Enen no Shouboutai

Review based on personal opinion and taste:

I had high hopes for Fire Force, having the same creator as Soul Eater. Soul Eater had some of the best characters around, altho silly overall, I remember staying up way past bedtime when I was 12 to watch it when it came up on TV. Every character felt so alive and unique, in a silly way, but Fire Force fails to deliver the same quality of characters, they chose cliche, overused achetypes of characters and modified them a little bit to appeal to the public, and boy did they fail. They also opted for a very serious plot, ... death by fire, the main character having his beloved family slaughtered and blamed for the crime, his goal is to find the killer and prove his innocence, not a unique plot, but still, a mature plot and when you combine it with childish characters, they just don't go well together.

The animation is pretty good, I enjoyed the fight scenes a lot, but besides that, it was a pain to sit through, had to drop it after 10 episodes, sorry. Hopefully Atsushi Ōkubo will come to his senses.

OK. To start, I´m a reader of the manga and I didn´t see the anime of Soul Eater (except for the first 5 episodes) and I´l be focusing more in the adaptation (11 episodes of 24 seen) than in the story of the manga because I´ll do a review of that one. Also I´m not a native english so expect for many misspelings.

Story 6
I know that Fire Force isn´t a jewel in what talks about originality an cliches, but all the cliches are justified, not yet in the anime, but in the manga, so you don´t have to criticate the series only because is generic. ... If you´re expecting for something different don´t see FF. Seriously. But FF hasn´t exploated all its potential in the anime yet because they cutted some scenes from the manga

Art 6
If we talk about animation, i have to say that i´ll take it as good, but is poorly distribuited through the episodes. The battles and the flames see pretty good, but in the talking scenes, you have the charaters talking in the same frame for more than 30 seconds. But something I hate is the focus onthe FANSERVICE (for those who don´t know, the fanservice in the manga equally frequent than in the anime, but there you can see is just a parody of the fanservice of the other series)

Sound 8
Thsi is the best point of the FF anime until now because it fits for every moment. The only problem that I have is that isn´t used frequently. But oooh god, the openings and the ending are too god (I prefer the OP 2 because it fits better for the series that the one)

Character 6
Well, in the anime we a have a cast a little bit cliche, and we hasn´t saw the profundization yet soooooooo.. be patient. Cliche doesn´t means bad.

Enjoyment 5
The ponit that I hate the most is the poor direction the anime is having sooo I´ll give you some tips about how don´t fuck up an adaptation:

1° Do not cut the dark scenes if you know they´re the essence of the original media
2° Do never sell Bluerays of an ongoing anime, specially if you´re on hiatus
3° If you´re gonna have hiatus, you could, idk, make it worth it improving the scenes, making they´re not just images or DRAWING THE FUCKING FACES (in the manga the faces aren´t drawen only in the small vignetes for not deforming the draw, but it isn´t difficult to draw an anime face in an animation, specially if is a static image)
4° Making battles see good doesn´t mean the animation is. Please, is DP, the have lot of money. Could you please make the characters move in the screen, please?

MEDIOCRE DOESN´T MEANS BAD. But I´m pretty dissappointed with the bad decissions of Yuki Yase as director. I understand that you could not have the best impressions of the anime, but give a chance to the second cour. Let´s see if the animation improves, because the sotry does in this arcs

OVERALL: 6

Its a good popcorn anime. You've probably seen most of whats in here before, Shonen protagonist, and I almost stopped half way through as it felt generic. It picked up pretty entertaining. I was wary to start this for a while, the smiling protagonist turned me off for some reason, but I like the backstory for why he smiles. I do enjoy the theme of fire, and in my head canon it felt like a successor to Last Airbender, if the fire benders were the only ones left.

The art and sakuga excellent. The knight character is funny. The Lucky Lecher gets old pretty ... quickly though, and when it starts to get old, it slows down which is good. Go enjoy

The concept is pretty decent but the major problem with this anime is they make a long boring string of episodes and then the final 10 episodes or so of the season are absolute bangers and they setup very well for the next season but then go ahead and make half of the next season disappointing and this cycle repeats. Overall it is interesting, has good visuals and characters with bad pacing. Also so that the fire fore fans don't get pissed i must mention that the second half of both season 1 and season 2 were epic, well-hyped up!

Fire Force is truly a 10/10 anime: 20/10 animation and 0/10 story.

All jokes aside, this anime seemed like it was gonna be a HOT new shounen, but man it just is not good. I don't have a ton to say about it, it truly is just one of the blandest anime I've ever seen. The characters are so shallow and lazy, the story never dragged me in.

The best way to describe how I felt watching this is that I just could never find a tiny bit of me that cared about anything going on. I felt like a grandpa trying to understand anime and just ... not giving a single shred of care. If you like shounen a whole lot and love good animation but don't mind the most cookie-cutter average anime story in the world, check out Fire Force. I don't even hate it, it's just painfully average.

Excellent first opening, truly lavish and loving production, decent shonen concept, but bland and boring story, with flat characters that never deepen, a plot that never thickens, and female characters embarrassing even for the genre.

Seriously, watch the OP and find a few screenshots of the background art and you'll have soaked up most of the heat from this show without wasting your time.

Enen no Shouboutai as an anime is close to a best-case scenario for the adaptation of the source material manga-- there's smooth animation and entertainingly-expanded action scenes, brilliant coloring that complements character designs, and remarkably detailed background art. Sadly, the background art develops ... the intended sense of a ramshackle, retrograde, post-apocalyptic city-state far better than the stock characters yelling in the foreground. All of this extra effort by the anime team carries the original material, but only so far-- the palanquin is resplendent, but the dignitary on top is asleep. Once the flash of the first few fights are past, and the standard array of Shounen Fighting Show character classes have been ramified into fire-based flavors, there's nothing particularly fun going on here.

The writer very much bashes you over the head with exposition about the world, characters, plot, even minor details like weapon characteristics in the guise of dialogue. The dialogue therefore does nothing to serve character-building. The characters are malleable, ill-defined stock characters held hostage by the exposition and plot. You can't say the characters drive the plot, but that a loose connection of cases (episodic format) move the characters.

There is nothing subtle about the 500 times the MC declares he wants to be a hero, every character declares the supremacy of a third generation fire-starter, and flashbacks appear in every episode where he's called ... a devil. It's not only unnatural but repetitive.

Beyond that the animation is full of still shots and recycled establishing shots. The same images are used throughout different episodes and most of the show is actually still dialogue. It's as if they blew all their budget on 1min worth of combat per episode while the rest is just still frames with one character's mouth moving.

The final point I have is pacing. The pacing and editing detracts from any form of tension the show could've had. Flashbacks appear mid-combat, characters stand still for 20 seconds mid-combat, and characters hold 2 minutes speeches while the infernal waits for them to finish, again, mid-combat. For example, in episode two, the alarm sounds and Maki runs in to urgently alert the team. But when they get there, the captain spends 1 minute relating exposition outside the house accompanied with a still frame. Then he walks the recruits behind the house and takes another 4 minutes to explain. It's impossible for the audience to care about the world, characters, and combat like this. The pacing is completely uneven and there's no tension.

I was thoroughly excited for this anime because I have never seen a story about firefighters kicking bad guy ass in nearly every anime I've seen. As well it was good to see a different type of character such as Shinra, who we all know is a demon and is tagging along with the fire crew in order to get revenge on a fire which killed his family.

The first 2 episodes were great because it really showed what a fire fighter goes through while saving people's lives, especially when there are cases of human combustion. I mean seriously it is definitely a life risking job ... and traumatizing! Unfortunately after the devastating Kyoani tragedy, from episode 3 onwards, David Productions gave the anime a big edit makeover. The changes they made were they censored burnt bodies, created pointless enemies that looked to be copied from superhero movies and added pointless supporting characters that mean nothing to the story. Absolutely regarding the censorship with the burnt bodies, it's important to understand and respect the families including Kyoani colleagues who have lost talented 35 people by a disgusting human being. My heart still breaks for all who were involved on that horrific day and it's hard to imagine it's one month since it happened!

If I had the opportunity to be involved with Fire Force, I would've given it a break for at least a few years after what happened or scrap it altogether if theyre making the story struggle to its knees from being in its original form. The only good things about the anime is the soundtrack, the main characters, voice actors (sub and dub) and the fact it was colourful despite the edits. Sadly they just weren't enough to keep me watching more of the anime so I decided to drop it after the 7th episode.

I had heard that the first 2 episodes set up some high expectations for the show that didn't follow through to the rest of the show so far, so i went into this expecting nothing. I was somehow still disappointed.

While it has an interesting premise, I kept getting put off.
- there are frequently strange editing choices where it feels like there's a scene or two missing, disrupting the flow of the animation. I've also noticed there's a tendency to reuse shots (usually when a characters backstory is brought up or influences the story - which is most jarring in ep 6)

- The show struggles ... with the concept of subtext.When a character is reacting to events that bring back memories or involve their past, the show beats you over the head with it. I got whats happening the first time you showed the flashback, please stop repeating that one shot without saying anything new about it. It doesn't matter how much you jumble around words. Your saying the same thing shut up.

- fanservice. Some people love it. Some hate it. I'm not a fan of it when it's during emotional or dramatic moments. Which it is a lot of the time. Also does the classic anime trope "oh im sorry i walked in on/groped you! It was totally an accident! Please dont hit me!" which was never funny imo and still isnt.

- Fight scenes are kinda meh. Some of them are pretty good. But the ones that obviously didn't get focused on are pretty one note.

- Main character is pretty boring. Like his backstory is interesting but the character himself is meh. He's got this whole i'm a hero thing going but like. Its been done. A shitload. What makes him different for literally every other shounen protagonist? So far nothing.

- I feel like that extends to the rest of the main cast. Maki is pretty cool and the leader guy too but it seems like most of the characters are just gimmicks and tropes with little else to differentiate them from said gimmicks.

Mind you i'm only 6 episodes in. Things could change. I hope they do there's potential. But i'm probably not going to keep watching.

Now, as you probably know, Fire forces was made by the same person who made Soul Eater.

As you also should know, Fire Forces is a FAR cry from the masterpiece Soul Eater was. Soul Eater had magnificent characters, setting, and story. It truly was ahead of its time. Almost a decade later, I can confidently look back and say that it's still a very good piece of work. But what about Fire Forces? Despite being released in 2019, I really do feel like it was released back in 2011, when Soul Eater was first released because it's so backwards.

I'd like to mention that Soul Eater ... had much better art, even though it's a lot older than Fire Forces. Unfortunately, that has all to do with the animation budget, as I know that the manga artstyle is consistent with Soul Eater's, and it's just the anime slacking.

However, the thing I hate the most is definitely the characters, and that can't be written up as bad adaptation. Damn, these characters drag the story through the mud. Alright, MC is this very cut and paste sort of "tragic" protagonist that has to figure out the past, and also has a unique power/history. But hey, you don't expect much from shounen MC's, so I'll give that a pass. The other characters, however, do not get a free pass. Random fanservice characters, boring villains, and an overall copy paste main cast at the 8th company. While the 8th company certainly isn't bad, (I found Arthur to be actually quite good) you'd wish that there was something more different, I guess. But of course, the other characters at the other companies and the villains of the story are just so basic. I mean, seriously. The non 8th company characters look like they were actually just taken from some obsolete 2002 shounen one-shot that didn't get high enough ratings to get serialized. Random fan-service girl, glasses guy, "gorilla" girl (you'll be hearing that a lot), and overly righteous captain. All in all, pretty basic. The comic routine is also pretty basic, but I can also say the same for Kimetsu no Yaiba, so it's not exactly the reason why this show is bad.

I'll admit, the OVERALL story is quite unique and not bad by any means. Comparable to Soul Eater? No, but certainly close to the quality of it. The setting is also pretty good. I like the story and setting that comes out of this anime. Firefighters fighting against supernatural fire demons? A unique spin on the "demon/spirit slayer" genre, that's for sure. But it's really not the story or setting that is particularly bad, it's everything else.
Also, despite the story having a great start-- the mystery of the MC's past certainly isn't bad--,the current sequence of storyline is very linear and feels quite rushed. The story arcs are very predictable and as a result, boring. Despite having the 8th company as the main actors in the beginning story arcs, the anime still is boring because the story arcs are just that bad.
Last note about the characters. And I really hate it when this happens. The 8th company feels like they have a moral high ground to be straight up crashing into a base and forcefully taking research documents. The audience is given the perspective that they are the good guys and that the 5th company are the bad guys. In reality, it's just that the perspective is done that way, but looking at it on a neutral viewpoint, the MC's company can't be said to be on the righteous side. Just looking at the sequence of events, the 8th company doesn't seem to have that much of a moral high ground. A motivation of "I can't believe they would make a joke about harming pedestrians" is NOT an actual cause to fight under the banner of righteousness. Seriously, the author had to be stretching the plot thin for that to be a form of incentive for the MC to fight the "bad guys."
And finally, my last gripe about this show is the "fighting." People are fighting amongst other people, but there isn't the actual threat of death. Even the villains don't really fight to kill, but to incapacitate or to make conversation. I know that bad shounen shows love to do this, and Fire forces is no different. Demon Slayer, one piece, Naruto, SOUL EATER, etc, all have their fights to the death, but I really don't see it with Fire Forces.
And so, that led me to drop this series. The combination of an overall weak cast of characters paired along with dull storyline arcs do not compel me to watch more, despite me having a slight interest in the mystery of the fire forces unit and the MC. And Obviously, is this show actually terrible? No, but it certainly isn't great. I wouldn't recommend watching it, but it's honestly still watchable.

This is my first time writing a review so bear with me. I was looking forward to watching this anime for quiet a while as i was intrigued by the premise of story especially Spontaneous Human Combustion.

From a story standpoint the anime is very interesting as it is a typical shounen story with a very interesting and new premise . The MAL synopsis does a good work of explaining it so i wont get into the details. The problem lies in the execution of the story. Writer does a pretty good work of building the world and give us few interesting power and characters but ... the way we are given that information is not creative at all. most of them are just exposition dumps where people just tell each other stuff which sometimes feel simply stupid and lazy writing at the best. But regardless the story itself is interesting so it keeps the person watching engaged and makes them feel to get to know the world our characters lives in more.


Now the art and animations for this anime is really good ,top-notch. It is handled by David production, which is a well known studio but this in by far their best animated anime. That really did amazing work with action scenes which are loaded with intensity and fluidity ,it's animation and character art is it strongest point.

Music was decent ,it was not a masterpiece but not bad by any means. The background music for characters and action scene was mostly done right and is in the sync with what is being shown on the screen. It complements it's amazing animation quality very well.

Characters are it's weakest point , it is what makes this anime drags infact . With such a interesting premise and overall plot for the story the character development is the worst and done very badly. Their are few interesting characters but most of the characters we spend our time whit our just plain and their backstory is just thrown at us . The female characters are just here for fan services and have no purpose in story ,the fan service is so much infact that it just seems a cheap move from writers part to keep viewer engaged but in reality does the opposite.

The anime is overall good enough for a person to be invested by the story but might be eyesore for people looking for good character development.

Fire Force is mainly about firefighters, many with special pyrokinetic abilities, that protect citizens from “infernos” - humans that that combust spontaneously and turn into demons. As the show progressed, it is found that the truth behind these monsters involve interwoven conspiracies by the same organizations that created the fire force.
The series started out well, building up the tone and setting. With both the strengths and pains of the lead, Shinra Kusakabe, being introduced, it seemed like a good cross between “I want to be a hero” vs. “I’m feared. ” Other personalities were unique and fairly intriguing.

After that strong first impression, viewers ... find that what appeared to be a solid unit started to fall apart, one piece at a time.

There was an apparent inconsistency in the personalities of the cast. They would be portrayed as one thing, but that would disappear later on and only appear when it’s convenient to the plot. For example (just this one spoiler), Shinra was gifted with a strong pyrokinetic power and was feared because he would smile when he was nervous, which was during inappropriate times. After he survived the fire that killed his family, he had this nasty smile on, which made him look at fault or even evil. It was a big chip on his shoulder that he had to bear that pushed him to want to become a hero even more. However, after a few episodes, it seemed like that quirk did not make a difference in the first place. He was becoming a hero without that smile of his really mattering; it was only pointed out randomly and showed up for aesthetic’s sake.
Jumping off from Shinra being a “hero”, there was likewise an evident lack in character development - not just in terms of personality or learnings, but in skill and strength as well. Without any real training, the lead inexplicably gets more capable, being able to defeat those with/in power.

Aside from the erratic storytelling for the characters, confusion was also present in world-building.
How characters get their powers was not explained. So many concepts were brought up with out proper description or support. The show mentions Adolla Burst, which is better than regular flame, but there’s no way to tell it apart visually or scientifically… so how does the audience know that that’s it, right?
To add to the disorientation, truths of the Fire Force universe were shared randomly, without logic. Realities that should have been introduced earlier were thrown in mid-series like after thoughts, as if the writers remembered all of a sudden, “Oh yeah, this should be brought up too.” Nearing the end, the that the fact that no animals exist is made known. However, meals with egg and meat had been shown previously, which is muddling.
Again, these are just a few instances that exhibit messy writing. Though this probably should not be part of it, maybe the animators also took fan service too far (is lucky lechery even a thing???).

Some saving points that could be commended are the creativity in the character’s fire abilities, there were some chunks of good dialogue, and engaging animated fight scenes. At the end, the bad writing of Fire Force took ahold of what could have been a great concept.

“Latom.”

Not sure why they took away the categories but this is a pretty interesting one to say the least. Major pacing issues, characters being one dimensional and general rushed plot development really hold this one back. I feel as though many of the best arts are lost between the lack of a build up with satisfactory resolutions. Black Clover does this really well as things begin to unfold over time that create intrigue into the world and its characters where fire force just throws it at your face. Characters will blatantly tell the viewer everything they need to know without much respect for the viewer ... or their commitment to growing with the show.

Fire Force however does have great action sequences with that same Soul Eater flare for character design and abilities. The MC Shinra is quite likable but lacks the depth of someone worth rooting for and whos conflict isn't all that relatable. Other highlights would include the lore of the world which is mysterious and intriguing as well as how character relationships will develop moving forward.

Story: 6
Art: 7
Sound: 6
Character: 6
Enjoyment: 7
Overall: 6

I'm pretty sure the idea of fighting 'Fire with Fire' is counterproductive at its most extreme, but I guess that doesn't matter when most of your cast is capable of pyrokinesis. 

Story:


After the Great Cataclysm some time ago, the world has been burned and split apart, and a new phenomenon known as 'Spontaneous Human Combustion' rears its ugly head as out of nowhere, people start exploding into flames and become creatures known as Infernals.  To combat this, a special force of firefighters known as the 'Fire Force' was formed, armed with soldiers of different 'generations' capable of different forms of pyrokinesis.  After an incident in his ... youth involving the death of his mother and the disappearance of his little brother, Shinra Kusakabe arrives as a hero of justice and swears to keep his promise to his late mother of finding and keeping his brother safe.

The biggest boon of Fire Force is the series's vast amount of worldbuilding and its corresponding mystery elements, as each arc of the series introduces new (and quirky) characters while gradually moving itself towards the series's goals.  The worldbuilding is extremely solid, outlining the different limitations on the various generations of pyrokinetics, as well as the structure of the Fire Force Companies themselves, escalating to the later terms of Adolla Burst and the different levels of Infernals.  My favorite is really the limits of what constitutes as 'Pyrokinesis'.  Each character wields 'fire' in a different way, sometimes just resulting to them manipulating thermal dynamics and heat to formulate their various powers, even if some of these powers need some hard liberties to be taken into consideration.

In order to explain all of that though, the series falls on some VERY strict arc setups with many of the show's stories focusing a new character in one event, adding them to the 8th Fire Force Company's cause, then repeating the same plotline a couple times over again, about five times before the show's planned two cours are finished.  By in large, this story setups services the story VERY well and puts the worldbuilding on an even pace that helps keep the show's intrigue and juggled plot elements in line without seeming like a confusing mess.  But because of that, Fire Force feels very ordinary; nothing really all that exciting since it falls back on such a reliable and safe cookie-cutter method that doesn't try enough to go beyond this particular formulaic shonen story style.  As a result, the plot ends up feeling predictable with not enough twists or wrenches I feel that give the show enough of a kick to rope the viewer in to wanting more from it.

The show's comedy also often sticks up in the most awkward of times.  Usually in moments of tension, stupid aspects of the characters involved or some quip makes its way on the battlefield and gets rid of any amount of serious context the show had prior, which variably sours the show's viewing experience or boosts it depending on who is involved when.

All of this results in an ending for (what I believe is) the first season to be...subpar, at best.  The series basically powercreeping itself at what's possible with fire/heat manipulation at the very end because...reasons, and the last episode resulting in being a massive loredump that sets itself up for a part two doesn't really sit right with me.  Fire Force as a whole benefits far more from its interesting setup rather than its story, and having the former rather than the latter only gave me reason to watch the show for its lore rather than its characters or plot.  "Bringing about the Apocalypse" stories don't really do it for me either, but that really was only the cherry on the top for a series that relied exclusively on the same arc type in order to tell its story.

Characters:


Branded as the Devil for gaining the nervous tic of smiling whenever he was nervous, Kusakabe Shinra is a boy who wishes to become a 'Hero of Justice' and help people as a way to stave off that bad image of himself.  Beyond that of course is keeping his promise to his mother that he would find his brother, Sho, and bring him home safely.  With only the ability to shoot fire from his feet, Shinra is an interesting protagonist due to how close he keeps these character traits as well as how commonly he repeats himself when explaining what his purposes in life are.  Unfortunately, his character remains pretty static because of this since none of his goals have actually been achieved or met, which ends up becoming a common thematic amongst the rest of the cast. 

The biggest example of that comes in the form of Shinra's Lancer, Arthur.  (Though I guess in this case, he's more of a Saber.)  Randomly coming into the series early on, Arthur describes himself as a knight, his plasma cutter is called Excalibur, and he will make sure you know this fact throughout the rest of the series.  That's it.  That's his entire character.  The best the series does to elevate his character is through the use of jokes and comedic moments involving his stupidity and stature as a knight, though it gets old really fast because having one character have half his lines claiming that he's 'a knight' barely constitutes as a character to begin with.

Unfortunately, much of the recurring cast follow a similar character structure.  Maki constantly beats those that she thinks calls her a 'Cyclops Gorilla' and adores her little fire sprites, Tamaki always ends up in fanservice scenarios because reasons, Captain Obi always thinks of the good of the people, and the Lieutenant always has some weird hat.  The style of character writing Atsushi Okubo does slowly fizzle away as more and more characters of varying importance get introduced, but the more prominent ones always seem to have this strange need of needing to repeat the same things over and over again as if to remind themselves of what their character is.

The antagonists fare a little better due to a majority of their character traits bordering obsession and other heretical aspects, but usually all fall under the umbrella of the 'Evangelist' and the desire to burn the world (again) and create the world anew.  Which, not really quite sure how that works, but sure, apocalypse is fine.  

Aesthetics:


Thanks to the power of the Jojo people, Fire Force comes off as a clear, stylistic show that really comes into its own.  Due to the expansive worldbuilding of the series, the combination of religious imagery with industrialized/scrappy buildings give the Empire of Japan a unique look to the setting of the series.  My favorite little detail are the blue rings on the heavy jackets of the Fire Soldiers.  They provide a nice contrast to scenes swathed in red and orange, and stand out to give scenes a bit of color when there just sometimes aren't any due to the scene being dark or because of some other reason.  

Character design also deserves praise, as each character has a unique aspect to them that gives them readability even if names don't come to mind.  Shinra's shark-like teeth, Haumea's crown-like visor, and Tamaki's awful excuse for a combat outfit (literally just a bra) are several examples that come to mind, and the different silhouettes are things that I definitely appreciate.  Atsushi Okubo's style of character closeups where we see characters' faces from very weird (and creepy) angles also comes back, which is at least on-brand to say the least.

Animation is also one of the series's strong points, as the waves upon waves of fire that spray and burn the series's landscapes and battlegrounds really create a spectacle to watch.  The sound design for these scenes where laser sounds and crunches in addition to typical whooshes and crackles really help elevate the action.  Shinra's ability to spurt fire only from his feet are a main contributor to how good the animation can be, as his fighting style lends itself to creating action from all angles involving both the air and ground.

Of the four opening and ending tracks, Mrs. Green Apple's "Inferno" stands out to me as the best of what the series got with its ED sister of 'Veil' standing out as a close second due to it contrasting the upbeat energy of its rivaling OP.  The high energy of Inferno feels like a 'Shonen' song just fits with the overall thematic of Shinra and the bouncing comedic tone of Fire Force.  It's one of those songs that I didn't think I would give much care for at first, but quickly became one of my favorites of the season and definitely has an interesting memorability factor to it that I didn't expect.

coldrain's "Mayday" by contrast is a song that...I'm not that big a fan of.  Honestly, with this song being metal, I'm not surprised it attracts the niche audience it does.  I don't know why there's a decent count of shows that get a metal song as its second OP, but hey I guess that's just how the industry works.  Definitely a recommendation for metalheads, but not really anyone else if they're not a fan of the genre.  Lenny code fiction's "Nounai" feels almost like a callback to the first OP and is definitely the least memorable of the four tracks.  It's decent, but it's kinda generic, especially when comparing to the other tracks of the series.

Personal Enjoyment:

I remember watching Soul Eater so many years ago and finding it...not really my cup of tea.  The way that Atsushi Okubo did characterization really boiled down to a number of the series's cast audibly repeating the same lines that explained their characters over and over again ad nauseam and I felt really tired finished the series because I didn't feel enough for the characters to really care about whether or not they succeeded in the end.  Where they were living in because of the stylistically drawn setting and soul-eating concepts were drastically more interesting by comparison.  

Fire Force falls on a very similar spectrum where the potential and intrigue of the world vastly outdoes the execution and plot of the series, leading the end result of the series to feel like it's good, but lacks something in order to complete it.  Watching Fire Force, I always felt the want to learn more about the series due to the interesting concepts and the mystery of 'Spontaneous Human Combustion', but not enough to really care when I was going through episodes since after the loredump, there wasn't really anything that kept me gripped into the series.  Interesting character concepts are lost when there's not much to anyone aside from a small bullet pointed list, and the slow, uneventful crawl to the end with the last episode left a bad taste in my mouth since it's clear they're revving up for a second season, so they can't do anything drastic or else it's doing too much too fast.

As such, my recommendation for Fire Force really falls to those either interested in a new shonen series to get their fix, or those who really, really liked Soul Eater.  The two series have way too many similarities that can't be ignored, and I lament having to compare the two together since I kind of wanted something new instead of a rehash of something I've already seen with a new coat of paint on it.  Fire Force is still a serviceable show that does have a lot of great points to it, but nothing about it is monumentally groundbreaking, which to me means that it ultimately squandered its potential. 

Fire Force is a show that introduced an interesting world, story, and themes, but comes across as childish and fails to resonate any meaning. When watching the show, I felt that if it was intended for a more mature audience, it wouldn't have to hold back as much. Some moments feel very dark for a show like this but they are few and far between all the unfunny comic relief. It doesn't start off strong but gets a little bit better as it goes on.

Characters:
Character development excluding the main character is quite awful. Shinra's development throughout the show is interesting with twists and turns along ... the way. The other characters are painfully static. Their first introductions are pretty much their only development and some of the "villains" only change by becoming friendly to the 8th. No character ever really changes and grows throughout the show (other than Shinra's strength I guess). Shinra claims what he wants to do from the start, while what he overall does changes, he never deviates from "being a hero." While I don't think this was bad for the overall show, I think there were many opportunities to let him question his motives and think in a different way. While conversations with friends about Shinra, his "bland" character is intentional and gets better later in the manga. His character isn't

Comedy:
The comedy of the show follows pretty standard themes for other shonen. I don't think I even smiled at many of the jokes. The worst part of it all though is the off-putting fan-service. Kotatsu, Tamaki is the first character that comes to mind when someone asks "When has fan-service done a show wrong?" Tamaki's character solely exists to be groped and become naked. One of her powers is literally "Lucky Lecher Lure" and does more for her than her other power. There are many shows that do fan-service right, take High School of the Dead for example. That show was able to balance the fight scenes with the service well and it never felt like they clashed. But with FF, it just felt entirely out of place. Whenever a scene involved Tamaki, I honestly felt like just turning it off. It might be a little unfair to compare an ecchi with a shonen of fan-service, but I think that FF stretches itself too far when "adding a little plot." There was also the fight between Arthur and Shinra that served as comic relief but never made any sense and just made them seem excessively childish, which I guess makes sense for a show like this.

Sound:
Overall the sound for the show is pretty good. They do like using a lot of bass drops though during the fights but don't subtract from the overall plot and impact of the fights for me. I think the 2 intros and endings serve the theme nicely and are all decent songs.

Animation:
The animation was fine and nothing overall stuck out for me other than the strange close-ups of people's faces and some weird cuts from the action. The fight scenes were very good and are what give my rating its current value. But something that I didn't like was the second intro's animation. It did not match the song and felt way to slow for a song as fast as MAYDAY. It almost seems like they animated it for another song and changed it last minute.

Overall, I feel the show lacks in many ways because it was unable to decide between a comedy and a dystopia. I wouldn't blame anyone for dropping it early in the season. Some people might be able to find the show more interesting, but I wouldn't recommend it.

Let me just start out by saying the animation in this show is absolutely SUPERB, the soundtrack and sfx too, absolutely insane! kudos.

Unfortunately, that doesn't save the show from the mediocre mess it ended up becoming. The premise is pretty good but the execution was very dull and the charcacters forgettable. A lot of content felt recycled from soul eater and I don't want to be "that" person but I did have an issue with the fact that the female characters were around solely for fanservice. The rivalry between the two main characters was boring and at one point, i didn't even understand what the ... characters' objectives were anymore.

Still, A++ animation and just art in general, if you're looking for a show with dynamic fight skills (especially if you're looking for something to use as reference), I extremely recommend it. If you want a show with amazing soundtrack and great OPs and EDs, I extremely recommend it. If you're tired of watching the same shounen show with a different name well.... lmao

I tried to force myself to finish it but I just couldn't

Enen no Shouboutai is a show that was being compared to the other top tier shonen of this decade. When this happens it is usually very difficult to gauge the actual quality of the show while ignoring the hype before actually watching it. This is the reason why I decided to watch this show after a fair amount of time from it's airing.

What we see here is a show with an interesting premise, superb action,fair world-building, decent characters, attempts at comedy and fan service. A promising action/comedy shonen that should have been way more than it is.

I'll elaborate more on each topic respectively,

Starting with the ... action and world-building, to me it felt like this was the strongest part of the show.
The combat and fight scenes ( especially the arc with Capt. Benimaru ) are very well done. I really took note of the way they imagined the sounds effects.The sound an adolla link makes, the sound when a plasma blade scrapes a demon's horn,the absolute thicc bass when a demon is obliterated, all sound exactly like they should. That being said it's not always like that. Some fight scenes inject comedy into them in a very tone deaf way, shows can handle comedy and action and even comedy during action without completely disrupting the tone that they set( Mob Psycho is a brilliant example).Other fight scenes sometimes don't take their time to really make the viewer understand the dynamic of the fight, and sometimes they are straight up disappointing. Every fight scene involving Dr. Giovanni turns into a lame version of him being inspector gadget.

The captivating mysteries surrounding the flames and the truth behind the incidents is what kept me watching. However, the show was so hesitant to let me have answers in a consistent fashion. Many other details like the life style of the civilians, the shift in work force , how society adapted to this change are all left for the viewer to speculate upon. There are certain aspects of the special fire force and their lives that the show touches upon but that's about as far as it goes.Most of the reveal happens during the last few episodes in a rushed manner to give the next season some steam.

The character design in this show is very cool, Captain Burns is like a pyro version of solid snake from the metal gear series, Dr. Giovanni looks like a plague doctor etc,although I wish they did more with these characters. They give some characters quirks and quips but no real personality.As of the ending of the first season we still don't know the identity of the antagonist or even the purpose of characters like Joker.The show has a sizeable cast but doesn't give them the time to breathe and make the audience take notice of any of them.The last thing is the women.It's disappointing that this show has no impressive female characters.Look, i'm not the kind of person who catalogs anime based on whether or not a show has a female cast, it can have 0 female members or an all female cast as long as they serve a purpose.The purpose here seems to be to fetishize a fit girl, a shy girl, a dominatix, a neko girl etc and that's why it's disappointing.

Lastly, Comedy and fanservice. I have intentionally clubbed these two together because most the comedy in the show is fanservice in disguise or running gags like "gorilla cyclops" and Arthur isn't smart.They quickly lose their charm.
The comedy is pretty hit or miss ( I guess they sometimes miss huh), its a lot of "How dare you touch me there,b-baka" moments.The fanservice in this show is in so much excess that I just simply skipped over them ,which is saying a lot coming from a perv like me.

At the beginning of the show, I fully expected that I would rate this very high,but as it went on and I saw more and more shonen tropes,stale jokes,more questions than answers,"oops,I somehow became naked again" scenes and sometimes straight up bullshit that it started cutting into my enjoyment of the show.Things that were used to make a show lively when nothing much was happening were starting to butt into sceen during important scenes/fights/explanations in a way that feels odd.My rating gradually got lower and lower finally landing at a high 5 or a low 6.

I'm writing this review without considering the manga as an alternative in order to make this review fair, but if you decide to change to the manga then go ahead.

Fire Force has the potential to be one of the best and most entertaining contemporary shounen if it wasn't for its ever-changing quality in direction and animation. To list a few of those directing issues we have: Awkward panoramic shots with no-face characters that last for five seconds fights with seemingly no correlation between cuts, sound designs that make my ears bleed from the pain that is to hear Shinra's feet explode, among others that I ... won't detail for spoilers.

Nonetheless, the characters are what maintain the show afloat and what kept me still watching this show. They are all very charismatic, each one of them having specific character traits to make them stand out. Not a single one of them feels out of place and they all have such good chemistry between them that you can mix any characters and have a comedic and/or dramatic scene with no problem.

The story has a pretty basic structure and nothing innovative in that aspect but the execution is what matters and Fire Force does a pretty good job at adapting a story to its specific world and set up. Fire Force has a unique story in that aspect and it never feels forced, boring or uninteresting; it always has you on the edge and wanting to see more of this world and its story.

The designs overall of background and characters are well translated in spite of some colour and lightning choices that sometimes put me off but nothing too distracting. However, as much as this show sometimes made me want to drop the series, there were moments where Fire Force outshone itself in the production design and brought me to hope for the future of this shounen.

Fire Force might be a production mess at times but it has competence enough for it not to be a pain to sit through more like an enjoyable and unique show to watch.

Fire Force initially hooked me because of its interesting premise, or rather it´s interesting setting. The idea of all the powers being related to fire, the idea of infernals and instantaneous human combustion, and the MC being in a Fire Force all sounded interesting. It´s still just a different skin on other shounen anime (Everyone having unique powers, the MC being in some sort of a squad, and there being monsters they have to defeat isn´t exactly new after all), but it is a unique and interesting one, nonetheless. I was especially interested in the different types of powers the author would come up with, ... since they all have to have the same basic premise: fire. (I´ll talk about the powers themselves later in more detail)

The first two or three episodes didn´t disappoint. The first episode was just frontloaded with sakuga. It looked incredible, and it delivered everything in terms of introducing the main characters and the premise that I needed it to. The scene in the second or third episode where they encountered the dude who got infernalized but was just sitting quietly in the living room, trying to hold it in to not hurt anyone, just waiting to be killed, was really good as well. We had some solid character-building moments for Obi, Arthur and Shinra there as well. Basically, Obi teaching them the importance of their job. That was solid. But then the problems began, and I´m gonna do my best to illustrate what these are in the following paragraphs (well, I do have a couple of positive things to mention as well):

I´m not going to address every single little thing, that would go beyond the scope of this review. But I want to address some core problems I have with the character writing, the story writing and also certain scenes or segments. So, let’s just start with the first big one. The character writing in this show is quite terrible.
The characters don´t have personalities, they have a personality quirk that makes up their entire general personality. If we´re lucky we might get a backstory and/or motivation for a couple of them, but that´s it. Shinra smiles when he is nervous and wants to be a hero, Arthur is dumb and thinks of himself as a knight, Maki is muscular but cute, Iris is nice, Hinawa is serious but cares about his teammates, Tamaki is fanservice, like, you get the idea. These things are decent bases for a character, but not enough on their own.

This segment will be me talking about some characters specifically:

Shinra is about as generic as you can get with a shounen protagonist.
His tendency to smile when he´s nervous and therefore being called a devil is interesting, the problem is that we never go beyond this stuff. It´s just a quirk to set him apart from other similar characters. And his yelling about wanting to be a hero gets quite annoying after a while.

Arthur literally never does anything beyond being dumb and blabbering about his knight stuff. It´s hard to hate him, I´m not gonna deny that his idiocy is kind of endearing, the problem is that just that doesn´t make a compelling and good character. I´m sure that at some point later in the manga there is going to be some sort of backstory for him, but I don´t think throwing in a backstory after like 100 chapters or whatever excuses him from being a one-dimensional piece of cardboard for everything before that. You can write a multifaceted character without throwing an elaborate backstory at the reader immediately.

My problem with Iris is that after she was sort of relevant in the whole Hibana thing (which I´ll get to specifically) she just kinda hangs around afterwards without doing much, since she is not a fighter and the author doesn´t seem to know how to make her relevant without the ability to fight. Again, I´m sure there might be a point in the future of the manga where she does something semi-important again, but as before, I´m not sure that excuses this. It´s not just a problem with her, it´s that way with multiple side characters. The author seems to have a tendency to drop and bring back characters whenever he maybe has an idea what a certain character could do. I just don´t think that that´s good writing. If it´s a rather unimportant side character that´s fine, you don´t have to have every character in your story do something at all times, but I´m talking about characters from our (very small) main squad.

Let’s keep going, Maki next. In the way her character was handled I was also pretty disappointed. I was ecstatic when she was introduced in the first episode. A cute but muscular and capable girl? Uh, yes please. Now let’s just keep building on her character an- What´s that? She barely gets any focus? Oh… Like, I honestly think it´s a shame. I think we get like one sentence on her motivation: That she´s the daughter of a captain but wants to prove that she herself is capable. That´s fine, we never see any of that from her specifically though. She´s always stuck in the archetype of the cute but strong girl that gets angry when someone comments on her strength, but the funny twist this time is that she gets angry at something that wasn´t even said. That joke was funny the first time, but not the next five times. We never go beyond that, not once.

And the biggest sin of all: We never even see her fight or do all that much. She was their when they invaded the base of the 5th department, but I don´t think she did much aside from like three punches, Hinawa was the one who took most of the normal dudes out. The only real fight we see Maki in is when she was fighting the flail guy close to the end of the season, and that was pretty amazing. Why couldn´t we have gotten more of that?

And now, the worst character, bar none: Tamaki. She is genuinely one of the worst things I´ve ever seen an author inject into their story. And I´m calling her a thing because that´s exactly how the author treats her. Not as a character, but as a vehicle to put fanservice in the show. Not only is that fanservice incredibly annoying (which I´m aware of is a subjective opinion), it´s also often completely misplaced and used in the middle of fights or other important scenes, completely ruining the tension that has been built up in the scene. Is it really necessary to burn her clothes away right after a scene where she was crying her eyes out because the man she loved betrayed and beat the shit out of her? Is it necessary to have Shinra faceplant into her boobs in the middle of an important fight?

And one of the worst and most ironic sequences I have ever seen, when she finally seemed to have a moment that can make her shine that doesn´t involve her getting naked, when she was fighting that Slaughterer guy. She talks about how she is a fire fighter herself, and doesn´t always want to be saved by others. I was like “great, even though it´s late maybe the author will finally make the step and actually give her a decent character moment.” And what´s the way she defeats him? Not by showing that she is a skilled, capable fire soldier, but by the bad guy accidentally grabbing her boobs, being flustered, and then getting struck down. I couldn´t believe what I was witnessing when I saw this. I was just dumbfounded. Just a horrible, horrible way to handle a character.

The other characters are mostly the same. The best character is Benimaru Shinmon, we actually get to see his backstory, motivation and him behaving differently at different times. He doesn´t always behave the same way. It´s almost like humans are that way. I also appreciate the backstory on how Obi and Hinawa founded the 8th, it fleshes them out a little bit more as well. None of these characters are fantastic, but at least there is something there.

Now let me talk about the story itself a little bit.

For the most part its what you´d expect from a shounen. It´s honestly nothing too special. But there are glimpses of something interesting every now and again. The mystery surrounding the world is generally pretty good and makes you want to know more about it. I said it before, I like the whole idea behind the setting. And I don´t hate the whole Adolla Burst and Adolla link thing. It especially makes room for some interesting theories about how the perpetual power plant, Amaterasu, works. Based on what we´ve got I have a pretty good idea on how it works, and if what I´m thinking is true, that´s just really fucking cool. (But I don´t wanna go into that here) The way Shinmons district “celebrates” people becoming infernals is also an interesting idea.

But, after the initial good couple of episodes, there was a stretch of like six or seven episodes that was borderline unwatchable, either because of how dumb or because of how boring it was. The training/infiltration thing was just boring until the Rekka dude started murdering children. And the Hibana arc is something I want to talk about in more detail.

The whole Hibana arc was where the show started to go wrong for the first time. Simply because I cannot believe her character. The way her backstory and everything was executed just doesn´t work, I think. Hibana is shown to be a very arrogant, prideful character who looks down on everyone, and has some very strong ideals/beliefs and some very strong feelings about hew views on this world. We learn why that is in her backstory. Well, in concept we do. Let me explain what I mean by that. She saw all the other nuns burn to death, and only she (and Iris) survived. And since she never took praying as serious as the other nuns, she believes that God doesn´t exist, so it must be the devil. And if she and everyone is a devil, she should act like one. (I don´t remember it exactly but it was something along those lines). I understand in concept what we´re going for here. But I don´t think it works the way it´s shown in the anime. I get that she has trauma, but she is shown to go from a caring person to bat shit insane evil in a matter of seconds.

But you can still make an argument for that. I don´t necessarily think it was executed well, but I can at least understand it to some extent. Now, the way she turns back after Shinra punches her once, I cannot understand. He talks to her about needing a hero because she´s given up on the concept of heroes and some more of the typical shounen talk-no-jutsu stuff, punches her, and bam, she is not very evil anymore (though her arrogant nature remains at least to some extent) and she´s in love with Shinra, because of course she is. This bullshit I can not make an argument for. The way she flip flops from being normal to evil to normal is just bad character writing. You cannot show me a character who has such a strong conviction in their philosophy of the world and then have her just abandon all of that in a matter of seconds. Either have this be a very slow process over the course of the series or show her having doubts in her beliefs from the beginning. The way it was handled is just bad. I´m not going believe a character who goes from talking about how she needs to be evil and exploit everyone for her own good to fondling Iris´ breasts in the shower to see how she developed in the matter of an episode. Just. No.

Let me quickly talk about the villains. The infernals are pretty cool, I love their designs, but the big bad guys are obviously not them. The villains are mostly alright, but since every villain is part of this cult, their motivations are always the same, which gets quite boring. None of them seem to have any goals beyond the motivations of their cult.

The next point I want to talk about: the powers themselves. For the most part, I think the author succeeded in making the powers unique and interesting. Shinra being able to shoot fire from his legs isn´t exactly a revolutionarily creative power, but I think it´s totally fine, since it means we´re gonna get a different stye of combat from the main character. It´s not all that often that we get a main character who´s power is based on mobility, not raw strength. So, in this aspect the fights have a certain uniqueness to them compared to other shounen. Powers like Arthurs Plasma sword, Hinawas ability to control his bullets, or Hibanas ability to basically make you pass out because she overheats you, all of these are cool and creative applications of the fire premise.

But there are some powers that I´m not quite a fan of. At a certain point it felt like we were moving farther and farther away from the premise that the powers need to be based on fire, and more to the premise that the powers just need a fire aesthetic. Like one character (Lisa) who just has tentacles. And they don´t seem to burn people, when she was holding Shinra (I think it was him?) in one scene with them he didn´t get burnt. And I don´t think it´s because of natural fire resistance or whatever, Hibanas cherry blossoms were very much able to burn him. Also, correct me if I´m wrong, but I don´t think solid fire is something that exists. So, what are these tentacles made of? They are just regular tentacles, but they are red, so it´s a fire ability. Same thing with this one guy who has a fire flail. The fact that it´s fire doesn´t mean anything as far as I´m aware. Another one I don´t quite get is the power of the captain of the 6th. She has a fire serpent that can heal people. How? Maybe it´s explained later.

The animation is very good, but also very inconsistent. In the action scenes they deliver good animation most of the time (although still to varying degrees), in all of the other scenes it often looks very static and not a lot is going on in terms of animation. Character designs are good, and I like the art style, although it does weird me out that most male characters seem to have the exact same face. I don´t know why, but it looks like this to me. Maybe because the eyes are always drawn in a very similar way and their heads have the same shapes. Well, whatever.

The sound design is stellar. The sound effects are quite amazing. Voice acting is good, music is pretty good, first OP is a banger, second OP is decent as well. I don´t really have any complaints on that front.

That should cover most of what I wanted to talk about. I can see the appeal of this show. If someone´s into all of the classic shounen tropes and just wants an action show with pretty fight scenes and flashy powers that you don´t have to pay a whole lot of attention to, this show is probably a perfect fit. However, I was looking for some substance behind the nice production, but I just couldn´t really find much of that. Fire Force has a nice shell, but sadly that shell is mostly empty.

I was at least not bored most of the time, it´s hard to be completely bored in this show if you like action, because at least on that front Fire Force has some great scenes, but I also never found myself being terribly interested in what was going on. The most I could muster was acknowledging “that´s a really nice-looking fight scenes”, but since there was nothing to be invested in for me, I just wasn´t more hyped for anything that was going in. It feels like I wouldn´t really lose anything in terms of enjoyment if I just watched the fights without context on YouTube.

In summary, it was an interesting premise for a shounen ruined by shallow characters and a fairly average story that was saved from getting a worse score than it got from me by having good animation and sound, some interesting mysteries about the world and very few interesting ideas in the story. So, the final verdict is 5/10. I know that by calculating the average of the scores I´ve given the different components of the show (characters, sound etc.) it´s closer to a six, but I just can´t value something like the sound as highly as the characters. So, it ends up being a 5/10 from me.

Episode 9 and the one before it convinced me to drop the show. Seemed like a lot of gratuitous violence toward children and women as shock value, while the revelation that a character we know little about is one of the bad guys was not as surprising as they seemed to be going for because we haven't gotten to know him.

And then there's the fanservice. I have watched One Piece for 11 years. I don't mind fan service... When it's used appropriately. There is a time and a place and stopping a key fight scene just to have multiple breast faceplants and a character's clothes ... strategically removed to be as revealing as possible ain't it, chief. Plus this happens at awkward, poorly timed moments constantly, in every episode. It's starting to feel more like a softcore hentai. I wanted to like this show because of the animation, character design and interesting concept but... nah.

Watch Promare instead if you want fiery action.