Heike Monogatari

The Heike Story, Heike Monogatari, or more objectively documented in Japanese history books as: The Tale of the Heike. No matter what you call this show, I see it as 3 words: a cult following.

It's so pleasant, fresh and refreshing to watch a historical work like "The Tale of the Heike" which was already very well documented in the history books throughout centuries as an epic account throughout its many translated derivatives, and the well-known 3-person team of director Naoko Yamada, scriptwriter Reiko Yoshida, music composer Kensuke Ushio who were once stationed at KyoAni making "A Silent Voice" and "Liz and the Blue Bird" before ... the well-beloved studio's unfortunate-and-fateful arson tragedy, came together to produce this show being adapted from Hideo Furukawa's 2016 work of the same name, translated into modern Japanese. Which if you read it in context to the series of events, having to see this notable event in animated form, while it will not beat the essence of the original work, at least this show is a statement piece to add to that work.

This 13th-century historical epic depicting the rise and fall of the Taira clan that's set during the Genpei War between 1180-1185, this story comes to us from a 3rd person's POV perspective of Biwa, a young girl and traveling biwa (the instrument) minstrel. And the first thing that you should be aware about Biwa is of the uncommon trope of a character that has heterochromia, which if you have watched shows like Wonder Egg Priority before, you know that there's a legit story to tell behind those pair of differently coloured eyes. And in the case of Biwa, her "origin" story is that she is the daughter of a biwa hoshi (lute priest) who got killed by guards of the Taira clan after she unintentionally insulted them, and she dresses up as a boy in order to avoid detection from the Taira assassins. Biwa is brought into the Taira clan after her blind father got killed through the help of Taira no Shigemori, the next in-line heir to the clan, in the midst of the Genpei War and needing to claim supremacy to spread the Heike name far and wide. Being the eldest son of the monk Kiyomori, the irresponsible and hard-headed leader of the Taira clan, Shigemori is a true taskmaster of what he does to keep his clan alive, no matter the hard tasks and internal strifes between family members (most especially the leader Kiyomori) in concern towards the raging war against their natural enemies, the Genji. Like Biwa, Shigemori is also heterochromic, but as opposed to Biwa foreshadowing the future with her pair of eyes, Shigemori on the other hand, can only see the spirits of the dead. But the two come together because of the fact that they're both heterochromic of seeing the future and who dies in various periods of time, and knowing Biwa's resentment on the Taira Clan for killing her father, this fact is only known in the most secret of secrecy between the two as Biwa is taken into Shigemori's family disguised as the usual orphaned child to be a companion for his wife (Tokuko) and 4 children (Koremori, Sukemori, Kiyotsune and Arimori).

The fact that both Shigemori and Biwa have "merged hands" is just for one sole purpose: to avoid the downfall of the Taira clan (and simultaneously the Heike) and with the amount of foreshadowing done between the two, they make amends to save the people they know that will face death imminent at specific junctures of their lives. But don't forget that as much as Biwa can only do so much to help the loved ones around her, her main role is to serve to chronicle the events of the Taira clan's rise and fall. Playing the biwa as the events are documented through solemn song, Biwa's voice gave some atmospheric pressures thanks to her VA Aoi Yuuki, and the juxtapositions of how both the Taira clan and the Heike are slowly but surely squandered of their control provides a sense of realism for a time period that many of us would've preferred to be in just for a day, and nothing more. Truth be told, I always get goosebumps whenever Biwa plays her lute to depict the winners and losers growing towards the Genpei war, and not just for Aoi Yuuki's distinct vocal performance, but also that Kensuke Ushio's magic for BGM around those periods are the ones that you'll really feel that it hit the hardest as you see people die for glory, valor and especially not to be humiliated by a rival clan like the Genji. Remember, pride back in those days are akin to today's high-standing political positions, only that the olden days have more weight to carry people and moral with them. It's for this reason where the story really shines, and as complex as the Tale of the Heike gets with many characters, locations and motives that you will not understand if you're that type of person who likes to have a fix on the content, but it's meant to tell a much bigger story: a larger than life story that only some like Biwa have the privilege to witness while helping others out of their rut if it's possible. We are also seeing this in a 3rd person perspective, so we're also in Biwa's shoes to really see what'll happen in this epic journey of proportions unimaginable. Your mileage may vary depending on whether it makes or breaks your experience.

Historical work like this, there's bound to have characters which may seem like a lot of actors running around a traditional town going places, and unless you're the type to really analyze what these characters add to the mix (I sure as hell understood), then this will also prove as a miss point to you. I have watched many historical live-action dramas that has the setting be like this (most of it are Chinese-based but it's similar), and can largely understand the adage of "too much cooks spoil the broth". But for a show that's based solely on this time period, you have to understand that there's a lot going on under the hood from royal families to ordinary townsfolk, because every fateful decision will be carried down to the people, and these decisions have serious implications to affect not tens but hundreds and thousands of people, affiliated or not. For example, taking Biwa into context as she journeys and dictates the life of a Heike, there's not one single person that is the sole cause for many to act. It's through meticulous and calculated actions to think for your own people, starting from the top-down royalty, and when pride and ego comes into the mix for characters like Kiyomori, the downfall is just as striking as the rise to fame, even if albeit a short-lived one. Everyone's decision matters, and not one character is wasted because he/she feels redundant to the entire story, which says a lot about character dynamics, especially for one rooted in the historical complex.

Unsurprisingly, you should already know of the 3 names by now: Naoko Yamada, Reiko Yoshida, Kensuke Ushio. These 2 ladies and a man have very prolific portfolios of works to their name, and the departure from KyoAni to Masaaki Yuasa's studio Science SARU marks a brand new chapter where this feels like the old Madhouse standards of Masao Maruyama being flexible with his staff to do what they want to do with creative freedom. Nevertheless, The Heike Story also really glows with vibrancy and colour throughout the entire show, and since "Eizōuken ni wa Te wo Dasu na!" a.k.a "Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!" was a significant mouthpiece for Masaaki Yuasa's studio in 2020, that excellence carries over in this show, and I can never get bored of watching visuals done the same that are made different which gives it a very unique feel of watercolour oozes. It's mouth-droppingly gorgeous, I'd say so myself. Making things better is the OST for the show, part of which I've already covered especially for Biwa's song recital tunes. Hitsuji Bungaku's OP is really good that's not worth even an episode's skip, and agraph feat. ANI's ED "unified perspective"...I don't know if you're feeling this with me, but there's a sense of duality, not just with the black-and-white visuals. It almost seems condescending to have monochrome colours to show Biwa's state of mind, and I guess the two-toned, mostly instrumental song is there to provide context of perspectives that somehow, work really well to give a ghastly vibe.

Does it really hurt for me to say that I want more of the trio's work portfolio, now that The Heike Story is offically added into the list that stands alongside KyoAni's films? Hell yeah, I suppose. The consensus is that you don't just watch shows that are done by well-enough reputable people, entities or even companies, because what concerns us is the real meat of the show and its contents, and for a work that's based on a centuries-old book, The Heike Story is a story worth telling for the many generations to come, and you and I both form the cult that will spread this underrated work that has gone under the radar for time past and present. Let this story not be gone and left in the dust in the future, and I applaud Naoko Yamada, Reiko Yoshida and Kensuke Ushio for the substantial effort for this underrated anime that's one hell of a learning journey through Japanese history.

I love Yamada Naoko, and the last thing I expected this to be was a disappointment. Think about whether or not you'd be excited to watch a light novel adaptation because its fans swore by it. Now replace “light novel” with "14th century epic chronicle,” and instead of getting an adaptation which enlivens the story, you get the screenwriters reading the SparkNotes summary of the original text out loud while periodically inserting their own headcanon at the most inopportune times and reinterpreting the setting in a similarly jarring fashion. A historical text of this nature had simply too much ground to cover, and an eleven ... episode TV anime didn’t give them nearly enough time to do so. They had to juggle the half-baked emotional lives of the Taira Clan, the manufactured backstory and narrative relevance of their anime original protagonist, Biwa, and the extensive formal narration sequences stringing the story together. Needless to say, the resulting anime is a bit of a mess. What’s worse is I know this is all most likely Yamada’s own fault. A director has a team of episode directors and storyboarders on projects not because they don't want to do all the directing themselves, but because most of their time is spent being showrunners who oversee creative decision making, and it seems KyoAni's tightly knit team and the constant presence of Ishihara and Takemoto really supported her more than anyone originally thought. Deciding to add so much anime original content only to cram the rest in with it was stupid, and it quickly became clear Reiko Yoshida had no idea how to pace such an unruly source material, the likes of which she's never handled before.

Anyone who hasn’t read the original text will find this rushed adaptation to be completely impenetrable. However, considering this show’s lukewarm reception even in Japan, any source material unfamiliarity which international viewers may have isn’t really the problem. The show is just plain boring, and everyone other than Biwa has the presence of a completely forgettable potato. Speaking of Biwa, this show feels like feudal Japan sanitized for the social justice generation. Yes, underage arranged marriages are bad. War is bad. Classism is bad. But these are all fundamental aspects of feudal Japanese society, and to have our obnoxious little Greta Thunberg protagonist scream in the faces of warlords about their moral bankruptcy and have them respond with goofy anime smiles and laughter instead of doling out punishment is just plain stupid. AstralBread wrote a preliminary review where he described Biwa as a protagonist who “simultaneously has zero presence [and] is a giant eyesore,” and I couldn’t have said it better myself. The story tries to prioritize a vague sense of climax towards the end, but in the early episodes, it absolutely refuses to make any necessary cuts. They’ll sideline important characters to focus on those who quickly lose relevance without even including their whole story because limited screen time didn’t allow, so what you’re inevitably left with is a bloated cast of increasingly inaccessible names and frustratingly identical faces, an anime original and out-of-place protagonist who gets inserted into plotlines she obviously has no place in, and partially developed characters with butchered backstories to whom you say goodbye shortly after meeting.

The animation is usually fantastic, which is surprising considering Science Saru has always been an absolute clown show. Yuasa burned out as soon as he realized producers couldn’t be artists, and he put Eun-Young Choi in charge of the studio despite being deeply out of her depth. They hire way too many foreigners, many of whom are total amateurs and not used to Japanese work ethic, and worst of all, they take on more projects than they can realistically handle as a studio. They were doomed from the start, and up until now, they’ve been incapable of making even a ten episode anime worth a shit for Netflix, one of the richest entertainment companies on the planet. I figured there was no way they would be able to keep up with Yamada's unrealistic KyoAni standards, and the production would fall apart as soon as she failed to deal with the industry’s incompetence plaguing a project of hers for the first time in her sheltered career. However, I can’t even grant them this, because their chosen color palette is so dry and dull, the animation can look bland even when it moves well. This is yet another case where I’m forced to blame Yamada herself, because the Director of Photography, Kazuto Izumita, worked on absolutely gorgeous anime like Great Pretender, Ousama Ranking, and Rolling☆Girls, so it can’t possibly be one of those cases where the DOP wasn’t supervised closely enough by the director. She obviously had a vision, and it obviously didn’t work. It’s a respectable passion project, and it has lots of beautiful shots and impressive sequences of animation, but it’s the most style-over-substance rendition of classic literature you could possibly imagine.

Thank you for reading.

Heike Monogatari is a beautiful series rich of meaningful emotions that the viewers will come to experience. It feels like a dream that slowly turns into a nightmare. It's a series that feels it has the same spirit Odd Taxi and Sonny Boy had. That being that it's a passion project trying to sincerely write a good series that doesn't use the cheap types of tactics mainstream anime uses to pull in viewers. I love anime that take risks, though they become the highlights of the season, the dedicated viewers have to accept that hardly anyone will watch them or appreciate what they tried to ... do. This series has flaws, but what frustrates me more is the mob of people who have lost touch of what writes even a decent series. Thus, trash like Mushoku Tensei and 86 become the most popular ones; the ones that will be hailed as masterpieces in the years to come, while a series like this, that is significantly better, will fall into obscurity and though appreciated, that group will be small. That is the fate of anime like this and that's an even greater tragedy.

Biwa goes on with the ability to see people's futures. For her it's suffering to see what she has to see, and her frustration goes on as she feels powerless to be able to do anything about what the visions show.

The Heike are filled with loveable and well written characters. They struggle to carry their clan as they travel, look for support, and battle against those that want them to disappear.

As for the flaws, the story was obviously told very fast since the staff only had 11 episodes. Some of the characters I liked the most felt rushed. The music, though I enjoyed it, felt strange in the way it was executed. The opening and the ending are my favorite of the season, however. The fights are sometimes grandiose, and sometimes slideshows.

Despite it's flaws, it's a solid 9/10, and I hope more passion projects with the skill and ambition of this appear soon to relieve me of mainstream anime.

Naoko Yamada (K-ON, A Silent Voice) and Science Saru (Hands Off Eizouken!, Devilman Crybaby) team up to deliver an excellent adaptation of one of Japan's most famous pieces of literature.

STORY

For the record, the "Heike Monogatari" was written in the Middle Ages the is based on historical events preceding and during the Gempei War of late 12th century. The story is sometimes referred to as "Japan's Iliad", and just as how in the West everybody knows how the Trojan War ended, everybody in Japan knows the final fate of the Heike clan. All this to say, "spoilers" are a moot point given you can learn the ... plot with a quick internet search. The crux of the tension in this adaptation of "The Heike Monogatari" is that our main character knows how the story is going to end thanks to her oracular eye- which I find to be an interesting take on the original material. Rather that try to work around the fact that the ending can be found in any Japanese history textbook and surprising the audience is a lost cause, the plot fully embraces that fact by making its audience-surrogate character knowledgeable as well and building the story around that fact instead. That switch-up keeps things fresh without having to take major liberties with the source material.

CHARACTERS

Although Biwa is the "main character" she functions primarily as an audience stand-in. From a meta perspective, she's there so that characters from the original story will have a good reason to explain crucial plot and character details which otherwise they would not need to discuss. Her foreknowledge of the ending and the tension and dramatic irony it provides are also crucial elements of her character. Finally, she serves as a crucial "point of reference" due to the fact that other characters can be expected to pop in and out of overarching plot regularly. Given that there are small hints that she will be re-telling the events of the story long in the future, it is unlikely she will do much beyond the observer role in the anime- with all the characters and plot points in the original work going on there would be little space to fit her into the existing story anyway. It's best to think of her as the character from over whose shoulder you watch the main story.

Keeping up with the rest of the cast can require some foreknowledge of the "Heike Monogatari" or at least a bit of active attention. The various people Biwa interacts with are usually given sufficient characterization and background information for the audience to understand how they all fit into the larger picture, so this anime doesn't suffer from "Continuity lockout" for those those who don't know the source material. Go in expecting something like "Legend of the Galactic Heroes" where there is a large cast with no single main character around which everything revolves and who is supposed to be there for the entire time.

ART & SOUND

Science Saru delivers their unique aesthetic and fluid animation in spades here, perfectly complemented by Naoko Yamada's mastery of stillness and quiet. This anime can move beautifully, but also knows when the story is best served by stopping and taking a breath. I've never been one who can break down precise animation and sound choices in any detail, so if you need somebody who can provide and deep-dive on production values you'll need to look elsewhere. Just that I that think both animation and sound display top-tier talent.

ENJOYMENT

I'm getting older as an anime fan. High school ended for me over a decade ago and even college is now starting to be mentally classified as "A while back". Every now and then I stop and wonder if a point will come when I finally age out of the anime community. But then I find something like this, something that reminds me animation can cover all kinds of stories for all ages, something to invest in even after the high school romcoms and college student in another world stories no longer resonate.

OVERALL

This anime may not be built for explosive mass popularity, it may not slot easily into some easily marketable form, but for those of us who want something different in our anime it's a must watch.

While many people were kindly disheartened by Naoko Yamada’s departure from KyoAni, I see it as a logical step forward in her already auspicious career. Yes, KyoAni is unquestionably an industry leader, pushing the envelope on how visually marvelous anime can be, but at the end of the day, KyoAni still caters to a broad audience—they wouldn’t be as successful as they are if they didn’t. With her latest films being “A Silent Voice” and “Liz to Aoi Tori,” Yamada has been dipping her toes into more experimental media for some time now, and with that requires creative freedom not as easily available at that ... beloved studio. So her transition to Science SARU—one of the most experimental anime studio to come out in recent years—serves as an exciting foray into the world of arthouse; and adapting a poem as ancient and dense as “The Tale of the Heike” makes this project all the more ambitious.

But regrettably, that ambition might’ve been too great.

For those who don’t know, Heike Monogatari is basically the Japanese equivalent of the Iliad and Odyssey; it’s a tale as old as time passed down through many generations. To adapt such a story would be a task so gargantuan, even the most talented of screenwriters would cower at its premise. And yet, Reiko Yoshida—who’s pretty much written all of Yamada’s works—stepped up to the challenge. I respect it, but the narrative was...messy, to say the least. The show kind of expects you to fill in the gaps yourself, but as a Westerner who isn’t too familiar with Japanese literature, the plot lost me more often than I’d like to admit. But that isn’t my fault. The job of a show is to tell a story, not to tell a story I’m supposed to already know: it’s just poor adaptation. There are way too many characters sitting around and talking about the plot, things just happen and I have no idea why, and it has the same problem as The Godfather where there’s a bajillion characters I can’t keep track of (it doesn’t help when so many of their names end with “mori”. Yamada just wasn’t set up for success with such a convoluted script adding so much confusion to the whole experience. On top of that, it was bizarre to see a script play so far away from her strengths as a director.

As evident from interviews in the past, Yamada describes herself as a “method” director, taking pride in her ability to get close to her characters’ thoughts and frame of mind. And looking at her filmography, this is her first time directing a story that isn’t set in modern-day Japan, and she seems out of her depth here. Biwa, as an observer-type main character, has next to no presence in the story for most of the runtime, and for a historical-political drama, none of the other characters were all that relatable either; it felt like she was grasping at straws when trying to portray them. Why? There’s too much dialogue. Her characters aren’t allowed enough space to express themselves. Yamada’s style focuses on empathy and all the little emotions we hide in our body language and facial expressions. A common theme among all of Yamada’s works is the deep anxieties the future can hold, and that fear has always been communicated through subtext. I don’t even want to call it subtext, because that implies there are lines of text to read in-between, and her best moments are when there IS no dialogue, conveying emotions purely through audiovisual mastery.

Oftentimes, Yamada’s characters aren’t able to process the emotions they’re dealt with. The beauty of K-on is in the senior's naive ignorance of their transient lifestyle. Tamako Love Story captures the unease of facing others’ feelings, including your own. And if “A Silent Voice” didn’t make this clear, emotions are more than just words; it’s not something that can be described, only felt, and she’s consistently delivered on that delicate intimacy until now. Heike Monogatari falls into that anime trap where everything’s overexplained. Characters that somehow have the self-awareness to psychoanalyze everyone including themselves is a trope I despise in drama. So to have Biwa, a literal child, flat-out say that she’s “frightened of the future” in such a pronounced manner was jarring, to say the least.

To make matters worse, the show feels tonally all over the place because Yamada was trying to get TOO artsy with it. I never thought Yamada would be one to use vapid metaphorical imagery, but alas, I was wrong. The most egregious example is in episode 6 where Kiyomori sees smoke in the shape of skulls to symbolize his guilt and fear of the recently deceased. Wow, how deep. I swear it looked like a parody scene straight out of Adventure Time; it was horrendous. If it was any other director, I would’ve burst out laughing.

And the final nail in the coffin to this bizarre mess of a show is the music. Ushio Kensuke—a composer that previously worked with Yamada on “A Silent Voice” and “Liz to Aoi Tori”—has started to become monotonous. It feels like he’s recycling old ideas in an almost self-plagiarizing way. His music is wonderfully hypnotic and captivating, seducing his audience into a more contemplative headspace to explore the character’s emotions. It was gorgeous, really, but this time felt lackluster and out of place. There were moments with goofy percussion, then 2 seconds later comes the more metronomic pulse of a sentimental piano. Instead of easing the audience into a lull, he’s just telling us how we’re supposed to feel, and that’s annoying. Also, for a period piece, I’m not a fan of him using modern instruments in the soundtrack. Sure, he made sick music in “Devilman:Crybaby” and “Ping Pong the Animation,” but why the hell am I listening to a brisk techno beat in a show set in the Heian Era? And it’s not like it’s a fusion of culture like Samurai Champloo.

I honestly think the biggest crime here is the rushed pre-production. I didn’t think Yamada would resort to the occasional still image. Naoko Yamada is a director that excels with time. Back in KyoAni, she had the liberty to completely redo K-on’s character design (a decision that paid off dearly) and she had the luxury to spend 2 trips to London in preparation for K-on the Movie. From what I can tell, Science SARU seems to be facing overproduction issues to the point that Masaaki Yuasa—a director synonymous with the studio—says he himself is burnt out and needs a break. That’s why Yamada’s here. They’re trying to look for freelance directors to diversify their catalog so Yuasa doesn’t have to do everything himself. A classic tale of too much anime, not enough workers. It’s depressing, really.

I know I’ve been mostly negative on this review, but that’s only because of my exorbitant expectations for the show. I mean, it’s not all bad. I liked some of the flower imagery. Whenever older Biwa starts hacking away at the biwa (what a dumb idea for a character name) with an intense staccato, it gave me chills. I love the background and how it gives it off the feeling of an old scroll. And I especially love the shots where Biwa is framed with one eye and the other is hidden off-camera. Depending on what eye is shown, it conveys a lot of what she’s thinking.

Everything that could’ve gone wrong went horribly wrong, but Yamada still managed to pull out a show that looks better than the vast majority of anime I’ve seen. It was too artsy, too ambitious, but I’d rather have it be too ambitious than not at all. This shows that Yamada is still a top-tier director, but also a painful reminder that no artist is infallible. Despite all of that, Yamada continues to be my most favorite director—not just in anime, but across all media. Having one disappointing project doesn’t change the fact that she created what I believe to be 4 consecutive masterpieces, nor does it diminish the deep catharsis they brought me at points in life I needed it the most. Sure, it could be that this new direction is actually pretty good and I’m too close-minded to see her vision, so I do look forward to revisiting Heike Monogatari after several months of reflection.

Thanks for reading!

This review contains spoilers for the original Heike Monogatari epic poem.

The Heike Story anime simultaneously:
A) Paces and structures the story in a way that makes it impossible to understand without having read the source material.
B) Shifts the focus of the story to anime-original elements like the new female protagonist and eye-based superpowers.
The result is a mess that doesn’t work as a stand-alone series and doesn’t work as an adaptation.

More on point A:
This is just one example of the many. The second episode of the show tells (via a 30-second narration) the story of a dancer Gio. She used to be the Taira patriarch Kiyomori’s ... favorite, but then he kicked her out, replacing her with another dancer, Hotoke-gozen. Except Gio was still demanded to come and hang out with Hotoke-gozen, who was lonely. Later, the episode shows Gio, her sister, and her mother as nuns, talking about how Kiyomori was cruel to her. And finally, the episode ends with Hotoke-gozen also becoming a nun.
So, who are all these people, and what is the point of having them in the show? Well, turns out you have to read the original to know the answer to these questions.
You see, despite ordering her to visit, Kiyomori treated Gio like shit, to such a degree that she wanted to kill herself. And then her sister wanted to kill herself out of solidarity. And their mother threatened that if they killed themselves, she would also kill herself, and it would be their fault, so they couldn’t. At which point Gio and Sister opted for the next best thing and abandoned the world to be hermit nuns. And so did their mother. And so did Hotoke-gozen, because she felt guilty. The moral of the story: Kiyomori is a dick, and also impermanence of life or some other nihilistic shit, idk, I’m not a Buddhist.
None of that is showed in the anime. Even assuming that Heike Monogatari is as well known in Japan as the Iliad in the West (everyone knows Iphidamas, son of Antenor, right?), that’s just not how adaptations are supposed to work. Either explain your side plots properly or don’t bother including them.

More on point B:
Biwa is one of the worst protagonists I’ve ever seen. She manages to achieve the unachievable. She simultaneously:
1) Has zero presence.
2) Is a giant eyesore.
One - she is completely irrelevant to the story. The only thing she has to do with the plot events is kinda being around when things happen. I mean, sure, she is supposed to represent the wandering musicians who had passed on Heike Monogatari into the present (the name Biwa is so on the nose, if this was a series about the American Revolution, her name would’ve been Constitution), but that’s a very poor and misguided excuse for having a main character that doesn’t influence the story they are a part of in any way.
Two - she is not integrated into the base story at all. This is freaking Heian Era, the very first scene of the show actually demonstrates how merely raising your voice against the ruling class gets people executed on the spot - and then there’s Biwa constantly yelling at all these feudal lords and court officials like a rebellious teen that pulls a “you’re not my real dad” card on his step-father after getting caught with a cigarette - and no one bats an eye. This character would make much more sense if she would've been a student from the future who time-travels to this period for her history class report and is invisible/incorporeal to the locals.
Four - Biwa and other anime-original elements of the show are generic anime fluff devoid of actual originality. She is yet another “plucky anime tomboy with a clumsy surrogate father” cliche (just from recent memory, Dororo, Arte, Deca-Dence, and this very season’s Sakugan all share this cliche). In this show’s world, having heterochromia gives you superpowers, just like in Rozen Maiden, Darker than Black, and Wonder Egg Priority. The disproportionate amount of screen time allocated to minor female characters suffering because it was hard to be a woman in ye olde times is the laziest Oscar-bait imaginable. And so on, and so forth.

If you want to see a good adaptation of an ancient epic poem that tells the story through a lens of modern values yet respects the source material, watch the movie Troy with Brad Pitt.
If you want to see a good anime about the plight of a Japanese woman in the patriarchal Japanese society, watch Hisone to Maso-tan (or just about anything by Okada Mari).
If you want to see a good anime with lots of feet drawn by Yamada Naoko, watch Koe no Katachi.
If you want to see a good anime with a ye-olde-Japan art style, watch Mononoke.
But I don’t see any particular reason to watch The Heike Story anime.

4/10 for “nothing of value.”

It is definitely a challenging watch, but I am really enjoying this so far. There is a special something about this show, so I strongly recommend giving it a try with an open mind.

I have not read the classical literature that this show is based on, and my knowledge of 12th century Japanese history is minimal. The synopsis provided on the MAL page here should be good enough to get started. Know that it is a centuries-old story of a powerful clan at its peak, the conflicts and political maneuvering it gets tangled up in, and the members of the clan in various moments of ... their lives, in their triumphs and misfortunes.

You absolutely do need to pay attention to follow the story even on a general level. Lots of names of places, people, and factions are dropped at a rapid pace, and often the characters on screen are not introduced, and you learn who they are over multiple scenes. Years pass in a flash without the show drawing attention to it, and character relationships and allegiances sometimes flip without warning. At times I did not fully understand the details of the situation, and I could tell that a lot has been withheld, either as an artistic choice or because prior knowledge is assumed of the Japanese audience. I have to admit that it can be exhausting at times, but I can also appreciate how the show does not get bogged down and expects the viewer to be watching and catching things.

However, I feel you do not even need to understand the whole picture. You as the audience are peeking into the chaotic lives that these characters lived almost a thousand years ago, as they are living them. From these moments, you can still understand on an emotional level what drives them and what they struggle with. I would say you can have a similar experience reading myths and folk tales, where the stories and characters are often bizarre, but you can still feel something from them.

Thankfully, the viewing experience is greatly elevated by the gorgeous art style, animated with a lot of care. The creators are not going for an insane level of detail or complex animation choreography. The colors, shading, and animation are more subdued than its contemporaries, but they still evoke an absorbing atmosphere, as if you're looking at a moving painting from the Middle Ages. The show is just so calming and pleasing to look at.

The music also adds so much to the show. Despite looking like a period drama, there is a lot of piano, electronic, and rock music in the soundtrack, which creates a surreal sensation and somehow enhances the atmosphere. Of course, there is traditional Japanese music as well. Especially memorable are the musical interludes where a character narrates the proceedings in a few lines of song.

If you have a love for shows that pursue unique storytelling and art style, if you have even a passing interest on medieval Japanese history and art, or if you can sometimes enjoy a story that has an evocative atmosphere but is not always easily understood, please give this a try, up to Episode 4. I will be cherishing it and go through the episodes as slowly as I can.

"Tomorrow. The next day. After this. In the future. Far in the future. Even farther. One day. Now I can look up for the future. Good things happen too."

How do we overcome suffering and how stories that have been told over and over again through generations can help us accept the nature of life, it's ups and downs?

The director Naoko Yamada was one of the survivors of the arson at Kyoani studios in 2019 and her first big work after this awful trauma is the retelling of what is arguably the most famous story of Japan, and the way I see it, this has ... everything to do with the events of 2019.

The Tale of the Heike (Heike Monogatari) is a work of historical fiction describing the events of the Genpei War during the end of the 11th century, but these facts are know to anyone nowadays. Just like the main character, we can glance "into the future" and read the future of each one of the characters that is presented to us during the series, so what's the point?

The point, I believe, is the deeper meaning behind the original tale and is expressed in the quote from the anime above, among other scenes. We suffer with the tides of life. Nature teaches us about the impermanence, the mighty fall, those who live happily today might suffer tomorrow. And yet, life goes on. Accepting impermanence as the real truth of life and remembering those we lost not with grief but with gratitude can help us overcome whatever might happen. Just like in the period described at the tale, we too live in a period of rapidly change in society, big historical events happening at our doorstep, and we might see ourselves as victims of chance and the fast changing of tides. But the acceptance of impermanence and the memory of the past can help us endure and acquire wisdow. Just like no power, happiness and good fortune lasts forever (the lesson the Taira clan learned the hard way), so is suffering and pain. After all, good things happen too, and no matter how hard things might be, there should still be a reason to look up for the future.

On a technical level, this work is a masterpiece. The exposition being played by the biwa player singing the respective parts of the original tale reminds you that this is a story that has been told through oral tradition, at the same time, the mixture of modern music makes the quick description of battles and political events more dynamic. Overall, the story chooses to focus more on the characters of the Heike clan than on the battles, which for the most part is a great choice. Special mention to Saori Hayami as Tokuko, which was simply the perfect choice, specially in the last episode where you can really hear the director speaking through the character on the themes I talked above. One small issue is that the events and characters are hard to follow if you never heard of the story before, but nowadays with the internet, an overview of the events is at one click distance, and I don't think the goal of the anime was to give a historically complete description of the events anyway. Also props to Aoi Yuuki's biwa and her singing of the tale. I would totally buy a complete version of the tale singed by her if that ever becomes available.

In short, don't let yourself be discouraged by not knowing about the actual history behind it before watching. If you really get interested, you would be falling into the Heike Monogatari rabbit-hole sooner than you think. Go ahead and enjoy the most beautiful animation of 2021.

13th century tragic epic about the fall of the house of Heike in the Genpei civil war (1180-85), marking the begin of Japan's middle ages and samurai rule. The jaw dropping beautiful images and cinematography focus on the period's flair and character emotions. Think: Shakespeare rather than detailed history lesson.

The camera work is fantastic, Naoko Yamada didn't fall into the trap to give us more of the same such as her trademark leg shots. Her new shticks are asymmetric image composition, super-closeup into faces, and objects (pots, pillars, ...) between the camera and the scene. And the occasional leg shot nevertheless. This comes on top ... of her new employer's (Science SARU) sophisticated CG. Screw you, Mappa and ufotable, this is better. More impressive details include the art direction which resembles the ancient watercolor style (like in Takahata's Kaguya-hime) and highly detailed background images. The latter of course styled after traditional Japanese art from the early middle ages. All combined, this easily results in the visually most impressive show of the year.

The story itself takes place before the Japanese middle ages (before 1185) and was first written down in ca. 1330. Until very recently there was no translation usable for somebody who is not a scholar, and the text fills about 800-1000 pages in print. The social realities we see are as ancient as the language used to describe them, a modern Japanese couldn't read or understand either. This epic can be compared to the raw material of the Canterbury Tales, the Nibelungen Lied or the King Arthur legend. The show dares to cover all 1000 pages, i.e. the story is told from beginning to the bitter end.

Yamada's approach to the heavy lifting of telling this beast of a story works. She is historically correct in all details mentioned, but it's not important for the viewer to pick up everything. It certainly improves the experience to know the historical facts, yet not knowing them doesn't kill the fun. That's because she makes the emotions, internal drivers and characters of the (many) players visible. Just like Shakespeare focuses on that in his many tragedies about the Kings of England. It's drama, it's persons, it's tragedy - not a history lesson. This includes the courage to have time leaps and gaps, an episode may skip details and events of the more boring years of this decades spanning narrative.

What truly helps here is Yamada's ability of "show don't tell", working with body language, and proficiency with camera techniques. For example putting a pillar in front of the scene creates an emotion in the viewer as if they peeked from a hideout. So there is no need to explain that we are witnessing a secret meeting to conspire against the emperor anymore. We intuitively feel it. With compact visual story telling like that, she maxes out the short runtime of only 11 episodes.

Sound and music mix ancient and modern styles. A memorable trip hop ED meets traditional Japanese song accompanied by the biwa. The sound editing is in line with the high production values and supports the powerful images without stealing the show from them.

I consider Heike Monogatari a future classic, and the next step in Naoko Yamada's growth into Japan's most important and gifted anime director alive (RIP, Satoshi Kon). It's been a long way from K-On!'s moe blobs to this epic, and I hope she isn't resting on her fame any time soon.

I fell in love with this anime since the 1st episode. The story is announced from the start: we will follow the downfall of the Heike clan and the fact that we know from the start what will happen at the end does not make the anime less good and on the contrary, rejuvenates more interest in this one. The characters all have unique personalities and the overall atmosphere is very appreciable. The humor is not too much and mixes well with the atmosphere.
I find the story told to be really great and never has a more boring moment and on the contrary have times ... that I find great. The sad moments and the happier moments really make this anime one of my favorites. I find it underrated and hope more people will recognize all of this anime's great qualities.

This show is one I'm not really sure how to recommend, as when I read through the already-written reviews to look for common criticisms and compliments from other people that I can either support or refute, I found that there were 2 main problems people had with Heike Monogatari. Which is that it a. was too confusing, and b. that the protagonist Biwa that was original to this adaptation didn't really add anything and just took away screen time and exacerbated the previous problem.

I personally agree with the second issue, from what I have heard and found online the real Heike Monogatari was quite the ... long tale, with one of the earlier translations spanning 800 pages. There was no damn way they were going to fit all of that stuff into their quaint 11 episodes, and I think this was the main cause of pretty much everybody's problems. The addition of Biwa certainly did not help with this problem in any way. I thought she was a fine character (other than her absurdly round cheeks in that one shot in the OP), but she really doesn't do much of substance in terms of the actual plot, and her individual story isn't really worth cutting out more of the main plot, which was way more interesting. I will say that her being a blind (at the end I guess that's a spoiler but don't get mad at me its in the synopsis) biwa player was a nice touch considering the most widely accepted version of the story was compiled by a blind monk from a bunch of stories passed down by other monks who chanted the tale with the accompaniment of a biwa. Other than that neat little factoid she wasn't really that necessary and was definitely a bit of a detriment to the story as a whole.

The other problem is a bit more of a subjective one. Many people said that Heike Monogatari confused them, even some who had read the original work. The thing is that I personally never got that confused, so I'm not really sure what to say about this one. I can definitely see how it could be a problem, it is a political drama after all, and does have quite a few characters that you need to keep track of, many of which happen to annoyingly have names that all end with -mori. I just personally didn't find it too confusing, but since quite a few people did, I think it is pretty important that anybody planning on watching Heike Monogatari keeps this in mind before and as they do.

Now enough about what I and other people didn't like about Heike Monogatari, what did I like about it?

Quite a bit, I think one of the strongest aspects was definitely the art. The soft color palette was really appealing and nice to look at, and gave everything a nice and natural look. The characters themselves also all had pretty distinct designs, which definitely helped me tell apart my -mori's from one another. There were also a few shots in some of the battle scenes that really reminded me of the style of traditional Japanese artwork, with sprawling scenes with multiple little things all happening at the same time. I think the visuals were fantastic, and really stood out to me.

Despite how it was confusing to many, I also really enjoyed the main plot of Heike Monogatari. I didn't know it but I guess I really like historical political dramas. It also just made me realize how much more awesome and cool history there is out there. Growing up in the US you really just learn about US history and European history, but Heike Monogatari has really strengthened my fascination with how much more history there is out there, and how much more infinitely interesting it can be than Teddy Roosevelt.

Some people knocked the characters of Heike Monogatari for not really being relatable, which yes I can agree with, but I feel that sort of misses the point. This is a historical work, and while some changes can be made in the fine details of these characters, they still are all people from almost 1000 years ago, and really can't be expected to be that relatable to us inhabitants of the 21st century. So instead I think its more fair to base them off of how memorable or interesting they are, and in that aspect I think they do just fine. While I may not remember some of their names (I still haven't got the hang of memorizing foreign names) I clearly remember and probably will remember plenty of them. Some of them were interesting people, and they all were a part of the story of the Heike.

In conclusion I think this has been one of my favorite shows of the Fall 2021 season. It's narrative really gripped me from the start and kept that grip strong the whole way through. It also gave me a deeper appreciation and fascination with traditional Japanese culture and even taught me a bit of history while it was at it. As long as you think you'll be able to keep up with the narrative without getting too confused I can definitely recommend this show, it was a great experience for me and I hope any other future viewers will feel the same.

Heike Monogatari is a 2021 adaptation of a 2016 translation of a 14th century epic account of the 12th century fall of the Heike clan, and it's as epic as that history suggests.

The story can be a little hard to follow, often long blocks of exposition are given about characters we haven’t met. Massive story beats come and go as if inconsequential, and multi-year time skips pass without mention. Each episode feels far longer than its runtime.

This results in a very distant perspective for the audience. This perspective is dry, and loses some emotional impact, but feels a grand, epic, tale.

I can ... say with confidence that there’s no other anime like it. The closest point of comparison I can find is War and Peace.

While the story is presented from a third person POV, our perspective shares major overlap with main character Biwa, a biwa player with the power to see the future who doesn’t appear in the original story. Biwa doesn’t change at all through time skips and major political upheaval. I found myself relating to Biwa, she views the story from as detached a perspective as the audience. Aoi Yuuki portrays her perfectly.

The rest of the cast is strong as well, particularly Shigemori, Tokuko, and Sukemori.

Heike Monogatari is elevated by its fantastic art and animation.The backgrounds are beautiful, resembling classic Japanese paintings, and the animation is consistently good. It is mind blowing when it dips into sakuga.

This is directed by Naoko Yamada, the KyoAni alumnus responsible for directing “K-On!” and “Koe no Katachi”, and the direction is exceptional.

The soundtrack is by “Koe no Katachi” composer Kensuke Ushio, and it’s as beautiful as that resume suggests. The show’s biwa and flute performances are great as well.

The OP features great visuals and a good song, but loses points for slight tonal dissonance from the show.

The ED is one of the best I've ever seen, it's slow and reflective, and beautifully animated and directed. The song transitions from subdued rapping, to a nearly silent passage, before abruptly transitioning into a loud instrumental closing section. I’m not familiar with music terminology, so I can’t explain precisely what's going on here, but I do know that it's amazing.

This anime is currently more overlooked than even Odd Taxi ever was, and is as much of an anime of the year contender.

Heike Monogatari is not for everyone, but I do strongly encourage giving it a shot, especially if you’re into Japanese History, historical epics, or the previous work of Naoko Yamada.

Well, this might be the worst thing I've seen in this period, I was in such a bad shape without the need for it
Heike Monogatari or "The Heike Story"
*The review may contain some spoilers*
Biwa is a little girl living in a period of Japanese wars and her father is killed in front of her simply and from the first minute of the first episode, which does not give any effect to the viewer. If the first episodes were used to build the character of Biwa and her father and explain the world of anime, the impact of Biwa's father's death would have been greater on ... the viewer and a little more logical

The structure of the world, characters and even superpowers is the worst of it all, I mean that all characters except Shigemori are 2D and don't have the natural reactions to the situations they are exposed to.
Biwa's father was killed in front of her and the only effect on her was that she screamed and there was no psychological effect on her because it "anger, hatred, grudge, desire for revenge or at least distrust of anyone." Instead, she suddenly went to live with the Hickey family and No one was surprised by this
Let's come to this Shigemori: who I thought was a pedophilia trying to molest a girl because of his strange behavior, and who suddenly saw a girl inside his palace and made her stay with him without any surprising reaction from her strange entry Without mentioning the abilities of his eyes, which is not mentioned how it came or why.. However, he remains a nice and comfortable character and the most logical person in terms of his rational behavior and may be the best character in the anime
Kiyomori: The worst character without complacency.. a one-dimensional person who doesn't even surpass being two-dimensional, arrogant, idiot the studio tries to portray as the sage with a nice second face through his excessive perversion.. and it is clear that they failed in that
Tokuko: A nice, cute, and demure girl with actions worthy of her position in the story and the events she experienced. Even her marriage did not come from her consent because she is nice, for example, but because she realizes that she has no other choice and will not have a refuge if she refuses, and she may be the best character in writing

The drawing of the anime/ is distinctive and appropriate to the events of the story in a great way and the animation is very smooth and beautiful with the design of the characters that make anyone who sees it realize that it belongs to this anime from its distinctive style
The sound effects/ are acceptable to some extent, but they are not that distinguished and do not remain in the minds of the viewer a lot, and their repetition is somewhat annoying, but the op is very beautiful, its lyrics are carefully chosen and its calm is comfortable, but the ed is the most wonderful thing.

I don't know if the anime deliberately promotes pedophilia by showing the marriage of 9-year-olds as a natural thing, or if their intention is to fight the marriage of underage girls by showing their suffering. Whatever it is, it is doing a bad job because it promotes it in one way or another, And if their desire is to fight the marriage of minors, then this matter should be shown more seriously, and it It must be structured for this event in a better way so as to leave an actual impact on the viewer.

Overall.. Heike Monogatari is an anime with good qualities and a unique story, but it was poorly executed, a terrible construction, and a non-existent plot that spoils the viewer's attachment to events and characters and makes the possibility of the viewer being affected by the events of the story is low.
But there are still some nice scenes that some people can enjoy, of course, but I doubt that their effect will remain after the completion of watching .. Because of the poor Narrative structure

It's hard to give any show a 10, but I find I can't give Heike Monogatari anything but. It's not perfect, but it's just so damn good.

Many shows start well then fizzle; others build to an anticipated climax that goes thud. HM never builds in that way; too much history and too many characters are coming and going for that kind of suspense. But each episode's story is a gem that works to make the too-short series hold together well.

And I imagine rewatching them without the week's delay will make it even better since characters can be better kept in mind.

The ending was amazing. ... It was heart-breaking, and the music underscored the pain. No surprise it reminds me of the ending of Eizouken ni wa Te wo Dasu na! Both came from Science SARU and the director was one of KyoAni's greats. We knew the outcome from episode 2, but that inevitability never seemed to be in place. And then suddenly it was, and all of a sudden, everything clicked and it was just too sad but done not with the usual melodramatic flourishes but subtlety and care.

Science SARU has become one of the best studios around. I cannot wait for what they do next. And in a few weeks, Im going to binge this and I bet it'll be even better. Without a doubt, the show of the year, just pipping Super Cub

This anime made me question whether I have prosopagnosia (face blindness) Lol. As someone with no background knowledge whatsoever this anime was very very very confusing….11 eps also took me more than an year to finish mainly because I didn’t catch up after a few eps while it was airing and then I forgot the storyline and my second rewatch took me couple of months and now I’m just confusion. I love historical genre hence I didn’t drop it but if you aren’t into the genre then just skip it. If I speak about the art, then some characters look really alike and there are ... these two baldies whom I couldn’t differentiate when either of them appeared. The characters name are your typical historical names like taira-no-shigemori, Fujiwara-no-narichika etc…and it was so difficult to follow who was who. I really have no clue what was going on. As a response one might say that there’s a novel or book about it which has details etc but honestly that isn’t a good argument for this. I’m here to watch anime directly and not read a whole load of backstory beforehand when I’m not even that invested.

I’m still rating it a 6 because overall it was fine, soundtracks are great (by composer of chainsaw man so you can expect similar soundtracks)….art is kinda unique but it isn’t bad…animation is fluid. Characters aren’t memorable except for biwa….I couldn’t even differentiate others for gods sake, all ladies looked the same all men looked the same and all grandfathers looked the same rip.
maybe the plot is really good too, it’s not that I disliked it…. I just couldn’t understand it…

Naoko Yamada never fails to surprise me with delivering projects better than her last ones, it's like everytime she works on something, she levels up.

This time rather than her usual genres, she took on historical genre and gave it a refreshing narrative through a short girl with weird eyes named "Biwa". Heikei Monogatari is a popular story in Japan (which tells the story of the rise and fall of the Taira clan during the Genpei War) due to that the series had very fast pacing like it was intended to skip stuff which would turn out to be unimportant to the whole narrative, which ... makes me sad that even Yoshitsune didn't get much screentime as the story ended.

And I loved the visuals... as always... took 650+ screencaps. The colors were vibrant, the style was consistent and the details were highlighted.

Overall, Heike Monogatari is a worthy watch, it can easily get you invested in the story and maybe motivate you enough to study more about the actual events of the history. Tho I can't say it's for everyone due to being historical/war/drama, but if you like this genre then there are some great live action movies directed by Akira Kurusawa and Masaka Kobayashi which shouldn't be slept on.

I could rate my recommendation of this anime as a 7 and a "Mixed Feelings" but I will give this anime the benefit of the doubt.

Heike Monogatari is another beautiful gem from Science Saru but I feel that I could have gotten better out of the story. I can't blame her for the fact that at times I found myself totally lost in the story, but it's also a fact that this one isn't such an easy anime to watch. Any lapse of attention and you are at the mercy of the story.

Its first 3 minutes are fantastic, it presents an anime splendidly and raises ... its hype to the heights, but I feel that these 3 minutes sell an anime different from the one we will watch over time. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but I, in fact, would like the anime to be the same as its presentation, which was impactful, tragic, suffocating and beautiful. The anime as a whole is light with its characters but dense with information, getting to be boring at certain times.
For those who watched the 11 episodes in a row like me, it is difficult to keep the focus 100% on the story, but for those who watched it weekly or paused, it must have been easier to digest the story.

The anime does have its epic moments, especially in the final episodes, reminiscent of the sensations experienced in the first moments of episode 1. And these moments are enhanced with a great studio production. Animation and soundtrack here are gold. They may cause strangeness but this difference, in my view, is something positive. We need a variety of animations in the anime and here is a full plate for those looking for that.

In addition, I highly recommend this story, as long as you watch it focused and dedicated. It can be quite an experience.

I don't usually write reviews as I'm not that good with words + English is not my first language, but I feel like I need to do it this time bc it's great and need way more recognition.

Heike Monogatari is overall an anime about the Genpei Wars adapted from a japanese folk novel
The first aspect I noticed of this anime was it's artstyle which remembers of the traditional japanese paintings. Lovely landscapes and scenes with vivid colors. Soundwise, it's obvious the presence of the Biwa sound (the protagonist, also called Biwa, is a biwa-playing minstrel) but it also adds a lot of newer more contemporary ... sounds as seen in the ending and some other scenes that breaks with the atmosphere giving it a wild feeling.
I found it a little bit hard to keep up with the names of the characters sometimes bc there's a lot from different clans and backgrounds, but the design is so unique I completely fell in love. It's also great to see how some characters mature over the course of the episodes, while some do not (which also adds to the story)

I quite enjoyed the series. It develops at a great speed but still with a lot of narrative and I know I can't make it justice with just my words so I kindly encourage you to watch it and experience for yourself.

So...this anime literally came right out of nowhere. Announced in September 2021, premiering not even weeks afterward, it caught a lot of people by surprise, especially the staff behind it. Directed by Naoko Yamada, who left KyoAni to join Science SARU which did the animation, with a screenplay by Reiko Yoshida, adapting one of Japan's oldest pieces of literature. I was all in. I mean, one of anime's most beloved female directors working on a show that promised beautiful animation and gripping political intrigue, taking place in the Heian era and starring a female lead? How could I not want to watch it? In an ... endless sea of generic ecchi and bottom-of-the-barrel isekai that get churned out every year, I was damn ecstatic to watch Heike Monogatari. It's no secret that my favorite anime of all time is Shounen Onmyouji, which is also based on literature that takes place during the Heian era and has supernatural leanings (Though Shounen Onmyouji is based on light novels). I was sure I was going to absolutely adore Heike Monogatari. But in case the rating didn't clue you in, I might have set my expectations too high.

Nobody knows who wrote the original Tale of the Heike, though this particular anime is based on the modern Japanese rendition by one Hideo Furukawa, and Heike Monogatari is the first animated adaptation of the epic novel. The anime's story goes as follows: Biwa is a young girl who has the gift of seeing into the future, but is told by her father to hide it. When her father is killed by the Taira clan's personal enforcers, Biwa is left an orphan until a member of the Taira (also known as the Heike), Shigemori, hears of her plight. Taking pity on her and because he himself can see spirits of the dead, therefore seeing in her a kindred spirit, he adopts her and makes her part of his family as a means of atoning for what his family did to her. But Biwa sees visions of the Taira clan meeting a bloody, violent end. Being a child and unable to do anything in her position, she can do naught but watch as the Heike's decisions and desire for power lead to their own downfall.

As much as I want to praise this anime up the wazoo, and believe me, you have no idea how much I want to, I can no longer deny its two biggest flaws. One is that the story Heike Monogatari tells is way too big to fit into a piddly eleven episodes. It's a big, sprawling epic that spans years and years, from the perspectives of a ton of different characters and showing how their actions directly or indirectly lead up to the great Genpei War. A story like this would be better told in, at the very least, 26 episodes, or at most, probably 39 or 52. Remember when anime that had that many episodes were the norm? And not just shounen anime? Because of how compressed the adaptation is, the pacing is very fast, leaving you with very little time to process all the big events that happen back to back to back, like a bunch of entitled soldiers burning a temple because the monks refused to let them use their bath, or Kiso no Yoshinaka razing the capital with his army for all it's worth. That being said, Heike Monogatari hardly leaves a moment for the audience to get bored, so there's always something going on to catch the viewer's interest. But that can also come with its own set of issues.

One of which is Heike Monogatari's second biggest flaw: This anime absolutely expects the viewer to be familiar with the original source material. It just throws a bunch of characters, names, and events at you in huge infodumps and exposition diatribes without much in the way of context, and doesn't even try to make an effort to allow the audience to get familiar with them, or show them in an organic manner. As someone who hasn't read the original novel, I was often very confused by the fact that Heike Monogatari seemed to randomly introduce new characters and situations in every episode at a breakneck pace, and even after several episodes, I could barely keep track of them. It doesn't help that many of the characters were hard to tell apart at times. Like, come on. I dare anyone to tell me they can tell Shigemori and Tokitada apart, especially since the former's left eye is such a subtle color difference from the other that it's still hard to tell who's who! And because of the anime's desire to just throw characters at you a mile a minute, any attempts to flesh them out come off as hollow because show's breakneck pacing doesn't allow itself to really delve into who they are as people, what makes them tick, why we should care about them, or even their states of mind as certain things happen. That being said, I don't want to be a Negative Nancy, and there are some characters who are very well fleshed out, like Biwa, Shigemori, Sukemori, and Tokuko. I found those four to be the most compelling, as we get to see them grow and change over the course of the series, even if I wish several scenes they starred in could have been presented with more focus and importance than they were. For example, Biwa's search for her mother and the end result of it is treated as mundane and an afterthought, and you'd think something like that would be hugely significant considering Biwa's, well, the main character. Koremori in particular was also a victim of this, as he could have been a more central character considering all the pressure he had on his shoulders, but the anime flip-flops between characters every other scene, making it hard to flesh them out in ways they deserve.

This is a more minor flaw, but sometimes the show has cases of pretty severe mood whiplash. For example, in episode 1, when Shigemori first discovers Biwa, she tearfully begs him to kill her...and in the very next scene, his maidservants are cartoonishly gawking at how poorly dressed she is, complete with cutesy music and cartoony expressions. Granted, this only happens twice, but they did feel pretty jarring to me. Of course, that being said, Heike Monogatari does have a lot to offer even with its flaws holding it down. For one, the animation is definitely unlike most anime and it's really a visual marvel. Naoko Yamada has always had a liking for live-action camera techniques, digital tools, and visual symbolism, light leaks, and so on, and a lot of the techniques she uses here really work, like depth of field, bloom lighting, and chromatic aberration. Every shot is packed with detail and used with purpose, from the sleek movement of the characters in motion to the impeccably watercolor/ukiyo-e style backgrounds conveying an almost otherworldly wonder about it. Pack that with a stellar voice cast and an eclectic but still mostly fitting soundtrack and you've got a recipe for greatness in terms of both sight and sound. So yeah, please don't think I hate Heike Monogatari, because I don't. Even though it's plagued by a lot of problems that prevent it from being considered a true masterpiece in every sense of the word, it still does have a lot to offer, and it's clear Yamada-san and her team put a lot of love, care, and effort into it. It didn't quite succeed, as it's short episode length leaves Heike Monogatari unable to live up to the huge story it wanted to tell, but as far as Yamada-san's first foray at Science Saru goes, I still think she hit a home run, and we still have ourselves a relatively good series here. Hell, if I was made to choose between this and the 800 bottom-of-the-barrel isekai that Japan likes to churn out, I'd pick Heike, no contest.

By the way, there is something else I'd like to mention as well: Just because an anime simply depicts problematic material, especially in the context of the setting and time period in which it takes place, that absolutely does not mean the show is promoting or encouraging it. Some dude on MAL gave Heike a low rating because they were under the impression that because it dared to show Tokuko's nine-year-old sister being married off to an adult man, a practice which, while definitely unacceptable in modern times, was considered commonplace back in the Heian era, that somehow the show was glamorizing or encouraging pedophilia. Uh...no. Heike Monogatari is absolutely NOT condoning pedophilia. If it was trying to do so, it would have made Moriko's marriage to an older man out to be a good thing, and there is nothing in the anime that does anything of the like. In fact, the anime subtly shows that Moriko's life turned out terrible when she was forced to marry. Seriously, people need to look more into the time period in which Heike Monogatari takes place. In the Heian era, women and children had absolutely no rights, agency, or autonomy. They had their lives dictated by others, whether it be family members or their husbands, and were forced to be submissive to those in power, even if women had positions of power, and any deviation from the norm would have either branded them as a pariah or gotten them killed, and even Heike Monogatari understands this. As someone who studied Japanese history in college, I can tell you for certain that Heike's depiction of both the time period and the questionable ethics behind marrying off underage girls for the sake of political alliances is fairly accurate. Besides, if that person thinks Heike is actively encouraging pedophilia or sexual assault, they ought to watch shows like Kodomo no Jikan, Daimidaler, every anime that sexualizes teenage girls (Which is about 80% of them, and Heike is not one of them), or pretty much every lolicon-centered hentai ever. Or that one movie called American Beauty, which is about a married, middle-aged man actively lusting over his teenaged daughter's best friend and has uncensored, underage nudity, and the movie outright encouraging his behavior. Make of that what you will.

With that, I think Heike Monogatari can be considered a flawed masterpiece. It really tries to be something good, and it is good, but because of how dense it is, I don't recommend this as baby's first grown-up anime. Not by a long shot.

"Heike Monogatari" brilliantly utilizes its artistic visuals, music choice, and story elements to convey a compelling story. As a history enthusiast, it is difficult to find shows that find that balance between the historical and anime elements. My initial hesitation was overshadowed by the show's surprisingly strong personality (For me a show's personality is how all the elements blend together to make it memorable).

If you are familiar with the ultimate result of the Genpei War, then boy oh boy will this tug at your heartstrings. This tragic tale touches on many elements such as loyalty, family, and inner struggle. You see characters deal with ... the consequences of choices and unintentional effects of the war play a toll on them. Its initially positive tone starts to fall apart as you witness events turn dire. I wholeheartedly recommend watching this show and recommend familiarizing yourself with the time period. Just simply search up "The Tale of Heike Monogatari" or watch a 5-minute video on the Genpei War!