Hetalia: The World Twinkle

The fangirl favorite of yesteryear has come back in its sixth season and it showcased a competent season of Hetalia. I found it as one of the decent shows of Summer season. Here's my review.

Story: 5/10

Hetalia always excels when it does not tame itself. Historical parodies and racist remarks have been always its forte which can range from hilarious to WTF effect. However, the jokes this time can forge a smile at best and indifference at worst. I cannot remember many moments which caused me to chuckle save Russia's episode and the Micronations which I think are the series' highlights. These are the only situations ... where their quirks work favorably in their favor.

We get some fairly entertaining historical episodes (the snippets of WW2 in Africa, a story from Denmark, Norway and Sweden, Canada's episode and how Germany came to be) but these pale in comparison with Gakuen Hetalia and Hetalia of the Dead (The Beautiful World) and with Prussia's mistake for Hungary's gender and Japan's tour with Italy (The World Series). With the segments gone, the humor which emphasizes on cultural quirks has gone stale due to its usage too many times before. The World Twinkle also ended in a very strange way that is totally random and devoid of humor.

Even when it tries to be heartwarming ( a story from Denmark, Norway and Sweden, Iceland's birthday party and Davie), the result is inferior with its predecessor probably because of the episode order the staff decided on. The whole series felt like a diluted sequel that is reminiscent of the weaker parts of Hetalia: The World Series in the end.

Art: 6/10

While the artwork is still a notch above from the first four seasons of Hetalia, it is a step down from the visually pretty The Beautiful World. It retained the character designs last season but it seemed like the animation feels rigid probably because of the tight budget. The characters get deformed at times when they move and their designs have less details than the last season.

Sound: 7/10

The minimalist score is still continued to be used and the voice actors still give their best in bringing these characters to life. By the way, Hetalian Jet is a fairly catchy ending song.

My only main beef with this season as regards to this matter is it does not know how to put the right background music at the right moment. The World Twinkle's serious episode (Davie) was supposed to be sad but was misdirected by giving it a puzzling score which destroyed the mood of the episode.

Characters: 6/10

With fifteen episodes running at five minutes each, it is impossible to give every character the exposure for the audience to fully grasp the humor they present. The staff was left in a pinch to take the risk of showing them all or to play it safe to focus with the main characters. They chose the former with mixed results.

Russia's straightforward insanity never gets old whenever he switches his personality gentle to yandere. The Micronations are one heck of an entertaining batch. They were able to humor the audience with their personality in a span of two episodes (Molossia takes the cake, I guess).

The Nordics are interesting but their presence in the series is pretty much introductory. We also get to be introduced with Canada but his 'Who-is-he' joke has long overstayed its welcome even before that episode. The main trio (Japan, Italy and Germany) and the Allied were mostly relegated to the sidelines. Prussia never gets out of his pompous behavior which is likable but makes the viewers wish that he gets more than that role.

Hetalia has never been known with serious character development but The World Twinkle's manner of showing its characters is so scatterbrained that I even forgot to root in anyone of them.

Enjoyment: 5/10

I am a long time Hetalia fan so I can safely say that The World Twinkle is its weakest season. Will it gather new fans? No. This is solely for those who are already acquainted with the series. If the staff wants to regain its old glory, they gotta adapt some seriously better episodes.

Hetalia is back (whether you like it or not) and it's pretty much the same as almost every previous season so far.

Story: 6/10

I'll summarize each episode very briefly, without spoilers (like that exists in Hetalia)

Ep 1: Nekotalia.
Ep 2: Food trivia from World War 2.
Ep 3: Denmark, Iceland, Estonia and the other Nordic countries exchange snacks and drinks from their own country with each other.
Ep 4: Finland narrates the Nordic states meeting and tells about the past.
... Ep 5: Germany and Prussia bro it out over a beer.
Ep 6: Germany goes full SS on Italy during the war in Africa.
Ep 7: England and America talk about what to drink during the war in Africa.
Ep 8: The war between Denmark and Sweden in 1657 explained.
Ep 9: Sealand, Wy and Seborga tries to find some friends.
Ep 10: Sealand, Wy and Seborga tries to find some friends.
Ep 11: Melancholy, sad and totally unexpected from Hetalia.
Ep 12: England and France discuss how to defeat the Axis powers.
Ep 13: Russia tries to make friends, but comes of as creepy.
Ep 14: Canada is ignored The Episode.
Ep 15: Germany almost kills Italy and chibitalia returns.

Art: 7/10

The art for the opening and ending are really colorful and each character has a very distinct color pattern. It's not as beautiful as Hetalia: The Beautiful World, but it's a refreshing change of art style.

Sound: 7/10

A lot of brass instruments are used, since many of the sketches takes place during WW2. The voice actors do their job well and nothing significantly has changed since the last season.

Characters 8/10

The characters and their interactions with each other is the core of Hetalia. A lot of new countries is introduced (such as the micronations in episode 9 and 10) and the Scandinavian countries get a lot more screen time (As a Dane, i like that) It's refreshing to see new countries and their interactions with each other, instead of the usual Italy-Germany-Japan gang.

Enjoyment: 7/10

I already knew what i went into when starting this show. It's Hetalia.
The only thing that really caught me of guard was episode 11. It's nice to see Hetalia change, even if it's just for 1 episode.

Overall: 7/10

If you have watched Hetalia before, you'll definitely like this.

If you haven't watched Hetalia before, you'll probably still enjoy this. It has some funny moment, good characters and you'll (maybe) even learn a few things about world history.

I'm a fan, not a fangirl, let me get that clear. Forgive me as this will be my first review.

Story: 7/10
Story wise, it's all over the place. But that's Hetalia. Each episode being only five minutes long gives you very little time to put anything good together, yet somehow Hetalia has managed to not only put on one, not two, but even three strips all into a five minute long episode. That's saying only to the later half and previous seasons of the series. You can tell both pacing wise, and angle wise the first half has less of an impact from the first episode ... or so to the episode which should have been an epic and hilarious fell flat as the cold setting it took place in.

Art: 8/10
Yes, it's a huge bump from season 1-4 like it's predecessor, but unlike it's predecessor, somehow the characters themselves were more like an imitation. But only for the first half. All artists have their own styles, and not everyone can draw the same way as others, however as an animator, the ability to copy is a necessity, yet somehow they managed to botch that up. It's especially clear when seen in the Nordics! But that was only visible in the first half.

Music: 9/10
The music is fine. It's the same as usual.

Character: 8/10
Characters are all over the place, raging from the super powers of the modern world, to the unacknowledged representations of micronations, and still more to be revealed. And like the show so are the personalities. If it sticks to the source material there's rarely anything you can complain about, other than the characters themselves.

Enjoyment: 7/10
Rather than a six, I'll give it a passing 7. The first half wasn't great, that's obvious. But it wasn't completely terrible, scene arrangement and pacing could have been better. If only that can be fixed for the dvd release, that would totally awesome but I doubt it. Other than that, the second half and pretty colors is enough to boost it up to a seven.

Overall: 7/10
Overall, kinda obvious, the first half needs some work, if it weren't 15 episodes long and the mess up episodes don't equal to half the season then I would have given a better score. But if DVD don't make sales a season seven may not be possible. And now waiting on the english release, I don't usually watch it english, but here's to finding a new Britain.