Cardfight!! Vanguard

Taking the world by storm, the card game Cardfight Vanguard has influenced many to integrate card games into their everyday lives. Players of the popular game are called "cardfighters," and they frequently battle each other in card shops. The game has inspired many people, one of which is the quiet and timid Aichi Sendou who is often ridiculed and bullied by his peers. Whenever he feels down, he takes a glance at Blaster Blade—a legendary rare card given to him when he was young—and gains the motivation to move on with his life.

However, one day, school bully Katsumi Morikawa notices Aichi's treasure and snatches the card away from him. After a turn of events, Aichi soon discovers that the card is now in the hands of Toshiki Kai, a cardfighter who has become the strongest in town despite having only recently arrived. To make matters worse, Kai refuses to return the card unless Aichi defeats him in a cardfight.

Much to everyone's surprise, Aichi rises up to the occasion. As he musters up his courage and pictures himself winning this decisive battle, Aichi begins to find his way into the adventurous world of Cardfight Vanguard.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Sendou, Aichi Main

Yonaga, Tsubasa Japanese

Kai, Toshiki Main

Satou, Takuya Japanese

Tokura, Misaki Main

Kitta, Izumi Japanese

Katsuragi, Kamui Main

Ishikawa, Shizuka Japanese

Suzugamori, Ren Supporting

Abe, Atsushi Japanese

Miwa, Taishi Supporting

Morikubo, Shoutarou Japanese

Tatsunagi, Kourin Supporting

Mimori, Suzuko Japanese

Sendou, Emi Supporting

Enomoto, Atsuko Japanese

Mitsusada, Kenji Supporting

Akabane, Kenji Japanese

Morikawa, Katsumi Supporting

Sugiyama, Noriaki Japanese

Tsuji, Hatsuki Director, Storyboard

Takadera, Takeshi Sound Director

Tokumoto, Yoshinobu Episode Director

Umemoto, Yui Episode Director, Storyboard

Reviews

May 11, 2025

Malawa

Recommended

I first watched this when I was around like 10, while it was cringey it ended up being way more interesting than most kodomo anime and I prefered it to Yugioh (GX at least) tbh.

Story:

As many will say, Cardfight!! Vanguard is basically the 'grounded' counterpart to Yugioh although it veers further into supernatural and sci-fi elements over time. Season 1 revolves around underdog Aichi as he attempts to get better at the eponymous game and climb his way up from locals (characters mainly play at this LCS called 'Card Capital') to regionals to nationals. Seeems very real but keep in mind they introduce a supernatural ... subplot later on with the main antagonist stemming from said subplot.

Majority of the episodes will revolve around or build up to a cardfight. Cardfights are presented in a realistic manner, although parts of the game will often get skipped (Vanguard early game is pretty boring most of the time), to the point where it's like you're watching an infomercial. They even namedropped a booster pack at one point. So big disclaimer: this series has no shame whatsoever with it's product placement and advertisement. Which is why it never aired on US or UK television channels compared to stuff like Yugioh which censored the backs of cards and had unrealistic duels.

A major standout of the story is the tension owing to the underdog MC and how you never know (well it's easy to predict if you think about) if a character will lose due to every character losing at some point. This is exacerbated with the regional and national tournaments following a team format where teams of 3 are pitted against each other. As a result characters can afford to lose matches and still go on to the next round given their teammates pick up the slack. As a result, the outcome of matches are a lot more unpredictable.

Characters:

So the MC Aichi is your typical whiny wimp that eventually grows a pair and starts kicking ass. At the start he's incredibly weak, episode 1 has him getting laughed at by the whole class due to his shyness and getting his favourite card Blaster Blade (despite him never playing the game) robbed by his fellow classmates. You might find his perpetual whinyness insufferable but tbh give him time because his development will come and it's actually satisfying, instead of him just becoming a badass like some lazy wish fulfilment he has to actually try hard just to muster a bit of bravery and develop some skill. The story even tests him with easy mode supernatural powers and he ends up becoming a power tripping junkie dependant on said power, proving that he has to solve his issues through inner struggle rather than easy handouts. His arc and growth in season 1 have yet to be beat in future seasons, from here on out he basically stagnates and Chrono/V Aichi just don't hold a candle in any way. D series protagonists are held back by a lack of time, it's hard to measure up when each story arc is 12 episodes long as opposed to season 1 taking 60.

The main rival figure and Aichi's crush Kai is basically Marmite in character form. Either you see him as some cringelord with a massive stick up his arse or a total badass. For me it was the latter, sure he did act like a cunt but damn his had a badass theme, his deck was bloody epic and the way he mercilessly destroyed all his opponents was to die for. And IMO it's better for characters to have a bit of an edge it's funny and makes them less boring unlike the manga which from what I seen made all of the characters generic nice guys/girls except for one problematic character but that's for later.

Later on both are pitted against the leader of the most infamous cardfight team in Japan and main antagonist Ren. Basically like Hell Kaiser from GX but slightly more eccentric, Ren is what happens when you take a children's card game way too seriously. Power tripping, arrogant, cruel (his so-called teammates Testu, Asaka and Kyou often ending up on the recieving end of said cruelty) and most importantly terrifyingly good at Vanguard this guy steals the show and serves as a really good threat. It's hard to even imagine how the meek and wimpy Aichi is supposed to beat him.

The supporting characters are alright: Kamui was boring but he ran cool space aliens/robos so that's something, Miwa is effortlessly likeable and cool despite doing barely anything, Izaki is whatever, Morikawa I'll come back to later, Shin made Card Capital pretty comfy with his welcoming and friendly personality, I couldn't care less about the pirate crew, Koutei is this super GAR super robo fanatic so you'll love him if you're a mecha freak (he only gets like one epic fight per season though and often loses), Tetsu is essently a good person on the wrong side and Kyou is a joke.

The female characters are solid all things considered and actually capable of winning meaningful matches or contributing to the storyline. Misaki is a high IQ badass with an eidetic memory and charming sassy personality who utilises a deck stacking/card advantage oriented strategy to control the game and set up crazy deck stacks. Easily the best female character IMO and has one of the best OSTs. Kourin is basically like a guardian figure to the MC. I liked her cool independent personality even if she lost nearly all of her matches, some characters are just meant to tank all the losses so others can succeed anyway. She gets more wins in season 3. Aichi's little sister Emi
serves to represent the typical card game enthusiast who doesn't have big ambitions and is just in it to have fun playing with cute looking units and does it pretty well. Meanwhile you have the complete opposite in the form of Asaka, an elitist up-her-own-ass Team Asteroid member with a pretty cute crush on Ren that helps redeem her otherwise bitchy personality.

The worst female character is probably Nagisa, her entire shtick is chasing after her beloved Kamui much to his misery. It's a gag that runs even into G series where they're both teenagers, to the point where you just want Kamui to suck it up and get with her instead of crushing after Emi.

Speaking of crushes, it's time to talk about our grade 3 fanatic Kourin-loving idiot Morikawa. Initially introduced as the asshole who stole Aichi's card in the first episode, the directors/writers then made the decision to just relegate him to joke character which was a great play IMO. In the manga/V series he's way worse, not only does he bully Aichi far more mercilessly he's then taken seriously as a character and expected to be forgiven when it's people like him who're responsible for destroying Aichi's confidence and turned him into a depressed loser. I didn't really get into V series but this along with the weaker personalities across the board points to the manga having awful character writing further reinforced with how Aichi is a complete gary stu in V series. As a result the changes to writers made to the cast was completely justified and saved this anime from being a complete trainwreck.

Soundtrack:

The composer Takayuki Negishi is the same guy responsible for the renowned Mnemosyne and CCS soundtracks and he ddin't slack here either. Every major character has epic themes and the soundtrack always fits the situation/atmosphere. The OPs are both fire, especially Believe in my Existence (epic af) and the EDs aren't too bad etiher.

Production Values.

If we're being honest, the values for this series are pretty ass but that's to be expected for a weekly release series. D onwards switched to seasonal format and the difference between that and G/V/OG are massive.

Overall:

Not much else to say, the Cardfight!! Vanguard anime peaked at season 1 IMO. Future seasons just don't measure up in terms of character writing and hype story. Only Link Joker comes close.

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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Mar 7, 2012

whitejaw

Mixed Feelings

Preliminary (22/65 eps)

this anime resembles yugioh and duel master but the game itself doesnt really have principle no traps no spells only luck.cards and knowledge

the stroy itself is prety good-the road the walk through
characters-i dislike the main character but the other one kai-kaiba is very likeable
and some other not head charcaters are funny and intersting

if you dont like the art from the 1st-5th episode i dont think this anime will be entertaining for you since 70%of the fun is watching the card fight and new cards being reviled

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Aug 7, 2023

Phasar2022

Not Recommended

Funny

Just a short review cus I don't like Vanguard anymore. Heck, the whole show is a so bad that this small review is enough to roast this bad anime.

Story 1/10

The story is of little to no consequence. Some kid gets bullied, gets his favorite card stolen and then uses card fighting to get it back. Suddenly the people who bullied him become his best friends and he's no longer the loser of his class. They especially note this in the second episode where they point out that before he had his card fight, he was a ridiculous loser with no friends and never talking to ... anyone, never being happy. Yup, worst story I've been in a long time

Animation 2/10

It's your Generic card fight animation. Flashy lights when cards are used, random spirits popping up left right and center, colorful hair for no reason other than to... actually, I don't know why. I was going to say make it seem original, except every single anime does this. So colorful hair the sake of it? In short, the animation is about as Generic as it gets

Sound 2/10

There's not much to say. You don't really notice the sound. It doesn't help nor hinder the anime. It's practically non-existant, which probably makes it the best component of this anime

Characters 1/10

If I could, I'd give it a -10. You have your main character who's a whimpy little brat, then you have your side characters who consists of two bullies who magically become friends, a quiet mysterious shop keeper and a brooding quiet other person. Because creativity and interesting character design with depth is over-rated

Overall 2/10

This is amazingly generic. Someone must have slept their way to getting this into anime form because there's not a single interesting thing about it. The characters suck. The story is non-existant, the animation is bland and generic and the entire concept is proposterous. I only watched it for four episodes because I was hoping something interesting would happen, and the first three episodes were just scene setters. I guess not.

Reviewer’s Rating: 2

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