Banana Fish

At the age of 8, after his notorious debut role in the critically acclaimed cult show, Boku no Pico, Ash "Pico" Callenreese ran away from his home in Cape Cod to escape social pressures and was taken into the custody of Papa Dino (or simply, Papa), the leader of the Corsican Mafia, to become its future leader. Turns out Ash does not wish this to happen, but Papa like really wants, so naturally we now have a series about 2 gay mafiosos running after each others because neither of them wants to change their opinion. One could even go as far as declare they aren't ... thinking very straight.

I read Banana Fish manga 7 years ago and didn't like it very much. After seeing the anime getting produced by MAPPA (which I adore), I assumed/hoped the anime adaptation could do better job dealing with the drama, action and even character design - which were all pretty problematic with its shojo art style and female target audience which seemed to be quite limited to fujoshi pandering. I am saying this as a guy who has read over 400 shojo manga, and in generally appreciates works aimed for the demographic. The anime is already better, but it didn't fix its characters or story.

My biggest problem are the characters - who, on the other hand, are driving the narrative - which means the story is also problematic because the characters are. For some reason, whenever there is a criminal warlord -- who has removed themselves from the shackles of modern society, created their very own world and hierarchy similar to the one they escaped themselves -- the same person wants to push their own shit and agenda onto others. "Don't do like I do, do like I say." Papa is not manly man nor a bro dude. He is an asshole with terribad double standards, who thinks he knows better what others should do. I rarely appreciate control freaks and narratives that are driven by some baddie acting like a freaking plot element. But that's exactly how Banana Fish works. Ash and Eiji - AKA the runaway gay couple - are not much better. Ash acts like a brat, and Eiji is more obviously gay than any other character.

The writing mainly reminds me of a show 2 cours back called Citrus. Series where every character was a lesbo and the lesbian was shoveled down the viewers throat. Banana Fish is practically the male version of that show. Everyone is gay, looks gay or at least talks about gay people. Ash calls one dude a faggot for watching homo porn... where Ash himself is the porn star. Good comedy, I guess. Every time we meet a new character who knows Dino, he casually mentions "btw, that dude is gay." If there ever is a character who doesn't announce they either enjoy shotas, manly buttholes, or are in a gay relationship, you can safely assume that they are at least checking 2 of the 3 mentioned because apparently, executing a show about gay people is best done in a manner similar to ecchi series which promote being hetero with boob fondling, pantsu shots and nose bleeding.

The actual events are a collection of cliches from kidnapping incidents to mexican standoffs. And of course, every Ash's "assassination" plan fails because none of the million people who attack him brought any guns. Baseball bats and random pipes are just that more efficient in a fight where the opposing party uses a fucking magnum. But don't worry! It's all just part of the bigger plan. Whenever anything happens, you know it is just an excuse for the story to go in the direction the author prefers. This is beyond visible and obvious in the series. Oh, and how are the kidnap incidents overcome, you ask? Simply by one of the characters announcing how one of the kidnappers is gay, followed by Ash trolling them with his cuteboy butt, and voila! the day has been saved once again.

The worst part of the production itself is that these are the production values to this anime, when they could be the values to something that is good. Go watch Gungrave, 91 Days (pronounced 91 Gays), Rainbow Nisha, Gangsta, Speed Grapher, Kekkai Sensen, or even Dogs instead. Come back to this one only if none of those pleased the manly mobster love in you, and even then, be prepared for some extra nonsense.

The anime is depressing, and quite stale, to be honest, The first episode I enjoyed initially, but the rest were... very strange. Fucking EVERY CHARACTER is gay.

Honestly, I am a fujoshi, but if every character is gay, and just wants to rape Ash, I'm obviously going to have problems. I don't get people who rate a show very high, because at a certain point they cried or something but this wasn't very enjoyable. Almost all characters are gay, and except Ash none of them are explored, at all. They are interesting but meh at the same time. I've read the manga, it faces almost the ... same problems. Overall, I don't recommend this very much, but who knows, might be interesting for you.


It's just not very good.

Banana Fish is a 2018 anime based off of a manga that ran from the mid 80s to mid 90s. The original manga was written by Yoshida Akimi. Who I am not even slightly familiar with. The anime version was handled by MAPPA. The same studio behind rubbish like Kakegurui and Sakamichi no Apollon. But they also worked on Dororo. So, we have to give them some credit. 

Story:

Ash Lynx is a New York boss in charge of a small street gang. His life changes when he finds a dying man who gives him a small item, a location and the words "banana fish." He soon finds ... himself on a quest to unravel the mystery of those words and the contents of the mysterious powder all while befriending the innocent Japanese youth Okumura Eiji and trying to sever his ties from the area's largest mafioso, Golzine Dino. 

There are quite a few narrative issues with this series. The first is that it quickly falls into a somewhat absurd pattern where Ash will be captured by Golzine or his men, he'll escape causing a tonne of damage and then Golzine will order him to be brought back alive. Because when you've captured the same kid four bloody times only to have him escape, you definitely want him brought in alive again. At least, if you have no pattern recognition. 

There are also problems with consistency. Golzine starts out saying he doesn't care if Ash is crippled. He just wants to break and then kill him. This quickly shifts to Golzine wanting to force Ash to be his successor. Because he can't change his mind about bringing him in alive, but he can easily change his mind about the fundamental reason to do so. There's also a point where Ash is considered dead and brags about how this frees him up to move around without anyone looking for him. About three episodes later, he has to disguise himself to visit a particular person because he's a wanted man. We don't see any signs that word's gotten out that reports of his demise were greatly exaggerated but he's suddenly a wanted man again. I see the writing in this is going the Final Fantasy VIII route of not even trying. 

Then there's the sexual assault stuff. This series features a lot of rape. Particularly within character back stories. And a lot of it isn't handled in any meaningful way. It's just basically used as an excuse for why characters like Ash & Lee Yut-Lung got to be the way they are, for cheap tragedy, and as an easy way for Ash to get some dirt against Golzine. It just comes across as in slightly poor taste and excessive. I also find it hard to believe that Americans would victim blame a literal child by acting like he seduced an adult. I know the culture around sexual assault is pretty bad there and grown women get victim blamed a lot, but that seems ridiculous. I don't know, American readers can tell me if children actually get victim blamed after being raped over there. 

The big, climactic action sequence at the end is also a bit of a let down. It all feels rushed. The whole plot with the banana fish also gets pretty much dropped and all the build up surrounding it is completely wasted. It also feels a bit deus ex machina that a certain character who gets shot twice and left for dead returns to save the protagonists twice. 

The story does start out with a lot of potential. The idea of the boss of a street gang fighting to take down the big mafia leader who mentored him is compelling. The first few times Ash gets captured or arrested have some interesting, tense moments. It just stops working when the third time hits because, at that point, it's an obvious story pattern. 

A lot of the build up surrounding banana fish is also really interesting. You want to see what's going to come from it. Until you get to the end and it's all a big fat waste of your time. 

Characters:

There are certainly issues with the characters. The big antagonist is a moron who never learns from his mistakes. Colonel Fox makes no sense as a character. Maybe it's because he's only in the last four episodes or so, but he's a mercenary who loves to kill. But he wants to set Ash up as a puppet leader because... Code of Hero is the best Transformers episode. 

There are some pretty strong dynamics with Ash and his gang. Well, with Ash, Shorter & Eiji. Pretty much every other character in his gang is bland. Which is a definite ongoing issue in the series. There are a few focus characters who are kind of interesting and developed but for each of them there are three side characters who might as well be unseasoned bricks of tofu. And one antagonist with rubbish or inconsistent motivations. 

Art:

This is actually one area where I have to give MAPPA a lot of credit. This anime looks great. The action sequences are dynamic. The characters have strong designs. The backgrounds and various objects are nicely detailed. And the series restrains itself and doesn't show the various sexual assaults in any kind of detail.

Sounds: 


The acting is solid. Nojima Kenji, Uchida Yuuma, Morikawa Toshiyuki & Furukawa Makoto are all strong in their roles. And the rest of the cast is, at the very least, completely competent. The music is decent enough. I'm not really a fan of the theme tunes, personally but they're fine. 

Ho-yay:

There's a lot. Ash's back story involves him being raped by a whole slew of dudes. And there are a lot more who come across as sexually attracted to him. His dynamic with Eiji is also pretty homo-erotic. 

Areas of Improvement:

Keep it consistent. Yes, motivations and situations can change. But you need to illustrate that instead of having situation or motivation A and then swapping to B with no explanation. 
If you're going to include sexual assault as a significant element in a story, you really need to handle it well. In this case, the history of sexual assault is largely there for the sake of having a tragic back story. And it's barely handled beyond being there, much less handled well.
Don't drop your important plots. Like I said, the whole Banana Fish thing comes up a lot and goes nowhere by the end. 

Final Thoughts:

Banana Fish had a strong start and real potential. Unfortunately, the repetition of Ash gets captured plots, poorly handled sexual assault, main antagonist's stupidity, consistency issues and other problems quickly evaporate the good will it starts with. By the end, we're left with a sub-par work. I'm giving it a 4/10. And that's mainly because of the strong start and those well executed dynamics. 

Banana Fish is that kind of shows that start off great but gradually die, as if the author came up with a creative idea but didn't know what to do with it and therefore had to wrap everything up in a very uninspiring way.

So, why 4 out of 10?
Well, aside from having disgusting abnormal sexual gross, the plot was rather very weak, and let me explain why very quickly:

• The story had good catchy premise at first but as it progresses it goes downhill; maybe because it skipped so many elements while trying too hard to have a nice dramatic conclusion, so it never spent ... time to explore any of the main supporting characters like Shorter, Arthur and many others who ended up being a side character. And later on, the whole story became uninteresting with redundant cliches about friendship sacrifices and stuff like that.
• The last 10 episodes were too repetitive and predictable: Just a loop of Eiji or Ash being kidnapped then they escape and fight a new ally on the side of the main villain.
• The environment and settings of the anime try to be realistic and close to real world, and that's actually my favorite genre and type of anime, but unfortunately though, it fails miserably at it, due to poor execution and too unreal little things, like having gangs that are friendly, trustworthy and aren't after money; and having 10 dudes with machine guns who cannot shoot down a single man with a knife -_- and superficial things of this nature that made the action scenes lame and less entertaining.
• The focus on the banana fish drug was almost completely forgotten in the second half and the whole plot faded away with the repetitive kidnapping and escaping loop.

All in all, the show could have been much better if it focused more on how the protagonist would expose the banana fish project rather than turning the show into a dramatic/action cliche. That's in a nutshell why I had to rate it with less than 5 (I really wanted to give more at first, but those problems aren't negligible to me).

Since its beginning in the summer, Banana Fish has been one the most followed anime of 2018. In that regard, it has captured the acclaim of popular opinion within the anime community for its emotional and thrilling story about personal bondage and greed regarding a mysterious drug. But now that it has come to a close, does it merit the praise it has received ? the short is no. The longer answer is below

Synopsis*

Banana Fish is takes place in the streets of New York where gangs and money control the flow of power in the country. In particular, the story focuses on Ash ... Lynx, a blonde pretty boy, that commands the drug and gang business for the kingpin of the city, Dino Golzine. Things take a turn when Ash receives a mysterious drug from a dying man;unbeknownst to Ash, the drug is a heavily guarded treasure of Golzine.
Meanwhile, Ash becomes acquainted with two Japanese journalists Shunichi and Eiji who are covering a story on Ash himself. Conflict arises when Golzine, sensing that Ash is willing to betray him and discover the truth behind the drug, calls for the capture of both the drug and Ash by any means necessary.

Story*

Much of the story involves the cat and mouse chase between Golzine and Ash which transpires to involve the higher powers in society putting stakes on the recovery of the drug, with each having their motives for involvement. At the same time, Ash deals with his troubled past and self hatred which led him to this chaotic present. Banana Fish alternates between the two in order to drive the motivations can be seen as a parallel problem for Ash;however, it never manages to develope each adequately by relying on cliches of crime drama. The story itself is not initially bad; however, as it progresses, it became a repetitive event of Mexican stand offs and hostages where it became apparent that there was a shortage of ideas and lack direction in developing the plot. One could predict exactly how each of these stand offs would end-ruining any chance of actual excitement for the audience. Speaking of which, the initial excitement of the Banana Fish was supposed be abut who would end up with the coveted drug. Instead, the show took a turn and concentrated more on making Ash some sort of prized genius by every antagonist available. While it is important to give importance to the protagonist, it is proper to lose focus and settle the entire problem being a character when much was already built on the initial premise. Finally, once the show did lose focus, the ending arch disappointingly decided to play it safe by cutting down the main conflict to a comfortable and easy resolution, thus it seemed as though there was a waste time for the viewer who could have drawled out an easier solution 12 episodes earlier.

Characters*

As the show initially started, it became apparent that there would be nothing novel about the characters, and as it progressed, attempts were made to carve out unique identities but still failed. Ash is something of recently developed caricature in anime where some light skin guy with either blonde or white hair has an attitude problem and hates everything; the only twist with Ash is that he is some sort of genius as well as being being indestructible to shanks, bullets, and knives.Golzine is a typical villain that does things for his own pleasure at the expense of the others, Eiji is a mary sue that seems to see the good in Ash and loves him unconditionally despite having no credible reason to do so, and the rest are functional as can be.That is not to say they are horrible but remain uninspiring.Additionally, another weakness problem is placed in how each character developed with the plot. For Example, it can be understood that there is some romantic type of relationship between Eiji and Ash but it is done at a surface level by sprinkling some moments here and there without being convincing the audience of their chemistry. The same is done with all other characters,; the show needed to slow down and focus more how each interact with one another in genuine moments rather than being placed a brisk paces where one still has not bought in

Sound*
Soundtrack is average with the only notable features being the second op and ed. Both songs are well made and captured some essence that Banana Fish was aiming for such Grief and Trauma.

Animation*
Nothing too remarkable although it is quite colorful and instantly recognizable

Enjoyment*
Banana fish is not boring and can be enjoyed if one turns off their brain ,but it ultimately catches up with the viewer when the series goes into safe and obvious conclusions.

Overall*
Banana Fish is a series that demonstrated great potential and could have been great if it had done things properly.The first few episodes did a good job of cutting the work out for itself ,but it never managed to develop in a satisfying manner.It is bad series that has to many surface levels executions and not enough substantive deliveries.

This will be my first review for an anime on MAL...

I had to write because I couldn't find any review similar to mine
My review will be short.
Beware of spoilers.

So, Watching banana fish makes me feel like watching any Indian Tamil Movies in which the Hero is too much overpowered and invincible, the same is with Ash in banana fish, he's just a human.. But he has an IQ of over 200, he has a bulletproof body, and also, dodges bullets like matrix, woah those who find it believable are the same to criticize Indian movies, how hypocritical.
So, this MC Ash can do wonders, still he ... struggles and fights, and he finds Eiji and they seek to uncover the truth behind the term "Banana fish"
The plot is very weak to begin with, and there was no real suspense because in the end our overpowered hero can take down a whole institution and rescue anyone who he needs to.
And this Invincible MC dies by a small stab from a little knife in the ending.. Argh.. What a waste

In this anime they made it sound like having sex with a male is too normal, they were actually treating and looking at the guys like they were girls, like almost everyone in this anime was gay it's too unreal, it had me cringe soo much. 🤦‍♂️

I found myself soo bored watching this plotless anime I slept in between with my headphones on, only to wake up from the loud noises of the gunshots.
I'm glad I completed 24 episodes, because review without completing a whole article doesnt sound credible. So I'm glad I can proudly say this was way too overrated and boring Anime, one of the worst I found uptill now.


When it comes to Art I'd say Ash designs was very nice, although he looked older for his age but very unique and good, nowhere does the MC like a 17 year old teen guy, he easily looks 27-28 grown adult.. And others designs were just decent..
And another thing is I always hate Mappa's designs you can see they make character's nose wierd from the side view, same is with S4 attack on Titan and also they make Jaws very big of characters(sideview)
Background and lighting were good considering this is a modern anime but Art being good doesn't alone bring any positives if it is not carried with a good or decent plot.

Many people recommend this anime as if it is some really good anime with a unique story, I was really hyped only to find a very plain boring plotless anime.
.
.
.
.
.
.
I had to do this because no one else did. If you've not watched this Anime yet then you better not

There're reviews saying this isn't BL. This was very adult and targeted towards fans of hardcore BL. The total number of women can be counted on one hand. One of the MCs, Eiji, is useless to the story except to tell how how fragile the other MC was, how different he was when they were together, and how much they liked each other. They only kissed once and don't hook up. However, MC does seem to get raped every few episodes. All the prostitutes are teen boys.

The story seems to be inspired by Q Anon. Govt being involved in pedo rings and drugs. The ... story tried to be smart, but it takes too much of a backseat and too many sacrifices for a developing relationship between two teenage boys.

(no spoiler review) I had high expectations going into this anime, a mafia type anime, with an 8.3 on MAL. Unfortunately, to sum this anime up, it is a badly written story with a high production value. I honestly can’t understand why many seem to be praising this as a masterpiece.

I will start with the positives. As I said earlier the production of this anime is amazing. The art and backgrounds really capture the New York setting and really add to the feel of the show. Also, I don’t know why this stood out to me, but I absolutely loved the clothing designs. Along ... with this the OST is beautiful, sometimes the pieces they played really added to the feel the show was trying to capture, and even made some scenes. In terms of openings and endings, the first opening was stuck in my head the entire show, and the ending themes really gave the last scene of each episode an amazing feel as it often played over a scene instead of cutting into a nending animation. The fight scenes are the thing that kept me watching. Both the Arthur fight and the climax fight especially. Honestly the best episode of this anime was the last episode, It was so beautifully directed.
That is about the extent to the praise I am going to give this series. Unfortunately, with all the great things going for this anime in its production the story and characters were absolutely garbage.

Characters: How is it possible for a show to be given 24 episodes and not have any character development beyond surface level. I will focus on the villains first because every single villain (and there are a lot of them) are essentially the same. They either want to gain power through banana fish, rape ashes, or both. There are even some that are given literally no character motivation at all, they are just randomly introduced into the plot to be another pawn used to progress the story. Along with this, not a single villain has a backstory. No villain is given the faintest of character arc at all. Every villain exists in the plot just as a tool of the author to torture Ash and suck sympathy from the audience. The entire story is pretty much Ash getting tortured to trick the audience into feeling sympathy as unfortunately for us Ash is also very poorly developed.
For the sake of time I will only focus on Ash, Eiji, and Shorter, the starting trio. Ash’s character is a kid who was tortured as a kid, raped several hundred of times, is good at killing things, and there is nothing else interesting about him. His only motivation is to protect Eiji. Which I guess can be an okay character motivation if Eiji’s presence in this anime was justified at all. In the end the only point of Eiji’s character is to be Ash’s motivation. Eiji is literally the least interesting character in this entire show. His presence in the show is so blatantly forced, why is he even there in the first place? He despite being one of the main characters has literally no backstory. We know that he has a sister that he mentioned once, he had a sports accident and is good at pole vaulting, which both become irrelevant after one episode, and he may or may not miss Japan. That is the extent of his character. He might as well just be Ash’s body pillow.
Shorter is another character who got no development and is the character who probably would have had the most interesting arc and could have had an amazing backstory. I would have loved to see more about his past and his motivations. Some interactions between him and the rest of the Chinese gang to build on their relationship and add to how important he was to him. Maybe a backstory to how he met Ash, or some more of how he got involved in the gangs in the first place. Maybe add something about him and his sister who we see twice and then forget about.
Whenever a character dies, gets hurt, or anything happens, I feel absolutely nothing. The writing gives me absolutely zero reason to care to any extent.
On a side note, why are there literally no female characters other than maybe two or three that are relevant for like two seconds and then vanish.

Story: The story is, as I said earlier, pretty much irrelevant. It can be summed up as Eiji is caught or threatened, Ash goes to save him, Ash ends up tortured or raped, they enter a momentary time of safety, Eiji gets caught or threatened again, and this loop continued for the entire show. Nothing interesting happens. There are no plot twists, no mysteries, no suspenseful sequences, everything is just blatantly given to the viewer. This show is so mindless yet acts like it has an original plot. Nothing about this show is original and it adds nothing the genre, everything this show does has been done before and done much better, generations even before the manga. I honestly just wish that such a good production was given to a better written story and characters.

Generally boring and uninteresting show that is very ugly and drags on for far longer than it needs to many of the characters have boring character designs that scream a Japanese persons interpretation of an American and many shots shot from afar of the characters look terrible. story is generally very generic for a mafia drama many scenes are very forced and contrived a lot of scenes have terrible choreography in fight scenes music is fine and is generally inoffensive and is the best part of the show but its not going to keep you watching by any means

To start from the top of ... the paragraph the story itself which for many people is the driving force behind a persons motivation to watch the show and to put it lightly the show has many many issues with contrived and baseless actions that don't make much sense from a logical perspective at least for me personally the characters are generally unlikable especially the main character who is easily one of my most hated Main protagonists that I've ever met he is an asshole to everyone around him even when he doesn't have a good reason to. to make it short the show is Yaoi bait and it knows it
side note theres nothing wrong with yaoi bait in a show but everyone in the show seems to want to fuck the main character even when they seem straight for the rest of the show the show doesn't care if the characters have spent the last 3 days escaping from a fight and the military all it cares about is establishing a scene where the main character can seduce his way out of a sticky situation for the 8th time

the show is very ugly the characters have extremely small faces for their heads and shots from afar are straight up unfinished obviously I don't expect masterpieces out of every frame but people especially shot from afar don't even have eyes in scenes where the focal point is a conversation between the people in the scene

the Music and sound design is the best part of the show by a pretty wide margin and its not anything special to be completely honest things make the sounds their supposed to and the music is generally enjoyable however many pieces of music are overplayed and in inappropriate places specifically the outro song plays too often for my taste but thats a personal issue tbh and if you disagree its understandable its just overall very unremarkable compared to some anime which can be carried by a good sountrack

Overall just unappealing in most aspects show. 2/10 tbh and I'm feeling generous

Seriously, no idea how all viewers should be 17+ and this is getting positive feedback. Lots of "cheaters", I guess :D

An anime, which could have been a proper street gang story, totally ruined by a forced love story making creators believe they need nothing else. To the feminists' joy, the useless, whiny, delusional character with zero development, this time is a male.

Plot is unoriginal and built around torturing the lead character repetitively because he is all this anime has, then kidnapping the useless character bound to be his supposed love interest. Gets boring after the first attempt and unbearable after the second. The suspense ... comes from your wondering how many times people can use the same "hooks" and deliver the same lines without thinking any character, especially a smart one, would not bite the same bait 4-5 times. What is also amusing is that every time the supposed tough guy "accepts his fate" and "takes responsibility", he eventually agrees to be saved. Because if he doesn't, there will be no more episodes without the need to dig deeper and develop an actual plot.

The reason Ash Lynx (lead character) loves Eiji so much is also as badly thought of as the anime. No spoiler really. It is "because he wants nothing in exchange". Besides you changing entirely as a person, that is...Even if we accept Ash feels this way, we all know he had at least one true friend, who was not using him long before ever meeting this guy. Name is Shorter. So, what did he want? Surely, no one let us know.

The lead character is constantly contradicting his own life philosophy on whether he is way beyond any physical harm, free to use his own body as a weapon or he is just a poor suffering soul. Guess it is hard to create a full-blooded character who will suit the popular opinion and be able to get on the fanservice bandwagon.

True, there are few worthy moments such as exposing (or explaining?) US politics in the Middle East and...well, think that was it.

Art is pathetic, leaving characters looking deformed and literally faceless at times. Animation is getting so much worse as episodes progress, you start to wonder if the "star-boy" is even worth all the fuss. Ridiculous, taking into account that according to its creators, the main character Ash's looks displayed later in the anime are elaborately inspired by the late River Phoenix. More likely, you can say his entire character is "inspired" by Makishima Shougo. Someone we also know pretty well from Psycho-Pass.

If you liked Psycho-Pass, you will also love the B1 "test space", shown in the second part of the show. Very original indeed.

All in all, the closest to this anime is Togainu no Chi, which at least did not hide under the false pretences of being something more than a character market for fangirls with an emphasis on "special" drugs, sexual crimes and extreme violence. Wonder why it was not liked and Banana Fish is, but my guess is it's because of how the anime market is lately.

I have only finished all episodes to see how bad this will be. I started with a 7 and now reached 3. That bad. I really hope this is the end and there are no further seasons. At least not with these compromised characters.

I did write a review, but i think it was too rough, get reported badly, got removed, and its a pain in the ass to resubmit so i just write another review more politely this time.
WARNING : PLEASE READ THE TAG, THERE IS "SHOUJO'
Anime with shoujo tag basically is an anime that is produced with market target mainly for young girl. So dont make the same mistake as i did, let me tell you beforehand, this anime probably gonna be suitable only for
1. Females (almost all of female will probably like this anime)
2. Male that is into boy-boy Love/BL (I dont know what ... is the most suitable word for it)
So, if you are not one of those 2 category people, i suggest you go and find another anime, this anime probably is going to "Let You Down, like it did to me.

I got really excited watching the first 2 episodes, because it seems this anime has a really deep craft into the story and characters, mainly the MC.
I basically drop this anime right after episode 3, so i will only review this based on what happen to those 3 episodes, and why i drop it.
From what i watch in the first 3 episode, this anime is SUPER GREAT, the story is deep, everything fits perfectly and its totally gonna be one of my best anime for its Mystery and politics aspect like "91 Days". But episode 3 tells me the sign this anime is gonna focused on Ash the MC and his lover Eiji, which i Cant bear to watch (I dont Like it, its a personal preference), while everything else seems going really well.
Summary :
Story : Great, i would give 8, and probably its the biggest story score i ever give for an anime that i dropped.

Art & Sounds : 8

Character : actually without that "One Element" i would give the characters score 7, but meh, 3 would be suitable, as it doesnt make any sense how th hell everyone seems so gay in one anime, and it seems everyone want Ash's Ass. And probably this is what the girls would say about harecchi anime, its just this kind of anime suits only for the targeted market.

Enjoyment : 4
I did enjoy watch, but it just let me down, forgive me for my stupidity to watch something that i should have skipped.

There were a lot of good anime in 2018, so I'm keeping my hopes high that Banana Fish won't end up as one of the shows the year is remembered by. I'm not versatile when it comes to crime dramas and can't give you a good recommendation, but trust me when I tell you: skip this one.

There's a lot to unpack here.

By definition, Banana Fish is a plot heavy crime drama. Yet if you gave me a piece of paper and a bit of time, I'd struggle to write down the events that take place in this show. And that's because it doesn't really have ... a plot. I swear it starts off with an investigation concerning a mysterious drug, coupled with a young man's revenge story. Fuck me if I know where it goes from there.

Banana Fish is more a bunch of loosely connected mini arcs, each with its own villain, than a coherent whole. The drug story gets lost somewhere in the mess and even the revenge story forgets what it's supposed to do. What you're left with is a rinse-repeat of the same conflicts and themes from start to finish. No one has a clear motivation and there isn't a goal to strive for. That's why it's very hard to stay engaged and care about anything that's happening to the characters.

Saying that a show is poorly paced is something critics like to overuse, but in the case of Banana Fish, it's true to a fault. The show doesn't shy away from switching between five scenes within 60 seconds. You'd think it's bad enough when each of those scenes features different characters, but it's actually worse when a same character appears in two locations within a heartbeat. It doesn't help that none of these people are recognizable or have any connections to the what's going on.

The only character worth mentioning is the lead: Ash. He is mostly an engaging persona from start to finish. Though they play the cheap bad boy card, he's still likable and easy to cheer for. The pop idol look is certainly silly, but does the trick. I have two major gripes with him. The first one being that his over competence seems a bit unbelievable when compared to the gritty nature of the show. The second one, oh God…

Banana Fish throws rape around like it's nothing. The show's counter balance for Ash's perfection is his dark past, i.e. all the abuse he goes through. Please note the present tense in that last statement. There wasn't a single villain in this show whose agenda wasn't to sexually assault him. It's like their main motive was to abuse Ash; other criminal activities would always come second. Ash was assaulted or played into being assaulted to gain some "advantage" multiple times through out the show. The consequences of these actions to a person are HORRIFYING (yes, caps lock). Yet the show treats Ash being raped the same as if he fell down and got a bruise. In no way is this properly addressed and it is mostly played for shock value. I don't know what more to say other than it is utterly disgusting.

Well, if that didn’t put you off watching the show, there's also Eji.

Usually, stories start from the point of view of an uninvolved character. Eji, like us the audience, isn't familiar with the American underground and is thus the perfect vessel for us to get to know that world. However, Eji appears only half way through episode one and his overall screen time is negligible. Instead, the show takes the rather risky approach of throwing us straight into Ashe's shoes. Ash takes up most of the screen time and we learn a lot about him through his actions and inner monologues.

Since the show doesn't use Eji to introduce us to the world, it's baffling why he exists. The romantic undertones that exist between them in the first few episodes are there only so you'd thirstily stick with the show hoping for something more. Nothing Eji does progresses the plot or helps develop any of the characters. He doesn't make any useful observations or gives new perspectives on the situation. He is one of those blank slate characters that can easily be replaced by a piece furniture. You really wouldn't loose much in the process.

The character design is rather bland. Ash is very recognisable, but everyone else is just an already-seen visualization of a common stereotype. The backgrounds aren't any better. Some ghetto locations were vivid, but most of the scenery were copy-pasted concrete buildings. The animation quality is actually pretty good - the action scenes in particular. There was a fight on a train midway through the show that held my attention with ease. Shame the stakes were never high enough to really get your blood going. As for the soundtrack, I don't recall much of it other than the horrid engrish OPs and EDs.

So there you have it. They say 2018 had a show for everybody. If you're really itching for a good old mobster tale, I hope there's something out there better that this. Also, don't get smitten by the yaoi click bait. In light of all the abuse that goes on in this show, romance is the last thing you'll be thinking about. More like vomiting this shit out and getting yourself a detox smoothie.

This anime had some great underlying points, but its inconsistencies pushed me to the point where I had to force myself to finish it.

It has a good underlying story; the mysterious Banana Fish makes for a good mystery, and as the story develops it helps engage the viewer with the main characters' goals.

The main character Ash is kind of a superhero. He's amazing at pretty much everything he does, though he has a dark past.

However, despite that (including being a genius and amazing at fighting) he conducts blatant errors on a regular basis, to the point where I found the anime barely watchable as it ... repeatedly made me unable to maintain my suspension of disbelief.

Ash is not afraid to run in front of enemy fire, which makes sense because enemy basic troops often have aim like stormtroopers in Star Wars; hitting everything around him, but not straight on. But from a realistic fighting perspective, Ash's actions make no sense.

Several people surrounding Ash are obsessed with him in a way I struggled to find any reason for.

The relationship between Ash and Eiji is engaging, and Eiji does get good character development through the series. Ash gets some character development too, but not enough to make him realistic.

There are many interesting characters who get screen time, though some of them felt a bit underdeveloped, or inconsistent.

The show also deals with (C-)PTSD, mental abuse, physical abuse and sexual abuse, including childhood sexual abuse. I found this depiction problematic; on the occasions the PTSD and its reactions come into focus, the portrayal is fairly realistic. However, all the rest of the time, the PTSD is just forgotten, which is not how PTSD works. Adding many more occasions of mild triggers/flashbacks would've made this aspect of the anime more realistic. I guess others might be okay with the way it's presented though.

Overall I was disappointed; the story had a good foundation, the art was good, there were interesting characters, and the relationship between Ash and Eiji was engaging.

But the lack of realism and blatantly inconsistent or unrealistic characters made me barely able to finish the series.

Please be advised for SPOILERS!

I think if you look at my reviews none of them look official nor do I do a summary, I usually expect people to have seen the show that I am writing the review for.

Banana Fish is one of those shows that looks really good on paper and that is loved by the community for being "deep" and for it being a "BL." This show is definitely not a BL because IMO that's not the focus on the show and the MC's to me don't seem like they actually romantically like each other.

Btw, I was really excited to watch this show ... beforehand so don't think I wanted to hate it from the start. Also I watched this a year and a half ago, so don't judge if I don't remember it perfectly.

Good things:
- Art style
- Mafia/gang feel

Bad things:
- Plot devices. This is easily the worst thing about Banana Fish. The first two episodes shows the horrors of the mafia and how gross and bad sexual assault and rape is. Towards the middle of the show the MC gets raped as a plot device to get out of jail and it just takes the whole seriousness away. The MC gets raped so often that it just seems like they are making fun of it at this point. It's such immature writing that people think it's deep. Just because a show as mature themes does NOT make it good or deep.

- Characters. Most of the characters are just awful. Ash is completely overpowered, even more so than the show was trying to make him. Apparently he has skills to hack computers, analyze drugs and their chemicals, and kill the most highly trained killers/gang members in the world.

- Eiji. He is basically the damsel in distress and has barely any plot to the story other than the beginning of the show. All he is there for after is to calm Ash down during panic attacks.

- The writer and his wife were easily the best characters.

- Ending. The ending is just stupid cry bait, it makes zero sense. Apparently after everything that has happened Ash just is too cool or he is too complicated to see Eiji off when he is going back to Japan. It never explains it either. It's just excess drama that makes no sense. And of course he gets stabbed randomly by a character we haven't seen in many episodes. After everything Ash has gone through he just randomly dies by a shank in the streets. And his first instinct after getting stabbed is to just go back to the library. God, thinking about this just makes it make less sense. It's such a dumb ending.

That's really it. I remember those bits and pieces but I was definitely bored by episode 7. I really wanted to like the show, but it's so bad. Maybe the manga is better.

Appaling queerbait. Does not do well for the update to modern times. People deserve to know that it's bland, rapey and vaguely homophobic in its fetishistic gaze that does not allow certain characters to ever act like human beings. Really gets off on it's suffering, though I suppose there's worse out there. Hopefully the manga is better, at least for it's time period.

Apparently I haven't written enough. Is the story unique? Yes and no. It's uniquely frustrating. It's got some unusual plot points, but I think most of us have read or seen better stuff about gangs (and US drug experimentation) than this. For ... something that seems to be going for an almost horrific level of 'realistically' pervasive (mostly) homosexual violence it seems bizarrely out of touch with the ins and outs of gang culture, youth culture, poverty and race that are all big elements of the plot. It is amusing how the corrupt politicians are republican so maybe it's tongue in cheek. It doesn't do a very good job with the way it treats homophobic characters, suggesting that they are worthy of forgiveness due to blood ties, although their motives are so inconsistently written it's hard to understand if the author understands what homophobia is and does, very ironic given the subject matter. On this note the victim blaming narratives are never challenged beyond vague disgust, and the characters who are supposedly sympathetic to them continue to sexually harrass and enable sexual harrassment of rape survivors. The ending is incredibly maddening and falls into exactly the kind of queerbaity trope you'd imagine, dressed up in asinine poetic imagery. Perhaps it works in the manga or in Japanese, but in this it's a big old groan. (Watched subbed not dubbed).
Is the art style fitting to the story? Yes the art style and the animation is mostly very good, though it looks like it should be in the 80s. Mobile phones make the plot make less sense, and the way timelines are condensed it does not make much sense anyway.
Characters well rounded? Character motivations are inconsistent and can flip on a dime. Certain characters go in boring loops of indecision over other characters with the personality of a void. Maddening misunderstandings are allowed to continue and fuel the plot for no other reason than drama. Plot points loop as supposedly intelligent characters make the same mistakes over and over again, with little progress or consequence. Sometimes characters are invincible, then it's time for them to be useless again.

When this was airing, I heard quite a bit about how this was among the better anime of that year, and that perception persisted over subsequent years. I added it to my ptw list rather recently, particularly as I’ve become more interested in crime thrillers like Akiba Maid War and Black Lagoon. Not everything has been a hit - Baccano!’s non-linear storytelling got in the way of my enjoying the narrative, and Rainbow included an unfortunate amount of gratuitous sexual abuse - but that hasn’t put me off of it yet.

This series unfortunately trends toward the Rainbow side of things. Don’t get me wrong, it’s ... not gratuitous in the same way, often shifting away from the worst of the sexual abuse happening on screen, though it does occasionally indulge in a little unfortunate fanservice. The fact that this series seems to make all its villains into sexual predators doesn’t help.

But that’s only surface level. The characters are hit and miss for me, with both of the leads being misses as one serves as a Gary Stu and the other largely as a male damsel in distress. There are more interesting side characters like Blanca and Max, but this series seems almost entirely uninterested in its women.

The themes are strong with this one, but the narrative less so. There are legitimately great explorations of the weaknesses and strengths of attachments in this dark world, but it explores that in a way that makes it difficult to appreciate. It does not help that many of the supposedly consequential choices of these characters are underwhelming, with characters regularly escaping impossible scenarios with short-term injuries and marksmanship with a gun generally being relegated solely to red shirts. Even the ending, which included something more consequential, felt wrong after a series where names characters regularly shrugged off bullet wounds.

In short, I found it pretty uneven. It had real glimmers of something special, but rarely made good on them.