Ranked #848

Deadman Wonderland

Think about it: you saw someone else commit a crime that you could not have foreseen, the criminal runs away and now you’re stuck with the law enforcement blaming you for the crime because there is no other evidence to prove that you didn’t do it. With that, you’re sentenced to death and placed in a twisted place where keeping yourself alive is probably one of the most difficult things imaginable. Of course, being an anime, writers can keep characters alive whenever they damn well please. Deadman Wonderland is the anime that fits this kind of situation, but does it portray it well?

Deadman Wonderland is adapted from the manga of the same name, which started being released on April 26th, 2007. Manglobe are the studio working with the animation for this adaption, with some of their other works including Samurai Champloo, Ergo Proxy, Zettai Karen Children: The Unlimited, and more. Deadman Wonderland takes the approach of an Action-Horror approach, with not as much emphasis on the horror aspect of it all, unless you’re one of those people who cannot bear the sight of a lot of blood and/or gore.

Our story places us with Ganta Igarashi, a normal highschool kid. He’s talking with his friends for a little bit about a new amusement park known as Deadman Wonderland, where his class will be taking a field trip to. As class starts, Ganta hears a faint song playing that he tries to recognize. Outside the window, a mysterious creature is floating and obliterates the classroom, with Ganta being knocked unconscious. Upon waking up, he sees the brutal sight of all of his classmates dead. The mysterious creature then embeds a crystal into his chest, knocking him out once more. Ganta then wakes up in a hospital, but is shortly placed into handcuffs and sent for questioning, as the police believe that he is the culprit of the murders that have taken place. With no one believe Ganta’s plea, he is sentenced to death row and is placed in Deadman Wonderland, where his new life begins.

The first episode alone places a very emotional impact on the viewer. Even if Ganta may seem like a crybaby, you can’t ignore the fact that all of his friends were killed and no one believes Ganta when he says that he didn’t do it, but saw a mysterious creature that did do it. Now, the first five minutes may not leave that impact, but throughout the episode, you may feel that sort of feeling. If anything, I was slightly annoyed at the fact that he wasn’t horrified about the where he was placed quickly enough. A normal human-being would go crazy, but this is an anime. I don’t expect everything to be realistic, but I would enjoy logic.

I am annoyed by the story a lot though as the show goes on. Deadman Wonderland sets itself up to have a story that is about Ganta getting redemption on “The Red Man” who killed everyone he knew and loved. Guess what happens around half-way through the show? Yeah, this story gets dropped. It then turns into a story about Ganta helping out a group of rebels who want to breakout and show everyone that Deadman Wonderland is an evil place. I wouldn’t mind the story change if the anime was longer, but in 12 episodes, you can’t expect me to be okay with Ganta’s mindset changing from redemption into rebellion. It just doesn’t make any sense to me.

This then leads me to my next issue. The ending is very disappointing. I don’t believe I’ve seen an ending done like this since I’ve seen End of Evangelion. It was just the last words that took place which made me just say out loud, “That was dumb.” Now, I’ve heard around that the manga is different, but I’m speaking about the anime here. This is also one of those endings that leave you on a cliffhanger, but not in a good way, like how Code Geass R1 felt to me, if I can compare. This may feel like a small issue, but I believe that endings have to be done well. When you watch an anime, you’re being taken on an adventure from point A to point B, hoping that point B will leave you satisfied. It’s a damn shame when point B just so happens to not go out with a bang like that.

I do have one more issue with this shows story that I really cannot mention due to it being kind of spoiler-ish. To put this into better terms, Deadman Wonderland brings in scenes and has questions arise that don’t get explained or answered. When it comes to shows of the genre that Deadman Wonderland is a part of, I can usually forgive this because I put this issue much more critically of the Mystery genre more. Though, I feel as if the scenes and questions that do arise are pretty vital story elements that would’ve easily made this show much better.

I can’t really complain about the characters much. The only character that doesn’t get much spotlight is the Hummingbird, who shows up in the latter half of the show. The other characters are just fine where they are. They all have their own personalities that are shown off and most of them serve a reasonable purpose in the story. As for development, well, there really isn’t much. If you’re hoping that Ganta develops into more of a badass, stop hoping. He reminds me more of a battle shounen male lead that is weak most of the time, gets strong for one scene, but then ends up weak once again.

I do enjoy the animation done throughout this show. Fight scenes look very nice and aren’t just still-frames. Character models are also good, but I feel like most of the females in Deadman Wonderland have breasts that go over the “too-large” point. Yes, there is something known as too-large. No, it isn’t funny either when there are instances of characters boggling over another’s breast size. The art is also very nicely done, with Shiro’s body paint being more interesting.

The OP of the show fits very nicely, with fade giving us a nice hard-rock song to get pumped up for, with lyrics in the song saying the name of the show in a badass-ery kind of style. The ED is Shiny Shiny, done by NIRGILIS. Now, this isn’t a bad song at all. If anything, I am kind of addicted to it. The ED doesn’t fit the style of the show, but fits the animation of the ending, which is a ferris wheel in the background during the sunset with pictures of the characters before they were in Deadman Wonderland.

Now, if you’re a fan of anime that has a lot of action, blood, gore, etc., then you should go and give Deadman Wonderland a try. If anything, I would go as far as to compare this show with Highschool of the Dead. I say this because in both instances, the shows are pretty meh (DW) or atrocious (HotD), but they end up serving as a very enjoyable show to watch, mainly for the action portions of it. When it comes down to the story, I feel resemblances of Durarara!!!, where the stories in the different arcs are started, but then stopped with no logical reasonings behind it. All in all, if something was done differently with the story, then Deadman Wonderland wouldn’t be an average show.
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Deadman Wonderland, what can i say about this anime? Well for starters lets just get the story out of the way. Deadman Wonderland follows Ganta Igarashi and is set in modern day Japan one day his whole class is murdered by a mysterious red man and through actions against his control he is found guilty of murdering his 30 something classmates and sentenced to death. Now in this version of Japan about a decade before these events there's a great Tokyo earthquake that left not just the city but all of Japan devastated. After this a prison is built called you guested it Deadman Wonderland the first prison to make money off the prisoners with rides and such and this is where Ganta is sent.

Now that that's out of the way let's talk about the things this anime does right and the things it does wrong.

First the story. For someone who read the manga up to it's current point I love the story it tells however with this anime you don't really feel that it picks what story it wants to tell. At one point Ganta's doing this another he's doing that and so on the way the story comes across isn't bad but it isn't that good either.

Next the Art. The art for this anime is done very well its the art style the manga did and the manga and anime did it well. Almost everything is done very well except a few moments were there is censoring but i guess that can't be helped but still worth mentioning.

Next is Sound. Sound overall is pretty good things make the sounds you would imagine for the most part. My main issue with the sound is the cussing i understand people cuss and swear but there's a lot of it and I know they did quite a bit in the manga some line are pulled right from it but some of it should have changed a little for context at certain points they don't do it right or it sounds weird which just ruins the moment it was going for. Something else is that they tried to stay real with the sound i guess you could say but at moments they really should have went up a notch or two. *Slight Spoiler Skip To next Paragraph* At two points i was kinda disappointed cause they were eh when they happened and whoa when i read them at one point a dude get sliced with a sword and barely anything another moment that was super eh was someone kicks a robot and its doesn't come through the sound how much of a feat it was.

Characters. Characters in this anime are highs and lows. Some characters like Crow shine but not as much as he should have, others like Ganta fall short but only because the anime doesn't get up to his development which sucks since he's who you are following in the story. The characters after the 4th or 5th ep starts to rotate into characters that did or didn't shine in the manga but don't really get the chance to do either.

And next we have enjoyment. At the end of the day did i enjoy Deadman Wonderland the answer is a yes, its fun its crazy and there's some nice twist but dialogue and some other issues just come out and bring it down time to time.

Overall I give Deadman Wonderland a 7 its good but only barley it really messes up in ways i just couldn't ignore and if i had compared it to the manga it would have gotten almost a 5. If you like gore, fighting, action, and a story you won't fully get unless there is a season 2 or read the manga then check out Deadman Wonderland read more

Strange things can happen to a person when they're in prison so the general rules of thumb are to keep a low profile, stay out of the way of other people, and avoid dropping the soap in the shower. For the inmates of Japan's only privately owned prison (which for some reason is run as a theme park and is built on Ground Zero of the Great Tokyo Earthquake), the ablutive antics of their fellow "guests" are the least of their worries, especially when the warden takes the term "punishment game" to a whole new level. The stage is set. The "Running Man" style collars are on. The next event is a lethal variation of Takeshi's Castle.

Welcome to Deadman Wonderland.

Based on the manga by Kataoka Jinsei (story), and Kondou Kazuma (art), the story begins with middle school student Igarashi Ganta, a fairly normal teenager with a reasonably mundane life - going to school, hanging out with friends, etc. All of that changes when his entire class are slaughtered while still in school, and as the only survivor he is found guilty of mass murder and sentenced to death. He is sent to Deadman Wonderland to wait out the time before his execution, but the powers that be in the prison have their eyes on Ganta so he must now navigate a labyrinth of conspiracies, greed, betrayal, murder, revolution, gladiatorial combat, and enough blood to make a clan of vampires drool.

Which immediately brings up the first problem with this series.

At its heart Deadman Wonderland is nothing more than a bloodier version of the common or garden shounen tale, but bolted onto the framework concept is a plot that has been worked over far too many times, so much so that it's highly predictable and almost barren of any original thought. Far too much importance has been placed on making the content "cool" in an effort to appeal to viewers who just want violence, blood and explosions, and with the added yet pointless melodramatic scenes designed to elicit audience sympathy, the storyline never really picks up enough narrative pace to maintain the viewer's interest. There are also a few critical errors that anyone with a basic understanding of investigative techniques would immediately spot and question, but we'll get to that in a bit.

Now this may confuse some people because Deadman Wonderland does have a lot going on in each episode, so an explanation is probably in order. This anime uses an event driven plot rather than a character driven one, and because of that the protagonist and his fellow inmates are simply along for the ride. They become nothing more than reactionary elements in the storyline, and in an effort to compensate for that the author and his adaptation colleagues have thrown as many different ideas at the series as they could. In truth, the only thing holding the entire narrative together so that it could be considered a story instead of a collection of random events, is Ganta, which gives an idea of the scale of the problem.

That said, Ganta isn't really terrible, but the nature of the plot ensures that his characterisation remains linear and one dimensional, and while it may appear to some that he matures as an individual, this is actually a forced measure that serves only one purpose - to make his win against the next big bad opponent a bit more believable. Unfortunately, Deadman Wonderland isn't really about developing the characters in any meaningful way, and this is borne out by the fact that the supporting cast only get a few paltry flashbacks even though some of them have a lasting effect on the storyline. The oddity is that probably the most intriguing character is Ganta's childhood friend Shiro, a resident of Deadman Wonderland who isn't a prisoner. She is an anomaly who appears to have a childlike personality, but her very presence in the storyline, together with her looks, is enough to set alarm bells ringing for anyone who knows the trope about mysterious white haired characters.

Given that this is an adaptation of a manga there's automatically a severe limitation placed on design, but Manglobe have done their best with what has been given to them, and the results are actually pretty good. The animation is smooth and there are some nice visual effects scattered throughout the series, the character movements are fluid and have a natural feel, and the action set pieces have a visceral edge to them that the manga lacks. There are a few issues though, but these lie in the smaller details as there are some design influences from other works (Ganta's likeness to Renton Thurston from Eureka 7, which is also a work by the Kataoka and Kondou). In addition to this, there's a tendency to fall back on certain stereotypes (the rather obvious musclebound oaf who likes nothing more than fighting strong opponents), which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it can get tedious to see certain character archetypes all the time. Thankfully these niggles aren't really enough to prevent viewers from enjoying the series, especially if one is able to move past the rather slapdash storyline.

Seriously, would it kill anyone to use some real world stereotypes, maybe something like the bad tempered little guy who doesn't know how to fight properly but makes up for it in sheer ferocity?

Deadman Wonderland has a rather eclectic variety of background music on offer that ranges from dramatic heavy metal blended with techno, to a few simple notes played on a piano. The quality of the audio, both the music and the effects, is surprisingly good, and the choreography shows that some thought has gone into the implementation and timing of each track. The opening theme is a heavy metal piece called One Reason by DWB (featuring Fade), that has been set to a well designed sequence that utilises a three colour base, in this case red, white and black. The end credits feature a slow moving ferris wheel accompanied by images of many of the characters from their lives before they became inmates of Deadman Wonderland, all set to the tune of Shiny Shiny by NIRGILIS.

To be perfectly honest, this anime doesn't really test the abilities of Paku Romi (Ganta), Hanazawa Kana (Shiro), or any of the other cast members to any great degree, but part of that is due to a relatively lackadaisical script. The dialogue lacks a degree of intuitiveness that can make conversations seem forced, and while the cast are capable seiyuu in their own right, they seem to struggle with several scenes in an effort to get the emotion across to the viewer. It's never a good thing when an actor or actress tries too hard, and this fact is borne out during a number of conversations in the series.

But then, that's pretty much the story of Deadman Wonderland - it tries too hard.

On the surface this appears to be a rather slick production with some high quality audio and visuals, but no amount of beautification can hide a plot that is more focused on currying favour with audiences than it is with actually telling a story. The narrative can often seem like a train wreck (i.e. bits flying off everywhere, people screaming and running for cover, etc), as many of the plot elements have simply been attached without any real thought given to integrating them into the story proper, and this is why many events can feel like they're nothing more than fillers. In addition to this, the idea of weaponizing blood isn't actually new as Wei Zhijun from Darker Than Black can blow things up using his blood, while Saya from Blood + must use hers to kill Chiropterans.

That said, one has to remember that the story itself is incomplete as this is only an adaptation of the manga up to a point, and this is one of the reasons why there are inherent issues that have yet to be resolved. Unfortunately that excuse cannot cover certain flaws that really do stand out, the chief among them being Ganta's conviction. The series makes a point of showing a confession by him and this is given as proof of his guilt, but what happened to all the witness statements? What about the forensic evidence like the direction in which the windows exploded, or the angle of the attacks on the classroom? While the viewer clearly knows that Ganta is innocent, the apparent ease of his conviction is dependent on his confession, but nothing is mentioned about the physical evidence from the scene of the crime.

Deadman Wonderland looks and sounds great, and if all you're after is a series that has lots of violence, blood, weird characters and a storyline that requires you disengage your brain, then this may be for you. The series may have it's problems, but the concept is interesting even if the implementation leaves a lot to be desired, and it does retain a degree of entertainment value for its action set pieces.

In essence though, Deadman Wonderland is nothing more than a potato that has been painted by Michaelangelo - it looks stunning, but it's still just a potato. read more

I'm writing this review because a lot of the current reviews are complaining about the story being to short and some characters not getting enough screen time. Obviously, not everything is going to be resolved at the end of the anime because the manga has 45 chapters and the anime is only 12 episodes. That being said, I think the anime did a pretty good job in adapting the manga and you should read the manga after (or before) watching the anime.

Story - (8)

As you know, Deadman Wonderland is about Ganta, a boy who is framed for the murder of his friends and sent to a privately owned prison. Shortly after arriving in Deadman Wonderland, Ganta discovers he can use his blood as a weapon. He is then sent to G-Block (where all the other Deadmen are) and the story begins.

Since the anime is only 12 episodes, we only get to see the first arc, which is fine. In terms of plot, we don't get to see the start of the main storyline. The first half of the anime is getting introduced to Deadman Wonderland and the second half Ganta teams up with Owl. Most of the questions that are introduced such as the Mother Goose System, the Red Man, and Makina (lady in charge of the prison guard) trying to discover what's going on, while explored, aren't resolved. This leaves people with the sense that the plot was cheap and incomplete, but there are 45 manga chapters and the anime only got to chapter 20.

note: if you want to read the manga, don't start on chapter 20 because the anime left out a chunk of main characters and some events happen in a different order.

Characters - (7)

Character wise, Deadman Wonderland was just okay. 12 epiosdes wasn't enough time to introduce everyone, so they left out some pretty important characters. I don't really mind that because we are already introduced to a lot of characters and more would just give less screen time all around (and they were irrelevant to the Owl arc). Even though they left out some characters, the only two characters to receive a decent amount of screen time are Ganta and Shiro. If you want more info on Crow, Hummingbird, etc. read the manga, they get a lot more development. The other problem people have with the characters is that a lot of them are introduced, then die in an episode or two, which leaves no impact on the audience. While this is somewhat true, it shouldn't stop you from enjoying the main cast.

Ganta → after 12 episodes, he showed a little bit of growth. He starts off as shy and wimpy. He needs Shiro to protect him in the prison. He's just average intelligence, overall a pretty normal character. He does notice how weak he is and tries to get stronger, so he's not useless the entire time. He cares for Shiro and hates the Red Man.

Shiro → She's lived at Deadman Wonderland Prison her whole life and she's shrouded in mystery as to why. She is pretty dumb, but saves Ganta a lot. We get to know more about her past and why she's in DW and can basically do whatever she wants, but I'll let you watch that.

Art / Animation - (8)

It's pretty dark in the depths of the prison and the scenes that are mysterious. The prison itself is very bright and shiny, which fits the show because Deadman Wonderland Prison needs to give the appearance of being a nice prison. The character designs were faithful to the manga and looked good, with the exception of Crow, I thought Crow looked better in the manga, might just be me though. Animation wise, everything seemed pretty fluid, I didn't notice any poor animation.

Sound - (8)

The opening and ending were pretty good, but I don't really listen to them (sorry). Background music was also fitting. Acting wise, I thought Ganta and Shiro's voices were perfect and really fit them. Everyone else didn't really have a whole lot of lines, but they did a good job. The only voice I didn't like was Toto Sakigami's voice...he sounded kinda like a woman, but he's really only introduced so I don't really care.

Overall - (8)

It's does a good job of introducing us to the manga, even though some characters were ignored and events were re-ordered. The door is still open for a second season, which I hope it gets because the real story was just beginning. If you want a gory show with plenty of death, Deadman Wonderland is for you. After you finish the anime (or before if you want) you should also go read the manga. In my opinion, it's better, but the anime version is worth a try. read more

There was a trend back in the Good Old Days of anime (as in you only thought they were Good because you weren't Old enough to know any better) of hyper violent OVAs. Deadman Wonderland feels like a tread back to those days. It has the over-exaggerated violence, the ridiculous amounts of blood, the awkwardly crowbarred in sexiness and, most noticeably of all, it’s utterly shit.

Time has changed a few little aspects though. The OVA market of old has turned into the late night 12 episode anime series of today. This means it has more space to tell a coherent and fulfilling story, a capability which Deadman Wonderland approaches by totally ignoring it. 12 episodes are enough to tell a neat story with a beginning, middle and end. It gets the beginning right, tossing our protagonist into a scenario in which society have become so totally ignorant of the prison sector, so that even when hell is being created right in front of their eyes, they think it’s an elaborate piece of CGI.

However, upon reaching the 'middle' segment, Deadman Wonderland tosses that whole story aside and becomes about super powers. Instead of developing the characters introduced in the beginning, it decides to quadruple the size of the cast, each and every single one having a hastily constructed backstory introduced right in the middle of a fight to the death that ends up having either little or no relevance to the actual battle happening in the present day. Neither does Deadman Wonderland get the 'end' part right either. This is partly due to the fact this is an ongoing manga, but plenty of other adaptations of ongoing manga have managed to construct some sort of conclusion in their respective stories. Usually this is in the form of the main character growing and learning something (see Arakawa, Spice and Wolf or Genshiken), which Deadman Wonderland tries to do, but royally cocks up because the main character has fuck all personality.

Yes, this is something else that comes with modernity. Instead of the macho men that spout 'witty' quips like they're in an American first person shooter game (that is, when they ever talk at all), Deadman Wonderland sports a bland spineless teenage boy as its main character. To be fair to Ganta, he does actually do something other than make reaction noises while other characters monologue exposition at him, as is the trend in certain other modern day anime. He reacts to situations by either whining, crying or sobbing. It really isn't much of a personality, as any bland male would react to the cartoonish level of hell that exists in that prison in a similar fashion, and he really has nothing beyond that. There is chance for him to grow into a hero, and Deadman Wonderland tried to do that. Other characters would spout lines as to how much he's grown a spine and standing up for himself, but I failed to see that myself. He started off as a crybaby who could shoot off magical blood bullets when he felt threatened. By the end, he was a crybaby who shot off magical blood bullets when he felt threatened, except this time he could shoot off his magical blood bullets even faster than before. That's not character development! That's like saying a character has developed because he is now slightly better at picking his nose.

Another thing the late night 12 episode anime has changed from the hyper violent OVAs of old is, now that they're on TV, they need to be censored. I can't really criticise Deadman Wonderland for this though, which is a shame because it's a really easy target. The gun that shot black balls of censorship through people’s chests was one of the most unintentionally hilarious things I've seen all year. But if you were to watch the dvd release, the censorship would (presumably) be removed. It would be like criticising it for the screen being upside down because you watched it while standing on your head. It's not the anime's fault you watched it that way. But the fact that it needed the level of censorship it has tells us how much blood and gore there is. Often the gore has no point other than to show how sadistic the anime is. It's really just repulsive and juvenile, like a child who tries to show everyone what a big man he is by killing the class rabbit.

Deadman Wonderland is like a modern day MD Geist. It's aggressively stupid and only appeals to those teenagers and manchildren who think sheer bloody mindedness is what is required to make something cool. People might defend this by saying a hyper violent anime is preferable to the insipid harem moe nonsense of the modern era, which is a load of cowpat. They are both as brainless as each other, just appealing to different sorts of immature mindsets. If you gave me a choice between Deadman Wonderland or, say, Fortune Arterial, I'd instead choose repeatedly slamming my fingers in a car door.
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Deadman Wonderland is a twelve (12) episode series that was left open ended so that there is the possibility that another season of it could be in the making. The title of this anime seduced me into watching it with the element of confusion channelling me forward.

STORY 7/10
Deadman Wonderland is a theme park that not only serves as entertainment to the public but also doubles as a prison for criminals in society. It is the only privately owned prison in Japan. It is here that the fourteen (14) year old Igarashi Ganta is placed after he is charged with the crime of murdering everyone in his class brutally. At first, the prison appears to be an ordinary one but as Ganta begins to learn more about the prison daily and continue his quest in finding the ‘Red Man’, he realises that there is more to this prison and himself that meets the eye.

ART 9/10
This anime was dark and gruesome and the artwork reflected such. The depiction of the amusement park was a stark contrast from the horror that was taking place inside. The prison itself gave off an ominous atmosphere which contributed to the intense mystery of the story.

SOUND 9/10
The opening score provided the key to the dismal atmosphere of the anime and the music included in the story played on one’s mental because even though kaleidoscope music was used it was the irony of the situation in which it was used. The ending piece was sad, reflecting Ganta’s major emotional state.

CHARACTER 8/10
The characters were pretty diverse with some of them surprising you completely! Each character added a different edge to the anime, contributing to the story and keeping the audience guessing as to the true nature or intentions of some of them.

ENJOYMENT 8/10
The mystery of the anime kept me intrigued because of the journey that is undertaken with the main character Ganta; empathising with him and also wanting to know more about why he was made to suffer for a crime that he did not commit. I was highly impressed with the amount of violence and gore in this series, so much so, that even some of it had to be censored! However, I was disappointed that the story shifted focus after episode six which annoyed me a little but realised that the ending was open thereby leaving the possibility that there would be another season in the future to tie up loose ends.

OVERALL 8/10
This anime is definitely worth the watch, that is, if you can stomach all the gore and violence that comes along with it. You can’t help but feel for the main character Ganta and hope that he gets vindicated. The only thing that ruined it for me was the change in the arc where the focus shifted from Ganta to another character Nagi, but nevertheless, a breath of fresh air in the anime universe.
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Deadman Wonderland really stood out to me as one of the best anime of 2011.

Story:
Basically The story starts out with the main character Igarashi, Ganta. Ganta is accused of murdering his whole class, which was killed by "The Red Man" as Ganta calls him. I would say his real name, but I don't want to spoil this anime. Ganta is sent to a prison called Deadman Wonderland. The story will then explain life in Deadman Wonderland for the first 3 episodes. In Deadman Wonderland every prisoner has to eat a piece of candy with in 3 days to survive. I was a little unsure about the whole candy thing at first, but it later on becomes a really important piece of the story. Two really good aspects of the story is the action and storyline. To me this anime is probably one of the most original anime that stands on its own. If your a fan of gore then I differently recommend this anime. Of course even if you hate gore, you will probably fall in love with this anime too. Lots of gore, fighting, cuteness,friendship,love,romance, and a messed up prison, leaving you filling sorry for everyone in there, you love it. Basically the prison makes you play death games if you plan on eating. I Give the story a 10/10.

Art:
The Art was perfect. It has its moments. Some parts of the art really stands out, others not so well. The art is still very good. The only thing I had a problem with was the censorship of the gore in TV version. At the time of me reviewing this, I believe the uncut version has not been released in Japan, but when it does I Recommend that more then the TV in censorship wise. Now if you don't like gore all that much I do recommend the TV version though. I Give the art a 9/10.

Sound:
I fell in love with the OP and ED. The OP was differently one of the best I have seen. The ED was really good too. All the voice actors really fit well with all the characters. Besides that there is not much to say about sound. I give sound a 10/10

Characters:
The characters really is what I thought really made Deadman wonderland so great. Each character has his or her own unique personalty. By the end of the anime you'll be fangirling or fanboying over someone and will hate someone.

Enjoyment:
I enjoyed this anime more then I have most. I was on the edge of my seat(desk Chair) through almost the whole series. The first 3 are a little slow, but by the 4th episode you won't want to stop watching it. I fell in love with this anime so much that finished it in 2 days. By the end of this anime you'll most lucky will want a season 2 or will start reading the manga if you haven't. Enjoyment 10/10.

Overall this was the best thing to happen to anime this year. I give this anime a 10/10. read more

First of all, I want to say I loved this anime. I've already heard a lot of people say how disappointing it was, but I just can't seem to understand their points to why...

Story: 6/10
In my opinion, the story is the only REAL downside to the anime. It's totally not bad at all, but there are problems. The story goes a little like this:
A boy in middle school witnesses his entire class get slaughtered before his eyes and is framed as the murder for the fact he was the only survivor. He's the whisked away to the magical, super-prison called Deadman Wonderland (well, not really magical... more like... horrific). It's, like I said, a super-prison created over the ruins of Tokyo, which was destroyed by an unknown phenomenon.
Well, that's the gist of it. Oh, and there's the fact that the very boy framed for murdering his class has developed a mysterious new power which uses his own blood to fire projectiles.
Now, the downsides, I'd say, are how there are so many characters introduced but never fully played out. Even one of the very first prison-friends of Ganta, the main character, is never played out! Of course, that leaves us off for a season two, but still... C'mon! The next downside is the pacing. It starts off fine, though. Then, maybe around towards the last several episodes, the pacing goes haywire! Everything starts happening and the ending gets rushed... While I love the ending, it isn't much of an ending, and the leading up to it was kinda disappointing.

Art: 9/10
I LOVE the art! It's so well done, IMO. I've heard some say that "it isn't the greatest but it isn't bad," but I HIGHLY disagree. The art is VERY well done... And, for an anime with SO much gore, it's pretty shocking. Watching anime with a plethora of gore like Elfen Lied isn't really disturbing (well, it is... but...). I mean, the art really isn't the greatest, so the shock factor was like, "WHOA! HE GOT DECAPITATED... Okay, now what?" But in Deadman Wonderland, the art is so good, that when people are getting sliced in half and their organs flying about, I'm going, "JESUSWHATISTHIS!?"
In short, the art is great and the gore is almost TOO well-done...

Sounds: 8/10
Voices are good, I'd say. Ganta sounds like the child that he is, and every other character's voice fits pretty well. Even the "gore sounds" are pretty good! Referring to Elfen Lied again, those gore sounds were VERY cheesey, and used that "PLLLQUAT!!!" kind of sounds. This anime uses very... Well, I've never heard somebody be ripped apart, but it sounds A LOT better than other gory animes I've seen.
Now, the music isn't my favorite, but I can't be picky in that area, since I don't like emo, whiny music about killing yourself (note the opeining song about cutting yourself and living in insanity...). Now, the OP actually FITS the anime PERFECTLY... Listen to the lyrics and you'll see what I mean; I just don't like emo music... I'm sorry... Hm, oh yea! The OP was an English song, which was surprising...
The ending song wasn't my favorite, either, but it's not my taste, so I won't judge it.

Character: 8/10
I LOVE 'EM ALL! Ganta is basically the kind of main character you absolutely despise like in Neon Genesis Evangelion. I mean, he's a total pussy (and he sucks... for the most part) and is afraid of his power (remind you of anybody from NGE? Hint hint: Shinji Ikari, maybe?). HOWEVER, unlike those characters we all hate so much (most of us, at least), Ganta DOES use his power and actually ATTEMPTS to learn it. He still is afraid of killing people, but if it means saving his or another's life, he'll use it without hesitation most of the time.
The other characters with his power (Deadmen as they're called...) are all very... Well, they have a lot of personality. Then there's Shiro, who's very likeable. She's basically like the comedy relief of the anime, even though she... Well, I can't tell you the truth behind the show, so you have to watch it yourself...

Enjoyment: 8/10
It's VERY enthralling and VERY impacting at times (not like change-your-life kind of impacting, but like, "Whoa... I can't believe... Really?" kind of impacting). I didn't miss an episode on its release date, actually, which is the first time I watched an anime that was currently airing so religiously. I don't know how else to say it, but this is a VERY enjoyable anime if you like action, characters with insane powers and can stomach the gore (even the censored TV-release that just finished airing was full of immense amounts of gore... They really only censored dirty-Japanese-words or when whenever somebody got a limb severed, or if their stomach is ripped open...). The gore isn't what I enjoyed, though .-. I'm not into "guro" (as the kids these days call it... or whatever), but I can stomach it.

Overall: 8/10
Very good anime and has some REALLY awesome action in it! It really reminds me of a lot of animes I love, so it made it all the more better, but it was still unique in its own ways. I highly recommend it if you enjoy animes like Mnemosyne or Elfen Lied (the first two gory-action animes to pop into my head...).
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Now, if you want to know what this anime is like... well, take the American comedy cartoon Super Jail, throw in the Joker's sick mind from Batman, add a pussified-character like Shinji Ikari from Neon Genesis but give him the will to be accepted and to survive like Naota from FLCL, then throw in some good artists to the bunch, and lastly: the gore from Elfen Lied. There you have it... That's the easiest way to describe Deadman Wonderland. read more

Deadman Wonderland is something you wouldnt Expect.
The first episode consists of the main protaganist (Ganta) going to school and his whole class being murdered right in front of his face by a mysterious person in which Ganta refers to as the RED MAN, after watching all his friends die, Ganta is seen in the court room where an odd video pops up that puts him in jail for the death of his classmates. His "lawyer" Tamaki says he feels bad but is the one who ends up making the video. Ganta proceeds to wonderland as a Death Row inmate, where he is first scared and confused, and meets a WHITE girl named SHIRO.
Now let me say this , the RE-developing friendship of the two is something of wonderment, SHIRO remembers Ganta from long ago as a child but Ganta cant seem to remember. The anime has a lot of blood and fighting action, as the DEADMEN in wonderland use their own blood as weapons to fight, the Director who also happens to be the dirty lawyer, sets up brutal fights between the blood users(DEADMEN) for the whole worlds enjoyment. This anime has a little bit of each character, the dyabolical, sinister Director, the poor kid Ganta. Love interests in some of the people who bring wonderland to its knees. Its a very interesting anime with a lot of thought left upon the watcher as the final episode ends, but if you watch it you must pay close attention to SHIRO, REDMAN, and ACE MAN. In this anime you must make connections to get it. Its only 12 episodes so its very worthy of taking time out of your day to watch alot of blood and violence, and to watch an old but new friendship rekindle.
I give this 10/10 read more

You'll be on the edge of your seat for this anime. There is a large sense of mystery in this anime as well as the moments of cringing whenever something horrible happens. It was a little slow of an anime to begin with, but after a while it really picked up the pace. It has the feel of a battle anime, but it does have a compelling reason to continue watching it right up to the end. Also, there are interesting characters, that are easy to get attached to, even the ones who you think you'll hate right off the bat. If left unsatisfied by the anime, read the manga to fill in any of the gaps and continue past the ending of the anime if you're too impatient for the next possible season (I don't think there are any plans for another season). read more

Deadman Wonderland is a a series that showed a lot of promise after a couple of episodes, but ultimately falls to the 12 episode only bug. While the series has an interesting concept, and a great deal of shock value, it falls flat on execution.

Our story involves around Ganta, a typically middle school kid who is framed for the murder of his classmates, who were really killed by what he refers to as "The Red Man". He gets sent to a private prison known as "Deadman Wonderland", which is more like a gladiator holding place than a prison. His goal is to find the Red Man and kill him. Oh, he also gets this weird blood power which allows him to use his own blood as a weapon.

The main issue with the show are the characters. Ganta is a kid in a brutal world, but he does not show any real growth at all. Shiro on the other hand is more like a flaw to Deadman Wonderland itself. Her upbeat and rather innocent personality almost represents hope in the show.

Besides Ganta and Shiro there are not many characters worth mentioning. Crow, is probably the coolest character in the show, but only gets a side character spot.

Another problem is that the pacing seems off. There are a few pick me up moments near the start of the show where the viewer can latch onto and think there's hope, but those are totally gone as the show progresses and it basically turns into a suffering with the main character ordeal. On top of this, the closing episodes reveal several things that are never resolved (but does leave room for a second season)

The art and sound are good. Maybe not the greatest ever, but not distracting at all. Voice acting is fine too, I can't really think of a character whose voice annoyed me. There is one character, Mockingbird, whose voice is questionable, but you only see him a few times.

This is a series that will probably hook you after the first couple of episodes and drag you into it and then you'll be more or less obliged to complete it. Deadman wonderland is not a terrible show, but offers little in the way of substance. It's just lifeless. read more

I really want to like this show, i've made every effort to enjoy this show, but i can't quite bring myself to recommend it.

Deadman Wonderland is the story of Ganta, a young man sharing a staggering resemblance to Eureka Seven's Renton (same mangaka) who is wrongly imprisoned in the futuristic Deadman Wonderland, a theme park were the convicts serve as the attractions.

The first thing that became apparent is that 12 episodes was never going to be enough screen time to do this show justice. The first few episodes drive us through the series of event's that lead us to Ganta's imprisonment, now i personally had wrongly assumed the wonderland would be a dark and dreary affair, initially this is not the case, the prison is futuristic in appearance, lots of shiny scientific looking facility's and park itself looks like an amusement park all bright and cheery. We're introduced to the idea that the convicts are given a battle royal style neckband which will deal them a lethal dose of poison should they not take the antidote candy every 3 days, these candy's can be earned via participation is the wonderlands various death themed activity's, i would have assumed this to be the basis of the show, as we're introduced and grow to know and appreciate the cast and the environment.

Sadly not to be, Ganta (far to) quickly discovers he had some strange new powers and is declared a Deadman and moved to G block, the dark drab place i was expecting from the beginning, and all the stuff about antidote candy and the rest of the park is forgotten, now i've not seen Ganta consume any more candy, i''ve lost track as to if only 3 days are supposed to have past over the course of the entire show, or if it's a highlight real of months, and they just got bored with the idea? Never really touched on again, so thanks for that.

The show then drives us head long into the Deadman universe, as quickly as possible attempting to introduce us to the Deadmen (those with similar powers to Ginta) through altercations with Ganta and then the Undertakers, a Bleach Captain styled band of throw away Nemesis's for the Deadmen.

The whole thing never really has a chance to catch it's breath and never really shows us enough interaction or actual screen time for the various characters to give them any depth or real significance in the show. By the 10th episode we've still got the major character's such as Crow refusing to assist poor Ganta, and rightly so, they've met exactly 3 times ever.

I'm at a loss of what to say about the characters, Ganta's kinda pathetic throughout and plenty whiny, and just doesn't get the time to grow, Shiro's random switches between psychotic and adorable are fun and all, and the various Deadmen we've seen so far have all been pretty cool, in the 10 minutes or so screen time they've had to share with god knows how many throw away characters, all of the under takers seem pretty cliched, but what can you do. I'd honestly say the cast has allot of potential, but your certainly not going to see any of it realised, if this is the first and last season.

The art and sound, are really good, i love the opening, and this was most of the reason i started the show, i was intrigued by the opening sequence, and it perfectly sets the tone. No complaints on the voice acting, i thought Kana Hanazawa did a stand out job as Shiro, nailed the character for me. Art although not setting any new ground, is all high end, and i suppose is the up side to such a short show, i'm not going to go crazy over it though, i've no doubt it's the main reason this show still average's an 8+ rating while genuinely good shows like Fairy Tail sat below the 8.0 mark for months and months.

Enjoyment wise, i just expect more from a modern show, the bar has been set really high, by the popular shounen crop of recent years, and this hasn't got there. I really wanted to like this show, my intrigue lasted a good few episodes, before i finally realised no significant ground was ever going to be covered. It's by no means a bad show, but it's one that needed to spend longer setting up the atmosphere and building up some suspense.

In conclusion the manga folks really should have held out for a better adaptation offer, this has by no means done justice to what i'm sure was good material. read more

I started watching Deadman Wonderland because it seemed like it had an interesting story. A boy's whole classroom is massacred, he is framed for it, and consequently put on death's row? Woah. That is like falling face first into a pile of shit and some got into your mouth. Sadly, that is how I felt after watching this show. It was pretty bad.

Story: I felt it could have in fact had something going for it. The general idea of the show revolving around the demented amusement park prison was disturbingly interesting. After I found out about the Deadmen and their powers, I thought, "Hey, this could go somewhere. Maybe the main character will overcome great challenges and earn his freedom since he was innocent to begin with." Sadly, I was naive and mistaken. The plot revolves around Ganta, who is a real pussy, and he has to win fights against other deadmen in order to survive. An interesting concept, except for the fact that well, Ganta is a wimp. I don't really even understand how he beats veteran deadmen and other strong opponents. It really doesn't make much sense. Anyway, the plot only gets worse and worse as the show progresses.

Art: I have no real beef with the art. It had its fair share of blood and violence, which was probably the only good thing going for the show. However, I would probably much rather watch Hellsing over this.

Sound: I also didn't have much of a beef with the sound, but it was nothing spectacular.

Characters: God awful main character. Little to no character development with other annoying characters as well. I think the only thing done right was the creepy ass Promoter being such a sadistic bastard. The other mention would probably be for Crow. He was a pretty cool character, it's too bad there wasn't much of a role for him in the later episodes.

Overall: I felt this was actually fairly bad. I'm surprised I actually finished the whole thing, but I hate doing things halfway. In any case, I wouldn't recommend Deadman Wonderland unless there were nothing else really to watch. read more

I had been longing to see this anime for quite a while. And finally i saw it. After completing it I was quite disappointed.

Story - 5/10
The story is Original but it had so many flaws that till the end it kept on counting. Igarashi Ganta is wrongly accused of killing all of his classmates (29 to be precise) during school hours. He is sentenced to death and awaits his doom in a privately owned (lol) prison called deadman wonderland where prisoners entertain citizens in a type of an amusement park. When he ends up here he finds that the guy who actually killed his classmates is here and then the story goes on as he steps closer to finding out his identity in the nightmarish prison. He meets different inmates and discovers the insane rules and regulations of the prison where death is always at the corner.

The story had immense potential, but it is never achieved. Episode after episode the story became less interesting and we kept seeing the bullshit they presented. The action and gore was at its height but the fights were just too small. When you see an upcoming fight you expect it to be action packed slicing-dicing but it never lasted long enough. Dont expect anything from the end too.

Sound - 9/10
This was a shocker. The soundtrack was really good. The opening sequence "One Reason" performed by Fade is sung in English entirely and is a pop rock song. It was really AWESOME and easily became one of my favorites. The BGM was pretty cool too.
The missed the ending sequence coz if the first 5 sec of it doesn't catch my interest i skip it. So i really can't say anything about it.

Art - 7/10
Well in a highly gory and action packed anime Art is pretty important. This anime doesn't fail there. The blood was impressive and the colors went with the atmosphere. The characters were drawn well. Though the protagonist was the lamest. They could have made him better. He looks like he needs a punch on his face. Anywhoo that's all for art.

Character - 5/10
Pathetic! I don't understand why the creator created such lame characters. Sometimes the characters were created just to be killed in the next scene. That doesn't even make sense. They introduce a character and show their ugly background/flashback and in the next scene they are sliced in two. This all is done just to show how cool and strong the character who sliced them is. The emphasis on showing off the coolness of every dumb and ridiculous character makes me laugh. And to top it all off the main protagonist is soo ugly and lame he makes Makoto from school days look normal. I mean in the one episode he is loser crying like a baby and in the next he defeats the boss . He just learns how to fight in one scene and takes on the villain in the next. I mean WTF. The side characters are not given importance. People just keep die-ing every moment which makes them look useless.
The female protagonist has a split personality ( i think ) and not much of her past is revealed. She seems quite mysterious but likes Ganta very much.

Enjoyment - 6/10
It was fun to watch people getting sliced but there's Quality above Quantity. After sometime it lost its energy and we keep expecting blood and flying body parts.This anime had loads of potential. The story sucked the most and the characters with it. At ep 4 this anime lost enjoyment quality. It became monotonous and the end kept you baffled. The villain ...umm ... wait ... no spoilers. Anywhoo I would never recommend this anime no matter what. Only people who like gore no matter the story will love this and wont refrain from giving it 10/10.

Overall - 6+1/10
The +1 is for the sound. It was a mediocre anime with unusual brutality and insanity. It was a mixture of poor execution with good sound crew. It could and should have been much much better if it was presented to the audience in a proper acceptable way. But it didn't happen till the end. The graph kept going down from episodes 4-12.

Lastly this was another waste of time. Its not a must watch anime nor it would be a wonderful experience watching it. But for the people who want to see immense gore and senseless violence please go on ahead and watch this.

If you think I can improve my review writing please MESSAGE me. And if you think my review sucked (not because you liked the anime and i didn't) because it was not informative then bring the hate on my MESSAGE section.

Thank you and have a Good Day!! read more

Deadman Wonderland. Some people are terming it "The most gory anime of 2011" , well I may have to agree. It's got gore, but is that what it's relying upon to be anything better than just an average Anime?

Deadman Wonderland starts off with Ganta Igarashi, just a normal schoolboy...until his entire class is killed by a mysterious power wielded by the antagonist later known as the Red man. Ganta is pinned for the murder by ridiculous "evidence" and is thrown into Japan's first, privately owned prison, Deadman Wonderland.

In prison, Ganta learns that he now wields the mysterious "blood power" (branches of sin) and he will be forced to fight against other users, and compete in brutal, childish games to survive.

The story isn't bad. For the most part it kept me interested and staying on to the next episode. The story does, however, try to be serious and fails because the world encompassing it is so silly. I do feel that it is pandering to a demographic that craves excessive gore, but it is not so amazing as to be what keeps viewers coming back. It's been done better in Hellsing, Elfen lied and even Highschool of the Dead.

The character designs are probably the main point of what diversifies it, art-wise, from other Anime's. I, personally, don't care much for the look of the characters.

As for sound. Deadman Wonderland does have some ominous backing tracks which helps to bring out the full potential of various scenes in the series. The opening is rather interesting as well. The voice acting is your typical deal, nothing special. I do feel that Hanazawa Kana was a lot better in Angel Beats! as Kanade than Shiro in this series.

Character development was where the series fell quite short for me. The protagonist Ganta is weak, pathetic and generally just a pain to listen to. He gets down on himself, he is a hindrance to the other characters. This is all well and good, but these are the cliché characteristics of a generic archetype and are suppose to be developed away from. The series loses touch and scenes where Ganta actually does something mildly heroic are too little, too late. I just couldn't relate to Ganta and that is the main reason Deadman Wonderland fell down for me.

If you are looking for mindless gore this isn't a bad series for it and all in all, its okay.

P.S: Telling from the ending this series had, this is definitely going to get another season.

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Ah Deadman Wonderland (referred as "DW" from here on), the only 2011 Spring show i watched. Let's begin with this:

Story: Ganta Igarashi is a 14 year old middle school student accused and later convicted of murdering his entire class, yet he proclaims his innocence and says he saw a "Red Man" actually do the killings. But his "public defender" Tamaki fails to help Ganta and gets sent to DW, a carnival where the inmates are subjected to humiliating and often life or death situations.

The story is pretty generic for the most part. Ganta tries to prove his innocence while trying to maintain his sanity in DW. He meets Shiro, a cheerful yet mysterious girl who quickly becomes Ganta's closest friend inside DW. He realizes that in order to survive he needs to take an antidote, called "candy" every two days or he'll die. To get candy, one must get credits, obtained from winning contests. Nothing exciting but nothing outlandish either.


Art: The best part of DW is the animation/art. Even though the blood/violence is heavily censored in the TV version, i found the animation to be top-notch. Each episode really does its best to show us the facial expressions of Ganta (especially episode 6), the Deadmen, everyone else in the show. But the violence is stunning on DW. People getting chopped in half, impaled, electrocuted, eyeball removal, yeah its pretty bad. Yet, ironically those instances are when the Animation truly shows its strength.

Sound: The OP/ED are nothing outstanding, but alright. The background music is just that, background music. Voice acting: Romi Paku is known for voicing every popular male character (see Elric, Edward) that's ever been seen and pulls off a strong performance as Ganta. Rising newcomer Kana Hanazawa (also Mayuri from Steins;Gate, Shiemi from Blue Exorcist) nails it as the aloof and cheerful Shiro.

Characters: I already talked about Ganta, but i'll add something to this. He starts off as your typical whiny shounen lead which gets really annoying as the show is 75% Ganta, 15% Shiro, 10% everyone else, though there are some instances where Ganta really shines (see episode 6). Only near the very end of the very short series, he finally admits that he's weak and seeks the training of "Crow" (aka Senji Kiyomasa), one of the powerful Deadmen inside. Their friendship stems as a result of one of the many "contests", such as Carnival Corpse, inside DW in order to get credits. I won't spoil what happened, but all i'll say is that the loser has to partake in a slot machine game where anything can happen ("Lose your right arm, Lose your eyeball, Lose your hair (?)").

None of the other characters really standout. Ganta suffers the mistake of being too nice to people, especially inside DW. He befriends Takami Yoh, a kleptomaniac searching for his sister but Takami is also in cahoots with the mainman of DW, the Promoter Tamaki (Yes, that guy who was Ganta's public defender, pretty twisted huh?). Later Ganta meets Iron Chain, the group who's plotting to breakout of DW and their leader Nagi.

Enjoyment: Having watched no new anime since last year, i can say with certainty that Deadman Wonderland is a refreshing yet lacking anime in some regards. Only 12 episodes, the ending is very much left wide-open yet very unlikely the show will get any real closure (such as a second season, or an OVA). But for the most part i loved DW. Ganta, while flawed, managed to keep his sanity for the most part. Shiro is loveable, funny and quick to defend Ganta from anyone at anytime. But there just wasn't enough episodes to explain the most important parts of the show, such as the Branches of Sin, Undertakers, and of course Shiro herself, but it's a good show especially given its only 12 episodes. I recommend this show.

The good: Crisp, detailed animation. If you haven't read the manga, you'll love this more than those who read the manga.

The bad: Unanswered questions, failed character improvement.


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If you like bloody violence and white girl butt, Deadman Wonderland was made for you. I was hoping the season finale would redeem a rocky last couple episodes, but it’s pretty much a mess. Some thoughts and my “cool” list.

Instead of the good and fair critique I’ve become known for, I’ll just take a note from Nichijou and list, “Things I Thought Were Cool!” and I’ll also add a, “Things I thought Were Terrible!”

Things I Thought Were Cool!

Shiro was cool and she’s easily my favorite insane character of the Spring 2011 season. I enjoyed her character, and I’m not above saying I greatly enjoyed looking at her boobs and butt all season. Although on a serious note, albino people aren’t attractive in real life. It’s true, look it up. It’s like anime has moe-fied albinism. I can’t imagine this series without Shiro though, seriously.

The entire opening sequence is excellent. The song, animation and design were all put together beautifully. I enjoyed all the animation overall. The characters and most importantly, the fights, all looked good. I enjoyed a lot of the grimy-ness of the characters and the dirtiness of the prison, especially in contrast with the pretty shows like Hanasaku or Denpa Onna.

I thought the lack of rainbow hair was cool. Besides Shiro and Kanako with their white locks, the show had some good hairlism (hair+realism). I just made that up, but I could see that one taking off.

Hummingbird was pretty cool. Crow was cool, but all his homoerotic scenes of girl-hating and being topless with Ganta were not so cool. His consistent slicing up of dudes was cool though.

All the action in DW, in a slice of life and drama filled season, “seemed” cool. Although the action wasn’t always that great, it always looked cool. I’ll lump the violence and gore in with the action as well. While the censoring was surely “terrible”, all the amputations and bone-breakings were cool. The violence along with some rape and drug use made this show pretty shocking at times. Guitar Hero (featured in my terrible list) even drops the F-bomb quite a bit.

There were some other cool things, but even more than things I thought were cool, there were…

Things I Thought Were Terrible

The overall character design, and not just looks, but everything from origin stories to personalities through to their special abilities or “super powers’ if you will. I hated Guitar Hero. I hated Daida, the 3rd grader. I hated Owl. I hated the “super good with computers” guy.

The show had some nice grown up themes and more mature plot style devices, so all the “super cool” character designs, for me, felt like an insult. I don’t need an evil priest who uses guitar guns or a little girl who uses a giant sword. They were terrible.

Ganta I wasn’t thrilled with, but I understood the need for a weak-ass lead, but I thought Romi Park (Edward Elric, Toshiro from Bleach), was a terrible choice to perform his voice. I enjoy almost all of the seiyu’s former roles, but the whiny-bitchy tonal quality along with the whiny-bitchy character design, was just too much whiny-bitchy for me overall.

While I thought the action was cool, I could use a little less shounen dialogue during the fights. More fight, less talk. Too much talk while trying to survive is terrible. Unless talking is your super power I guess.

Does Cool kill Terrible? Or does Terrible kill Cool?

Unlike the actual show, there’s no killing here. As evidenced by the scientific list above, Deadman Wonderland definitely has its merits. I’m not going to rail on the show, but I’ll just say that story isn’t told in a very tight, consistent way. It also feels very rushed. At first it just felt like a quick, fast moving show. Now that it’s over, it ended up just feeling rushed, as if they tried to squish 20 episodes worth of material into 12.

I will be watching a second season however and waiting eagerly for Eating Cookies With Shiro, coming out on Blu-ray soon!


[Thoughts about final episode removed due to spoilerish tendencies: go to http://moemonster.com/2011/07/02/deadman-wonderland-episode-12-finale/ for full unedited review] read more

Sometimes, anime characters are put into such unfortunate circumstances that you can't help but shake your head in pity. Now, this isn't the type of misfortune where you go "Barnacles, I procrastinated and didn't do my boating essay," or "Such misfortune! A certain Sister bites me all the time!" The misfortune I'm talking about is when Heaven itself seems to abandon you, when it seems all the forces in the world are trying to guarantee no salvation for you.

The subject of this particular tragic treatment is Ganta Igarashi, who starts as a completely normal middle school boy with all of the nice, usual things. Family, friends, and a sense of security. Sadly for him, this was not going to last. On the very first episode of Deadman Wonderland, a mysterious figure, which Ganta dubs the "Red Man," appears and butchers Ganta's entire class, leaving him the sole survivor. Framed for the massacre of his class, Ganta is incarcerated in the social experiment prison, Deadman Wonderland.

Deadman Wonderland isn't your everyday kind of prison. For starters, there is an amusement park built right on top of the prison, with the usual cute and fuzzy mascots roaming around. Here, the prisoners are used to operate the attractions and entertain the audience, with sadistic attractions such as the Dog Race and most importantly, the Carnival of Corpses.

Since Ganta is housed on death row, there isn't much hope for him in this place. Tagging along with him and constantly saving his life though, is a mysterious girl named Shiro, who claims to be Ganta's childhood friend, and possesses near super human feats of strength and agility. Her presence is a mixed blessing for Ganta; she's rather clueless and childish, but doesn't hesitate to save Ganta. Deadman Wonderland follows Ganta's experiences in this bizarre world.

Deadman Wonderland certainly has an interesting concept. Modern day gladiators, supernatural powers, and plenty of violence. What's not to love?

The problem with Deadman Wonderland is that it's trying to fit too many things into a very short 12 episode anime. Halfway, an important concept and fighting ability called "The Branches of Sin" is introduced. It essentially gives a mastery over using one's own blood in a variety of offensive and defensive ways. Somewhere along the way, a rebel group is introduced, an old geezer who never really gets an explanation, a very feminine looking boy, and Undertakers are also introduced. There simply isn't enough time in 12 episodes to flesh out these things to make it flow with its other concepts, resulting in little character interaction and development. Even at the end of the series, there are lots of unanswered questions.

Let me elaborate. There is a staggering revelation near the middle of the series, a revelation that could very well shatter what little logic is present in Ganta's situation. What would happen if Ganta found out about this certain secret? Would he go insane? Would he crawl up and die? Or would he take vengeance?

I don't have a clue, and you're guess is as good as mine. The series introduces this extremely interesting revelation and yet does nothing with it. Given time, this could help make Deadman Wonderland a much better show. And yet, this won't happen, because of Deadman Wonderland's lack of time to flesh out events. It's disappointing, but something in the future could elaborate on this and give a new dimension to the show.

As for characters, I've read a lot of complaints about Ganta's weak attitude. I really can't blame him though, since he's just a middle school student who suddenly finds himself on death row. I think it's be unrealistic to think that he'd suddenly toughen himself and willingly face the dangers of Deadman Wonderland so quickly. The entire story takes place in less than 2 weeks I believe, after all. There are a few interesting characters that appear, such as the Crow, Kiyomasa Senji, who is my personal favorite character of this show. He becomes somewhat of a friend to Ganta, though he is unwilling to share the former's optimism of escape.

While on characters, I have to applaud this show for introducing some truly hate worthy characters. I'm looking at you, Promoter Tamaki, man who plays with life like a toy. You too, Genkaku Azuma, you sacrilegious mediocre guitar player. And you too, Hibana Daida, unladylike gorilla who wields Zabimaru. Enough ranting though.

Aside from characters, the art in this show is pretty decent. Plenty of dark colors and tones in the prison, while bright colors are usually in the form of sadistic, cute mascots with a gun hidden in them or something of the sort. There isn't much diversity in setting, since it takes place in a somewhat futuristic prison after all. That means lots of corridors, cells, stone, steel and things of that sort. Fight scenes were pretty interesting, though animation quality takes a dip sometimes.

Moving onto sound, the background music was just that, background music. I didn't notice any real noteworthy melodies and such, but the music was appreciated where it was. The opening is "One Reason" by Fade. It's a typical rock song with, surprise, English lyrics. It's very appropriate for the dark tones of the show, and it's a pretty decent song.

However, the ending song is a completely different story. It's an interesting song called "Shiny Shiny" by Nirgilis. It has a pretty upbeat pop style to it, an interesting contrast to the heavy rock and violence of the show. There are also some melancholic sounds in the song, another contrast to the happy. However, hearing this after the blood has been spilled in a particular episode, gives an interesting feel close to pity. The ending basically shows pictures of the lives of many of the characters before they experienced the hell of Deadman Wonderland. Innocent things like being with friends, embracing loved ones, and appreciating childhood.

Deadman Wonderland isn't for everyone. There's tons of blood, gore, and some rather disturbing scenes (ahem, Penalty Game). The first episode is remarkably similar in levels of gore to Elfen Lied, so if you can handle things like that, be my guest and enjoy the attractions at Deadman Wonderland. This show should be viewed with enjoying the interesting atmosphere and action as much as possible. It's about a boy with all of the misfortune in the world, living in a twisted environment, trying his best to understand what it truly means to be a "Deadman."

In Deadman Wonderland, we do our very best to kick the loser while they're down. So sit back, and enjoy watching our prisoners suffer, minds shatter, and play the part of fool, all while I watch. read more

Deadman Wonderland.

A place where the first thing you think when you arrive would probably be : "Well F***, I'm screwed"

Story:
You've went through reading the synopsis so you probably have a fair idea about whats going on in Deadman Wonderland. You might ask yourself, why I rated the story with 8 points. Let's go through the action Anime cliche list:

Superpowers: Check
Whiny main character: Check
The power of friendship makes him strong: Check
Partial amnesia / forgotten childhood friends: Check
Tragic past: Check

Those are all things that I personally dislike in Anime, but Deadman wonderland managed to find a great setting and a great background to justify at least half of the used cliches in a way that didn't bother me! Well done.

Art:
Fitting. The art-style helps the atmosphere a lot and thus is able to emphasize the gore and drama without any efforts. The Animations are, mostly, fluent. No 3 frames per second fights that look like a slideshow or 20 second face close-ups to cover a incredibly hard to draw special move.

Sound:
m/
Deadman Wonderland has a great soundtrack. Not the kind of score that will stay burned in your mind forever but it does a great job on paraphrasing emotions.
The OP is one of the best I've heard so far. The Band "Fade" took their original song "Black Hearts and Dollar Signs" (great song btw.) and wrote new lyrics to it. That's pretty much all they did. The alternative version is called "One Reason" and really catches the atmosphere of the Anime. There should be an OST on sale... I'd buy it.

Characters:
THIS!
Deadman Wonderland is full of twisted, wicked, psychopathic, disturbed and mentally broken characters. And most of them have some kind of background and development the viewer learns about. Best of em? Shiro! Only 2 Episodes and I knew that she would stay one of my favorite characters for a long time, hopefully I won't develop some kind of fetish for psychopathic serial killer girls...
But one thing that bothered me was Ganta. He was the typical whiny wimp character, weak and useless until the last episode. God I hated him. But still I will not rate the characters any worse because of that. Think about it. You are 14 years old, you get accused for murdering 24 of your closest friends, you get send on death row to the most wicked place on earth and on top of that every single (sane) person you could possibly call for help is against you.
He is the only character that stays sane throughout the Anime and in his current situation I can really forgive him for being so whiny. But this is not an excuse for other Anime characters! (Yes I'm looking at you, Uzumaki Naruto!)

Overall...
... I really really really enjoyed Deadman Wonderland. Though again, it's one of those Anime you either hate or love or don't understand. I see how fans of it try to give it some kind of deep meaning where there is none. Most of the story twists where obvious from the very beginning but despite some highly illogical bits of story that sometimes summon hate upon this Anime, it's not totally trash. People that don't understand or are not able to see all the small details and symbolic stylistic devices might hate this anime or love it just because of the gore it feeds our eyes with. Others will try to find symbols and meanings where there are none and thus will think that the Anime tries to be something it is not and hate it because of that.

When watching DW, try to turn off the critic inside of you and focus on the obvious things. Sometimes hidden messages are best hid when they are not hid at all.

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Yangires and Yanderes usually fascinated me in any anime title because of their potential to influence any story. Ever wondered how to make one for the short-term? It is quite simple.
Watch or stay inside Deadman Wonderland. Just as the title suggests, its abuse of Deus Ex Machina, unlikeable cast, unexplained details, unnecessary deaths, insane laughter, and butchered accelerated, not fast-paced, story will turn you into a crazy psychopath, laughing maniacally like Light Yagami from Death Note. Amusement parks could start appearing in your dreams to cope with your psychological disorders. The only way to avoid this is zero expectations, inexperience in the otaku world, and ignorance. I am serious.

Biased and crazy? Since I completed this recently, I am and still have some sanity left. Let us begin exploring this madness before I laugh like the main characters in the given links.
Light Yagami: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDmb4YQqizQ
Lelouch Lamperouge: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGJbYpeDMZg

Production values are medium at the very least. They are not outstanding but unquestionably (YMMV) fitting. The opening and ending themes brought me out of my misery whenever I watch this so I never skipped them and watch the preview of preceding episodes. They both start and end the show well every time. Voice acting is fair as well. The style and quality of the art are normal like most of Shounen titles with extra focus on their supernatural abilities. I don’t have any negative issues with these factors at all.

For the rest, this is where it all falls. The main character Ganta Igarashi survives a quick massacre done by the Red Man but is arrested in a very unreasonable manner with no public support at all, not even his own relatives, and receives a death sentence. He goes to Deadman Wonderland, a questionable private prison where prisoners are guinea pigs for the audience’s entertainment. Just as any teenager, he is in shock because his previous life is gone for good. His characterization is a mix of Shinij Ikari, Shiro Emiya, and Madoka Kaname. He runs away but never quits in certain lost situations. He is unskilled and charges without thinking. His behaviour and comments are foolish in important situations. Without others, he is completely screwed. As such, he should have died in the first week of his stay but the writers played similar cards to Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica: audience sympathy and Deus Ex Machina. It is used in most, if not all, of the episodes. He even made something similar to Naruto’s Rasengan and fired it. It always amazes me how he escapes his situations because he has absolutely no chance of survival especially the first event he participated in. There are only a few things you could do whenever a Deus Ex Machina are invoked for Ganta’s survival: cover your eyes and ears in disappointment and fear of being stupefied, laugh hysterically, throw a tantrum, drop this anime.

Shiro is the avatar for some of the Deus Ex Machina. She is extremely powerful, childlike, and faithful to Ganta. Appearing out of nowhere and instantly solving about half of his problems, she is god-like. Without her, the torture would have ended a lot earlier, saving us from psychotherapy. More details could spoil the story so I’ll stop here.

For the supporting characters, they are all fine but lack the focus on characterization. Certain characters suddenly show up such as Mockingbird, introduced in the last quarter. The flashback about the major villain in the last episode (not sure if it was ep. 11 or 12) is arguably unnecessary since it does not majorly influence the story anymore. Senji is the only likeable character in this series. If he was the main character, then it is definitely a more interesting although still typical since it is Battle Royale. His match with Ganta is questionable though.

The side stories with Tamki and Makina is the only interesting part as far as storytelling goes. Exploring the deeper secrets of the hidden section of the prison or political conflict regarding the confidentiality about the Deadmen, are far more interesting than Ganta’s retarded struggle. Besides that, there is no ending and the final arc is full of Deus Ex Machinas. No more unnecessary deaths, cheated unescapable situations, Plot and Character Induced Stupidity! Don’t waste good ideas and the success of the manga adaptation.

12 episodes is simply not enough to cover all of their background and motives. Some lack detail and some are too late. If the staff wanted to make another season of this, it should be a faithful adaptation, not a butchered animal for leftovers. read more