Alternative TitlesJapanese: ニードレス
Information
Type: TV
Episodes: 24
Status: Finished Airing
Aired: Jul 3, 2009 to Dec 11, 2009
Duration:
24 min. per episode Rating:
R - 17+ (violence & profanity)
L represents licensing company
StatisticsScore: 7.601 (scored by 21160 users)
Ranked: #11042
Popularity: #364
Members: 43,325
Favorites: 340 1 indicates a weighted score
My Info
Popular Tags
No tags found |
SynopsisThe year is 2130. After the third world war, large contaminated areas known as "Blackspots" formed all over Japan. Large walls were used to quarantine off these Blackspots. In time, signs of inhabitance appeared within these wastelands. Among the survivors who had been abandoned inside the Blackspots, labeled as "those who were unneeded", came forth possessors of uncanny abilities: fire, wind, brute strength; they were defined by their supernatural abilities. Others, fearful of their powers, expelled them and named them Needless.
(Source: anime opening) |
Related AnimeAdaptation: Needless
Side story: Needless Specials
Characters & Voice Actors
Staff
Reviews
|
|
Kvakond
64 of 92 people found this review helpful
|
24 of 24 episodes seen
|
| Overall |
8 |
| Story |
6 |
| Animation |
7 |
| Sound |
9 |
| Character |
8 |
| Enjoyment |
10 |
Needless is not for everyone, but it is a fantastic show as long as you watch it for what it is and are able to enjoy it for what it is. Still, while it was still airing I got the feeling that most people had misconceptions.
First of all, Needless is not a shounen. Needless is a shounen-parody. Or actually if I stick to proper genres I would agree that it's a seinen, and the reason why it is "full of shounen clichés" is because it makes fun of those classic elements by overacting them till they reach grotesque levels. It's important to understand that that is the basis of the show.
Muscular machos? Naturally. Battles that last for eternity? Most of the anime is set in a single room. Fighters with named attacks or techniques? In Needless they not only shout them all the time, they also write them on the screen with huge flippin' letters to make sure you remember!
I admit though that throughout the anime adaptation there are points when the show turns into the very thing it pokes fun of, but I'll get back to that later.
The second popular misconception is that Needless is a Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann ripoff. Which would be hard considering that the Needless manga started years before TTGL. I won't stick my head into the sand and deny the similarities, I compare Needless to TTGL in this review on a few occasions myself, but while TTGL builds a strong coming of age story over the top of making fun of old school mecha anime, Needless stays in the sandbox where it feels safe but pushes its limits further there.
As you can kinda expect from this type of show, the story is almost non-existent. A mash of dozens of old concepts thrown into a bowl to create a frame for the action, humor and nonstop manliness. What comes as a result is somewhat interesting, but it's kept on minimal complexity so it doesn't get in the way of the "important" elements of the show. On the other hand, the author had some fun with the character's special attacks and you can find quite a few references there. Naturally I'm not talking about "Mio-chan hip attack", but things like "Little Boy", Dean Drive" or "Agnischwattas". I won't call it deep but it's still a bit more layered than people would think.
When it comes to characters, Needless has a huge list of archetypes, and this is also the point where TTGL fans start coughing blood. The "main" hero who likes to solve every situation with his fists (Blade/Kamina), the main heroine who's also a little ruff around the edges but makes up with bust size for lack of braincells (Eve/Yoko), a useless wingman for comic relief (Uchida/Kittan) and the timid kid who grows into a man (or not) (Cruz/Simon). The difference is that Needless really goes beyond the limits and centers the characters around their most basic trait, pushing that one aspect as far as possible. It also adds things like pedophile priests, bold old scientists and most importantly an army of lolis ranging from lesbians to androids. And yet, despite being this bottomless pool of one-dimensional fan service sources, there is not a single character in the show who is unlikable and every viewer can find one or two who they truly love. Even the one who was annoying in the anime gets cool later on in the manga. This palette of characters is what really makes or breaks Needless.
The graphics are hardly anything special: the character designs are a nice recreation of the manga, while the animation is mostly fluid but not really homogeneous. The music on the other hand is quite worthy of praise. I would be the last person you could call a metal-fan, but the hard hitting power metal BGM of the show is just amazing. Taken from e-Zuka's "I got you under my skin", from "Raging Flames" to "Elephant's Scream" every track is a perfect match to its respective scenes and gives them the necessary boost.
I think that just proves that Madhouse was the right studio for this show. With that said however, it also entails the consequence that Madhouse fans are all too familiar with: abrupt original ending. This case is not nearly as bad as for instance with Claymore, but the changes at the end, along with the severely toned down gore (compared to the manga), resulted in the anime sometimes coming through as more of a shounen than a seinen.
So after all that, what makes this mixed bag of shallow elements so special in the end? The entertainment value. The indescribable energy that flows from every scene and gets multiplied by the music to the point that you clench your fist, jump out of your chair and yell "F**K YEAH!". The bursts of laughter you get every time said scene gets interrupted for a second with a crazy one-liner. The brainless fun you get from the painful lack of logic in the show. And I think that's the keyword, Needless is brainless fun. If you are looking for something more or different, Needless is probably not for you. But for what it is, Needless is perfect. read more
|
|
Skadi
137 of 243 people found this review helpful
|
24 of 24 episodes seen
|
| Overall |
6 |
| Story |
6 |
| Animation |
6 |
| Sound |
2 |
| Character |
7 |
| Enjoyment |
6 |
Typically shounen style action series are not usually my thing. I find them to be completely silly and juvenile and cater to a demographic that I am just not a part of. The posturing and trash talking, the ridiculous reversals of fortune, and the long drawn out nature of the fighting usually cause me to lose interest. Honestly I am surprised this appeals so much to teenage males, who typically have the attention span of a goldfish. However, initially Needless seemed to be different, and appeared as more of a parody and comedy with an extremely enjoyable female lead. Eventually though it loses its way and falls victim to the things that doom many of its brother anime; trying to be and do too much instead of sticking with what was working.
The plot, initially is about as basic and nondescript as they come. Needless is set in a post apocalyptic world in which a new race of super powered humans have emerged, possessing fragments of power that give them mastery over a certain skill such as fire, gravity, and magnetism. These fragments apparently have all come from a common source, a god-like being known as the Second. These altered humans are known as Needless. But there is a hard and fast rule however, while some fragments are more powerful than others each Needless can only possess one. It all sounds like it an interesting take on the superpowers genre, and it a lot of ways it is though the way that the powers are used begins to get annoying after while (more on that later). All is not well in the world of the Needless though as they are threatened by the extremely powerful Adam Arclight and his followers in which they face extinction from his scheming. Only the mysterious Adam Blade and his band of resistance fighters stand in the way.
Needless is chalk full of slapstick comedy, action, blood and death, explosions, fan service, and machoism. Fans of these are likely to find plenty to like. The real problem with the series as a whole is the pacing of its storyline. Things move along quickly in the first 1/3 of the series. Perhaps a bit too quickly, which may have lead to the problems it suffers from for most of the middle and late portions of the anime. The heroes find themselves trapped in a room where they must do battle with Arclight's strongest followers. The battles are action packed but they drag out...forever. The story comes to a crawl and these battles seemingly go on forever as almost half the anime is taken up by this one fight and set in this same room. The shocking plot revelation made during this arc is obvious to anyone with any degree of sophistication. Once our heroes finally manage to get out the rest of the series is almost completely taken up with flashbacks, plot building, and adding a conspiracy arc. While this made Needless' story infinitely better and more complex it again felt to me like a complete reversal once again in the theme. To me it was like the director couldn’t make up his mind. Did he want to create an echii action parody, a straight shounen fighting anime, or a complex story about genetic research and political intrigue?
A small rant is in order on the battles. I know that it is a staple of this kind of series to yell out and name all of your attack moves and special abilities, but really is it that hard to come up with some names that make some sense? After hearing "Little Boy" or "Dean Drive Fox Hound" uttered for the billionth time I just wanted to shove a pair of scissors into my ears. And seriously what the hell does Dean Drive Fox Hound supposed to fucking mean anyway? It’s nonsense!
The real tragedy is that what they were doing at the start was working. The best part of Needless is the characters, in particular Eve Neuschwanstein (try saying that ten times fast). She’s got all the body measurements to make her a fan favorite, but she has a hilarious and quirky personality to go along with it to make her memorable. She stupid, can’t remember anyone’s name which leads her to "shorten" people’s names into nonsensical words. She has a really cool special ability called Doppelganger, which allows her to change herself into basically anything of the same mass as she is. Unfortunately as the series progresses she tends to disappear more than a main character should from the action, thus taking away a lot of the appeal for the show for me since I really enjoyed her. Also her Doppelganger ability is used in ways over the course of the series that seem to be inconsistent with what the ability should really be able to do.
As for the other leads, Adam Blade and Cruz Schild the results are not as good. Blade is a silly and typical shounen male with an over-the-top character design complete with an unoriginal and clichéd personality (basically think TTGL's Kamina). Unless you love 12 pack abs and these kinds of stereotypes or this is the first anime you have ever seen, then you’re unlikely to be impressed by him. That being said he does have his moments of comedy gold and he is not completely without merits. Cruz is also a typical anime boy who reminds me of another TTGL character, Simon (the young version) in both looks and personality. Though he seems to have more sense than most of his shounen brethren, and stays out of trouble for the most part and leaves the fighting to those with powers. His greatest attribute is that he’s probably the only person in the show with a brain.
The rest supporting cast is a mix of some very entertaining and memorable characters and more shounen stereotypes. With the exception of Disc, the rest of Blade's team of resistance fighters is uninspired. The ones who really shine are among Arclight's subordinates. This starts and ends with the Pretty Girl Squad of Mio, Setsuna, and Kushinashi. I found their antics to be the most amusing of any of the characters in the series. They are probably the objects of the most fan service, next to Eve, but for the most part it’s all pretty funny and just doesn’t feel as pointless as it usually is in other shows.
Artistically Needless is an uneven experience. The animation of the fights, action, and special effects are all topnotch. The service is well done, at least amongst the females, and they are cute and not too ridiculously proportioned. However the men are awful. I am on record as being a firm hater of bishies and effeminate men. While the men in Needless are certainly manly, they basically look like bishies on steroids. The fact that all of them looked pretty much the same (does anyone in the future wear shirts?) and the silly looking cartoonish muscles and impossible body builds took away from the art overall.
The absolute worst thing about this series is the music. The first OP "Modern Strange Cowboy" is without a doubt the silliest song I have ever heard and the worst example of Engrish lyrics gone wild. The second OP is not near as bad but still not that good and both the ED themes are average at best. Also the commercial break teaser halfway through is laugh out loud silly with the retarded sounding "Needless" being overacted by various male cast members. The acting overall is decent, but again the male voice actors over play their parts so much that they just sound silly.
Overall my final opinion on Needless mixed. I did enjoy many aspects of it, but it had more potential than it delivered. The schizophrenic direction and pacing are too much for me to ignore. Your enjoyment of Needless is likely to depend on your own personal tastes. If you love shounen action then you might want to give this a chance. I found it to be an average series at best.
read more
Recommendations
|
|
Main characters have similar personalities, same style of artwork, epic fights
characters are pretty much the same, the action is similar in terms that they are not logical but still fun to watch..
Similar characters (google image TTGL and Needless), ridiculously epic fights. Needless has more fanservice and non-sensical plot though but more funnier. Gurren Lagann had characters you've come to care for, but unfortunately this was not the case in Needless.
Both anime have extreme over the top non-stop action that just boils your blood. Very similar art and as of lately, both have extremely good animation. Of course TTGL is a lot better than Needless BUT, some people have already watched TTGL and have nothing left of that sort. That's where Needless comes in!
one thing you could say is that theyre both shonen,while needless is more 'extreme' than TTGL.if you liked needless,which is just extreme non-stop fights with shouting and titles and big titted girls everywhere without a real plot,than youll like TTGl,which knows how to take shonen elements and make it cool.TTGL has a story,giant robots,big titted girls(but not too much),and yeah,a few shouts here and there.the battles are epic there,and belive me that you dont have to like mecha to get into this one,its just too awsome
Same type of drawing and characters. Only the first episode has come out, but it reminded straight from the beginning of Gurren Lagann. Same type of action and very enjoyable. Blade reminds me of Kamina, Eve reminds me of yuuko, and simon is like cruz.
same frantic art style and animation and both feature constant screaming dialogues
both have crazy action....TTGL just has way more class though while needless has more ecchi and comedy secnes
similar art styles and characters, even their acting (villain like acting)
but Tengen Toppa is far superior in all aspects
Anyone watching Needless should also watch it
Like Gurren Lagann slightly lamer cousin not as good but still awesome
probably funnier though and has loads more ecchi which you can't really fault
Both title have huge amount of epic scenes. Adam Blade looks just like Kamina
Both animes have A LOT of yelling and spirit in them. They both ultimately deal with increasingly tough opponents but the protagonists always win somehow. Lastly, both animes have loads of action. Needless has a bit more fan service, but let's not forget Gurren Laggan's yoko.
Almost everything!!! however subtract the mecha and the beastmen and you come up with NEEDLESS!!!
Blowing stuff up, drilling through stuff, calling your moves, implausibly skimpy outfits, all while fighting for survival.
Both are manly shows for manly men designed to satisfy a man's needs in a manly way.
Both are about a weak un-confident male lead, that makes companions who gives him the strenght to help people around them. later on they both have important roles in battle. while TTGL is mecha and N is super power they both have the same feel and art style.
Oh wow, these two series. If you enjoy Gurren Lagann or Needless and vice versa, these two series here is a must add to your PTW list. Obviously, these two titles have many similarities:
Both series has ALOT of action, drama, and comedy throughout the series.
Two of the main male protagonists in the series are similar in terms of appearance/personality: Kamina from TTGL and Adam Blade from Needless.
Both series' settings have similarities that features the a superpower like world.
Both series' action scenes are similar with many exaggerated fight scenes that mixes in with drama and comedy.
Epic battles, similar characters and artwork, Fanservice, Eve Neushwanstein is the new Yoko Littner, rock music, an ecchi episode 6.
Both have that over the top ridiculous action and pull it off not hindering the storyline or character development in the process
|
|
|
Supernatural powers, ecchi, and epic battles.
Similarities: Hotblooded ecchi with an antihero over the top protagonist. Both have plenty of trope busting, and trope exaggeration. Manly men doing manly things.
Differences: Needless lacks the harem or romantic relationships almost completely, It has plenty of women though.
Action, jokes, and extremely butchered religious symbolism all rolled into one.
Both of these anime contain cute girls, supernatural phenomenons. Male heroines make shows having strong plot lines and activities.
Holy crap, two main badasses protagonist in the these two series? Tbh, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou and Needless reminds me of each other.
Both series has a male protagonist who has an enormous power. With him is a female partner who is energetic girl and other girls.
Both series has a lot of fan-service in the form of action, violence, and gar. Both series also has the "world domination" theme and justice plays a theme throughout the series.
They also both have a lot of comedy and gags but at the same time some emotional moments.
|
Opening Theme#1: "Modern Strange Cowboy" by GRANRODEO (eps 1-13)
#2: "Scarlet Bomb!" by Aki Misato (eps 14-24)
Ending Theme#1: "Aggressive Zone" by Needless★Girls+ (eps 1-13)
#2: "WANTED! for the love" by Needless★Girls+ (eps 14-23)
#3: "Modern Strange Cowboy" by GRANRODEO (ep 24)
| No posts for this board were found |
Fansubbing Groups
Which fansubbers do you like the best? Click + to approve of their subs for this show. Click - if you don't think they did such a great job.
Related ClubsGRANRODEO, !~~tsubasalover's Friendships~~!, ~ Ecchi 4ever ~, SKETCHY LINES EVERYWHERE Appreciation Club, HURRAY BUTTS!!, Dying Will Bullets!!!, Silver, White, Gray-Haired Characters Fanclub!, Battle Arena, HOT-BLOODED SHONEN CLUB!, ~Immortality~ *kami-Sama* ~God Complex~, The Masters & Servants Realm, Intense Anime Characters Fanclub , LOLI DEFENSE ARMY, krachb00nia, Chihara Minori Fanclub, Overrated or Underrated Animes and Mangas, MadHouse, Supernatural Fan club , RedBlade, Klub Miłośników Kultury Japońskiej - KITSUNE♛☠♥ We Love Anime ♥☠♛, Anime & Manga Recommendation, One-eyed characters, DevilBlade1 WorkShop, English Dub Fanclub, Solva Fan Club, BLUE SKY TEAM, Super-Powers Anime Club, Mio's Fan Club, Anime Watching Souls, Anime clubbbb, Eve Neuschwanstein FC, Heroes who surpassed the gods!!, ~+{Yui Makino Fanclub}+~, Netflix Junkies, Turk Anime Fans, Pretty Girl Squad Fan Club, Power House, Kitamura Eri Fanclub, Needless, Purple and Blue Haired Characters, Claim your Current Character Obsession [C.C.O.], GarSubs, MOVIC Leeds, Dark Legends fan club!, Kuchinashi Fanclub, All Anime/Hentai, Criminal Minds, Alternative Seinen see all
Recently Watched By|
23 minutes ago |
35 minutes ago |
1 hour ago |
2 hours ago |
2 hours ago | |
2 hours ago |
3 hours ago |
3 hours ago |
3 hours ago |
4 hours ago |
|
|
