyetic show, but it decides to go all Gurren Lagann on us in the final 2. This title is pretty obscure so let’s go over the plot first.

There’s a plot? Of course! Kaz Gordan is from Earth and he has three friends. Together, they form Team Jet and they are training to become the best racers in the universe. Scan 2 Go is a futuristic game that lets you mentally synchronize with your (tiny) toy car as you travel across dangerous tracks. The game never really hit it off on Earth, but every other planet is playing it. Kaz convinces his teacher to let Team Jet travel across the universe after he crushes him in a toy car fight. The heroes win tournament after tournament as they meet strange allies and tricky villains. There are many tournaments and training sessions throughout the show, but it’s difficult to call them actual arcs. One of the big story arcs was when the team went to Gurao to train since that’s where they got to bond with their allies. Finally, the team went back to Earth for the universal tournament. The final Grand Prix to decide who the fastest racer in the universe is. Unfortunately….an old enemy has decided to show up as well. There will be much more about that in a moment.

Scan 2 Go’s animation is actually pretty good. To an extent, I expected this, but it really shines during the space battles or really any scene with Ryu. The energy attacks are great and I’m convinced that this show could have pulled off a hand to hand battle scene. How does it stack up against other toyetic shows? I think that the animation is behind Cardfight and Buddyfight, but it beats Tenkai Knights and the original Yugioh series. Animation isn’t typically a gamechanger for a show, but it sure makes the racing scenes more exciting. I can’t say that any episodes had bad animation and that’s always a good thing.

The soundtrack for the show is one of its biggest strengths. There are technically not a whole lot of themes in the show since the old ones just play again and again and again. That’s all right though since they’re so good. From the starting theme, “Scan 1….” so Ryu’s theme, Scan 2 Go’s music selections are intense. The Ryu one is definitely intense and it makes for a very good villain theme. It’s in sharp contrast to the racing theme that typically plays since that one is very fast, but hopeful. Unfortunately, the opening isn’t very good, but this is the kind of show that can get by that thanks to all of its other strengths.

Let’s talk about Ryu. He changed the entire series, which is very impressive. Until he showed up, Kaz just had fun outracing everyone and showing them why his Falgor was the best car in the biz. That all changed when Ryu introduced the notion of racing to destroy the other competitors. His car is the fastest and the strongest in the series so none of the other racers can hope to beat him in a fair race. Luckily, that’s not what he wants anyway. He just wants to destroy the universe! As you can imagine, that was pretty shocking to see in this show. Until then, one could argue that the strongest fighters weren’t even planet busters…so how did we upgrade to universe busting?

Well, Ryu is a living embodiment of a black hole and the power gem that is on his forehead gives him additional power. His car has the ability to instantly regenerate injuries although it may just be Ryu’s ability that transfers to the car since they are fully synchronized. Ryu is so great that he actually pulls off a feat that people have been waiting for DBZ to show. He destroys a moon just by having his car ram into someone else’s. It’s a great scene and it’s pretty tragic since you’re not used to seeing other people get injured in this show. That being said, Ryu goes even farther than that.

Only one character is destroyed in the entire series and you can probably guess who did that. Ryu has a climatic battle with the greatest racer in the universe..or at least, the man who was the greatest racer in the universe. It was a very fun, high budget battle in space and we got to see both of them really put everything on the line. That was easily the darkest episode and the moment where the series had changed forever. It’s hard not to quickly begin to love Ryu as a villain. He toys with all of the heroes and he is the only one who seems to realize that their cars can be used as weapons. After all, they can shoot thunder, make tsunamis, black holes, etc. Why should they only be used in races?

Another reason why the final episodes were so great was because we finall got to see the mysterious council make their move. It really felt like a moment out of Shonen Jump when we got to see Ryu fight these new characters. They all had unique powers and they talked a good game so it was pretty great. I don’t think anyone ever questioned who would win the fight, but it was just fun to see. Ryu’s car also gets to smash through an entire army and it can move so quickly that it turns into a giant meteor.

It doesn’t stop there though as its gravity powers (Or Ryu’s) are enough to push the Moon out of orbit and send it crashing to Earth. Ryu’s universe destroying plan is also rather simple. His car just needs to win one more big race to have enough power to make a black hole big enough to suck everything in. (He absorbs the powers of those he has defeated after all) Naturally, Kaz and friends are here to stop him so it ends up being a 8-12 vs 1 matchup in the final battle. It’s pretty great to see, but the heroes sure look weak and completely out of their league compared to such a fighter.

The heroes are able to let their cars reach FTL speeds as well, although I found Ryu’s feat more impressive since he was doing it on his own. That being said, it’s intense to see them just cruising past planets on their way to victory. I also have to give the show some props since the easy way would have been to just have had Ryu die when they pushed him into the sun. Let’s just say that it’s not enough to stop him. I think that he should have been able to have just left and regrouped somewhere else, but it was pretty much impossible to stop him so they had to end everything somehow. At least the heroes got to try their luck at pushing a moon. It’s a good strength feat since we need to keep in mind that Wonder Woman, Superman, and Martian Manhunter teaming up couldn’t move the moon while the heroes from Gurao were able to move it. (Even more impressive is that the Moon was already crashing so it’s different from pushing a Moon that’s in orbit.) Other heroes come to help after that, but the heroes already got the main job done.

Now, all of this does bring to mind one big concern with the sport and why you have wonder about how safe it is. The show is rather inconsistent in showing just how synchronized you are with the car, but it seems to suggest that you feel the virtual damage that you car does. It’s why the humans will wince or groan with pain after a big attack or end up getting knocked down. They also seem to abandon the real world completely, but is this physical or just mental? At the very least, your conciousness leaves like in Sword Art Online, but other times we see the fighters just appear where the cars are. (Even if it’s thousands of miles away from the arena) So, it’s possible that their physical bodies are able to instantly warp to their cars or they are spirited away during the match. However, they stay at the racetrack at other times to trade insults with the others.

Ultimately, I don’t think that the show could really make up its mind on this. I’ll just think of it as throwing your conciousness into the car, which is why you feel the damage and wind up wherever the car is. After all, we can’t really look at Zero’s battle with Ryu any other way. How else could he breathe in space and follow Ryu there? (Ryu can breathe in space, but he’s not even human so it’s all right) I’ll just add that you can quickly go back to the real world as well or stay there the whole time depending how synched you are with your car. Naturally, this means that mind games work very well in this series.

I still haven’t mentioned what the risk of racing is have I? Well, if you feel the virtual damage, then you are put at great risk. One fighter ended up synching with his car while in space so when the car was blown up, the guy was either blown up with it or he ended up suffocating. Luckily, it seems to be the former. Another guy is obliterated by an energy blast because his car was. There’s no way that you can find this hobby safe and it makes you wonder about all of the one shot characters who got crushed throughout the series. It seems like the virtual damage doesn’t affect you if you don’t have a high synch rate so the throwaway characters might be safe, but it’s still hard to see how this sport is condoned. Maybe that’s why Earth isn’t exactly head over heels for it. Well, that’s enough about how awesome the series is for now, let’s look at the rest of the characters. (Since I basically already talked about Ryu a lot. He’s my favorite character in the series while I have to boot Kaz down to number 2)

Before Ryu took the spot, Kaz had been my favorite character in the series from the very first episode. He’s just awesome and a shining example of how I want my main characters to look. Kaz doesn’t pull any punches whether he’s racing against little kids or old men. In the very first episode he ends up beating his mentor so that he could escape Earth and race in the big leagues. It was pretty cool since the future is luckily safe enough that 10 year old kids can fly around the cosmos unchaperoned. (Unless you count their little robot friend.) Kaz always has a lot of determination and he constantly mentions how he wants to be the Fastest in the Universe. It’s a noble goal to be sure and one to be proud of. He makes quite a few rivals along the way, but he’s never outmatched for very long. His car’s special ability is that it can fly, which actually isn’t one of the better abilities, but it hasn’t failed him yet. While Ryu wields the power of darkness, Kaz holds the power of light and there are only two to three other characters who have wielded a similar power in the past. Zero and one of Kaz’s masters come to mind. Unfortunately, he only uses it a few times throughout the series and surprisingly not in the final fight. That’s a missed opportunity, but it doesn’t stop Kaz from being one of the best main characters out there. I agree with just about all of his decisions and he doesn’t make any huge mistakes throughout the series. No, Kaz is all about the win and then the team..in that order. His Galaxy Falgor is also cooler than almost every other car in the series.

Shiro is the main rival of the series, which guarantees him a spot in the top 5 of the series. He has ice abilities so he can freeze an entire battlefield and stop everyone in their tracks with minimal effort. Unfortunately, he can’t totally control this power and he ends up turning into a wolf sometimes. He seems to be part of a wolf changing species, but he looks pretty human while in..human mode. His car is pretty great since aside from ice abilities, he can also teleport. That is very handy to have in a race and it’s hard to see Shiro ever losing once he gets that power. To an extent..you’d be right, but it’s also partially because his role is lessened a whole lot by that point. By the end, he’s barely in the show anymore aside to just be in the background. No matter, he’s still a pretty great character. The only part of the show where he got to be a little annoying was when he was having a lot of internal drama and he let Ryu play him like a puppet. That was pretty sad, but luckily it was also very brief. Shiro is one of the only racers who can actually give Kaz a fight so he needs to stay in the game!

Zero is known as the greatest racer in the universe and Kaz has always wanted to surpass him. It’s a little sad that they never get to have a proper race since that would have been pretty great. Zero is essentially perfect, which irritates his rivals, but shows why he has so many fans. He doesn’t use any gimmicks or cheap tricks to win as he just races from start to finish. That being said, his decision to fight Ryu may not have been his greatest one. It was an awesome moment since Zero had gotten a whole lot of hype while Ryu was the mysterious son of the black hole. Zero put up a good fight since his car could shoot lasers and he held his own while in space. It was an admirable fight and it was a great way to wrap up his character arc. Let’s just say that I wasn’t going to forget him after that. I’d actually say that he is one of the coolest characters in the show and I’d probably place him at third behind Ryu and Kaz. That final fight certainly did a lot to help me gain respect for him.

Fiona is the main heroine in the series and she has a long lasting rival in Hebina. Her car’s ability is that it can navigate through a race track by using its gliders to look at the stage layout, but the writers probably realized that this wasn’t much of an ability so she gains thunder powers as the series goes on. Those are very useful to be sure so I was glad that she got those new powers. She likes to think that she’s just as good as Kaz in a race, although all of his allies seem to illogically believe that to an extent. Even if Kaz proves them wrong over and over again…their honor is at stake here! She’s definitely better than Myron and Diego, but Shiro would take the number 2 spot on Team Jet…if we decide to count him. She’s definite a pretty likable ally and at least her skills are considerable. She may be top 3 as far as toyetic heroines are concerned, which is a feat in itself.

Diego is the Dex/Bud/Bronx of the show. He’s always eating except when he’s too nervous or upset to do so. His car is pretty slow, but strong. The problem is that there are several other cars that are simply stronger than his, which takes away his only gimmick. How can he hope to win a true race with such a car? Typically, his will power is just that much better than his opponents so he is able to get an extra boost to win the day. I can’t say that I believed many of his wins though and he’s not one of the better allies. He gets a subplot where he feels like he is the weakest member on the team and the sad part is that it’s probably true. Kaz puts a lot of effort into training, but we never see Diego proactively decide to do this. He’s too interested in eating so why should he expect to be strong? It was emotional and all, but he really doesn’t add anything to the show. I still wouldn’t go as far as to say that he’s a bad character though. He’s just not that good.

Myron is one member of Team Jet that I definitely didn’t care for. He’s the smart member of the group, but that doesn’t stop him from still wanting to be one of the fastest racers in the universe. He’s asking for too much if you ask me. His Storm Slazer actually has a pretty good design and it’s gimmick is that it can drive well over ice, sand, and water. It can also drill under the track to hide if necessary. The problem is that Myron is always quick to turn against Kaz since nothing can ever be his fault. He’s worse than Diego and some of the allies from Gurao, which is pretty sad for him. He was definitely a little worse than I could have expected.

Dradd was Kaz’s first rival and he stayed with him until the very end. He has a rivalry with Ryu going on, but he has to get in line since Kaz and Taiga also have beef with the guy. His car’s special ability is that it can hit the ground hard enough to make it jump forward. It’s pretty nifty, but not that practical compared to the other cars. Power is his thing like with Diego and Ryu, but he’s probably second in that category. He talks tough and he is older than Kaz, but he had to start his training from scratch since he had stopped improving. He’s the best member from Gurao. That may not be saying a lot, but his races are fun to watch and I definitely wouldn’t call him a bad character. He’s outmatched against Kaz, but that’s just his bad luck right?

Taiga is Kaz’s second rival and I guess that makes him rivals with Dradd as well to an extent. He races so that he can become better than Zero and then a big rivalry starts with Ryu. He is a good racer, but his will power isn’t so great and he can be manipulated rather easily. He’s not bad, but he tries to act a little too cool at different points and it just doesn’t work. He’s a decent rival, but I’d say that Kaz is clearly superior in a race. I could probably take Taiga a little more seriously if he could have convincingly defeated Diego in the race, but it was a little too close for comfort. He talks really tough the whole series, but he’s usually on the losing end of a race. At least he learned the values of friendship by the end…

I’m starting to realize that the sad characters were not great in this show. I liked Shiro, Zero, Kaz, Fiona, Dradd, and Ryu. That sounds like a lot, but considering how many characters are in the show…that’s a pretty small number. I just ended up not really feeling like the other characters were that good. Kraken is no exception as he is a King who enjoys the game, but it rather overconfident about it. His voice doesn’t help matters at all, but the worst part is that he just doesn’t seem to be that good. His car can shoot large waves of water, which is a pretty great technique, but his car isn’t great on the ground…and that’s where almost all of the races take place. He bonds with the heroes at one point, which gets them all on his side, but he didn’t get me on his side.

Hebina might be the worst member from the Gurao team since she is clearly a villain who just happens to race. Her abilities are not great so she constantly cheats to ensure that she claims victory in her battles. None of the other characters call her out on this half the time and she certainly didn’t earn her spot with the best in the Final Grand Prix. Her theme is also awful and the only piece of music that I didn’t like. It’s not an exaggeration to say that she may be the worst character in the show. Her gimmick is that her car can make illusions so that it looks like her car has multiplied. It’s not very original though since a shadow council member could do that with his car and likewise with Kaz’s original teacher. She’s going to have to do better than that if she wants to be an expert racer and hopefully she becomes likable someday…but the sequel series would really need to change her character to make that possible.

Jack is a cop who also happens to be a racer and he’s definitely not likable. He’s probably the weakest racer from Gurao and it’s hard to even remember what his gimmick is. He definitely has something since his character needs a gimmick, but it probably wasn’t that great. He has a hero moment towards the end of the series where he destroys a meteor, but it just doesn’t make up for a whole series. He needs to just stick to one field and master it instead of dabbling in both. He constantly goes after Hebina, which would be okay if it was just to arrest her, but he doesn’t take his job seriously enough for that. He just likes to give her a hard time. He must have been lucky to have made it to the final grand prix.

Ray is Kaz’s teacher from Earth and he’s pretty cool. His attitude is similar to Kakashi’s in that he is always very confident and mysterious. It’s a little hard to take him seriously since he was defeated in the very first episode of the series and then disappeared until around episode 49, but he quickly made up for this in the final race. His skills are apparently up there with some of the world’s best and that’s pretty cool to see. From Kaz’s three teachers he was definitely the best. Master Hippopo is arguably the strongest master since he’s the leader of the super council and he fought Ryu, but he was certainly not very likable. The only good scene with Hippopo aside from his fight against Ryu was probably his “death” in one of the earlier episodes since Kaz got to have a rage moment as he dueled against Hebina. Now that was intense!

Antares was one of the less interesting members of the main guys. He is a publicity guy first and foremost. He like to always be in the spotlight and he acts as if his races are just shows for his adoring fans. That ultimate comes back to bite him in the final episode. His car’s gimmick is that it can use its tail to do a flip on the track so that it can dodge attacks. It’s pretty useful, but definitely not the greatest bonus for when it comes down to a contest of speed. I just don’t really find him to be that likable and I also doubt his skills.

I have to say that the ending wasn’t great though. I Loved the huge climax and how out there is got, but some parts were still a little disappointing. One part that I was underwhelmed by was Kaz’s big charge against Ryu. He decided that winning on his friends sacrifices wouldn’t be worth it so he attacked Ryu in a rage moment. Unfortunately, he is just thrown to the side and he couldn’t deal any damage. He didn’t even last 5 seconds so that was pretty sad. I also think that they should have just said that Kaz was the winner at the end instead of just saying that all fans of the series were winners. That’s a bit of a cop out right?

Overall, Scan 2 Go is a great show and it’s certainly not one that you’ll want to miss out on. The series mostly doesn’t have a whole lot of stakes in it since it’s just about seeing the heroes race as they get through their challenges, but that definitely changes once Ryu enters the show. Before Ryu’s appearance the show still would have gotten a 7 easily, but his battles gave it the push that it needed to reach the elusive 8. It’s a great experience from start to finish and the visuals as well as the soundtrack only help to enhance that. Kaz is a likable main character and Ryu’s a great villain so you don’t need to worry about the characters dragging it down. Some subplots like Shiro’s origin don’t really go anywhere and we could have done without it, but maybe it’ll be in a sequel at some point. Regardless, the show just wins on all accounts so you definitely want to see it as soon as possible!

Overall 8/10

Slayers Next Review

Posted on November 14, 2014 by dreager1

I have now finished the second installment in the Slayers franchise. The previous title managed to be a pretty good anime as it was a pretty unique title with a main character who wasn’t afraid to deal with collateral damage. The concept may not seem unique to older anime viewers, but there aren’t many fantasy titles that take place in the olden days like this one anymore so it was pretty fresh for me. Slayers Next definitely takes most of the aspects from the first show and brings them to new heights. This works as a double edged blade, but it is definitely another anime worth watching.

The series takes place shortly after the climax of the series finale as Lina and Gourry have split up from the rest of the party. They seem to just be wandering around without much of a goal, but they meet up with Amelia and Zelgadis. Zelgadis still wants to be turned back into a human so he is working for some corrupt dealers. Lina quickly sets him straight and the 4 heroes decide to search for some manuscripts to the Claire Bible. The Claire Bible is supposed to have unlimited knowledge so that should help Zelgadis in his quest. This artifact becomes more and more crucial to their quest as some strong monsters start showing up to destroy Lina. Lina Inverse begins to suspect why they are after her and let’s just say that there are some planetary ramifications involved. The heroes are going to have to grow even stronger if they want to counter this new threat.

Now, you can argue that the Claire Bible arc is the entire show or you can divide it up by having the search for it be the first half while the battle against the monsters is the second half. It’s debatable I suppose, but it’s really just all one arc in my mind. A mysterious figure by the name of Xellos helps to distinguish these parts as he leads them on a lot of wild (filler) goose chases to various parts of the planet in the first half of the series. Also, we can’t forget that this is still Slayers. There are quite a few filler episodes where the cast gets to help liberate kingdoms and solve mysteries as they take a break from the serious dealings with the monsters. Sometimes, a filler episode will even squeeze in a moment or two to add some details to the real plot as they go on their journey.

The series is still pretty light as with the first title with only a quick scene or two where the violence gets ramped up. It never goes overboard as the show keeps it real and that makes the scenes even more surprising. As with the first show, this only occurs at the very end when the climax starts. The body count begins to rise and you can tell that the main villains mean business. Slayers does a good job of knowing when to get serious and when to keep the mood happy and light.

I also have to give the writers credit for their depiction of Lina Inverse. It would have been easy to pull a 1st Hokage or Goku/Gohan where they are always very nice, but instantly become feared amongst their allies when they get serious. I never liked that aspect of a character since it’s okay to intimidate a villain, but your allies shouldn’t fear you. Doesn’t that basically just make you the next villain? Lina’s pals never fear her except for comic relief scenes where they back away. That’s more acceptable since it’s just for laughs anyway and you can tell that they aren’t serious.

Lina starts to question her use of the dark magic from the Lord of Nightmares after she sees a vision, which unfortunately hampers her ability to fight towards the end. At least she still pulls through when the chips are down, but I disagreed with her hesitation from the start. The world may blow up, but it wouldn’t matter anyway since the villain would bring a lot of ruin to the planet as well. Lina is primarily a thief, but she always gets tangled up in these wars since she is a mage of world wide renown and she does have a sense of justice deep down. (Although she doesn’t admit it, which is a plus) The heroes are lucky that she is around since Lina is vastly superior to all of her allies in terms of raw power. We rarely see a main character shooting off blasts that can level cities so casually. (We also see proof of this as seen when she does blow up towns and mountains as opposed to Goku who can’t afford to blow up a planet so the doubters still have a little bit of wiggle room there)

Sadly, the anime does use Lina as an excuse for some fanservice now and again. (For once, I wouldn’t actually blame Lina’s character for it since it’s usually people insulting her, which is hardly her fault) It’s not drastic since Lina’s character is meant to purposely not be able to give us a lot of fanservice so it’s mostly just a lot of chest comments from villains that Lina quickly decimates. Martina is usually the one who initiates this and she also gives us some more fanservice. I’d say that Next definitely has more of this overall than the first season, but it’s still reasonably light compared to most shows. As mentioned, the fanservice is mostly audio based as opposed to the standard visual. (There’s only one or two hot spring scenes that would beg to differ) I’d say that this is preferable, but they are naturally both uncalled for and I’m just glad that they aren’t heavily featured here. It should be noted that there are some brief romance elements to be found here. From the parody Sylphiel to the filler princes, Slayers Next does include a bit of it. The final episode also has a quick moment, but luckily the characters realized that they just panicked and pretended that the whole thing never happened. Forget and Forget is their motto and it worked pretty well.

Gourry is about as likable as he was in the first show. This means that he is a great character 90% of the time, but he still can’t help, but make insulting remarks about Lina’s chest, which quickly drops him down as a character. To be a truly good character, you must be good at least 99% of the time. Gourry is always a little slow on the ball when it comes to just about anything, but it arguably gets even worse in Slayers Next for him. A scene that captures his personality perfectly is when the heroes go to the hot springs. Gourry takes so long to change out of his clothes that everyone is already leaving when he’s getting there. He tries to tell Zelgadis to wait up since he was just about to go in, but he doesn’t listen so Gourry is forced to enjoy the hot springs by himself. It’s hard to tell whether you should cry or laugh since it’s just so sad for the guy. You also have to wonder how long it took him to change since you’d think that the heroes had already been in the hot springs for a while.

Gourry’s also fairly outmatched in this series by just about everyone. Unfortunately, he doesn’t know how to use magic, which is pretty dangerous in this world. He has the famous Sword of Light, but it feels like anyone can just block it or dodge the strikes. So, Gourry doesn’t look very good when it’s battle time, but you do have to admire his determination. He’s typically the first guy to attack and the final one to fall. That speaks highly of his durability and his actual swordsmanship is great. We get a glimpse of how strong Gourry could be if he was serious during the final batch of episodes and he looks very impressive there. If he could learn to fight at that level consciously, he would be a real threat. Technically, the Sword of Light is great since it’s unbreakable and it can block any magical blast. (Within reason) It protects him from all projectiles and one good hit can destroy any monster. Gourry’s main drawback is that he is only a human so it’s hard to block a blast if he’s not prepared for it and he can’t fly. Gourry can only move at normal speeds as well. When he was “awakened” Gourry’s reaction times were the critical change as he could block just about every blast and his raw power seemed to go up. So, his overall ability was not altered very much, he was just able to utilize his abilities to their fullest extent. If he could do that every time…I’m confident that he would be one of the top tier fighters here. At least, he could be the second strongest hero! (Behind Lina)

Zelgadis has certainly changed a lot since his days in the original series. He’s totally used for comedy now and he’s barely serious at all. He’s also shown to be significantly weaker than Lina at this point so he can’t really help when it comes down to a fight. Ironically, he did get a cool new sword, but it’s no Sword of Light and the villains tend to be too fast for him. All of this doesn’t bode too well for him, but you could argue that these developments were not downright terrible for him. No, the worst part is that Zelgadis completely turns against his friends just because he believes that someone can cure him. He betrays them without a second thought even though he knows that he’s working for an evil person. I have to admit that this was going pretty far and while he may have joined up with Lina’s team on good terms by the end…it was a little too late for him. He just went way too far in his quest.

Xellos is easily one of the worst characters in the series. He’s played off as a mysterious fighter who is also incredibly strong, but it worked better for Blues. (Proto Man) Xellos has an extremely nasal voice to continue the franchise’s interesting ensemble of voices, but it’s not enough to make him likable. He likes to troll the heroes, which isn’t terrible in itself, but he does it in an evil way. You can tell that he’s a villain, but the anime tries to play it off like he’s just above such disputes. He humiliates Zelgadis and typically just gets the heroes into trouble, but they still allow him to tag along on the journey. He also makes random romantic advances to keep people quiet, which also makes him pretty tedious. He has a few twists and we discover just how powerful he is, but he still manages to look terrible. After all of the hype, he can barely take on a minion (He needs Lina’s help) and he gets utterly wrecked by the first real villain that he encounters. Sure, he took on an army in a flashback, but flashbacks are like banana peels. They used to be good and now they’ve just spoiled our image of what things could have been. whenever Xellos appeared, I would hope that someone would take him out. The heroes never really tried to do anything about him so it was up to the other villains.

Amelia has stayed pretty true to form in this sequel. As with Gourry and Lina, she really hasn’t changed at all and that’s a good thing. The first episode was a change of pace since she seemed to be more confident in her role as a princess as well as her combat abilities. She may be a little more aggressive and eager to fight here, which can only help her character. She is still a hero of justice and Amelia is easily the most heroic member of the party. (Gourry may be a close second, but Amelia really just wants to help people out. It doesn’t get more heroic than that!) She is the first fighter to finally enhance her hand to hand skills with spirit energy, which is a classic Shonen technique. She can’t really match up against the villains so she is forced to watch on the sidelines with Sylphiel and Zelgadis for the majority of the series. Her determination is simply not enough to close the gap, but she’s still a pretty great character.

Martina has quickly become one of the main characters of the series, but she’s only good in a parodyish way. Sometimes it can be hard not to root for her to defeat Lina so that she can finally have a win, but usually you are just hoping that she will go away. She crushes on people pretty quickly and she worships a made up monster that she thought up during her desperate hours. I do admire the fact that she is always going after Lina, whether it means going through a den of monsters or burning one of the Claire Bible manuscripts. I think the series should think twice before making her a permanent member of the team, but she’s still better than some of the party members that we’ve seen in other series.

I have to wonder what happened to Sylphiel. I’m thinking that the writers must have forgotten about her and how skilled she looked in her debut in the original series. Sylphiel started out her anime history by blocking one of Rezo’s ultimate blasts with a barrier. Not even Lina and Zelgadis’ combined efforts were enough to block this, yet Sylphiel stopped the blast with ease. After that, she has never managed to pull off a decent magic feat again. For most of this series, she just provides the heroes with moral support. Sylphiel does get one good moment where we find out that she knows how to use the Dragon Slave (City Buster) attack, which was a great improvement, but her other abilities are still below average. She is mainly a healer and it seems like she will be sticking to that. I think the writers dropped the ball here since she could have been the ultimate defense fighter with her powerful barriers and healing magic. She’s still a decent character, but she’s probably a little less likable than she could have been. Also, she says “Dear Gourry” instead of “Gourry dear” in this show a lot. I guess it’s because Gourry isn’t usually around, but it’s hard to get used too. She means well, but I’m not sure what she can really bring to the table when a fight draws near. Lina has some healing magic to use in a pinch as well.

Gaav is one of the big villains in this series and he’s pretty great. He’s a villain who relies on his physical attributes while also utilizing his energy blasts. Think of him as an evil Goku and you’ll have the right idea. He’s easily the best villain in the franchise so far and I don’t see him dropping anytime soon. He doesn’t appear until the series is almost over, but he makes his presence known. His end is pretty unsatisfying, but I think it was better than some of the alternate ways that the show could have gone about it.

The Lord of Nightmares is a supremely powerful being who is capable of doing just about anything. She is above all of the other cosmic beings so she can be used as a Deux Ex Machina whenever the need arises. She is known to be a really evil and dangerous figure by reputation, but we find out that she’s not really a bad person. She blows up galaxies and star systems, but she doesn’t do it for any petty reasons. It’s just the natural cycle of life. She will alter her plans if she wishes to do so. She gets a bit of a role in the climax and I was glad that she lived up to the hype. I doubt we’ll ever get to see her seriously fight since it would be impossible for another fighter to match her, but I’ll take this over nothing. She’s easily one of the better cosmic beings since she is at least a reasonable person and she doesn’t drone on about how we can’t change the inevitable.

Phibrizzo is the final villain of the series and he’s definitely a force to be reckoned with. His true form seems like it would have been cool, but we don’t really get to see it in action. Phibrizzo makes the intriguing decision to fight the heroes as a little kid and I can’t say that I appreciate the gesture. This means that we can’t really look forward to any close combat situations with him. He likes to terminate his opponents from afar by simply willing it to be. He has power over death, which makes him very powerful, but not very fun to watch. I didn’t like him as a villain from the get go. As I mentioned, he’s very tough, but that doesn’t make him likable. As far as final bosses go, Slayers could do better. If only Gaav had been the final antagonist..now he was a villain!

Kanzel and Magenta are two of the monsters who challenged Lina and her friends during one of the mini arcs. They were actually relevant to the plot by the end since they had orders to get Lina, but their episodes tended to feel like filler. No matter, these guys were pretty tough and especially Kanzel. Both of them could have easily defeated Lina’s group if they had fought seriously from the beginning. The battle with Kanzel was pretty fun to watch since he could spam his teleporting ability and his defensive capabilities were unbelievable. He was able to take on a Ragna Blade and a Dragon Slave. His design is also pretty great when he enters his super form. Both of these villains were actually pretty likable and I would take them over Phibrizzo.

Halciform is a villain who gets a pretty minor role, but his immortality gives him a fighting chance against Lina. I always felt like anime writers gave immortality a little too much credit. Even if a villain is immortal, they are still vulnerable unless they have instant regeneration. At one point, Gourry slashes Halciform, which destroys him until he regenerates. It takes him a few seconds and they could have gone for a more serious injury that would have slowed him down some more. He also has some magic spells, but it’s nothing that will really be able to take Lina down. I didn’t find Halciform to be that likable, but he was a decent threat as far as one shot villains go.

Zangulus only gets to appear briefly for about 2-3 episodes, but he arrives at a pretty crucial moment. He looks pretty good here as he just wants to fight Gourry and he’s more of a rival than a villain now. He doesn’t resort to cheap tricks and he just wants to have a fair one on one fight. I can’t say that I really cared for him in the previous show, but he’s much better here. It can be a little hard to take him seriously since he’s outclassed powerwise, but he still puts up a good effort. His sword certainly comes in handy as well. His screentime may be limited, but Zangulus certainly makes the most out of it.

Seigram is actually one of the biggest villains in the show. He’s technically just a minion to Gaav, but his abilities speak for themselves. He was strong enough to give Zellos a good fight and he was also outclassing Lina and her friends. It’s hard to land a hit against him since he’s constantly teleporting. It’s sort of like Tobi’s trick from Naruto. He’s a cunning and resourceful villain and I became a fan by the end. He reminds me of The Other from Avengers. He has a cool mask and epic powers so that’s basically all that I needed from him. He’ll probably just be known as one of the more obscure villains as the franchise goes on without him, but he was pretty cool.

The soundtrack is decently good. I’m still not going to say that it’s great, but it fits the fantasy setting that the show is in. You’re certainly going to remember a few tunes by the end of it and they won’t annoy you, which is always a good thing. I’m still not crazy about the theme songs since they do feel rather dated (In terms of sound), but you can tell that the budget for them was also a lot higher than the original show. The characters look very sharp and the openings also have more action, which is great. (There should have been 2 openings since this is a 26 episode show though…)

The animation is also a noticeable step up from the first show. Some episodes may look a little bit like the original, but the climax as well as the first episodes can really show you how the animation has advanced. The colors are a lot brighter/sharper and JC Staff has once again showed us that they are ahead of the curve. Mixing that in with the DBZ effects just makes it incredibly enjoyable to behold. Slayers is able to keep that 90’s feel while bringing in some animation that looks like it’s in the latter 2000’s era.

One area that could come back to bite Slayers are the power levels in the series. Lina continues to learn new spells, but physically she is still just a human. This affects the whole cast since it doesn’t matter how much they train their offensive capabilities if their speed and durability to not improve. As it stands, the heroes get nervous whenever a monster shows up. If a normal monster can give them a good fight, then it’s even harder to see how they can stand up to the higher ups. They were lucky that Phibrizzo decided to take their ultimate attack and that the Lord of Nightmares found the heroes intriguing because things could have gotten very dangerous otherwise. Lina’s attacks deal damage over a pretty wide area, but that’s still not going to cut it against enemies who move at high speeds. We saw Zellos take on one of the commanders in a hyper speed battle and Lina’s group couldn’t even see them half of the time. The heroes simply wouldn’t stand a chance and the opponent wasn’t even one of the high ranking villains. This series certainly had a decent amount of plot hax, but it wasn’t spectacularly obvious. All shows have some plot hax to a degree, but it’s all about minimizing these scenes.

Slayers definitely deserves a lot of credit for the character roster. We have some pretty likable heroes and villains. Since the show lacks some of the advantages that other titles have, it has to make up for it with strong writing and solid characters. (For example, Sword Art Online started out with a huge budget, top notch voice actors, and an amazing soundtrack. Slayers has to start off without any of that) The voices are still a little retro in an unintentional way, but they can make the characters a little more humorous as well. One way to tell whether the characters are really good or not is to pay attention to the filler episodes. There are plenty of them to be found here (Dragon Fishing, Tennis matches, mysteries, etc) and a filler episode can hold up well if the characters as good. If they’re boring or can’t hold their own episodes with a bad plot, (Like Naruto and DBZ without the Saiyans) then they may not be as good as you think. Some of the filler episodes weren’t that good, but the characters always stayed in character and they weren’t as bad as the filler that I am used too.

Overall, Slayers Next is a pretty solid show. I’d basically say that it’s the very definition of a good/fun anime. It was slightly better than the first show, but it’s pretty close. This one had more action, but some of the filler episodes as well as Xellos’ character as a whole kept this from being a stomp. That being said, we’ve moved away from the days of the random mobs and monsters as real threats are always around now. Slayers Next also had a little more fanservice humor, but it was not overdone, which was a very good thing. The soundtrack can hold its own and the animation has improved. As long as Lina and Gourry are the two main characters, we can look forward to fun episodes since they can really hold their own stories. Their interactions are always fun and the voice acting keeps you entertained. I recommend this title to all fantasy fans and viewers who want to see a traditional RPG styled title.

Overall 7/10

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