Needless

Typically shounen style action series are not usually my thing. I find them to be completely silly and juvenile and cater to a demographic that I am just not a part of. The posturing and trash talking, the ridiculous reversals of fortune, and the long drawn out nature of the fighting usually cause me to lose interest. Honestly I am surprised this appeals so much to teenage males, who typically have the attention span of a goldfish. However, initially Needless seemed to be different, and appeared as more of a parody and comedy with an extremely enjoyable female lead. Eventually ... though it loses its way and falls victim to the things that doom many of its brother anime; trying to be and do too much instead of sticking with what was working.

The plot, initially is about as basic and nondescript as they come. Needless is set in a post apocalyptic world in which a new race of super powered humans have emerged, possessing fragments of power that give them mastery over a certain skill such as fire, gravity, and magnetism. These fragments apparently have all come from a common source, a god-like being known as the Second. These altered humans are known as Needless. But there is a hard and fast rule however, while some fragments are more powerful than others each Needless can only possess one. It all sounds like it an interesting take on the superpowers genre, and it a lot of ways it is though the way that the powers are used begins to get annoying after while (more on that later). All is not well in the world of the Needless though as they are threatened by the extremely powerful Adam Arclight and his followers in which they face extinction from his scheming. Only the mysterious Adam Blade and his band of resistance fighters stand in the way.

Needless is chalk full of slapstick comedy, action, blood and death, explosions, fan service, and machoism. Fans of these are likely to find plenty to like. The real problem with the series as a whole is the pacing of its storyline. Things move along quickly in the first 1/3 of the series. Perhaps a bit too quickly, which may have lead to the problems it suffers from for most of the middle and late portions of the anime. The heroes find themselves trapped in a room where they must do battle with Arclight's strongest followers. The battles are action packed but they drag out...forever. The story comes to a crawl and these battles seemingly go on forever as almost half the anime is taken up by this one fight and set in this same room. The shocking plot revelation made during this arc is obvious to anyone with any degree of sophistication. Once our heroes finally manage to get out the rest of the series is almost completely taken up with flashbacks, plot building, and adding a conspiracy arc. While this made Needless' story infinitely better and more complex it again felt to me like a complete reversal once again in the theme. To me it was like the director couldn’t make up his mind. Did he want to create an echii action parody, a straight shounen fighting anime, or a complex story about genetic research and political intrigue?

A small rant is in order on the battles. I know that it is a staple of this kind of series to yell out and name all of your attack moves and special abilities, but really is it that hard to come up with some names that make some sense? After hearing "Little Boy" or "Dean Drive Fox Hound" uttered for the billionth time I just wanted to shove a pair of scissors into my ears. And seriously what the hell does Dean Drive Fox Hound supposed to fucking mean anyway? It’s nonsense!

The real tragedy is that what they were doing at the start was working. The best part of Needless is the characters, in particular Eve Neuschwanstein (try saying that ten times fast). She’s got all the body measurements to make her a fan favorite, but she has a hilarious and quirky personality to go along with it to make her memorable. She stupid, can’t remember anyone’s name which leads her to "shorten" people’s names into nonsensical words. She has a really cool special ability called Doppelganger, which allows her to change herself into basically anything of the same mass as she is. Unfortunately as the series progresses she tends to disappear more than a main character should from the action, thus taking away a lot of the appeal for the show for me since I really enjoyed her. Also her Doppelganger ability is used in ways over the course of the series that seem to be inconsistent with what the ability should really be able to do.

As for the other leads, Adam Blade and Cruz Schild the results are not as good. Blade is a silly and typical shounen male with an over-the-top character design complete with an unoriginal and clichéd personality (basically think TTGL's Kamina). Unless you love 12 pack abs and these kinds of stereotypes or this is the first anime you have ever seen, then you’re unlikely to be impressed by him. That being said he does have his moments of comedy gold and he is not completely without merits. Cruz is also a typical anime boy who reminds me of another TTGL character, Simon (the young version) in both looks and personality. Though he seems to have more sense than most of his shounen brethren, and stays out of trouble for the most part and leaves the fighting to those with powers. His greatest attribute is that he’s probably the only person in the show with a brain.

The rest supporting cast is a mix of some very entertaining and memorable characters and more shounen stereotypes. With the exception of Disc, the rest of Blade's team of resistance fighters is uninspired. The ones who really shine are among Arclight's subordinates. This starts and ends with the Pretty Girl Squad of Mio, Setsuna, and Kushinashi. I found their antics to be the most amusing of any of the characters in the series. They are probably the objects of the most fan service, next to Eve, but for the most part it’s all pretty funny and just doesn’t feel as pointless as it usually is in other shows.

Artistically Needless is an uneven experience. The animation of the fights, action, and special effects are all topnotch. The service is well done, at least amongst the females, and they are cute and not too ridiculously proportioned. However the men are awful. I am on record as being a firm hater of bishies and effeminate men. While the men in Needless are certainly manly, they basically look like bishies on steroids. The fact that all of them looked pretty much the same (does anyone in the future wear shirts?) and the silly looking cartoonish muscles and impossible body builds took away from the art overall.

The absolute worst thing about this series is the music. The first OP "Modern Strange Cowboy" is without a doubt the silliest song I have ever heard and the worst example of Engrish lyrics gone wild. The second OP is not near as bad but still not that good and both the ED themes are average at best. Also the commercial break teaser halfway through is laugh out loud silly with the retarded sounding "Needless" being overacted by various male cast members. The acting overall is decent, but again the male voice actors over play their parts so much that they just sound silly.

Overall my final opinion on Needless mixed. I did enjoy many aspects of it, but it had more potential than it delivered. The schizophrenic direction and pacing are too much for me to ignore. Your enjoyment of Needless is likely to depend on your own personal tastes. If you love shounen action then you might want to give this a chance. I found it to be an average series at best.

Needless is not for everyone, but it is a fantastic show as long as you watch it for what it is and are able to enjoy it for what it is. Still, while it was still airing I got the feeling that most people had misconceptions.

First of all, Needless is not a shounen. Needless is a shounen-parody. Or actually if I stick to proper genres I would agree that it's a seinen, and the reason why it is "full of shounen clichés" is because it makes fun of those classic elements by overacting them till they reach grotesque levels. It's important to understand that that ... is the basis of the show.

Muscular machos? Naturally. Battles that last for eternity? Most of the anime is set in a single room. Fighters with named attacks or techniques? In Needless they not only shout them all the time, they also write them on the screen with huge flippin' letters to make sure you remember!

I admit though that throughout the anime adaptation there are points when the show turns into the very thing it pokes fun of, but I'll get back to that later.

The second popular misconception is that Needless is a Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann ripoff. Which would be hard considering that the Needless manga started years before TTGL. I won't stick my head into the sand and deny the similarities, I compare Needless to TTGL in this review on a few occasions myself, but while TTGL builds a strong coming of age story over the top of making fun of old school mecha anime, Needless stays in the sandbox where it feels safe but pushes its limits further there.

As you can kinda expect from this type of show, the story is almost non-existent. A mash of dozens of old concepts thrown into a bowl to create a frame for the action, humor and nonstop manliness. What comes as a result is somewhat interesting, but it's kept on minimal complexity so it doesn't get in the way of the "important" elements of the show. On the other hand, the author had some fun with the character's special attacks and you can find quite a few references there. Naturally I'm not talking about "Mio-chan hip attack", but things like "Little Boy", Dean Drive" or "Agnischwattas". I won't call it deep but it's still a bit more layered than people would think.

When it comes to characters, Needless has a huge list of archetypes, and this is also the point where TTGL fans start coughing blood. The "main" hero who likes to solve every situation with his fists (Blade/Kamina), the main heroine who's also a little ruff around the edges but makes up with bust size for lack of braincells (Eve/Yoko), a useless wingman for comic relief (Uchida/Kittan) and the timid kid who grows into a man (or not) (Cruz/Simon). The difference is that Needless really goes beyond the limits and centers the characters around their most basic trait, pushing that one aspect as far as possible. It also adds things like pedophile priests, bold old scientists and most importantly an army of lolis ranging from lesbians to androids. And yet, despite being this bottomless pool of one-dimensional fan service sources, there is not a single character in the show who is unlikable and every viewer can find one or two who they truly love. Even the one who was annoying in the anime gets cool later on in the manga. This palette of characters is what really makes or breaks Needless.

The graphics are hardly anything special: the character designs are a nice recreation of the manga, while the animation is mostly fluid but not really homogeneous. The music on the other hand is quite worthy of praise. I would be the last person you could call a metal-fan, but the hard hitting power metal BGM of the show is just amazing. Taken from e-Zuka's "I got you under my skin", from "Raging Flames" to "Elephant's Scream" every track is a perfect match to its respective scenes and gives them the necessary boost.

I think that just proves that Madhouse was the right studio for this show. With that said however, it also entails the consequence that Madhouse fans are all too familiar with: abrupt original ending. This case is not nearly as bad as for instance with Claymore, but the changes at the end, along with the severely toned down gore (compared to the manga), resulted in the anime sometimes coming through as more of a shounen than a seinen.

So after all that, what makes this mixed bag of shallow elements so special in the end? The entertainment value. The indescribable energy that flows from every scene and gets multiplied by the music to the point that you clench your fist, jump out of your chair and yell "F**K YEAH!". The bursts of laughter you get every time said scene gets interrupted for a second with a crazy one-liner. The brainless fun you get from the painful lack of logic in the show. And I think that's the keyword, Needless is brainless fun. If you are looking for something more or different, Needless is probably not for you. But for what it is, Needless is perfect.

NEEDLESS to say....

While Needless bears many similarities to a previous anime, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, I feel that these comparisons are unfair and often lead to many people rating this series down. Comparing one's work of art with the Mona Lisa is an unfair one, after all.

Needless begins off on a very good note, full of high-octane energy and very manly characters. While it is admittedly similar to Gurren Lagann, it really stands in a class of its own. The story... what story? Fans of this series aren't really interested in the story, or at least in my point of view. Its a generic setting ... with generic characters. A badass hero, a moe heroine, a kid, an old guy. The characters don't exactly set themselves apart either, with very unoriginal backgrounds.

Now that the bad parts are out of the way, let's talk about the good. Where do I start? Needless is full of incredibly good stuff, with fantastic art (although there are some dips in quality here and there, but little enough to ignore). The music, is brilliant. While pretty much unnoticible in most parts of the show, it is when the action kicks off that the music really gets going. Heavy metal riffs with fast beats really serve to get your heart racing during the epic battle scenes. The visuals are good, with a suitable style for a show of its type. They really don't spare on the blood either, which is a good thing (for most people, I trust).

Ultimately, NEEDLESS is a series that really focuses on what its good at, and cuts away pretty much else. And what its good at, is providing ENJOYMENT. Yes, the slapstick humour, funny (though not very interesting) characters, the epic battle scenes and heavy metal guitar all combine together to provide an extremely enjoyable series. If you want to have a good time, and aren't really interested in heavy plots, emotional baggage, and complex character development, then NEEDLESS is for you!

NOTE: I have not read the manga, so manga readers can go to the manga page for this show and talk about it there. This review is for the anime only.

Although I've only seen 3 episodes at this point, I think I've seen enough to write a fair review. I'll update it later of course to reflect the future scope of the story, because at this time it's still not completely clear what's really going on. Besides the fact that we know Simeon is evil, what the Needless are, and that they are after Adam Blade.

STORY: 7 (Good)

The story so far is typical of a ... shounen, with nothing really outstanding to set it apart from the rest. It's not overly simple though, so I believe it's worthy of being called "Good".

The evil organization, Simeon, is out to exterminate the Needless, which are a sort of "super-human" who possess varying abilities (usually one per Needless). One of the main characters, Adam Blade, possesses the strange ability to copy the powers of other Needless he comes in contact with (think Sharingan), and use them all at his leisure. Eve has the Doppleganger ability, and can take the form of others using either a picture, description, or by coming in contact with them. So far, we don't know much about Cruz (such as whether or not he may be a Needless but just doesn't know it yet), so for now, he plays the part of the currently-weak, developing character that might turn out to be more useful later on.

Throw in a couple of thought-provoking elements such as the Black Spot and Adam Arclight, and the stage is set for (potentially) a moderately interesting shounen.

ART: 8 (Very Good)

While the art isn't really top-notch, it's well done, and there's not much to complain about. Some found that in episode 2 the special attacks were rather bland, due to reused animation and the fact that each character took longer to "call out" their attack rather than to actually do it... But I found this little problem less obvious in episode 3. It seems like they cleaned up their act a bit. Episode 3 bumped up my judgement to "Very Good".

SOUND: 10 (Outstanding)

Let's face it, the OP rocks. I like the rock music played throughout other parts of the show as well. It's nice. I'm a bit WTF'd by the ED though, I actually find myself skipping past it every time due to it making my IQ take a temporary plunge, but I won't take points away for that... It's at the end anyway.

CHARACTER: 7 (Good)

It's about what I'd expect from a show of its genre. Each character has room to grow, so it has potential. I liked Adam right off the bat, and Eve is definitely doing a good job of keeping the show fun. I'm not partial to Cruz at all but maybe that will change. As I said, they have room to grow, but by the same token, they're nothing special at the moment.

ENJOYMENT: 9 (Great)

At the end of the day, I enjoy watching this show. This is not the kind of show I have to force myself to get to watching, unlike some other shows I'm watching at the moment (*cough* Haruhi S2 Endless Eight *cough*). Seeing Adam kick some ass, I'll admit, is mindless, plain-old fun. And you're always curious as to what Eve will do that episode. Curiosity is a big part of what keeps me coming back for more.

OVERALL: 7 (Good)

This show has room to grow, and for those of you who judged it after episode 2, at least give it one more. Episode 2 didn't sit well with me either particularly, but I found the third episode redeemed everything a little. And after all, who knows where it's really going yet?

I'll keep watching it for sure. I vastly prefer shows that are more thought-provoking, have deep stories, and well developed characters, but to be honest, this show is just fun in it's own way. Sometimes it's good to throw away the rules and rock out to some over-the-top action.

Go watch the OP. I bet that'll have some of you at least trying it out.

I feel this show hasn't been getting the love it deserves and I think the only way to rectify this is with a semi thought out and heartfelt review so here I go
(it's the first one I ever wrote so be gentle)

Story

Okay now get this
it's about bad ass muscle-bound lolicon loving mutant Priest dude
who lives in Japan after several countries decided to bomb them for some reason and so everyone got super powers.

He fights an evil organisation filled with other muscle-bound mutant dudes
... and some hot 6 year olds girls who also have superpowers
this organisation also has a bunch of bad ass robots that hunt people down.

This priest right lives with a hot 14 year old chick who doesn't wear underwear and the bad guy from Mega man, one day on a typical days jogging for the bad ass priest he come across this green haired pussy kid who's being chased by one of the bad ass robots I mentioned earlier,so for some reason he decides to help out the loser and kicks the bad ass robots ass, the kid realising that this priest is totally awesome (something green haired kid could never hope to be)
decides to go live with the bad ass priest the hot 14 year old chick and the bad guy from mega man.

Then uh a bunch of cool an funny stuff happens

Art
I can't really say much about this since I don't know too much about it.

But it has really bright outlandish colours that look lovely and capture your eyes.
It has lovely character designs the characters look pretty distinct in their appearance so you can easily tell who is who though the rare few do look similar.

The settings and background art look very appealing,
and animation for the characters is fluid and well just great making many of
the fight scenes look amazing.

Animated by the people who made Death note it's about that level I would say.

Sound

The soundtrack is filled with rock and roll type stuff which gets you pretty pumped up which is a must for this kinda show.

The opening number
Space cowboy is probably of the coolest and I guess GARest openings your likely to hear.

It surprisingly features a couple of classical sounding pieces as well which seems a little weird for the show but does not at all feel out of place.

Characters

Lets see you got

Bad ass awesome priest with lolicon fetish
Bad ass awesome hot chick with big rack
Green haired pussy kid (you can ignore him)
Dr dude from Mega man
and group of other mostly bad ass characters
who would take forever to mention,
most of the characters are cool and awesome basically.

Enjoyment

If I could give a million points for this I would
before warned though
only awesome people who like awesome things will like this
So watch it now
or else

btw

show = awesome

NEEDLESS was one of the first anime I started watching as it was airing, when I first got into streaming new shows via fansubs. The shininess of watching brand-new shows hours after airing in Japan still hadn't worn off for me, so that may have somewhat influenced my opinion of the show. Regardless, NEEDLESS is a crazy, action-packed, explosion- and fanservice-filled ride through a post-apocalyptic wasteland straight out of Fist of the North Star or sCRYed.

My reviews have gotten a lot of 'Unhelpfuls', so I'm gonna try and stick with the usual format and see if that's more palatable.

Story - 6/10

Unfortunately, this is ... NEEDLESS' weakest point, since it's a comedy/action series, the jokes and the fights are really what keep the story running. The overall plot is pretty much the exact same as the aforementioned sCRYed; an event that devestated part of Japan also gave the survivors mysterious powers, which the heroes use to fight against an evil megacorp trying to run things. The battle between the two Adams is pretty awesome, but reminds me too much of Cable and Stryfe from the X-Men comics. Very derivative story but not bad for what it is.

Art - 8/10

I know the art style turned a lot of people off, but I love the super-exaggerated look of the characters and the action sequences are superbly done. The girls are all drawn primarily to be easy on the eyes, while the guys all have huge necks, pulsing muscles and multi-pack abs (except for poor little Cruz). As a parody of over-the-top shonen anime, it's appropriate that the art style parody those same conventions.

Sound - 10/10

Easily NEEDLESS' best stat. I loved the music, from the BGM to both OPs and EDs. I personally prefer "Modern Strange Cowboy" to "Scarlet Bomb" but they're both pretty killer as OPs, and the (in)famous Pretty Girl Squad takes over for the EDs. The voice acting is very hammy and over-the-top; Adam Blade's seiyuu speaks maybe three lines in a normal voice, shouting all the others at the top of his lungs. And the way he rasps "Memorized!" (omoeta) is fucking awesome.

Characters - 8/10

While few if any of the characters in this series have any real depth, this was never intended to be a series about dialogue and character interaction. All the characters have one or two traits that are turned up to maximum volume and blasted 24/7; for example, Adam Blade's overwhelming arrogance and lolita complex, Eve's inability to remember anyone's name, and so on. Still, despite the lack of depth the characters manage to be quite charming, especially the over-the-top hero of the show (Cruz is technically the main character, but Blade's the one who does all the fighting).

Enjoyment - 9/10

This show made me laugh, turned me on with the antics of the Pretty Girls Squad (especially when I first saw the ED, full of mostly-naked girls we hadn't even seen yet O_o), and got me pumped up for the crazy over-the-top fights. Even slamming kanji into the camera's face to remind us of the names of the moves got a 'fawk yeah!' from me.

Overall - 9/10

Usually story counts for more for me, and I wouldn't give such a high overall score to an anime that falls so short in the storyline category. But as I said, the plot's not really what's important in this show. I mean really, what's the overarching plot in Lucky*Star? It's an insanely fun and crazy funny parody of shonen stereotypes and does it marvelously. And interestingly enough, the parts that are parodied the most--the endless battles and in-your-face fanservice--are done about as well as I've seen in the 'serious' shows.

If you don't like the pro-wrestling atmosphere of hugely muscled guys and hot chicks in skimpy clothes fighting one another (for often implausible reasons), then you might want to stick to more serious fare. If you love shonen anime tho and like to laugh at the conventions of the genre, NEEDLESS is definitely worth giving a shot.

When I first watched Needless, I thought the first few seconds in "Blah blah blah, story line, narrating, etc..." But then out of nowhere, "WE'RE MODERN STRANGE COWBOYS!" The moment I heard this song, I knew I may just have found my new favorite anime. Which leads me to say this, the music and overall sound in this series is BEYOND AMAZING! Sound (10)

As for that "Blah blah blah, story line, narrating, etc..." it is pretty much the gist of the entire story. I suppose settings after World War III are pretty common and that the series is kind of like a mix of Scryed ... and Gurren Lagann, but I thought it had a little bit of Ikkitousen/DBZ/shonen-ish in general in the mix too. A bunch of fighting, ecchi, etc... I would definitely recommend those kind of series to anyone who may have liked this show as well. (Even if some of the mainstream shonen have extreme negative criticism from some audiences.) To summarize, even if Needless is doing what has already been done, It's doing it RIGHT. Story (10)

Having said that just now, I want my readers to know this. This series is NOT, I repeat, NOT the new Gurren Lagann. No, if anything, Gurren Lagann is the new NEEDLESS. The Needless manga started in 2004 and I know this is the anime page, but you have to understand that these concepts all first started here. Mostly, the art and character designs. (And characters in general.) We've got a pretty nice cast, a shota for all the fans of that out there, manly man for all the people who want their fill of "WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK I AM?!" and the girl who is pretty much the ecchi fan service until all the other girls show up. All of the characters are pretty unique in my opinion and all have their moment to shine. They're a group to be remembered, not just some random set of people that are like filler characters from Bleach or Naruto. Art/Animation (10) Characters (10)

However, the most important factor of this show, which I think really will determine whether or not you can go through with it entirely... Is the "Enjoyment" factor. I could say "Hey, I watch this show, and I love it!" But it's WAY more than that. I am over here, singing the OP each and every time I watch this, like some kind of weeaboo, raving with my friends at how awesome every single moment of this anime is. We'll be over here screaming "I'VE MEMORIZED IT!" "LITTLE BOY!!!" "EVE CANNON!" and it's just the most amazing experience I've ever had in my entire life. Seriously, if I had to say what my feelings were for Needless in a single sentence, it would be something like this.

"My Need for NEEDLESS is highest on my list of necessary necessities."

I'm sad just at the thought that this series has to end. My overall rating of this series and enjoyment is a 10/10 and if you can watch this, pushing aside just the minor little similiarties and "shonen-aspect" that this show gives off, you'll be able to let loose and enjoy this as much as I do.

BE SANITY!!! (Lol, Ayako, and their subbing errors. This was my first review by the way.)

There are probably a ton of things that could be said about Needless, but in the spirit of this series we will just narrow it down to something simple. Needless! is a show you will either like for what it is, or hate it for the very same reasons.

Needless is a pretty simple show with an equally simple concept. Have a mix of characters with noticeable personalities brawl it out in a span of 24 episodes, accompanied by some great art, fanservice, GAR, gore, comedy and a fast phased metal soundtrack that won't fail to get your blood pumping.

In a future where Tokyo has ... been bombed and 'black spots', areas in which people with mysterious abilities roam, exist there is an evil company surrounded with secrets that has settled in the center of the Black Spot and eliminates all opposition. However, a small group of people decide to stand up against this company. Now the plot is in place we are only missing the 'Fight' and 'Finish him!' lines and the person they belong to. Ah well.

Enter Adam Blade, our very manly main lead. Accompanying him are his sexy sidekick Eve, a kid with no combat abilities, an old geezer, a cool Shinigami girl with a giant sword, a loli half human-half cyborg and a girl with a split personality. On the evil company side we have the usual ultimate evil in human form, Adam Arclight, a mysterious guy warped in bandages, a magician kid and an evil queen type woman with a huge rack. Crew set? Let's Brawl.

Quiz time. The question is: "What makes a show with such a simple concept so popular?" Maybe it are the characters. After all, who expects a priest that turns out to be an insane 12 pack abs devil priest with a lolicon fetish that prefers storing grenades over holy texts in his bible and has some wisdom like this: "If someone hits you on the left cheek...DO A PILE DRIVER WITH YOUR OTHER!!" ? Or a sexy girl that can transform any part of her body and comes up with the most unique nicknames since she cannot remember people's real names? Or a crazy maid that takes the meaning of split personality to a brand new level?

It could as well be the art. It is good to great to stunning at times. Animation is smooth, characters look realistic enough. For Needless, that is. The creators probably also knew they did a nice job with the art, as they even included two moments in the series where the art is a..different kind of stunning. The soundtrack could be the secret behind the series' success as well. It always seems to come with the right tune at the right moment, something that makes the fights so much more epic and enjoyable to watch. If not that then it probably is the comedy. It is well done and fits the tone of the show, yet does not fail to give you a good laugh every now and then.

Needless is a show that may prove either enjoyable or not for the reasons above, but especially on the person watching it. Simple as that. If you are still not sure on what to expect, watch the first opening/ending or simply lock the door to your room, dig up your headphones and marathon the thing. Although the title may be misleading, this show could very well be something that makes a nice addition to your list.

Ever since Kenshiro informed Zeed and his gang they were already dead, the badass traveling a post-apocalyptic wasteland (shirts optional) looking for ass to kick has been a staple of anime, to the point that nowadays it's almost always a parody.

Needless continues the trend of parodying the genre, by including something almost all anime seem to have nowadays, moe fanservice.

STORY: Overall the story is nothing special, it's the same thing we've seen before. The action tends to be done fairly well, albeit usually fairly one sided. The only thing that holds it back from being a 7 is the tendency to needlessly (pun ... intended) take time to throw in fanservice. I'm not referring to panty shots or jiggle, that's almost expected nowadays, I'm talking about taking a full 24 minute episode to slowly undress the "Pretty Girl Squad" with only the actual plot development in about 90 seconds at the end. Hopefully they won't pull something like that again.

ART: The character designs themselves are good, they just seem out of place. Adam Blade looks like he belongs, but most of the other characters have designs more fitting for Romantic Comedies like Asu No Yoichi.

SOUND: Nothing to complain about here, the OP is very good, the ED while a bit out of place is rather catchy, and as I've said, Needless covers it's action fairly well, including BGM. The voices all work, the only thing they need to work on is attack names, they seem a bit random, but that's more a script issue.

CHARACTER: The characters are for the most part fairly good. Adam Blade's lolicon tendencies are rather entertaining. And as lolworthy as the existence of a "Pretty Girl Squad" is the members are rather likeable and the loli actually makes sense as a "cute bruiser" type rather than just fetish fuel. The only pointless one is Cruz, who is so useless to anything no one even cares to remember his name.

ENJOYMENT: The series grew on me after a couple episodes, it's definitely fun to watch, it just has a few facepalm moments here and there that detract from the series.

OVERALL: Needless is worth watching. If you aren't really a moe fetishist and are more a straight up action fan you should probably give it a few episodes to try to let the intial anachronism feeling wear off. I'll probably end up giving the series a 7 or an 8 when I finish

There are some animes that will end of being forgotten from people’s memory, and be marked as ‘generic’ anime. We call those anime, ‘Needless’.

To describe what needless is; it focuses on multiple theme of being manly, being comical, being serious, being eechi but also being ridiculous itself. It’s anime for ‘GAR’ I can say. Spammed action sequences take majority of this anime, and there are tons of plot holes even on those actions. It follows typical shonen style plot and full of clichés. There is nothing good about anime except the fact that you will actually enjoy it regardless to how horrible it is.

Actually, it’s ... even more generic than you can think. There is useless boy who is reluctant to become a main character. There is a hothead, but also useless support character, screaming ‘LIIIITTLEEEE BOOOOOOOOOI’. There is ‘wanna-be-Kamina’ Blade man who smells like GAR barbecue. There is evil one, who is evil. They killed them of one by one. They have 4 mighty ones, and one ultimate boss, Adam Arclight. It is so generic, that makes it way too much predictable.

Honestly, there is no real plot there. It’s just fighting sequences that make this anime worth with screaming of characters all over the place. Over-the-top actions and series of panty shots. That’s all about it. Regardless, let’s talk about how story of Needless goes. First, there was Cruz. He met some hot-headed manly dudes and girls. They made a crew. There is an enemy to fight by default. They just fight. They went to boss lair. They fight again. Soon they meet boss. Fight. Done, it’s the end of the story.

One of the worst aspects of this series is pacing. Seriously, at first, it went fast; although it was ridiculous overall, pacing was not that bad. After that, they got trapped in that gigantic room with pretty girl squads for about… I don’t know, about 6 ,7 episodes? That’s ridiculous. They could’ve at least provide some other background other than that. It screwed up some of enjoyment I had when they were just laughing and kicking around before they went there. Actions are dragged out so much, due to extremely detailed explanations and ANALyses on each move and some babbling, waiting, shoutings that character does. Plot holes are so big; you will have plenty of time wondering; ‘Why are they even waiting for 15 minutes in the middle of fight just to allow enemies to have a think time?’.

However, the worst thing is probably that they failed to manage to keep the consistent and interesting plot itself. First 1/3 of the series was probably better in terms of fighting, or w/e. Later, it suddenly gets serious. Every aspect is basically ‘spammed’. It spams this serious and unserious mood about 10 times during one episode. Spammed slap stick comedies are timed so badly, most of time it ruins the mood horribly. There are so much spam of out-of-circumstance-bloods and nudities. Some plot twists are not actually a twist, since they were mostly predictable. It’s just spammed with absurdity. Funny thing is, ‘Side stories’ of needless were much better than its ‘Main story’. I enjoyed the entire support episode that those not contains the main stories. For example, flashback episode of Blade was better than Blade fighting with Arclight.

Art, was terrible. No, it surely was. Starting with character design first; characters are overly muscular and females are overly… um ‘something’. Their body shape all looks exactly same, so does their faces. Design of Cruz is probably the worst here, look at his neck first of all. They all looks like some kind of mass produced clones with different hair style and costumes. Speaking of clothes, they are even worse. Oh hell, they are just ‘LAUGHABLY ABSURD’. Extremely wide collars, un-matching colours… Those costumes are also, almost same for every single characters. The worst, is costume of Disk-san. She wears pyjama from the start to the end and it is clothes that someone like your grandmothers would wear. Action part animations sometimes become choppy, such as the part where they are screaming their ridiculous attack names. Other than that, animation was overall just fine.

Sound aspect was as poor as its art. Some audio effects are completely out of circumstances and break apart the atmosphere. OP was fine but it showed how spamming English language in J-pop can be resulted being ridiculous for actual English users. Ending… I better not describ; it’s lolicon fetishes. Well, that makes sense, since two things I can remember in Needless is spam of ‘LIIIITTLEEEE BOOOOOOOOOI’ and kawaii shots. Seiyuus send their most time… screaming. They sound all monotonous; you can’t say the difference between the voice Blade and Arclight when they are speaking, since they speak with exactly same emotion every single time. Moreover, the problem in their speech existed from the start; the title of, ‘Needless’ itself. Those who do not know English people might think its fancy name for calling super heroes, but I personally think it’s ridiculous. Also, there are some extremely uncomfortable attack names that seized me in pain, such as ‘LIIIITTLEEEE BOOOOOOOOOI’, ‘Dean Drive Fox Hound’, ‘Magnetic Worldo’ and even ‘Doppelganger’. They are spammed throughout the whole series and may decay your ear at the end of the series. Seriously, ‘LIIIITTLEEEE BOOOOOOOOOI’ is just the worst thing I’ve ever heard. I cried for overuse of misused English…

There is not much to say about characters, since they are, generic. They have nothing except of being brave or following some same clichés that shonen suffers most of the time.

Blade, despite of having some spam of irritating lolicon loving part, succeeded of being one of the coolest, and manliest one I’ve ever seen. Other than that, characters development and description is pretty much ‘dead’. They are empty, including Blade. They are just overridden by their cool abilities and failed to show what they have inside. Only one who actually showed that was Saten, but others; none existence. In terms of comical relief and some interesting plot, pretty girl squad and Eve was the only ones who were ‘interesting’.

Yes yes, I can ignore everything. However, I just couldn’t stand that Cruz guy. He is the worst character in this series. Everything is on his point of view, yet what he do get kicked and punched to death while everyone is fighting. The part where I died was when everyone is saying, ‘YOUR ONLY ABILITY IS THAT YOU CAN FUCKIN THINK’. Guys, everyone can think, even the most foolish person in this earth. They are all just common senses that Cruz has. Oh wait, maybe because that everyone in his crew is too dumb to even find out what ability of making things freeze and burn at the same time. (Temperature) And, in this part, we find one big plot hole. In his crew, there is a android who lived 300 with super computer brain, and there is also a doctor, who was one of the most professional scientist in the past. It makes absolutely no sense that Cruz becoming the only one who can ‘think’.

Eve is the only one character that makes this series at least a level of watchable. She is cool and very manly in terms of her spirit, which makes her only of the most ‘manlike female’ in the anime universe and also the best character of this series.

Needless is a terrible and good at the same time. Although it was spammed with ridiculous comedies, ‘LIIIITTLEEEE BOOOOOOOOOI’, bad art, monotonous voices, bad English, plastic muscularity and ‘Ability to THINK’, it was very very enjoyable, like most of shonen stuffs. Somehow, character success of at least not being dull. Actions are cool and so does their abilities. There are scenes that you can say, ‘hell this is just awesome’. Dragged episodes cut these enjoyments in half, but whatever. It is still enough.

So, in conclusion, Needless failed to become over the average anime in terms of its quality etc. every aspect. However, it was still enjoyable whatsoever. Needless will be forgotten, and I also do not particularly recommend watching this anime, but I can be sure that it was quite an experience having manliest characters and cutest females in one series with awesome superpowers.

I have to say that this is the worst anime that I have seen in a while and I'm surprised I made it through the whole thing. The only redeeming quality of this series is the main character Adam Blade who is just entertaining to watch.

Story:
Cliche and predictable are how I would describe it. It tries to throw a few twists at you but I saw them coming far in advance. It tries very hard to be epic and over the top but lacks a well thought out story

Art:
Animation was pretty clean, but the fact that characters cloths would regenerate and wounds would be healed ... between episodes, or sometimes scenes just so it could be done again was just too much.

Characters:
I hated every single one of the except Blade! Every single one of them was retarded except the kid who had normal intelligence but was treated like genius.

Enjoyment:
will never watch this series again and would only recommend it to people that i don't like.

Alright, this is my first review, I hope this goes well.

When I first saw this anime here, I thought that it would be just another shounen beat up anime, which I haven't really even watched, because I have always kinda shyed away from them. Well, I decided to give it a try and began watching this. The voice actors were for the most part pretty unknown ones to me, they haven't been in any other animes that I have seen, at least ,not in any positions from which I would remember them.

It soon became pretty clear, that the anime isn't your typical shounen beat up ... anime, because at least I have an image, that they usually have storylines that take themselves pretty seriously, and they don't really cultivate humor that much. This anime, however, seemed to be pretty humor based, and it wasn't trying to hide it's pure fan service either. As I watched the show, I noticed that I might actually like those shounen animes which I mentioned before, since I enjoyed all the fighting scenes and over the top charismas of the characters and muscles and everything that just screams "fuck yeah, I am the real man". That combined with the humor that I actually found to be pretty funny, it looked like this was going to be one really good anime to watch.

I also liked the art of this anime, although there wasn't anything special on it, it was just fit for this anime, that's pretty much all I can say about it, not bad and not anything special. The music however, was so goddamn good. The music fits perfectly in the background of the battles. The music is just full of testosterone and it fits perfectly in the speedy and epic fighting scenes, making them even more enjoyable. I also liked the first OP of the show, for the same reason as I liked the background music of the show. The metal music just fits here perfectly and that's why I highly disliked the other OP. I Liked some of the characters, but, as it is with many other animes, the main character (or one of the main ones, I am not really sure), Cruz, is pretty bland and boring character, but luckily the other characters make up for that. Adam is a bad ass character that I liked for the sole reason of him being an awesome ass kicker and really over the top confident character, which raises the testosterone count of this anime to the point that it's just so goddamn awesome that you can't hate it. The other characters also function well and they form a pretty good character roster, but Adam alone is one reason to watch this anime.

As I said in the beginning, this anime is pretty humor and fast action based anime, but the story is also pretty interesting. However, the anime doesn't really utilize it that well, and I personally think that it doesn't have to. I think it was the writer's plan to make this anime more action and humor based one, and not focus to the story that much. And I think that's fine, the reason why I enjoyed this anime is because of the fast paced action and all over the top fights, manliness and humor, not the story. Don't get me wrong though, the story is, at times, interesting, but it's wasn't the reason for me to watch this anime. That being said, in the end, the story of this anime gets much bigger role than in the beginning. This was expected: there were many things that were unexplained, so it was kind of a good thing, since those things are explained in the end, but at times, it kinda felt like a forced drama, not to the point of annoyance luckily, so it didn't really kill the feeling of this anime.

The fanservice also has a huge role in this anime. And in an anime like this, it doesn't really bother me, actually, I must say that some part of me might actually like it, I mean c'mon, who doesn't like pantsus? If this anime would be a serious one though, then it might kinda kill the feeling, but in this kinda anime, it's not a bad thing.

To summarize all this, I say that if you expect this to be an anime that has a deep and serious storyline, you probably won't like it, but if you just love all the action, over the top personalities, fighting and the humor, then you will enjoy this.

Final verdict and tl;dr for convenience:
Needless has no redeeming qualities when it comes to being as basic of a concept as a shonen duke-it-out. It's a poor and a mecha-less attempt of capitalizing on the hype for TTGL's "post-apocalyptic rebels with an attitude", and as such, it is rushed and bare-bones. I seriously recommend a critical re-watch if you somehow thought that anything above 6/10 is deserved, but I understand if you judge your anime by your personal watching experience.

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The visual style and premise seem alluring, until you start watching it. Needless is a very basic shonen duke-it-out with a very basic plotline and, ... harshly put, proof-of-concept charactes.
The art? It looks fine and dandy... until they stop giving a sh*t. I don't mean like "oh neat, this is a simplified black & white raster to intensify the feeling of speed and intensity", I mean it like lazy and forgotten. There are unfinished sections within, and it's very blatant. For that alone, I cannot recommend this rushjob.

Needless' noticeable storytelling and character tropes include, but are not limited to:
-clothing damage
-constant peep-shotting, regardless of the previous
-power lobbing
-plot armor & strength (guy who is losing by all accounts suddenly just wins the fight)
-stretching jokes and story recapping to hit the episode time
-useless characters
-pure lack of context and ideas

The story is actually not basic, just bad. After the nuclear war, sections of the world have become barren wastelands. Yup, it's just SECTIONS of destroyed, plantless/lifeless landscape, not the actual whole world, with people scrounging for scraps and living a generally shitty life. There is nary an explanation for this. Then comes a medicine megacorporation gone bad with the intent of... well, if there was an intent, I'm sure it was hidden in the later episodes to justify one or two evil speeches. The big bad wants one of the characters for his plans and so lures the good guys into their home base after two destroyed goons.

The main character, the shota, has little to no relevance to the actual storyline. The supposedly actual main character (voiced by Takehito Koyasu, DIO for one) is a thunderhead whose main trait beyond plot armor and stronkest ability is his comedic relief trump card, that is, going full Sanji on >12 yr old girls. The other main and side characters are either useless and/or boast tropes as their only defining traits.

OST, apart from op/ed, is some nice-sounding, yet pretty basic metal guitaring. You've heard all of it in your general fighting games before.

May contain minor spoilers, will leave out story spoilers.

I'd like to sum this up at the beginning, but don't want to give it away just incase you haven't seen it.

The story was actually the best part, in a sense. Needless is about people who have supernatural powers called fragments that allow them to do wild shit. The first 7 episodes of this are amazingly badass, it really sucks you in and the story just takes off quick and runs full steam ahead. I can't really elaborate on the story without giving too much away, but a group of Needless go take on ... some badasses early and it starts off chalk full of potential. the rest will be below.

Art was very good for its age, the sound was a little too 80's - 90's rage metal for me, but it wasn't totally out of place. The voice acting was actually fitting as well.

This show has a bit of a weird feel, on one hand it doesn't take itself too seriously, constantly breaking the fourth wall, but on the other gets a little deep for an action fighting anime. The comedy keeps it afloat early and had me rolling at times.

The characters start off strong, but then becomes are major weakness about half way through.

**minor spoils**


The progression is just too ridiculous. It starts off so strong you start wondering where this is going and then after 9 or so episodes it just stagnates. The characters are caricatures of caricatures. it's got the classic samurai 7 feel to it, gathering the team, all with strong and weak points. But ultimately the supporting cast were completley irrelevant. They may have well just left them out since they really just got their asses kicked at every opportunity.

when i said the story stagnates at around the midpoint, it's not hyperbole. MC and crew get trapped in a room for like 9 episodes getting their asses kicked by weak characters and progressively fight stronger characters and the formula repeats until you're sick of it. The character progression is almost non existent for anyone. It focuses heavily on the antagonists, which is something i don't really like, and no matter how villainous the antagonists, it becomes obvious there will be no serious resolution. At least they could have held that card closer to the end to dampen the dissapointment.

at the end its the antagonists giving the motivational speeches and teaming up, which literally makes no sense. the motivations of the antagonists are so flimsy that you cannot possibly reconcile it meaningfully. You would think throughout the numerous heinous acts committed they may have questioned their role, but ofc they save that shit until the end, which just left a bitter taste.

The ending turned into pure DBZ, with so many twists that i subconsciously reached for imaginary nausea pills.

To sum this up, it starts off really strong, with interesting plot, characters, and potential and ends with a trainwreck.

The actual main character is a weak boy who plays literally no role, in fact i still have no idea what his role was throughout the entire show but he garnered so much screen time I felt his value would be revealed by the end. It wasn't. He served no purpose other than to recap episodes. If you can shut your brain off and watch it for the moments of parody, there is certainly something here. But the tone is so confused that you can't call this a comedy or parody, you just have to call it a clusterfuck.

Well, i hadn't had this much fun watching an anime for some time. It was first aired in Dec, 2009 but only found this particular anime about 2 weeks ago. Didn't watch it right away, but when i watched the first episode, i couldn't stop watching.

Very few Anime's hook me like this one. It reminded me of Gurren Laggan for some reason. I'm not very versed in the Anime lingo, i cant tell you that this is a seinen or shounen or what not. I just watch them cuz i enjoy watching anime. Doesn't really matter to me what it's called do don't expect anything ... on this review to have that much depth. All i am here to do is tell you what i think... and i think this is a great Anime to have. So lets go down to the scores...

Story - 7: - Well i rated this a 7 because as I've said before theres nothing new here. Post apocalyptic world with people that have super powers and theres one nut that tries to rule the world and the heroes goes out and stop him. Altho if you go to the story, that really wasnt their goal, it just happened to end that way, which made for an amusing story.

Art - 8: - I gave this an 8. To often do i see anime that is consistent throughout the series. There will be a few episodes that seems that the producers used a different animator. For this series, it didn't come often, and the ones that did, turned to to be a more stylized and a rush job. In anycase Gurren Laggan had the same thing.

Sound - 7: - Well nothing spectacular here just good. There were sounds, and background music but nothing that really popped out as good or bad. Opening and ending themes were standard and ordinary, even now as i'm writing this review i cant remember the Intro and Ending music. It isn't bad either, its just there and unremarkable.

Characters - 9: - Here is where it gets interesting. Without going into details and bordering on becoming a spoiler, the characters they had were interesting to say the least. Everything from am anti-hero hero, cute girls that constantly show their underwear, to multiple personalities and character types, including the " cliché" types that are abound in any anime genre.

Enjoyment - 9: - I had a blast with this anime. Every episode was either entertaining, Amusing, to total laughter. It was enjoyable to say the least. It pokes fun at every anime you can imagine, and most of the time, it makes fun of itself. There are times where the characters are even aware that they are in an anime and make fun of each other. Lines like "I cant believe that a minor character like you without powers is even in an anime like this.." just takes the cake in making fun out of everything. And when it seems that it couldn't get any better, they snuck in a love story without you noticing it. Man, that caught me off guard. In anycase Total Enjoyment start to end.

Overall - 8: - I have the overall score an 8. It could have been higher but i'm just going on the average. Story and sound gout it down to an 8 instead of a 9. But don't let that 8 fool you, if you enjoy a good laugh or just tired of serious anime, and just want senseless fun, this is the anime for you. I highly recommend you watch this. As always, if your not sure, Download the first episode and watch it, It it doesn't tickle your fancy than don't continue, for me at least, the first episode was enough for me to say Hell yeah..

Needless


This anime is about the aftermath of a World War 3. A bomb was dropped on Tokyo city and as a result, some people gained strange powers like controlling fire or water or having great speed or strength and stuff like that (much similar to that in Sekirei). These people were given the name Needless (which is also the anime's title if you hadn't noticed). This anime is a perfect combination of action and comedy together with time to time ecchi.

The story in this anime is quite good. It's basically about a group of Needless fighting another group which is oppressing them. The story has ... progressed quite well. From start to end everything is in perfect order. They gave a pretty decent introduction as to what is happening and also gave a satisfying ending to the story which sort of ends the possibility that the anime will get a second season and continue with the manga. Anyway, it really won't matter that much when you finish the anime.

Voice acting done was pretty decent. It wasn't like they were doing it on gunpoint or anything. It was pretty good. The artwork was also well done. It was well done and matched the sheer violence this anime had to offer. The way the action scenes were shown was also quite good.

All the characters in Needless had perfect roles in the anime's story. All introduced characters had perfect and important roles in the story. Along with a role in the story, all characters had something funny happen to them which was very well done and these scenes decreased the overall seriousness which most animes of the action genre have. This anime is one of the best animes I have seen yet. I enjoyed every part of it. It's just full of comedy. Whenever a scene got too serious or emotional, something funny was thrown in to lighten up things. Even the finale, which is supposed to be a very serious and/or emotional episode, also had comical scenes around every corner. A scene did not go too long without some comical scene in it.

Needless is a great anime. The violence might be too bloody but the excess comedy more than makes up for that. The way bloody violence and comedy have been mixed in this anime has made it quite different from the rest where most action animes are often serious. This great combination of action and comedy is what makes this anime awesome.

I am open to suggestions. Feel free :-)

if you like x men then you will like needless. needles are mutant humans with powers.
the story.
is great its about this guy named Adam blade and he has to fight the dug company know as Simeon. the story is 10 out of10
the art.
the art is bright and colorful and great for a 2009 anime . 10 out of10
sound.
sound was very good and it has a very good dub. sound 10 out of 10
the characters are very good and funny
and Adam arc light is a very great bad guy
and one of my most fave characters and funniest is eve . ... character 10 out of10
enjoyment .
i 100% enjoyed this anime it is funny and has a lot of action. its worth the watch.
overall.
i give this anime 10 out of10 its a great anime

First off to compare this anime to gurren lagan is absurd...Ok i can see the similarities in the characters of Kamina and Father but other than that, nothing alike. There is no real storyline, and the little that is there is not amazing..It was interesting enough for me to watch the whole series. I love anime with action and this is action packed, with cool abilities for each character. I do enjoy that but to compare it to Gurren Lagan..give me a break, that was still to this day one of the best anime I have seen, and although I enjoyed needless ... to a certain extent it is still my lowest rated anime on my list. I know I have not seen a whole lot of anime, but enough to get on this site make a profile and continue to be addicted to anime and watch it everyday, and will continue to watch anime for the rest of my life. Now don't let this deter you from watching this anime. It is enjoyable because of all the action and cool different powers. It does have a whole bunch of characters so that is a plus as well, but you don't grow attached to any like you do in Gurren. Shit I cried during that anime. You are not shedding tears for needless that is for sure...and the ending for needless...meh

I don't know about you, but I love this series more than I loved tengen toppa gurren lagann. I really didn't like the whole Chibi Mecha theme in Gurren Lagann. Anywho, this anime is EPIC in terms of story, characters and ACTION. I think this anime has it all: fan-service, epic fight, supernatural abilities, and ... blood and gore. If you were a fan of Gurren Lagann or even a fan of action genre-based animes, please do consider watching this series. I highly recommend it.

This anime is a combination of both action and comedy together including the cuteness of girls. To me, I am fine with moe. I only enjoy this anime is because of the characters and the funny plot combined with great action scene. I don't come and watch this anime just because of panty shots.

Episode 14 is the most funny part when Adam Blade says "The reason is Girls. You look like a young girl and I'm already in paradise".

To me, all the characters are badass and I like most of the characters except for Curz Schild. At least Cruz Schild instructed people in the last ... episode which was good. All the cast do not show me things that I don't like (crybaby, whiny, arrogant)

My 2 favorite characters are: Seto & Solva. They are badass females. You know I really love to see badass females even badass lolicons. Seto uses gravity power while Solva uses Magnetic World. Solva's powers reminds me of Magneto who uses magnetic powers. Wow an epic combination of x-men with cute girls.

The art and animation looks fun just like Soul Eater. I really wanted to see action combined with humour otherwise it will not be fun to watch at all. I also wanted to see action at least my some badass female save the day like Revy from Black Lagoon. Adam Blade is a very cool guy who is badass.

Every character is unique in a lot of ways which makes this anime even more fun to watch.

I will recommend people this anime who are into fun and action scene with some panty shots. I give it a 9 out of 10. NEEDLESS to say, I really love this anime! JUDGEMENT EXECUTION! HAHA! Just Joking!