Kyoukai Senki

Futuristic post-war Japan is divided into four military regions, each led by conflicting nations trying to gain complete control over the country. While the Boundary War—fought with the help of humanoid mecha weapons called AMAIM—has long been over, the rivalry between these factions is still ongoing, and, as a result, the Japanese are heavily oppressed.

Amou Shiiba, a 16-year-old orphan boy who is secretly rebuilding an abandoned AMAIM named Kenbu, stumbles upon Gai, an autonomous AI in need of battery power. By choosing to help one another, Amou and Gai find themselves at the center of a disaster, and Amou is labeled a terrorist and cast out of society. Even so, Amou refuses to remain idle in the face of injustice, and he embarks on a long journey rife with struggle and companionship. His aim transitions from leading a peaceful life to liberating the Japanese people.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Shiiba, Amou Main

Satou, Gen Japanese

Tezuka, Gashin Main

Uemura, Yuuto Japanese

Shishibe, Shion Main

Ichinose, Kana Japanese

Gai Main

Fujiwara, Natsumi Japanese

Kei Main

Ishikawa, Yui Japanese

Nayuta Main

Murata, Taishi Japanese

Zelenoy, Alexei Supporting

Namikawa, Daisuke Japanese

Gobert, German Supporting

Fukuyama, Jun Japanese

Ho, Guan Supporting

Mizunaka, Masaaki Japanese

Spears, Joe Supporting

Nakano, Yutaka Japanese

Tasaki, Katsuya Producer

Beniya, Yoshikazu Producer

Habara, Nobuyoshi Director

Abe, Masashi Episode Director, Storyboard

Reviews

Jan 2, 2022

Captain110

Recommended

Kyoukai Senki was very enjoyable for me. I found that it wasn't the Gundam series that I love. Sunrise did a great job taking this anime in a different direction. The fact is getting a season 2 which is solid. It was very boring starting episodes but it did pick up as went on. The final episode was well done left a lot of questions about what's coming in season 2. Kyoukai Senki mechs had total different looking like Gundam rip offs the AI were funny each one was unique. Kyoukai Senki is solid anime something you can watch in day. Slow beginning but the ... solid ending for the first cour.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Dec 27, 2021

i-like-this

Mixed Feelings

Sir Killalot’s Japan.

I was surprised at how hyped I felt by the end of the first episode of AMAIM. It establishes it's world and military problems well, Amou and Gai, a super AI meeting and helping each other even under the reality of becoming terrorists was well set up and animation seemed to be pretty good.
The real problem with AMAIM is it’s pacing. After around the 5th episode the story hops from mecha, military action to a strange mesh between a slice of life and boy scouts genre… thing. It doesn’t really work.

Amou is a pretty okay lead protagonist. He’s shy and indecisive, but ... he’s not an insufferable idiot like most teen protagonists caught the centre of a military war anime. He’s not Shuu from that piece of shit Guilty Crown is what I’m saying. Amou feels like a typical teenager who has gotten into something way over his head with no way of turning back and he has real flaws to back up those feelings. By the end of the season his character arc is actually quite satisfying. That said, he’s not a particularly interesting character to watch which is the problem. That could be said for the other two lead AMAIM pilots. Gashin is the dark, brooding type who's father was killed by war and blah, blah, blah you’ve seen the archetype a million times before in other, better (and worse) anime and Shion likes to… make pots? Well it’s original at least.
The AI’s can range from silly too annoying. Nayuta is definitely the worst offender, but I actually really liked the chemistry they shared with their respective pilots, especially Amou and Gai. They act like real buddies and it’s kind of cute watching them joke around and support each other.

The animation is pretty good. When the action is low it can get a bit distractingly sloppy especially in the faces, but when the action is happening the show can get fucking awesome! I found myself surprising invested whenever the mysterious, rouge mech Ghost was fighting and the last episode was an absolute blast.

It’s unfortunate that the whole show couldn’t have been as engaging as the final episode of the season. Sloppy pacing, cliche villains and inconsistently interesting main leads means theres a lot holding this show back from being good, but I do think it’s an okay show. When the show hits, it fucking hits and, I mean I watched the whole thing so… there is a lot to like about it too if you’re willing to give it a go.

6/10 It’s Okay *Thumbs up*

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Dec 27, 2021

KANLen09

Not Recommended

To the folks over at Sunrise:
We know, we know. The Gundam franchise that started way back in 1979, that was a massive success of a franchise that tied in all the anime, movies, Gunpla merchandise, video games, heck even the long-lasting relationship and sponsorship with Bandai, that spawned THE generation of what the mecha genre should be defined as. Years later, with the many iterations of Mobile Suit Gundam, and with the recent purchase and closure of defunct studio Xebec to turn that around as yet another subsidiary studio of yours by the name of Sunrise Beyond, the Gundam franchise continued from there with the ... inherently bad Gundam Build series that only serves as fodder for more of your advertisement for Bandai Gunpla merch.

The problem right now is, with Kyoukai Senki a.k.a AMAIM: Warrior at the Borderline, while the attachment to Bandai Spirits is the only notable thing that connects it to the Gunpla merch world, who is your target audience exactly? And what is it that you want to achieve with creating yet another standalone product that has no connection to Gundam (other than the robots that's uniquely designed by the one and only Kanetake Ebikawa), even at the mere slightest?

My reply to you:
Kyoukai Senki is just yet another disappointment of anime looking to fill the ropes of a Gundam-esque spin-off, filled with too much overbearing political BS, that the story's concept and execution is even more pathetic than the worst that Code Geass has to offer. For someone that wants to get into the Gundam franchise but doesn't want to go through the intricacies of starting from scratch, please, just watch any good Gundam show (that literally has Gundam in the title) that holds up as its own source material. You'll spend your time better that way than to watch this bastardized uninspired boring mish-mash of a show.

If you've haven't already caught my message, Kyoukai Senki is just a mess of a boredom show that's awaiting your attention, then beckoning you to fall asleep more quickly as soon as it starts going deep. The story of a futuristic post-war Japan that sees it divided into military regions like World War III is happening in the modern age to see which one stands supreme. To counter this Boundary War of sorts, the destruction mechs called AMAIM are once weapons to the cause, but not solutions to the oppression of ordinary Japanese citizens. And all it takes is for an orphaned boy, dawned with his sense of justice, coincidentally find an abandoned AMAIM with an autonomous AI embedded in it, to get it juiced up and fight for his own independence together with his friends and comrades ready to fight for a Japan that's liberated from military prowess. Thanks to the MAL Rewrite team for the synopsis to which I counter-wrote here for this review, because I could not be bothered to add more stuff from what the anime presented, so much that it hurts me deep inside.

Kyoukai Senki (or AMAIM which I'll refer from here on out) is just plain bad. Mecha shows have a standard story formula to go by, and as much as the predictability can set in quick, it's the execution which defines the experience. And that experience is set by scriptwriter and series composer Noboru Kimura, which looking at the hit-and-miss work resume that he has, I'd fathom why he chooses to play mindgames with people about the shows that he's written for, especially originals (see Gundam Build Divers, Skate-Leading☆Stars). Not even acclaimed Xebec director Nobuyoshi Habara whom directed beloved series such as Soukyuu no Fafner: Dead Aggressor a.k.a Fafner of the Blue Sky and Broken Blade a.k.a Break Blade could ever be enough to save the horrific writing that Noboru Kimura has conceptualized for AMAIM.

If the story wasn't enough to save the anime, then the characters will be the judge of that. And yep, just as you'd expect, all the characters are one-note mutes, only there to service the "huge" plot that covers the span of the entire post-war Japan and basically having less or even no character development at all. For the first "homecoming" of an MC, 16-year-old Amou Shiiba isn't the type of character to lead that calvary charge, as much as his character feels like the exact opposite of that: a teenager who's just beginning to grow up into the face of reality shoved in his face, being ignorant and disillusional of his surroundings when faced with injustice, only to then be forced to act when the going gets tough. This is not how you want to paint your character being a person that's clouded in his own claustrophobia, and unfortunately all the character development that Amou got feels very forced and intertwined to the central plot. Like come on, have some backbone, will ya? Inject some sense into your head! The other AMAIM pilots of of Gashin Tezuka and Shion Shishibe are only as good as side-by-side comrade complements will get in battle, and have the same or slightly better backbone than Amou himself. Weakness is not a bad thing, but meekness is not weakness, and this kind of behaviour just isn't excusable.

The cast of characters are just far too much, most of the majority being a blip of cameo scenes when the show actually calls for it. From the best to the worst, the AI companions of Gai, Kai and Nayuta are good companions which both aid and power the AMAIM mechs for the respective pilots, and also serve as their stratagems when things are looking hot in heat. But Gai is just too talkative and loud to the point that it can get annoying at times. The branded terrorist group Yatagarasu, made up of people whom want to see the dream of a fully-liberated Japan, I do have some compassion for people fighting for independence, and most of them serve fairly to the plot in a good way. But when it comes to the various military groups (the Confederation of Oceania, the North America Coalition, the Asian Free Trade Entente, and the Eurasian military, like who is gonna remember each and every group), that is when the show banks hard into showcasing that the military is milking Japan for their own gain. And with that many groups, it tries too hard to exemplify that a war is ravaging, but why do you need THAT many people in the first place? Military is military, geddit? You're one entity, not segregated forces.

The two complements that I can give to AMAIM is that "the old has gone, the new has come". Xebec died and rebirthed into Sunrise Beyond is by no means a consolation to expect that there'll be good production values, and AMAIM just comes of as being decent at best. At least this show has Gundam mech designer Kanetake Ebikawa, so the AMAIM mech designs look unique and sleek to give it the fresh appeal. The OST is near-bangin' good with the mysterious new band that is Blank Paper's debut with the OP "enemy", and newbie singer Yu-Na Fukinbara's ED "You're my perfect mirror" is a solemn, yet melancholic song that speaks deeply to the heart, and has undoubtedly risen to become one of my top favourite EDs of the season. If there's one thing that Sunrise can be good at, is nurturing new talent for the company's music department.

But overall, even with decent animation, rather boring visuals and a good OST, art/animation and music aren't enough to save the clusterfish of a by-product that's looking to mime the success of the many iterations of Gundam, its settings and all that are sorely "founded" on the basis of Code Geass, and failing yet so spectacularly. Even yet another mecha show in the same season like Megaton-kyuu Musashi, I would definitely recommend that over this. But thankfully this is just Part 1, so Part 2 is coming soon in Spring next year to continue this as a split-cour.

Just stop using anime to farm for more merch, Sunrise. Even as a business entity, you're more than this, and definitely can produce better IPs than something of a non-canon like AMAIM.

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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Feb 16, 2023 1:17 PM by Hyperion_PS | Discuss (12 comments)

	Poll: Kyoukai Senki Episode 1 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Stark700 - Oct 4, 2021	62 replies	by SomeFennecu »» Yesterday, 1:26 PM
	Poll: Kyoukai Senki Episode 13 Discussion Stark700 - Dec 27, 2021	35 replies	by Timeline_man »» Sep 10, 11:53 AM
	Poll: Kyoukai Senki Episode 7 Discussion Stark700 - Nov 15, 2021	25 replies	by Deago »» Jun 25, 2023 1:30 AM
	Poll: Kyoukai Senki Episode 6 Discussion Stark700 - Nov 8, 2021	16 replies	by Deago »» Jun 24, 2023 6:05 PM
	Poll: Kyoukai Senki Episode 5 Discussion Stark700 - Nov 1, 2021	25 replies	by Deago »» Jun 24, 2023 5:33 AM