Back to Gundroog's Profile Gundroog's Profile

I initially wanted to do a comprehensive review for Fire Punch. While I hated the experience, I thought maybe there's enough passion and creativity behind it to warrant picking things apart. However, the more time I spent on trying to do that, the less value those elements started to carry, and the more Fire Punch began to look like a plain mess.

It starts with a solid and straightforward premise. Post-apocalyptic frozen world, some people have special powers called blessings, there's allegedly a big bad behind it all, and people are going crazy under these extreme conditions. Then comes a group of people trying to rebuild ... civilization and burn down Agni's village, his sister, and himself for the crime of cannibalism, even if it was in the form of eating endlessly regenerating limbs that Agni provided. He is then doomed to burn and suffer for a long ass time as his endless regeneration counters eternal fire. Years later, Agni learns to control the pain enough to think and move and goes on to get his revenge.
I don't like retelling whole chunks of the plot like that, but I saw this as the solid beginning for the series. It reminds me quite a bit of Hokuto no Ken but edgier in that regard. You have an insane unjust world in a setting where humanity is dying out, but here comes an incredible hero who nobody can stop. It's nothing especially unique, sure, but a pretty good setup for a short action story.

For a while, that's precisely how the story progresses before diving entirely off the rails towards whatever the author thought would be cool or funny or, in many cases, shocking. Fire Punch's lack of any direction or purpose is obscene. It genuinely feels like the whole thing was written without a plan in mind or at least trying to build up from what already exists. Characters appear and then get killed off for no reason. Potential thematic elements are introduced only to be discarded. There's nothing coherent about it. I had some fans tell me and tell others that it's about human connection, hope, emotions, etc., and sure, if you try, you can apply that sort of theme onto the story, but what's the point if the story itself doesn't develop it in any way?
For example, there's a moment later on in the story where a character reveals that they have gender dysphoria, and immediately that was enough for someone to say this is a topic that the manga talks about when in reality, all the discussion or commentary about dysphoria starts and ends with "it sucks." Wow, ok, good talk. Next time have a character also say that war is bad and that rich people are assholes, so it's even more profound.
Another example is Agni's whole role in this. It starts with revenge, but shortly after, the author plays pong with his motivation, what does he want, what does he live for, what does he value, and what does he hate? All these things just get flipped around for the sake of convenience.
There's nothing to take away here, just a bunch of episodes that allow fans to try and ascribe deeper meaning or value to the writing.

So what is left? The art is nice most of the time. In particular, the way Agni is drawn covered in flames is great. There are a few genuinely funny or heartfelt moments, but they're overshadowed by utterly tasteless shock content. Dogs raping kids, goons talking about how they'd rape a little boy, some necrophilia, pointlessly cruel farming of the blessed, a bunch of deaths that only happen for shock factor. It's no better than any other edgy schlock in that regard. Is this worth a read? If you want a good story or a cool action series, no. If you've read Chainsaw Man and thought, "Wow, I wanna read whatever else this genius wrote," then you probably already know the answer and only read this to find out why some asshole would give another masterpiece an unjust 3/10.

Animal Treasure Island turned out to be quite a nice little adventure, and for something made in 1971, it holds up really well.

The story follows the rough outline of the original novel it's based on with obvious liberties taken around every corner. I haven't read the actual book but I've seen 3 or 4 different adaptations by now and it's been fun to spot the similarities along the way. The only major departure seems to be a boy meets girl element when Jim meets Kathy. Can't really complain about it cause it's added in quite naturally and their relationship is rather cute. This kind ... of stuff is also pretty common in anime when dealing with this type of story.

The presentation is where this adaptation really shines though cause its relatively short runtime for a movie is chock full of various visual gags and action scenes. It's all not only creative, funny, and well-choreographed, the animation is excellent as well. There's really a lot of expression in how characters move and act, I think any animation fan would enjoy this for the craft alone.

There's also some decent musical numbers peppered in throughout but I didn't find them quite as good as other parts of the movie. The only standout is a sequence where Jim and Kathy discuss what they'd do with a treasure and it culminates in a musical scene with pretty dreamy visuals where their imaginary ship floats through abstract backgrounds and places where they'd want to go.

Overall it's a pretty easy recommendation for anyone who liked adventure stories, old anime, or animation. It's a great example of a movie that's obviously intended for a younger audience but can still be entertaining well outside that age group.

Ashita no Joe 2 came out quite a bit after Ashita no Joe 1 but suffers from all the same issues, some of which become inexcusable 10 years after the original.

Right away I want to point out that Ashita no Joe the manga is a masterpiece. I can go on for a long time just talking about how much I love the characters and how well their arcs are written out, how great the art is, the dialogues, the presentation, everything.

However, both anime series are terrible adaptations that do nothing to enhance the source material outside of some really good voice acting and pretty ... shots from time to time. Outside of those things, adaptations only degrade the original work by cutting out and watering down important character interactions and consistently ruining the pacing with filler episodes, filler scenes and intentionally padding out scenes that shouldn't take nearly as much time.

Even without comparing it to the source material the pacing of the show is terrible, the music went from period-appropriate tunes (after all it was a 70s anime adapting a very late 60s manga) to tasteless synth and rock tracks. Art improved but animation remained mediocre. The backbone of the story is still incredibly strong, strong enough for a lot of people to enjoy and understand the themes and arcs of the original but that's what makes it so hard to recommend after reading the manga. If the anime doesn't bring anything of value to the table while actively taking away from the experience, how can I recommend it?

Fun little short. I don't think it gets mentioned too often despite being one of the most recent of Yuasa's works and that's probably fair. Kick-heart doesn't have the same emotional impact his other works normally carry, instead the focus seems to be more on style and animation which are done extremely well.

The story is simple and a lot of things are left up to the viewer to fill in. You could try spinning it in a way that would make it look like some point is being made or some theme is being explored, but that's just self-wank. The only thing that matters, is ... the premise of a masochist wrestler falling in love at first sight with his female opponent. Unbeknownst to him she's also a nun at the orphanage he grew up in.

What really matters is how this story is presented. The art is very on point. Rough, colorful, expressive but still smoothly animated and at times set to psychedelic music that adds to the whole surreal feel of the short and helps to make the scenes flow. Don't expect elaborate fight scenes or anything like that though. Since it's Yuasa you will instead get things like a man getting his chest slapped silly in slow motion or main character getting trapped under expansive folds of fat filled with gunk and bones. There a bit of more or less normal wrestling too but what you'll see is mostly goofy and eccentric.

As a package it's hard to say this is very remarkable or a must watch but it's good for what it is and worth checking out if you care even a little.

Adolf is an extremely well put together thriller focused around the lives of 4 characters. The Sohei Toge who serves as the narrator and writer of this story and 3 men named Adolf.

If you’ve ever read Urasawa works before I feel like the formula here will be pretty recognizable. Everything starts when Toge goes to report on Olympics going on in Germany when his brother asks to meet him in his hotel for something extremely urgent. What Toge finds however is a ransacked room and his brother dead in a tree outside the window. Who did it? Why? What will Sohe do and where ... will it lead him? In very little time Tezuka establishes an intriguing mystery that smoothly transitions both reader and the main characters into a messy offer that will keep spiraling down throughout the entire story.

It’s hard to describe what follows without spoilers, while none of the individual reveals will likely affect your enjoyment too much, Adolf as a whole is still built on the excitement of following the footsteps of the characters and finding out what will happen to them. Tezuka doesn’t hold anything back when it comes stakes. Even if you know the main characters won’t die, the things they go through constantly put them under pressure to which they react in a believable human way and this pressure is near constant.

Toge constantly has to face a shadow of government hanging over him. There’s a real sense of overwhelming power watching his every step, making sure not a single thing goes his way. Torturing him mentally and physically in hopes of depleting his willpower enough to squeeze out the information they need.
Kamil’s perspective is a bit more mild until the concluding chapters but as a jew living in Japan, his side of the story serves to introduce some jewish characters and set some things up.
On the other hand, Kaufmann’s PoV might be the roughest of them all as you get to see a little kid who wouldn’t hurt a fly slowly turn into an irredeemable monster after he is forced to enroll in AHS to become a part of Hitler’s Youth at behest of his father. The things he is made to do are depressing enough but seeing him get brainwashed and become a slave to ideology is heartbreaking when you get to see the results of it.

The manga can see a little unfocused at first. At least that’s how I felt originally. While sure, it’s established early on that this will be the story about three Adolfs, we nonetheless spend a huge chunk of time with out narrator/writor - Toge. Sure it’s exciting and it connects with a lot of key characters but it makes the switch to young Kaufmann and Kamil a bit weird cause you go from intense chases, escapes and fights to kids listening in on their parents or some historical exposition about nazis, jews and other things. However everything comes together so nicely in the final chapters that it’s hard to call any part of Adolf unnecessary or unfocused. If anything I feel like maybe there could’ve been more chapters flashing out Kamil cause in the end, while he’s a very important character, he’s given the least room to breathe and develop.

However it’s worth noting, I think, that even though the characters are an important part of this manga, their development is not a selling point. None of them are deep but their believable behavior is what makes them interesting. It’s not often that you see someone go through the things they go through and having it realistically reflect on them is enough to create some curiosity and intrigue.

Despite thrillers often lacking in what people usually consider substance and focusing on emotional engagement, I think Adolf succeeds in both. As in the background a gripping adventure goes on, there’s an overarching point being being made about justice and how people can use ideology to manipulate others for the sake of achieving their personal goals. How this zealous loyalty can ruin people’s lives and lead to terrible, needless tragedies. Tezuka never beats you over the head with this but I feel like that’s intentional. It’s vague enough that people might interpret this differently but not enough to a point where you can say it’s about anything at all. This might just be a result of how impartial Adolf is for the most part. Not in a “nazis weren’t simply evil” kind of way but in the same way a history book would simply tell you about people and atrocities they did without telling you how you should feel about. History in general is treated with respect here, even though the story is entirely fictional, a lot of it is supplemented by real events without any huge rewrites or alterations.

One point that’s so-so to me is the art. I remember reading Astro Boy and being kind of put off by a chapter where some village in Asia gets bombed and a bunch of people die and it’s all done in Tezuka’s trademark cartoony art style which severely clashed with what was shown. While Adolf still have some kind of cartoony moments overall there wasn’t a moment where I felt it clashed or was inappropriate. Also Tezuka’s paneling is as always on point. Normal moments get mostly normal presentation but when Tezuka wants to add some emotional tinge to the page he knows just how to do it by arranging the panels just right.

Overall Adolf is an excellent manga. Being 36 chapters long it’s hard to not recommend it to anyone who wants a good read. Though if you’re queasy or easily upset some of the darker parts of it might affect some people.

Kengan Asura is refreshingly straightforward about what it wants to be. Even though I had many issues with it over the course, it’s still nice to read a manga where the team behind it clearly knew what they wanted to do and were passionate about executing it to the best of their ability.

Kengan is first and foremost about action, action and more action. To a point where nearly entire 27 volumes of it are a single, gigantic tournament where not a single damn fight is omitted. Plot, while present, takes a back seat or rather gets shoved in the trunk. As such, I think ... it’s fair to say Kengan lives or dies based on quality of action.

This is where things get tricky though cause despite all the good decisions it makes, there’s plenty others that undermine them.

The premise itself is extremely simple. Early in Japan’s history, conflicts between merchants and companies led to much bloodshed, that was until an emperor suggested that instead, they should solve their conflicts through martial arts matches between fighters representing involved companies. That’s how Kengan association was created. Skip to current day and we have a sad salaryman Kazuo, who randomly stumbles upon Ohma beating the shit out of a muscle mountain. The next day it turns out that this Ohma will represent the company Kazuo works at and he’s appointed as Ohma’s manager.

It’s a nice and easy ways to set up a story that will directly revolve around fights and little else. There’s more to come but I’d like to first talk about the most important part, the fights.

This is where Kengan gets pretty interesting, cause it sets up its universe in a rather particular way. Usually action manga go for either superhero level shenanigans, where everyone is impossibly strong (like in Dragon Ball), or something more grounded, with at most some visual flair to make real life look more exciting (like with Ippo). Kengan attempts to take the best of both. Real world laws and logic make the action feel a bit more tangible and relatable cause every exceptional display of power is relative to normal people like you or me. At the same time majority of fighters have some unique quirk about them, be the extreme grip strength or absurd range of joint motion or simply reaction time that adds quite a bit of variety.

At its best Kengan presents many interesting what-ifs of martial arts variety that make for exciting match ups. Like pitting a fighter with incredible strikes against a top tier grappler or pro wrestler fighting an unconventional sumo wrestler and other such thing.

Another strong point of the better fights is choreography and strategy. Not all, but plenty of fights in Kengan are a genuine battle between two excellent combatants who all have plans of their own. Seeing how they adapt on the fly and interact with the moveset of their opponent creates a tense dynamic where everything could change at any moment.

Unfortunately some of those are either ruined at times or significantly undermined. When it comes to strategy and realism, Kengan just goes dumber as it goes on. It’s easy enough to accept some oddities at first cause they aren’t too exceptional and usually come with a decent explanation but then horseshit starts to slide in. A guy who uses his super dense controllable hair as a weapon, a guy who unlocks his brain power that makes him absurdly strong, a guy who spent some days starving himself out in the forest without sleep to become one with the universe, a karate master who trained to stop a bullet from a few meters away, secret technique that makes your heart beat faster which someone turns you into a god of fighting. Also the more ridiculous it gets the less does it feel like any of the characters actually represent their martial art, even though the manga loves to remind you about their fighting style, history behind it and some of its strengths. Even though the writer and editor have a lot of martial arts experience, I’m disappointed that even something like Street Fighter is closer to being a faithful depiction of martial arts than Kengan Asura.

None of this over the top shit does Kengan any favors cause instead of at the very least serving as some interesting condition, they usually just become straightforward shonenshit powerups that “dramatically” turn the tides. The fights lose tension they once had and the damage done to either fighter means nothing as it could just lead to them getting stronger or simply still having all the strength they need to win. There are regular cases where manga waves away physical condition with endorphins, adrenaline or painkillers, which is interesting at first since it’s a real thing that at times keeps people going beyond their limits but when this idea gets overused, it becomes an obvious crutch for writers who think pulling a rug from under you is epitome of excitement.

This fetish Kengan team has for epic twists is another weakness in my opinion. It’s fucking wild how often they try to catch you off guard. It gets to a point where you can easily figure out what’s going to happen by thinking what’s the most logical flow of events will be and inverting it. A guy is beaten into puree of meat, blood and bones? Well don’t discard him just yet cause he’s actually gonna win! This spreads to the overall plot too, where everything is filled with attempts to create exciting twists. It peaks when one of Kengan participants tries to usurp the leadership and it’s like two kids playing war and making up new tools of attack of defense to prove that they’re the winner. There’s no build up or any proper setup, Kengan often just goes “KA-POW DIDN’T EXPECT THAT DID YOU, FUCKING IDIOT, HOW COOL IS THIS SHIT OH WHOOPS LEMME REVERSE THAT AIN’T THAT WILD HOLY SHIT I’M INSANE”. The only enjoyment I got from stuff like that is only in laughing at how stupid it is.

Well back to action, I can overlook the lack of tactics and over the top bullshit if at the very least it looks cool and visceral, and admittedly, Kengan Asura has pretty damn good art. Dorameon gets better over the course of the manga and at around half-point or even earlier he gets excellent at depicting muscular bodies. The perspective, proportions, their overall dimensions and everything else helps you to build a very solid image of what each fighter’s body looks like. This would be even more impressive if Kenga didn’t go full unga with power levels cause before that, physical appearance of the fighter and their weight would give you a general idea for how strong they are.

Art unfortunately falters when it comes to actual fighting. Many of the fights feature moments where both opponents actively exchange blows and instead of depicting it with more clarity, you get a bunch of noodles and non-specific explosions in the air that come together to form polluted, busy panels that carry no impact. Even when things get more specific the noodle limbs persists and actively diminish visual power of the strikes. This is why many of better fights share a common characteristic like characters who are too dangerous to casually exchange blown with or rely on grappling where things are obviously not fast enough to warrant the noodle treatment.

I think this problem could be solved if Kengan took a lesson from Ippo or even Dragon Ball who both had their own approach. For example Ippo often featured “phantom” limbs or bodies all going in very particular directions. This ends up looking like a composite photo where multiple frames are combined into one. When done well it allows the reader to complete a coherent sequence of events in their head without making them completely make up what happened like in Kengan. Dragon Ball on the other hand takes an even simpler approach. Toriyama doesn’t have throwaway brawl panels like so each one usually focuses on specific action that thanks to the way manga is paced and paneled, smoothly flows into the next one to form a well choreographed scene reminiscent of classic action movies. Even if battles are done at insane speed it was very easy to follow and didn’t lack clarity nor impact.

A small issue with art that I think is also worth noting are very poor backgrounds. It’s very negligible most of the time because fights happen within a white, empty arena that doesn’t warrant a detailed depiction, especially considering that the spotlight is always on the fighters anyway. However outside of that whenever I had to look at the backgrounds they went from either mediocre to terrible, like in the forest areas where the background are made out of poorly glued together photographs. It’s not a great flaw but it can be distracting nonetheless.

It’s hard to say Kengan is completely bad at anything cause it’s so bizarrely inconsistent with it. At times you can tell the team practiced the moves to depict them with true to life accuracy, other times it’s so lazy and vague that I have to wonder what’s even the point to show it. It’s a mixed bag that never lets to ride out the high nor suffer from a bad streak, for better of for worse.

I think that about wraps it up for action. So, what does Kengan have going on outside of that? It has fun characters, who despite being very flat, have interesting and diverse personalities that make it fun to just see how they do things and interact with characters and the world around them. It has comedy that can be hilarious at times. And finally, it has story that regularly shoots, stabs and punches itself in the foot by trying to be more than it actually is.

At the beginning I deliberately pointed out how simple and effective KA’s opening is. After all, when your series is all about fighting, that’s what you should be concerned with first and foremost so a simple plot only helps to avoid hindering it. As story goes on Kengan throws in completely unneeded details about everything and tries to build mysteries which are so hard to care about that when big reveals drop my reaction was just “so what?”. Why would I care about who taught Ohma the secret technique or who “the real Niko” or any other garbage? Kengan treats this stuff as if you’re supposed to at the edge of your seat in anticipation while doing no set-up whatsoever. For example in the last few volumes there’s a hint that that Kazuo might be more important than he seems (mild spoilers ahead). A bit later we find out that he’s a descendant of the old clan and his ancestor fought to death for the ancestor of his boss so entire reason this tournament was initiated is to repay the debt. So what? What does this add? What is gained by knowing this? Who even wanted to know this? The initial explanation of Nogi wanting to be the boss of Kengan was good enough.

Manga ends in a similar way, teasing a sequel by revealing characters who worked for “the real Niko” and it’s another so what situation. I don’t know them, “the real Niko” is barely even a character and could be easily cut out of the story without losing anything and yet this is what’s supposed to hook me into checking out the new manga, just laughable.

Similarly awful are attempts to raise the stakes. Kengan starts off trying to make you feel like it will be a manga that’s rough around the edges. Many characters love and some even live to kill. The setup itself implies that there are basically no rules and deaths are mundane (in fact, the amount of careers that end in death is so common it’s used to explain the high amount of fighters with XX wins, 0 losses fight records). What actually happens though? Among important characters only 1 dies (not counting the super amazing twist nobody will see coming) and 2 come back to life after actually dying, what a joke. Even characters that are meant to be evil or set on murder either mellow out or start being presented as “lovable assholes” who don’t actually mean it. Kure Raian is a best example of that. An insane guy who actually tried to kill someone for no damn reason, then just goes around all willy nilly making casual comments that are meant to make you like him despite the guy having no redeeming qualities and arguably not enough charisma to be lovably evil like Dio. There’s also quite a few under the table deals going on in the tournament with some company owners usually fretting over being pressured by more influential CEOs or potential financial ruin but guess what none of that has any consequences, the manga is filled with duds like that. It might be redundant but I want to shoot another example which is the Fang of Metsudo, the guy who’s supposedly so scary, people can’t keep on fighting after facing his overwhelming power. This could’ve been a very immediate threat and consequence. You don’t need to see people years into the future to know their spirit really is broken and losing their spirit is everything for people who live to fight. You guessed already what happens. It doesn’t actually hinder anyone, in fact people who fight him are completely cool with it shortly after, amazing.

Either way, this review might paint a very negative image of the manga and I do think it has great many flaws that ruin what could’ve been a modern classic for the action genre but I do still think it’s a relatively entertaining manga. There’s a decent amount of actually good fights, art is usually very pleasant to look at and brief moments between fights usually have neat comedic and SoL moments. Even when Kengan is at its absolute worst it can almost be funny how stupid it is, even if it probably would’ve been better without it. It’s also a relatively easy read thanks to how it’s paced, I think I finished the whole thing in about two by reading it for a few hours every day. It’s hard to make a definitive recommendation but I think this manga is at least worth a try. At best you might find a thrilling action manga, at worst you’ll have a laugh at how dumb it gets while still enjoying the good parts.

P.S. There’s also volume 0 of Kengan Asura but it’s just a bunch of bland and predictable (when not outright obvious) backstories of some characters that has very little action and adds next to nothing to most of them. The only part worth reading in my opinion is the one that shows how Metsudo and Kure met and lived. It’s not vital either but it’s the most entertaining one out of all of them and helps to flesh out Metsudo a tiny bit.

As someone who doesn’t really watch ecchi I’m not sure if people normally apply different standards to it but looking at Queen’s Blade as any other anime it sure is disappointing.

The show has 3 things going for it, or rather things it was probably supposed to have going for it if done well.
First, and most obvious one, is ecchi. Titillating display of ass and titties that’s not enough to blast rope but enough to say “ey, that’s pretty nice”.
Second one is action. The show is named after a competition set in the world of this anime, Queen’s Blade. It’s a competition created by angels ... that pits lightly dressed women against each other, to see which one of them is more fit to be the next monarch. The whole thing was setup to avoid mass conflicts in pursuit of the title. Naturally, the show revolves around this competition and action it results in.
Third one is the actual writing of it. The drama, characters, plot, all that. It might seem misguided, to think that an ecchi show about a bunch of almost naked women beating each other up, and undressing further in the process gives a shit about its plot. However I think Queen’s Blade wants you to think otherwise, given how often it strays from first two points to remind you that no, this is all actually pretty serious and important.

How does it fall short then? Well, for the first one it’s hard to say cause one man’s stick figure drawing is other man’s explicit materials. Either way having seen whole 5 or 6 ecchi centered shows and played a few Leisure Suit Larry games I feel like QB is rather lacking in both straight up ass and titty exposure and more importantly, it lacks in creative scenarios to present those. I can find anime porn anywhere. In fact, I don’t even to look for it and I will still see some of that shit on social media or elsewhere. It’s not interesting to just present a naked anime girl and call it a day. You gotta think up some context behind it that makes it more interesting. QB has glimpses of that with a character who constantly has a scaly snaked rubbing around her groin and some demon girl that sucks out people’s life force in some indirect kiss thing that looks like she’s absorbing their stomach fumes and that’s ok. But aside from that you have plain old mud wrestling without much of actual wrestling, you got a few massages and a scene where one character seems to drip boiling rubber onto another one (?) to make an armor for their sparring session. For a show that clearly focused on T&A it comes off suprisingly timid. It’s all pretty tame and gets a flaccid/10 rating from me. I’m not a perverb though, this is all strictly professioler.

When it comes to action things don’t get much better cause boy is it laughable. Despite fights happening almost if not every single episode, sometimes multiple times, it doesn’t seem like anyone put any thought into them. There’s no choreography, no variety in fighting styles, even animation is rather mediocre. Most fights in Queen’s Blade remind me of two kids pretend fighting with sticks. You know how kids don’t actually want to clobber their friends with a stick so they just hit each others pretend swords in a very childish imitation of swordplay? Same thing here, so many fights just have two opponents hitting each others weapons until one gets disarmed or they throw out an ultimate move or some shit. I know proper swordplay is pretty hard to animate but they could’ve compensated for that by making attacks more flashy. Having characters throw around attacks that shatter surroundings and produce some neat effects but nah, it’s just cling clang.

Writing keeps level of quality described thus far very consistent by being utterly mediocre. A bunch of characters coming together to fight in a tournament to achieve some goal of their is such a simple premise and they still messed it up. First episode kicks off with what was probably meant to give spotlight to the main character, Reina and her relationship with her family as well as explain why she wants to follow Listy, a “noble thief” who saves her. However everything is so basic and goes by so quickly that instead of getting a feel for the character and reason to sympathize with them, you get a collection of side notes that doesn’t accomplish anything. “Reina doesn’t want to be countess, likes her sister, likes Listy cause she’s strong and confident, wants to be strong herself”. This is the character with most development too, it only gets more basic outside of that. This would’ve been more acceptable if QB tried to rely on interesting personalities rather than their development but one of the more important plot threads revolves around Vance family and relationship between Reina and her sister Claudette who’s not related to her by blood. It’s such a fucking story plot thread too. “Claudette is not from the REAL royal line so she’s treated like shit but Reina loves her anyway” and yada yada. Entirety of this season just comes off as an introduction to Queen’s Blade. A season that’s supposed to get you familiar with everyone and get you invested in the upcoming competition but it fails that miserably. Even the supposed main villain gets only as much as a mention. It’s like they just took their story beats from a damn stock asset store. At times it almost feels inches away from becoming a parody because of this but nope, it’s all played with a straight face.

What I will give QB credit for is that at the very least it doesn’t look too bad and while animation is at best slightly above average, the art is rather consistent and detailed. Designs for major characters are pretty appealing and cover a good range of body shapes and well as ways to be revealing. It also didn’t hang on anything for too long which, with a story this bad, works in favor of pacing so even though I was bored during most of it, at least it didn’t feel like it’s dragging on. I’ll also say that as bad as it was there was some part of me that found it a tiny bit charming just for seeming genuine in its terrible attempts to make something good and deliver on the premise.

Overall, I do not know who would want to watch this. QB fails to deliver on any of its promises and there’s plenty anime out there that do them better, separately or all in one package.

Bunny Girl Senpai had a pretty interesting start in terms of reception. It feels like many people dismissed it as yet another trashy ecchi/harem LN adaptation thanks to the name and rather erotic cover art. Yet, as more people got to see it, many were quick to point out how the poor Bunny Girl was misrepresented and how it’s not a generic ecchi show but actually a very thoughtful anime about problems people face during adolescence.

At first I bought that myself but after actually watching the show I have to disagree. BGS is hardly different from a run of the mill romcom. We follow Sakuta, ... a character that’s supposed to be your normal relatable outcast with nothing special about him but shows his “amazing” qualities when he turns out to be the only one capable of saving the girl in every new arc.

This is where the only real gimmick of BGS comes in, the Puberty Syndrome. That’s what this anime calls a mental illness brought about by unstable and stressful life of a teenager but in reality is so vague there’s no point to see it as anything more than “dumb thing that tried to justify more dumb shit happening”. Think of it as oddities in Monogatari but if they were done extremely poorly, more on that later.

Whole show can be broken down into arcs, each revolving around a particular girl with their own problem. Not a lot of stuff carries over though and when one girl is “solved” they become more or less irrelevant and stop playing a meaningful role in the story. Even the titular Bunny Girl, Mai Sakurajima, eventually starts feeling like a background decoration that only serves as an excuse to shove in more perverted jokes or romance so basic and plain it makes Naruto seem like Anna Karenina.

With that out of the way, let’s get into more detail. I think for this show to be at the very least more than passable it needs to have either of two things: interesting characters that get fleshed out or developed over the course of the story or a strong gimmick with interesting mechanics that would serve as an excuse for some high concept scenarios that combine psychology and physics.

BGS has neither of those. Main characters alone are a good example, especially considering that they’re supposed to get the most attention.

Sakuta, our protagonist, is less interesting than a box with “don’t put fingers inside” written on it. At least with that box I wonder what’s inside and with Sakuta the answer is obvious from the start, nothing. He feels more like a self-insert for chuunis and other nerds rather than a real person. A lot, if not most of his dialogue revolves around perverted, low brow jokes that also make up 90% of comedy in the show. Telling a girl how his imagination is much more perverted than she thinks he is, how he’s gonna enjoy the sound of a showering girl or how he’s delighted to have a cute girl step on him. These remarks never lead to anything and girls just brush them off after providing some cliche “moooou yada ;///;” tier response cause he’s just such a charmer. There’s even an older lady reporter that just seems to want to fuck him for some reason, it’s less egregious in the anime but very heavy handed in LN.
When Sakuta is not a braindead pervert he’s somehow a warrior or justice. Telling off someone taking a photo of Mai without her knowing, beating up an athlete for spreading lewd rumors about Koga, threatening to call the cops on random pervert messaging Rio’s twitter account and in general going above an beyond to help out any woman he sees. This is all explained by him having empathy for people who are put in a situation where others can’t empathize with them, which just so happened to apply to every damsel he saves.
In the end, I think his characterization as both some selfless messiah going against flow and a horny worthless teenagers is a very incoherent combination, which is part of makes him feel like a self-insert. Characters like that are often flawed but those flaws are never acknowledged and more often made to seem as something charming. It’s a fantasy of being special without actually being special in any way, that’s Sakuta.

His girlfriend, Mai, will take much less words to describe because despite being the second most important character she has fucking nothing. Her whole issue was that she’s a super popular mega star and she wants to get away from that, wishing that nobody knew her. Because of this, people start forgetting her and become unable to see her. Some pseudo-science bullshit later she’s completely fine again and we get to know her for who she really is, a mild tsundere. She fires off your typical “I don’t like this but I actually like this” trite and constantly teases Sakuta. Maybe two or three times she shows some other emotions, hinting at some drama spicing up their relationship but every time it either doesn’t actually matter, or in case of the ending stops mattering after Sakuta accomplishes an amazing feat of going from point A to point B using public transportation, truly nothing is impossible when you’re in love.

Going over side characters makes things seem a lot more sad. Kunimi, Sakuta biggest friend is just there, he’s a nice guy who shows up a few times to do nothing.
At least his other friend, Rio, gets a few episodes but there’s the same problem of bad execution. We get a few scenes showing she’s loves Kunimi even though he already has a girlfriend and that causes her frustration and then show fucking jumps to “I took lewd pics of myself cause I wanted attention” which gets solved by Sakuta just hanging out with her and Kunimi riding a bicycle to her place after Sakuta calls him in the middle of the night.
Koga appears about as suddenly as she vanishes, she’s a village girl who changed herself to fit in with the city crowds and worries about doing something that would hurt her reputation, that’s it.
Nodoka admires her sister, Mai, but at the same time suffers from her mother expecting her to achieve the same success.
Makinohara Shouko is not really a character. Apparently LNs do something with her later on but as far as anime goes she’s just some entity that shows up to motivate Sakuta.
Kaede, Sakuta’s sister is terrible too but there’s also another problem associated with her and a few spoilers so that’s for later.


Now, onto the second issue. The pseudo-science or bullshit known as Puberty Syndrome.

As dumb as it is I don’t think it’s completely without merit. If this part was actually developed I think the show would at least be able to invoke some curiosity simply by making you wonder what it will do next.

BSG as is fails to do that cause of all the supernatural things that happen, none of them get any clever use. I won’t even mention the mechanics of Puberty Syndrome in general cause those aren’t a thing. There’s no consistency to how it works or how effects manifest outside of all victims being teenagers with some frustrations or insecurities. Not like the show sticks to its own premise of Puberty Syndrome being a psychological issue because they try to explain everything with some of the dumbest faux-physics I’ve seen in a while.
People can’t see you? That’s because Observer effect, you know? It’s like with Schroedinger’s Cat you know? None of those things fucking fit the situation but author will throw out those concepts regardless, seemingly just to make it seem like the work is way more complex than it actually is cause he sure as hell doesn’t demonstrate any sort of understanding of the concepts he mentions. That is further cemented by the show usually forgetting it said anything about physics after initial explanation and going for a more supernatural take on things. With Sakurajima for example, this went from Schroedinger’s Cat and Observer theory to “she ignored everyone at school, not wanting to avoid the attention and that made other students become unable to see her and forget memories they had of her”. Sakuta at one points asks a fair question, if this is a problem with how she acts a school, why did it spread over seemingly entire country? To which the reply is something among the lines of people unconsciously carrying this “atmosphere” with them similarly to how there’s some social standards and norms that people might adhere to without realizing. A terrible explanation but at least it’s not as pretentious as trying to explain it with science.

After Mai fading out of existence, next story concerns what is by all means a time loop but wait, that’s too simple for BGS. This ain’t a time loop dude, it’s LAPLACE’S DEMON. Time isn’t actually looping, you’re just living in a simulation launched by a school girl who wants to reject a boy without making it seem like he’s trash, cause her friend likes the guy. Why does a simulation loop by the day instead of only repeating relevant window of time? Why is Sakuta in it? We actually get an attempt at answering the second question, apparently it’s because of quantum entanglement, just smash my head in this is dumb.

Other cases of PS aren’t nearly as severe. We get a body swap caused by jealousy/adoration, doppelganger cause by dissociating. This all feeds into the problem of these problems not only of the gimmick being rather tame but also them not being used well.

When people stop to see Mai the most she tries is wearing a bunny girl outfit to make sure someone will notice her but not only does she drop that after the first time you see it but she also seems to stop any real attempts to make people notice her until convinced to do so by Sakuta. Despite people not seeing or remembering her, they can still feel her physically. While it’s not a surefire way to make people remember her, it’s weird how they never even tried to convince people that she exists by having her move objects in front of them, pushing and pulling people or imprinting her palm or face on something. In the end it feels like author didn’t know what to do with it himself cause this is all literally solved through the power of love, somehow, Sakuta yelling about how he loves Mai gives people a reason why she would exist.

The apex of missed opportunities are the time loop episodes. Time loops are an excellent way to explore characters and everything resetting the next day is a really good excuse to mess with things. Look no further than Groundhog’s Day for an example of how much potential this premise has. So what does BGS do with time loops? Pretty much nothing. First episode only has things repeat a few times with Sakuta at most using it to change a few conversations and not by experimenting what response his words would get but using the conclusion of the original conversation to reach it faster. Then a classic misunderstanding happens and a guy Koga was trying to avoid thinks she’s dating Sakuta so the time loop breaks. After an episode of fake dating to keep the pretenses she falls in love for real and time loops again in hopes he will respond to her feelings. How does it go? Well, he just goes along with it and keeps doing the same shit until telling her “stop, I won’t change my mind” and tells her to be herself.

Doppelganger due to dissociating? Just be yourself. Don’t feel like going back to making movies? Just be yourself. Scared to do something wrong? Just be yourself. Jealous of your successful sister you can’t live up to? Just be yourself.

No experimentation, no depth, no creativity. If not for the two elements I talked about already, maybe in its intention to solve common insecurities of teenagers, BGS would get some points for a sincere attempt to explore these issues, but no. Psychological element of BGS is an anime equivalent of a facebook motivational pictures that recite shallow quotes of unknown, kitchen philosophers in fancy font on top of a pretty background or twitter posts that tell people that drinking water and working out will cure their depression so depressed people have no reason to whine about it. None of the issues present are shown with any sort of nuance. It’s almost insulting how casually author used real things that can actually fuck people up for cheap tearjerkers while pretending that there’s something more to it.

This peaks in final episodes relating to Sakuta’s sister and I’d consider what follows a spoiler if it had any impact behind it. Kaede was bullied online for not leaving a reply from her group of friends on “read” and not replying. I know, sounds dumb but we’re talking about dumb teenagers so it wasn’t too hard to accept that something like this was traumatic for her. Either way, the trauma of it makes her faint and lose all prior memories which takes a toll on her mother who straight up goes insane. Don’t worry, BGS doesn’t actually show the parents perspective or explain why daughter’s amnesia made her mother spill her marbles, it’s just there for you to feel bad about the whole thing. Sakuta keeps his cool though and comforts Kaede, telling her not to worry about who she was and thinking only about her current self. He encourages her to keep a diary and write down her thoughts, limits her from interacting with outside to avoid trauma and brings her some books and movies to keep her entertained. Until the end of the show he does pretty much nothing to fix her problem with going outside or interacting with people which lasted for TWO years until she herself wants to fix the issue due to… Sakuta bringing a bunch of girls to their apartment. Little by little she starts to push herself. Answering the phone, going a few steps outside and gradually taking it further. This actually proves effective and after fainting again she wakes up with her old memories intact but without memories of her last two years of being a shut-in. How does Sakuta react? He tells her he needs to go take a piss and books it the hell out of the hospital, crying and yelling, acting like she literally died. Not even a trace of being happy for his sister can be seen even after he more or less gets over it. What the actual fuck is this? How is your sister remembering her formative years and all the other important memories such a gigantic tragedy? I get being somewhat sad that last two years were erased but this is too much. Go and see videos and interviews of people who lost memory at older age. They don’t know who they are, who people around them are. They don’t know where they live or really anything around them. They look at their own photos without a shred of nostalgia simply because they have absolutely no context for them. Imaging that all the memories you hold dear and everything that formed your identity just disappearing. That’s a very tragic and traumatic thing in and of itself and Sakuta acts like his sister fucking died when she gets those memories back and then we even get a montage of his sister talking as if she died too and framing her path towards recovery as some form of suicide. It’s incredibly distasteful. What makes it even worse is that in the post credits sequence all of this supposedly dramatic shit is gone cause when she reads the diary she gets the knowledge of what happens and her slightly different personality is implied to have gone back to the way she was shown before. There was nothing to stop the author from setting up her past as being something she might be best off forgetting in which case a switch from positive improvement and being happy back to painful memories would be easier to see as something troubling. Why even pull this whole “I cry every tiem” tier shit when you’re gonna act like everything’s cool the next day? That’s not even me decrying morals of the show but a glaring inconsistency for the sake of having manipulative melodrama.

Now, it’s not wholly bad. I’ll admit it’s somewhat easy on the eyes. Not too pretty and character designs are very forgettable but there’s some nice scenery here and there and a few cases of good animation. In general it’s very average but at least that means it doesn’t get add to the garbage fire. Voice actors deserve some praise for the work on this series. If not for their heartfelt voice acting it would be impossible for me to even remotely sympathize with these poorly written characters.

While show is chock full of holes it at the very least is not another case of a terrible adaptation. I’ve read the first volume before watching to make sure that it’s not fault of the show of not being faithful to the source material. If anything it makes it better by cutting enough excess to fill in a few extra episodes that added nothing to the narrative. At times it becomes a bit too fast in places but that’s a minor flaw in the big picture. My biggest problem with the pacing was that it often didn’t give any breathing room for characters to get along and make progression of their relationship more gradual but to some extent this still applies to the light novel.

Hard to say to what extent Bunny Girl Senpai nailed what it was going for considering how many people enjoyed it for it’s melodrama and bargain bin Monogatari elements but I think it failed on pretty much every front. It doesn’t have a single well written character, supernatural or paranormal parts of it are tame and left unexplored, melodrama constantly shits on common sense and even comedy is gets stale. That’s a hard pass.

I really wish I could recommend Ashita no Joe anime cause the manga’s story deserves to get a good adaptation and have more people experience it. Unfortunately, both as an adaptation and on it’s own show, AnJ is just bad.

I initially wanted to approach this from a perspective of someone who hasn’t read the manga and judge the anime on its own strength but I couldn’t make it through beyond about 30 something episodes before dropping it and having a blast reading through the manga.

There’s two very big reasons behind why I strongly dislike this anime. For one, AnJ has terrible pacing. In 79 ... episodes it adapts merely about 11 and a half volumes of the manga. That’s roughly 7 episodes per volume. Anyone watching the anime will likely notice the many ways in which Dezaki padded things out. Awkward pauses in dialogue, long scenes consisting of a few still shots, reused animations shown over and over, animation loops that are held for way longer than they should be.

That stuff is all relatively innocent compared to the second big problem, the way it constantly pads out content with anime original material AND at the same time they manage to cut out some scenes and dialogue from the original. More often then not the stuff they cut is not some unimportant rubble but rather scenes that add nuance to the work as a whole, it removes teeth from a story that bites. I know anime was being produced roughly at the mid point of manga’s publication but they also only adapt about half of it so I don’t believe there’s any excuse to alter so much. Some might say just skip the filler and here’s what makes this even worse. AnJ doesn’t just have filler episodes, some of them are relatively self contained and can be ignored but those are tiny minority. For the most part original material mixes in with canon, at times completely ignoring the way plot unfolds for the sake of filler coming in more smoothly. However hard they try though, there’s always a clear contrast, because whoever wrote the filler didn’t have an ounce of writing talent compared to Asao Takamori. Filler is meandering, pointless, it moves nothing forward and at best reiterates previous material instead of moving forward. It downgrades character to acting like generic archetypes, it dumbs them down by trying to make their cold conclusions seem like the most shocking revelations. I strongly believe that there’s no alteration that had a positive impact and there a fuckload of alterations that build up until a shittastic climax that is Carlos vs Joe arc.

When you do get to see the canon though, AnJ shows what it could’ve been. A story that still has few analogues in anime, a realistic and sincere story about a dregs of society fighting for a better tomorrow despite their tragic yesterdays. It’s not a drama that makes you feel good, because there’s no escapism to it. It doesn’t round off the edges of the real world, instead slamming you right against those edges and showing you how heartbreaking and hopeless things can be. However it does this not to make you feel depressed but to motivate you to push on forward, to improve yourself, to strive for better things instead of wallowing in the problems or trying to ignore them. Joe and many other characters constantly have to deal with problems, one worse than another and none of them are exactly equipped to handle them. Joe himself is a delinquent like no another. An orphan who constantly moved around and had to defend the only thing he had left, his pride, with his fists. The result of his upbringing is that he’s terrible at normal social interactions. Compromise is not in his dictionary and he lives his life scamming others and spending his nights wherever he can. When Danpei, an ex pro boxer and now pro alcoholic notices him in the slums it’s a starts of a very interesting co-dependent relationship. Joe sees Danpei as an opportunity to get stronger and beat the first opponent he can’t overcome while Danpei sees in Joe an opportunity to get into the world of boxing and climb back up the ladder. While Joe is most definitely the highlight, other characters still get developed into complex human beings with their own personalities, lives, goals and ideas.Unfortunately filler considerably undermines the journey characters go through cause while in the manga every volume is a difficult journey that shapes the characters, in the anime there are too many sideway shifts that significantly downplay the arcs people go through.

Another occasionally strong point of the show is its presentation. One of the biggest advantages anime has over manga, is that you get to hear the characters and you get to see their acting and movement in more detail which in right hands can add a lot of intricacies. Voice actors in particular have to be the highlight of the entire anime in terms of presentation. It’s incredible how much passion comes through in their dialogue, how they manage to capture emotion with such sincerity that I can’t help but feel for them. One thing that always stood out to me is just one scene where the rarest thing happens and Joe actually cries, it feels like he’s genuinely sobbing while trying to hold himself. You get to HEAR that this is a man who’s used to putting up a tough front crying himself after possibly the first moment of genuine happiness in his miserable life. Tange similarly is just fantastic, it’s a travesty that both his and Joe’s VA never participated in voicing any anime other than AnJ.

Yet, while I will praise voice acting for managing to depict emotional outbursts with rare sincerity, I can’t help but feel that Dezaki’s overly dramatic presentation often hurts the story. When it hits, it’s great, Dezaki has a sense for dramatic flair and it helps the moments that are meant to be exaggerated or shocking but sometimes you need the opposite of that. When seemingly dreadful things happen with little flash, it makes a point. Bad shit can happen anytime, anywhere and to anybody. You’re not special and there’s nothing to say that tomorrow you won’t become just another number in a small box on a piece of paper showing how many people died this year. It’s this kind of quiet dread that and insignificance of the individual in the big picture that can make tragedies all the more depressing and AnJ manga excels at that. When anime exaggerated everything tenfold it makes a common problem seem like a unbelievably cruel twist of fate. Overall it’s part of why anime ends up feeling so cartoonish and immature in the end.

It’s hard to say how much the flaws I mentioned will impact one’s experience of watching the anime but it’s my honest opinion that as an adaptation it’s a travesty that tramples over excellent while simultaneously only surviving thanks to the strengths of said source material. As its own show I had to drop it due to how damn slow and stilted it is so take that as you will, I only managed to make it through out of morbid curiosity of how bad they’ll screw up the things I love. I know many people managed to genuinely fall in love with this show and maybe if I didn’t read the manga I’d be able to like it more but really hope that anyone who wants to experience this fantastic story choses the manga instead of a lackluster anime.

Magi is a rare manga that managed to grab me less due the writing and art, but more due to gaining admiration for the author and my desire to see good parts of it through while looking what went wrong and why. Sadly I don’t have the answer to that, but I’d still like to talk about what makes Magi great/bad while looking forward to her new manga, Orient, being an improvement.

The beginning of Magi might give people a wrong idea of what’s to come. It seemed plain and in some ways, generic. You got yet another fantasy world, though this time with a huge ... focus on Asian and Arabic regions instead of the usual Europe which is somewhat refreshing. You got a power system not too different from the others, with magic and magic items and weapons with special abilities. Initially there’s even a pretty straightforward seeming plot progression of traveling across the world and capturing dungeons and beating up bad guys.

However, Magi quickly deviates from its peers towards political conflict and moral dilemmas. This is at the same time its biggest strength and downfall. When it works, the manga presents you with some genuinely fair arguments and intrigue. Characters get to have real debates, instead of right side and wrong side it’s more often about people doing morally reprehensible things for a good cause, or retaliating after they were wronged themselves. One such example are the ruling dynasty of Kou empire. Even though their unrelenting conquest of other territories seems aggressive, and their homogenization of culture disrespectful, behind it is an effort to prevent future strife under the premise that much conflict is born through disagreement and under one ideology they’d be able to instill peace. This is not the most realistic solution but this is not the most realistic world so I think it’s interesting regardless that even villains seem to have real reasons behind their actions.

Same way when it comes to politics it feels like Magi takes a note from real world history. This makes countries almost feel like characters in and of themselves cause there’s an organic relationship between citizens and government. Some of the best examples of that is Balbadd, one of the first cities we see. Incapable leadership by a corrupt monarch leads to bad relationship between rich and poor classes of society, eventually it all leads up to a revolt, bloodshed, and a new ruler. Yet, troubles don’t end there. Since last monarch managed to get country in a huge debt it falls under control of Kou empire who forces Balbadd to accept their culture, way of life and government yet since this doesn’t sit well with some of its older citizens and political figures, it promotes yet more conflicts down the line. There’s a whole lot of stuff like this, especially during the later parts of the manga where for the longest time, conflicts tend to center around politics and economics rather than actual fights.
On top of that, while this is not much more than reference, I really like how seemingly every country in the world of Magi has a real life alternative. It’s obvious that plenty research went into this and I wonder how much more a history buff would get out it.

Unfortunately there are always exceptions. Being fair an argument can lead to some interesting dialogue but when that fairness is unwarranted it just leads to some stupidity. For the first time this really annoyed me during the part where our main character Aladdin opposes mages who keep normal humans under their city in terrible conditions as they sap their magic energy (which is also what everything is made out of in this world so if you get drained you die) top mage man explains to him the story behind this all and why he thinks it’s justified. That’s nice and all but then time comes around the argument of “well they don’t mind it/like it so why would you free them” when talking about people who were forced into conditions they live in and beaten into submission until they convinced themselves to enjoy it. Aladdin just accepts this as fair and doesn’t reply and we just ignore that from then on. This example was bad to me but worst one is right near the end of the manga. It’s slight spoilers but basically there’s a point in the story where everyone in the world is convinced that dying and blending together in the great flow of life as pure energy (rukh, the stuff mentioned above that mages siphon). Main characters for a while wonder if it’s really okay to save people since they’re all so happy about it and it’s just wild. You’re not being fair to anyone, you know they don’t want this, why are you doubting this? It’s like watching someone get hypnotized and being told to jump off the roof and you watch as they walk towards the edge thinking “well they’re seem really into the idea of jumping off the roof, who am I to judge?”. I try to be fair too and this is obviously an issue of personal view more than anything but I think most people will agree with me on the point mentioned above.

Overall Magi’s message becomes loud and clear as you follow the story. It’s narrative about what’s right and wrong. It is right to control people for peace? Is it fine to kill if it makes the world better? The questions it asks are vague but answer is generally the same. Magi consistently rejects any kind of moral system by pointing their flaws or hypocrisies, instead going for a much more idealistic answer of doing what you feel is right and dealing with consequences. It celebrates personal will and diversity of thought instead of any sort of constrictions for the sake of pragmatic results. This might seem a bit too basic cause “just bee yourself” is such a cliche and generalized thing to say but I think Magi’s way of getting to it through difficult moral problems is interesting and engaging cause for once instead of the usual “I AM RIGHT AND YOU ARE WRONG, BY BEATING YOU WITH MY FISTS I WILL PROVE THIS TO BE TRUE” followed with “YOU BEAT ME WITH YOUR FISTS OF JUSTICE, NOW I KNOW THAT YOUR WAY IS THE WAY OF TRUTH” we get something more human to chew on.

Buuuut, there’s a caveat to that too and it’s one of the biggest I have with Magi. This caveat is plot focusing on the moral message so much, that they forget to do anything else. Moral dilemmas are interesting for some time but that has a limited appeal. I need to relate to characters or at least care about them to engage with what happens to them and wish to follow it but in Magi there’s no time for that. Even when it comes to some of the most important characters you get to know fuck all about them! For example Alibaba’s entire character is that he’s upbeat, fair and nice but also wants to date a girl and be loved. Doesn’t sound too interesting does it? And two lasts points only pop up during gag segments if I recall. Even less could be said about Aladdin, a person with no eyebrows is more interesting and the only thing a person with no eyebrows has going for them is minor lack of hair on their face. Aladdin is just a nice kid who likes meeting friends, learning stuff and other shit. That’s it. This is who you follow for the majority of the manga. All because there’s so much focus on repeating the same basic structure and same type of argument instead of doing something new and expanding on your universe and characters.

What makes this such a travesty is that there’s short bonus chapters at the end of each volume and they bring more life to characters than the actual main chapters! They all revolve around quirkier aspects of these characters that aren’t seen or used enough otherwise. When I finally finished reading this manga I kinda wanted to see more of these characters but then realized I just want more of those bonus chapters. Ohtaka’s got a sense of humor too and you don’t need to see bonus chapters for that but maybe if she was daring to put more lighthearted and SoL segments in this manga we’d be able to get better feel for the characters and maybe care just a bit more when they face real danger.

Don’t have a good segue for it but the universe had a lot of potential too. Since they’re all vaguely based on different countries, you already got the complex culture for future reference and since the manga takes place in roughly medieval times, yet with heavy presence of magic, there’s SO much ground for exploring different possibilities. What would occur if certain cultures got their hands on certain type of technology or magic ahead of others? How would they use it, how would the others respond? There’s a moment like that in the manga that I enjoyed a whole lot. It happens in the later parts of it and concerns a militaristic country reforming into one focused on business in accordance with the new world order set by one of the characters. To reform their country they take many steps but they face a big problem. Their country is so big and their business partners are so far apart that transportation is difficult and costly. They get screwed out of access to technology more sophisticated than a wagon and resort to magic. In the end they come up with mobile magic circles that teleport goods and people to points setup across the map. This revolutionizes trading but doesn’t go as smoothly when countries they want to trade with start raising rather realistic concerns. If only there more of that. Instead the world is only able to come out ahead of characters thanks to the story focusing on politics so damn much.

I avoided talking about what Magi is actually about for so long and that’s not because I forgot or don’t want to spoil it but because at the end of this negative section I only have a little mention for it. The plot of magi is fucked up, unfocused mess with no weight or intrigue. It’s hard to even talk about it because there’s no proper structure to it. It’s just a series of things happening over and over for some reason until big bad escalates it to the max and we get a final conflict with a final resolution and a flaccid “everything was fine” happy ending.

At last I’d like to talk about art and end this on a positive note. I think the art of Magi is great. On a purely technical level it’s not the most impressive thing you’ll see in WSJ but Ohtaka’s sense of style more than compensates for it. More than once throughout the manga you’ll see pages dominated by a single panel with some intricate designs that depict magical formulas or symbolic and religious imagery. Spreads with a lot of detail that don’t fail to convey sheer scale of combat between large armies or simply beautiful scenery. Even on smaller scale it’s an enjoyable manga to read cause of how lovely and energetic everything is. The multitudes of expression on faces of characters helps dramatic scenes and sometimes serves as a punchline for comedy. When it comes to combat Ohtaka usually puts emphasis on powerful and expressive forms. I think it’s somewhat weak at the beginning but at some point she’s gets really good at this so even plain, uninspired action scenes become a pleasant sight thanks to the amount of impact, momentum and general power that comes through the art. It helps that a lot of the manga seems to be drawn using a brush pen that always leads to some delicious nuance in line art. Overall this was a good chunk of why enjoyed the manga.

That’s about all I have to say. This turned out rather ranty but there’s a lot of things I wanted to say. I hope what came across is that Magi is a manga with both great highlights and weaknesses but in the end, I feel like the strong points of it are good enough to warrant some appreciation. Orient, please be good.