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Jun 7, 2023
Some anime starts out badly, then gets good. This... um... Less so. This starts out okay, then (at least by mid-season) gets less okay.
The premise is pretty run-of-the-mill; strangely gifted kid suffers great tragedy, takes up sword, and fights the evil-du-jour. From the outset, the kid is a hackneyed font of justice and compassion, but this quickly changes when—NOT. Yeah, he's a "good is dumb" goof who, halfway into the series, has undergone little notable character development. All of the most unpredictable elements of the show are utterly predictable, excepting the bits that *should* be predictable. I'll try
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not to spoil, but one example of an egregiously dropped plot ball is that a hint is given in episode 9 about how a particular demon can be defeated. The hint is subtle, but plain. However, ultimately he is defeated instead using BS-no-jutsu. Essentially *every* battle ends with "oh yeah, focus on my breathing and use one of my starkly limited number of techniques." At this point, our protagonist expresses sorrow for whichever psychotic being he has just put down, just in case we have forgotten that his entire personality is comprised of compassion, determination, and questionable judgement. Thanks for the reminder, Frisk.
But you know, it's okay... except for the increasing number of almost unbearably obnoxious monodimensional 'characters'. And, of course, assuming you don't mind gaping plot holes and inconsistency, and blatant retcons because somebody didn't think far enough ahead to break someone's legs *before* they go for a long walk.
But you know, it's okay. It's very... very... okay. If you can stand it.
*Two episodes later...*
My wife and I just dragged ourselves through episode 16 in hardcore MST3K mode. Massive logic holes, a monster which can only be defeated with the power of friendship (not that they actually tried anything else), a baddie with a tragic backstory written by an eleven year old commits a pointless war crime and we're supposed to feel sorry for her five minutes later, and the absolutely worst 'good guy' whom we honestly want to be eaten alive by demons (but we'll settle for Staphylococcus aureus, we're not picky) didn't run into so much as an inconveniently placed rock in spite of running at random through the cursed forest of death while yelling constantly. I think we're done here. Sorry for the false mediocrity alarm, folks; this one's a stinker.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Oct 11, 2022
Here's another one for the 'better than it should be' file. It lacks the ingredients for a good show, but substitutes science and humour for them in a way that actually makes it both very enjoyable and educational. I feel like my life might have gone very differently if my education had focussed on turning education into entertainment instead of boring, unpaid child labour. I've tried learning about the immune system before, but watching this show helped me to absorb and retain vastly more information than any textbook could.
There are a lot of intriguing, subtle nods to scientific facts. This is
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really cool, but sometimes leaves me wondering whether some things are intentional references or just random filler detail. For example, is Red Blood Cell's inability to navigate her way out of a bathroom stall (not literally) just a 'clueless protagonist' trope, or is it a reference to red blood cells (lower case) ending up wherever they end up at the whim of the circulatory system? Does White Blood Cell's knife symbolize something about the particular way in which white blood cells attack foreign organisms? There are a lot of details like this that make me curious—but maybe that curiosity is the point.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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May 13, 2022
Wow. What a weird mixed bag. Starts out with a frequently creepy protagonist caught between sexual narcissism, scientific amoralism, cringey nerdism, and bouts of common decency. Extends into an intriguing setting which more than supports itself without smut. Diverts into plausible xenobiology and 'How It Works' pages that actually apply to the real world. Then it jumps directly down the unpleasant rabbit hole of "Jesus F. Christ, when did Ayn Rand start writing H-manga???"
This is a really good milieu story with one or two genuinely unexpected twists. Now, I'm not *complaining* about the sexual content, but to me it
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just felt like a somewhat resentful outlet for a sexually frustrated author. But the shoehorning of objectivist pseudo-truth principles into smug anti-feminism starting around volume four... dude, no. I'm not 'woke' in the common sense, but premises like "egalitarianism is a fundamental lie because reasons, and happily accepting the choice between rape or murder is the only true feminism" are borderline criminal schizophrenic, crafting contrived situations to justify barbarism as enlightenment.
Basically? It's surprisingly good, and I'm *this* effing close to dropping it in disgust.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Sep 19, 2020
Hey, remember that really strong twelfth episode of 'Kore wa Zombie Desu ka?', where the production team discovered that they were out of plot, and instead of adding an epilogue they attempted to shoehorn in a really weird, badly distracted and potentially schizophrenic 'obligatory beach episode'? Well, here's what you've been holding your breath for, folks: an 'obligatory festival episode' and 'obligatory tournament episode' rolled up into one convenient package, only it's too creepy for television. No, not 'malevolent Lovecraftian entity' creepy—it's more of a 'brazenly staring up girls' skirts under various circumstances while breathing heavily' creepy.
Whoops... I just spoiled the entire
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plot. My bad.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Sep 19, 2020
Kore wa purottodesu ka?
Interesting premise, poor execution. And by "poor execution," I mean that they attempted to lop its head off with a very dull axe, and had to take multiple agonizing swings in order to finish the job. Then, being a zombie, the plot got up and continued wandering aimlessly anyways.
The BBEG has a tragic back story filled with betrayal and disillusionment... But we have to infer this from circumstances, because the show doesn't bring it up in spite of this being the keystone of the entire plot. We don't explain what happened to bring him to such a
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point of desperation, or what kind of time frame this took. We don't divulge the origin of his extraordinary powers which are unrelated to what little we know of his background. We don't get into the rationale for persistently denying his ethically reasonable request, even when the lives of friends and, indeed, an entire city (which may or may not have a population of over twelve people) are at stake. We do, however, specify that he likes penguins, because that's very relevant. Because it explains why he looks at penguins. *sigh*
The trite yet severely overstated running gags are irritatingly tired before they even become running gags. About half of the characters are genius imbeciles of implausible power, and pretty much all of the characters are self-caricatures. Dialogue is mostly pretty predictable, except for when a character goes off the rails for the purpose of ham-fisted exposition. The plot needlessly writes itself into a corner multiple times, then escapes either by ignoring the situation, throwing continuity out the window, and/or the liberal application of Deus Ex-Sensei. There appear to actually be multiple plot lines (and pointless red herrings), but they're all wadded messily together into a lumpy screenplay play-doh snake because 'all weird things are directly connected, and writing is hard'. I don't believe that the writer(s) had any real understanding of plot structure, or at the very least they lacked the competence to meaningfully fill that structure.
I think I can summarize the nature of this whole mess with one teensy-weensy spoiler: vampire ninja maid string ensemble ghost busters. If that sounds like word salad to you, then imagine it as an actual scene—a scene included exclusively to wedge a central character into the plot climax without actually involving them in it. In fact, that's basically a synopsis of the entire plot right there, and the list of characters it applies to includes the protagonist. All of the frenetic conflict is just filler surrounding a single dramatic-ish character interaction—there is little actual material in this season which could not have been more effectively covered in one non-violent OVA.
...Speaking of which, I'll murder the OVA in my next review.
There was one moment of genuine dark drama. I don't mean "manically grinning vampire anti-hero" edgelord darkness—I mean a gruelling scene which demonstrates a character's extraordinary burden of power and associated self-loathing. Sadly, the writer(s) thought that the dramatically necessary end of that scene should be sacrificed in order to set a logically inconsistent (and immediately dropped) limitation on that power, and in order to make the utterly nonsensical introduction of the BBEG. I guess the tragic tone would have put a bit of a damper on all the tedious running gags.
Did I enjoy it? Well... sort of? At this point I feel like the show somehow hacked my brain. It's objectively mediocre to sub-mediocre, and what stands out about it is all of the flinching and cringing it inspired... but I watched it, and I was entertained, and I don't understand why. I guess that's the bottom line. It's watchable, but it isn't good.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jun 8, 2019
Implausibly shallow and disinteresting characters with implausible gimmick-based personalities doing implausible things for implausible reasons with implausibly few consequences and an implausible lack of plot or character development. It'd be an okay absurdist comedy, if only it was funny. But it's not funny—it's just stupid, meandering, incoherent and obnoxious.
I tried skipping ahead to see if it gets any better. It doesn't.
MAL would like a longer review. What is there to even say? Let's autopsy the first few pages.
Princess Lacks-A-Name somehow or other summons a powerful warrior (read: pro wrestler with a furry persona) from Earth to "eliminate evil magical beasts"
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and "defeat the Demon King," whoever that is—it's not like there's any sort of introduction to any of this. Our protagonist, who knows as much as we do, responds by manhandling and subsequently suplexing Her Royal Highness with apparent impunity, resulting in a gratuitous yet unappealing panty shot.
One jarring half-year cut later, and we find our protagonist attempting to lure a cat into his house/pet shop in a creepily suggestive manner. Here we also meet Generic Harem Regulars 1, 2 and 3, none of which are any more likeable than the wrestler who, as it turns out, is a nauseating suck with the judgement and attention span of a potato. MAL, please let me post this now. I don't want to go on.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Sep 13, 2018
Aggressively average. Trite, even.
Our unlikely heroine is lazy, weak and apparently not the sharpest tool in the drawer. We're off to an original start. W00t. Other very interesting characters include the saccharine guardian, the all-powerful yet occasionally goofy grand master, the cute talking animal that only the heroine can understand, the 'unique because weird' girl, the ambiguously mean school girl clique, the stern tsundere, the mean tsundere, and the tragic tsundere.
I'll give the implausible setting and circumstances of the story a pass on the grounds that this is fantasy... Well, most of a pass, anyways. I have questions.
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Questions like "if you yourselves are the targets of these otherworldly flint knappers then why do you routinely split up into vulnerable two-member patrols to seek them out," or "why are you, who habitually scoffs at our heroine, so incredulously outraged when she fails to accomplish what more experienced and competent warriors could not?" And also, what the hell is "Bort" supposed to be—some sort of weird misapprehension of Q-carbon, only "Q-car" is a sort of $%^& name?*
It's not bad, but it's not good. It's very, very... okay.
*: Yes, I did in fact look this up. No, I didn't find anything. No, I don't know why I didn't find anything. Regardless, "bort" is apparently a low grade diamond used for abrasives, and not in fact some sort of superior form as the show seems to imply. Thanks for your concern, and you have a great day now.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Aug 28, 2017
A very reasonable title, cut with filler and flashbacks to the point of being barely watchable much of the time. When in doubt, jump to a flashback. If in doubt about a flashback, put a flashback in your flashback. Are we at the climax of the series? Better bump it up to 90% flashback content. Can't remember what's going on because of all the flashbacks? Better recap — with a flashback.
The producers of the Naruto Shippuden anime milked what I assume was a pretty good manga for easily three to four times its value by turning exceptionally bad hack
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writers loose on the story between installments of the manga, and by... well, it's like that time...
When in doubt, jump to a flashback. If in doubt about a flashback, put a flashback in your flashback. Are we at the climax of the series? Better bump it up to 90% flashback content.
And then there was that other time...
...Cut with filler and flashbacks to the point of being barely watchable much of the time.
...Better recap — with a flashback.
...Are we at the climax of the series?
Well, I'm sure you get the gist of why this should have been a much, MUCH shorter series.
That, and the Yota mini-arc. Seriously, **** that guy.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Nov 1, 2016
WHAT. THE. FUCK.
Berserk doesn't start out looking that great. The opening theme is an atrocity, and the closing theme isn't a whole lot better. And then, there's... THAT music... The animation is a bit patchy, swinging between good, stylized, and conspicuous single-cel zooms. The characters aren't especially charismatic, and the plot lacks context. Then the plot moves ahead, the characters develop and become much more interesting. THAT music is still lurking, waiting to randomly assault any scene in which blood is not being spilled, but it's worth it. It's genuinely interesting.
...And then you watch the final
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two episodes.
I'm gonna go read the manga now.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Jan 31, 2016
Silly. Ridiculous. Absolutely glorious. This is a satirical jab at every action anime/manga trope out there. Every tired old immature cliche is used... just slightly incorrectly. Godlike heroes? Check... sort of. Ancient sealed evils? Yup... more or less. Calling your shots? Well, yes... Fan service? Oh dear god, I'm afraid so, and I'm so sorry.
One Punch Man is written on three levels. On the surface, it's another cookie cutter anime about talkative heroes beating the crap out of talkative bad guys. Well... Mostly the other way around, really. Below
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that, it's a cutting bit of satire which pokes fun at the entire genre's nonsensical nature. Delve further, and there are disguised bits of character depth and social commentary.
But overall, it's just fun. Go watch it.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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