Decided I'd write my first review! Bear with me since it's been months since I've seen it, but everything is still pretty fresh in my memory. The reason I've chosen to write about this specific anime is because, so far, it's one of the few anime that I felt greatly disappointed by.
I got interested in the anime from watching the intro to the second season on YouTube. It looked hype as hell, and after reading the synopsis multiple times on different platforms, I thought I'd give it a shot. Suffice to say that while I don't think that this is a horrible anime by any
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means, you're just better off watching practically anything else in the genres that this is listed as.
Let's get started shall we?
Art:
This was probably the best part of the series. The vivid and vibrant colors used in the animation throughout the course of the show were AWESOME. The character designs of practically everyone in the cast are unique and intriguing, and make you want to become more invested in them. The battle sequences and the choreography are all fantastic and the color inversions that you see at various parts throughout different episodes provide a cool little addition that you don't see often in other shows. Almost nothing wrong with the art style.
Story:
Now we get into the negative aspects of the show. Hamatora seems generic enough, people who have powers hide it from society. Not like we've seen that anywhere in any show. However, this show takes a little twist on the whole idea of people born with superpowers also known as "Minimums". In this show, the titular "Hamatora" is the name of a detective duo known as Murasaki and Nice. Throughout the entire series, the detectives of Hamatora and other members that work out of a cafe work various jobs throughout the city. A good chunk of them are pretty trivial, but the overarching and foreboding theme seems to be a serial killer murdering Minimum Holders and giving their powers to other people.
Seems like a cool premise right? That's what I thought. The first two or so episodes were pretty compelling and got me interested in the series straight away. I mean, not gonna lie, the show did seem eerily similar to the acclaimed "Heroes" franchise with the villain, ironically named Moral, killing Minimum Holders by lopping off the top of their heads and stealing their brains. Nonetheless, the suspense in the first few episodes had me hooked and I eagerly continued watching.
Color me surprised when I find a bunch of pointless filler episodes littered throughout the series. Specifically episodes five and eight. Episode eight wasn't only your standard and cliche beach episode that you find in shounens, but the obsession with bitter melon in the episode was extremely bizarre. Nothing really happens aside from some minor competition between Murasaki and Nice. Oh and there's a gang too.
Episode five. Oh LORDY episode five. You know that one episode of "The Office" where Michael promises a bunch of kids that he will pay for their college if they pass high school, only to reveal he doesn't have the money? Take the level of cringe from that episode and combine it with the cringe from the BDSM jokes in Kill la Kill and you have something not even remotely close to the cringe in this episode. The episode starts harmlessly enough, but morphs into an outrageous onsen plotline, if you can even call it that. Sitting through two or three straight minutes of a half-naked guy doing sit-ups while grunting and releasing a pheromone through his sweat was so uncomfortable that I can't even describe it. Episodes like this made me straight up quit the series. It's not that the idea of the show was even bad either. This show had so much promise in the premise and the storyline, both of which got muddied by poor writing and unnecessary filler. Serious and tense moments got sullied by nonsensical side-plots, which is a shame because, again, the plot wasn't bad alone.
Taking this into consideration, Hamatora, along with it's sequel series, really doesn't know what it wants to be. Is it a fantasy? Is it a sci-fi? Is it a thriller? A comedy? A mystery? There are so many different aspects of anime that are just thrown in without any real cohesion. I was so confused throughout the whole season because it couldn't find a niche. You could argue that it was trying to be a niche-breaking anime, but it does a poor job at doing so.
Sound:
I don't have too much to say about this. The sound really wasn't that bad, it just wasn't anything special. The sound behind the action sequences got your blood pumping, but that was about it. Find any typical shounen anime, and you'll probably find a soundtrack either similar or better to this one.
Character:
This part really stung. As I previously mentioned, I loved almost all of the character designs in the show. Each one was unique and you could pick them out almost instantly. Plus with names like Nice, Birthday, Three and Ratio, they aren't too hard to remember.
What sucks is that there is almost zero character development and almost zero backstory aside from Nice attending an academy for Minimum Holders, Honey and Three having a sweet and emotional past and the relationship between Ratio and Birthday. But that's about it. You get close to no insight onto any of the characters until the next season, but that's besides the point. I was so disappointed by Hajime that you don't even know. I was under the impression she was going to be this secret bad-ass that could deck villains across a city block. But nope. Aside from episode five (gag me), she doesn't reveal anything about who she is. The only thing you get to know is that she squanders Nice's money on hamburgers like a leech.
Koneko and Master are the same way. Neither of them are even remotely compelling or relateable due to them having a near-absent presence in the show. Moral's drive is also pretty generic too. I mean, it's very clear that he's a villain, and does a good job at it, but there's nothing creative beyond his design. His motives are pretty cookie-cutter to put it lightly.
The only character that I found remotely compelling was Art, who strives to live and bring down tyranny through the memory of his deceased brother. There are also two great plot twists involving him in the last few episodes, but I won't go into that as to not spoil anything.
Overall, I wouldn't say that Hamatora is "bad", just overwhelmingly disappointing. I'd like to refer to Hamatora as a "background-music anime", as in you'd be better off watching this show while you're doing something else like chores. Just have it on in the background. You don't have to get invested in the show at all, and if you miss a detail, it usually isn't too hard to pick up on it later.
Want a superhero anime? Watch My Hero Academia or One-Punch Man.
Want a suspenseful detective plotline? Watch Psycho-Pass.
Want to watch an anime based on a video game with vivid colors, clean animation and blood? Danganronpa's the anime for you.
Again, it's not a "horrible" show, and I'd recommend it to anyone who wants a fresh spin on a fantasy-detective series, but there are just so many other better shows that you could watch that it almost doesn't seem worth your time.
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Oct 1, 2018
Hamatora The Animation
(Anime)
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Decided I'd write my first review! Bear with me since it's been months since I've seen it, but everything is still pretty fresh in my memory. The reason I've chosen to write about this specific anime is because, so far, it's one of the few anime that I felt greatly disappointed by.
I got interested in the anime from watching the intro to the second season on YouTube. It looked hype as hell, and after reading the synopsis multiple times on different platforms, I thought I'd give it a shot. Suffice to say that while I don't think that this is a horrible anime by any ... Previous - |