Ranked #310

Kekkaishi

Kekkaishi is basically one epic siege story. The very fact that its based around protecting one piece of land (conveniently the main protagonists' school) only at night time, is the show's main hook, and it fulfils its interesting potential throughout.

Yoshimori and Tokine, our plucky teens, are charged with the seemingly life-long mission to protect a mystical piece of land with their barrier technique. The ability to create barriers of all shapes and sizes by pointing their fingers and shouting "Ketsu!" and destroying the contents of their CGI boxes with "Metsu!" It’s a very cool and unusual technique and the animation remains consistently good throughout the series, so it never gets old watching the two develop their skills, or to watch Tokine take liberties and use her kekkai to smack Yoshimori in the face.

The manga is written by a female so you can expect some good characterization for Tokine. The two heroes are on an even level for most of the anime, and being that it’s written by a female, the relationship and romance has a more deft touch to it. Sexist observation? Maybe, but I can tell you that I didn’t really roll my eyes or get bored with any of the lovey dovey moments sprinkled throughout Kekkaishi.

Populated by interesting and amusing characters, an epically memorable Taku Iwasaki score, refreshing pacing, and creative action, Kekkaishi is the definition of how a shonen genre anime is meant to be made. It does get a tad derivative towards the end, being unable to escape the tropes of the genre, but its still good fun. Each episode also ends with a great Photoshop-like montage of characters, basically summing up the climax of the last 20 minutes.

The producers even had the grace to just end the adaptation at the end of an arc, rather than overtake the manga or descend into filler hell. It’s a bittersweet compromise but one we should accept and respect. For a show sponsored by McDonalds, you'd think greed would compel them to milk everything out of this show, but they knew when to stop. Whether it was due to Kekkaishi not being as sell-able as Naruto or One Piece for example, I don’t know, but I don’t care when what they leave us with is an anime as excellent as this.

So like I said, Kekkaishi is a kind of siege story, a staple of the action-thriller genre that live-action films occasionally excel at, but anime rarely ever touches. Kekkaishi greets the genre head on with shonen enthusiasm and ends up an entertaining show worth watching. read more

Perfect execution of a unpopular shonen anime. Even though it has a mainstream plot and presentation, it has a soundness of all the elements in the show that so many one shot animes lack.

I could not give the show a 10 for character, since no character stood out like the infamous L, or Light, or Luffy, or many of the other great characters. Even though I was captivated by all the characters, no one stood out. It may be due to the female writer's preference not to bias her character development to only one of the two main characters. Even though it is a male oriented theme overall, she has built a great relationship between the two characters. Their attachment and growth dependence on one another really shows in the later part of the anime.

The story I could only give a 9 because it did not have any shocking twists, nor deep revelations. The show was intended for amazing action, intense adventure, and they even blew the budget on the animation! I meant that last part as a figure of speech. The plot was always entertaining, so I was never for a moment bored, and I was always anxious waiting for the next episode. Excellent themes are hidden within all the episodes. Especially between the common male male female character trinity, just like in Naruto. Also the ominous older brother, and tiresome grandfather play out in some dynamic relationship with Yoshimori. Kekkaishi is as good as Bleach and Naruto at their best. I use those two, since they stories are the most parallel to each other.

The animation was incredibly done. For clearly being an unpopular manga and show, the production was high grade. Limited CG images composited into the shows main scenes. Princess Mononoke was one of the first to do this well, and has been proven to be an incredible advancement for the industry. Over the next 10 years we are going to see much better animation, once show budgets increase as the world turns to a complete global market.

The score is done with great meticulousness for the creation of appeal. The end character montage with a rock rift is such a great way to end each episode. It makes you crave for the next episode. Shows like this that repeatably use the same melodies to lead into scenes really enhance the appeal of the show, instead of forcing some repetitive melody in your head. Animation is nothing without sound. Shows that do not put money into their soundtrack... fail.

The dialogue was great, so my overall enjoyment was superb. The common banter in shonens is a great exemplification of how it is possible to escape from all your problems in a moment. One minute a character is stressed over being weaker than an enemy, the next they are cajoling with their nemesis.

If you want to watch a consistent anime that gives everything you want, just take it all and watch the show. It does not disappoint and delivers in action, with only marginal build up of suspense. The creators of this show analyzed all the popular anime, and formulated a perfect model for a show they wished to produced, then approached the closest show that matched their requirements. Pretty prehistoric method of manga selection, but does it ever make a great animation.

Now its time for me to go back to the pile and search for another show. There is still one more episode to be subbed, but I am already satisfied by the show that is Kekkaishi.

Oh and by the way, they use these cool barriers called Kekkai, which act as shields, and can perform a type of volume combustion, which they then consume as a form of garbage collection/religious burial for ayakashi (ghosts/demons), and they even play on the idea of encapsulating dimensions, and also about dimension construction. I said the show had no deep revelations, but it does use some damn cool archetypes. read more

So the basic plot line involves a boy, a girl, and a best friend (who comes a bit later into the story) and their nightly adventures as the Kekkaishi (protectors of some ancient spiritual power source). Of course their adventures lead to a bigger plot line involving mysterious enemies and even more mysterious brothers and family histories but that's how shonen plots usually go.. .

The strength of this show is definitely the characters and their relationships. Granted the fighting and etc kept me raptly entertained as well (it didn't drag likes shonen series are prone to do...naruto), my personal taste require that the characters are genuinely likeable or loveable, considerate, caring, thoughtful, and funny . And the characters in Kekkaishi did just that.


Yoshimori (the boy) is for all appearances your regular shonen hero being lazy, stubborn, friendly, combative, and powerful despite his obvious lack of finesse (which he works on through out the series and does show development)...he has a very obvious crush on Tokine (the girl. and in my opinion his total devotion to her is very cute) and acts like a true best friend to the initially distant Shishio (who actually opens up to be charmingly clumsy).

The spirit dog helpers are funny and charming. Yoshimori's and Tokine's family are also a source of entertainment being comically violent, quirky, and sincerely loving of each other.

If it's not already obvious, characterization is the biggest point of concern for me when enjoying an anime. If I don' t like the characters then I usually lose interest.

Story-wise, this anime kept me interested enough and ultimately hanging for more.

The art pleased me being simple yet attractive, comic...although it was a little messy at times.

The sound was decent

Enjoyment was very high. Didn't skip an episode or scenes out of boredom as I tend to do in a lot of shonen series.

My only sore point with this series would be its very small fanbase *sigh* such a great series. read more

Watching _Kekkaishi_ is like enjoying a big box of chocolate; you know it's essentially just fat and sugar, but that doesn't stop you from eating it.

_Kekkaishi_ offers nothing new, nothing spectacular, essentially nothing. It's not one of those animes that tries to be high brow and thought provoking. In the limitation of its scope, however, the series has done extremely well. The story progresses with fast enough pace that one doesn't feel the urge to fast forward, often with suspense--in the form of unresolved secrets or crisis--sustained throughout several episodes. The art is excellent as well: very clean and rarely with the exaggeration of either being too 'shoujo' or too 'shounen.' It's rather rare these days to see the female protagonist drawn without over-developed body parts, which in this case only makes her more charming and lovable.

The story is simple and rather straight-forward. The basic premise of nearly all episodes lies on the encounter of the two main characters with the invading monster(s) of the week, with stories dedicated to character development revolving around this premise. I am glad to say, however, that the story has not fallen into one of the major caveats of this structure. The conflict resolution does not always depend on the main characters getting stronger (through training, for instance), but also on their character growth and interaction.

Many hints are dropped within the series suggesting the series targets a rather young main audience: too many things are explicitly spelled out for you. The male protagonist's main drive, for instance, is hammered repeatedly to the audience from his own dialogue. A good thing that comes out of this is that the characters have well-defined personalities that explain why they do the things they do. Every character remains faithful to his/her main trait. This, unfortunately, also makes the characters rather simplistic and two-dimensional, with no room left for surprise. I find it difficult, however, to blame a series dedicated to younger audience for being reductionist in its portrayal of human psyche.


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Kekkaishi is a decent shonen show. All the usual elements are there, a simple minded young hero, the cute girl from the neighbourhood, their hate/love relation and lots of monsters to make them evolve and become powerfull saving the day.
What makes it decent? the techniques they use are interesting and the enemies vary as well, plenty of original monsters and the usual undisclosed romance do a good job entertaining, topped with funny gags and cliches that worked out quite good, becomes very silly for moments but also has the dramatic scenes building up momentum for the end.
Its not completely original or a must see but its well built and didnt became boring like most shonens nowadays, if theres any flaw its prolly the open end, built on a good plot I was personally expecting more, at least the arc ends, but leaves room for more seasons.
Taking all into consideration its an average show built for entertaining and does it well, its not incredibly good but doesn't fall into boring or the usual flaws of shonens, if your into the style its a good watch but if you prefer something more elaborate, don't expect too much of it.
Wont disappoint but wont leave a strong impression either.

I enjoyed the ending song quite alot and Id like to comment on the 8 scoring in character, because I do believe there are good characters here, not original but better built then other similar shows. The enjoyment rating is a bit overrated because its hard to find an action shonen lately that isn't completely cookie cutter, this managed to get out of the box enough to be watchable. read more

The story was pretty ordinary and not very interesting in itself. After all, this is a shounen fight anime, so obviously a really good story is unnecessary. It was quite annoying that all those things happened in such a short time(less than a year).

The backgrounds looked quite pleasing to the eye and the character designs were fairly well done as well(though Masamori's weird moon-shaped thing on the head was annoying). Animation was very good for a TV series and the different special abilities looked cool enough.

I liked the opening song and thought it fit the series well. Background music and sound effects were also great.

Characters were a little plain but nothing too bad. It was a pleasant surprise that the demon dogs were not annoying but rather amusing.

Overall, I'd say it's an enjoyable show, it doesn't drag and get annoying even if watched in a very short time. The fights are entertaining, look cool and don't last too long. Recommended, unless you require a deep plot to enjoy your anime. read more

this was a a really fun series. I must complitment them on their originality. and how they were able to keep me occuppied with boxes. the inguenuity of the main character was most enjoyable. there was also a good aura of mystery that kept me wanting for more.

most of the characters developed well, especialy the female protagonist,

i was wondering how they were going to handle the elements for romance when one was in high school and the other in middle school, but it worked out well.

the sound in this series is one of its best points. it really comes strong during moments of suspense.

anyways good series, tried its best, was original, and showed how shounen anime shoud be. read more

Try to watch it! it`s so awesome right from the very start!
Even the opening song is so cool!(well, atleast for me hehe...).
anyways, if you watch it, you suddenly became inspired as if you want to watch for more than a week STRAIGHT! (maybe a jerk will :P).

This is a very good anime to watch, it will mostly appeal to the Naruto and Bleach crowd. The main story is interesting but needs a few improvements. The art style is good but also neds improvements. I loved the soundtracks for the anime they were uplifting during the fight scenes and made me get sad during the tragic scenes. The character are likable but none of them stand out that much. The show has a lot of good comedy scenes here and there and is sure to make you laugh. Overall this was entertaining anime and is worth watching durring your free time.

Kekkaishi is just an amazing anime that sucks you in it has a epic story and epic battles, there is boy that named Yoshimori and a girl that named tokine and they are there to protect the school where theyre from , cause there are the bad people that want to do something with that school and Yoshimori and tokine are there to protect it from the bad people, the kakuburou.
and they fighting with powers with kekkai these are boxes / barriers that closes u up and then vanish. U have to watch kekkaishi cause its amazing and the fighting style theyre fighting with its just amazing. read more