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- Story
It starts off with the League of Villains trying to escape with a man on life support until Endeavor and others stop them. The one they were transporting ends up escaping. Midoriya in his class are sent to Nobu Island for community work as part of their studies in which they they end up meeting the antagonist of this film (the man that escaped named "nine" and his group of villains) that are looking for a specific boy because of his quirk. Without spoiling anymore the story is just OK. Nothing special. It's your average Shounen Anime film structure you're probably already used ... to seeing if you've seen a lot of Naruto, Bleach or One Piece movies.

- Art

Art is really good. It's definitely a step up from the 1st movie for sure.


- Animation

The animation in this movie was fucking FANTASTIC all the battles were Lit and choreographed excellently. Definitely the best action sequences this Anime has produced thus far.

- Music/sound
Nothing new here. Pretty much everything in here you've already heard in the show. Did the job though anyway. Can't really comment much on sound effects. The movie didn't do a whole lot that really pushed it sound wise until the end. It still sounded good in theaters though. Not as good as Dragon Ball Super Broly though.

- Characters
There is some character development between Midoriya and Bakugo. However, I can't speak on this without spoilers. What I can say though is that all your favorite characters are here and actually useful in this movie unlike the previous one.

- Enjoyment
I had a fucking blast with this movie. You could see they clearly had a much bigger budget to work with here and that they used their A-team to make this movie. Which is likely why Season 4 animation lacked so much. I can't even be mad though cause after seeing this movie I can see why they would need their best working on this film. The action sequences are so wonderfully done and directed. Better than anything they've done with the Anime for sure. And as usual the movie ends in a spectacularly hype fashion. If you thought the previous movies ending was hype. Well boy/girl you ain't see shit yet.

-Overall
GO SEE THIS MOVIE. If you were kind of on the fence about it if you were disappointed after seeing the first movie like I was. This is so much better. Bigger budget, Bigger fights, Longer fights, flashier fights. Not to mention All of class 1-A is utilized in this film. So no one's left out. Everyone gets their moment. Don't listen to these people giving this low scores cause of this movie not having much plot. Don't listen to the people saying this animation is no different from the T.V Anime. either. They are clearly smoking something good to think that. This movie did it's job as being a very entertaining movie and I can't recommend this film enough.

I'm not going to bother writing a synopsis since you've probably already read the one provided on here. So I'm just going to jump right into the review. This is going to be a long one. Strap yourself in.

- Plot

The plot of this Anime is extremely straight forward and rather basic. Main character is on a journey to find his mother that was kidnapped when he was a a toddler, during his journey he meets up with old comrades and they embark on a quest to save his mother and take down the Imperial Army and liberate the Country. A long the way Challenges are ... overcome, many interesting people are met, former Ninku companions are discovered. There are some neat things a long the way to keep your interest.

So if you're looking for any plot twists or an intricate plot, you won't find this here. But what you will find here is a fun adventure, with good world building, fun characters and decent action. The plot isn't complicated but it doesn't have to be because the main cast and the world are what really make this Anime enjoyable in my opinion.

- Pacing
Since it is an adventure Anime a bulk of the time is allocated to side stories, so the pacing isn't going to be fast, but unlike other Shonen Anime these Side Stories are actually pretty well done and the outcome of them aren't always happy endings. The thing that surprised me the most is how the writers did such a good job at building the world and people that live within it by using these side stories. You really start feeling immersed into this world and it makes you want to keep learning more and more about it.

- Characters

Main Cast

Fuusuke: Rat Ninja and Former captain of Ninkuu's squad 1. His specialty is Air techniques. Pretty impressive resume for a 12 year old huh? He always has his good friend Hiroyuki Penguin by his side.

Touji: Snake ninja and former captain of the 6th Ninkuu squad. He specializes in ground based abilities. He has a younger sister named Rihoko and has fought alongside Fuusuke and Aichou during the war and they have known each other since before then as well.

Aichou: Rooster ninja and former captain of Ninkuu's squad 10. His abilities include being able to jump extremely high into the air and being able to soar in the sky. Not quite flying, but very damn close. He's hot tempered and is often brash and can be kind of a dick at first but he lightens up later on.

Rihoko: The sister of Touji. She is not a combatant but she is shown to be able to use the substitution technique.

Hiroyuki: Fuusuke's best friend. He is a Penguin with a lot of character.(which is expressed very well through gestures and the like since he cannot talk)

Conclusion: The way these main characters interact with each other is probably one of the things I enjoyed the most about them. The interactions feel real and they talk to each other and act as friends would in real life. They are all able to express different emotions and characteristics and it never feels forced or out of character. Overall their characters aren't deep or complex but they are fun, likable and ithe way they interact with each other and the world around them is well done.

- Villains

I don't want to spoil the villains but I will list their names and give a basic description then talk a little about what I liked about them and what could have been improved on.

- Kisumi (1 of the 3 colonel's in the Imperial Army, He has Long Blonde hair and has an Elegant, Feminine look to him.)

His character was ok. His motivations made sense if not very original but I do wish they spent more time building his character. He is absent for a lot of the series and his character arc ends leaving a lot to be desired and falls kind of flat.

- Ajirada (1 of the 3 colonel's in the Imperial Army, A big man with a sophisticated yet imposing presence)

I really felt burned with Ajirada. They could have done so much more with his character. I really wish they expanded more on his back story, and there was a chance to give him a small character arc about half way through the series but for whatever reason they decided to not do it. He had the potential to be one of the most interesting characters in the show. Disappointing.

- Mekira (1 of the 3 colonel's in the Imperial Army, a Red head with short hair and a tom boyish look) Again, Another villain that left much to be desired. (do you see a pattern here?) She had an interesting back story that they could have used to explore the world outside of the Country the story takes place in but they just choose to not do anything with it. They also chose to not do much with her character either. She comes into the show late and doesn't really do much of anything. Her character arc concludes okay, but they could have done more with her.


- Kouchin (Leader of the Imperial Army, Tall and wears garbs of a Priest)

He also suffers from what the rest of the villains in this show suffer from. Not enough screen time to develop them enough. Kouchin however has even less time than the others and makes him the most boring villain of them all. His character is so text book, just like his motives. Yeah at the end we get a few reveals about him and why he's doing what he's doing but we're so disconnected from him by the end of the story that it's hard to care.

Conclusion: The villains are by far the weakest part of this Anime. They aren't utilized enough. You have a 55 episode Anime and they don't do much of anything. Or have that big of an influence on the plot itself. They tend to show up then disappear for an extended period of time which I feel really shouldn't be happening.

- Music
The Opening and the 3 Ending songs are fantastic. I loved them. They're all full of emotion and have a wonderful sound and vocals.

The insert songs themselves aren't anything special but do a good job at fitting the tone of each scene. They also borrowed one specific insert theme from Yu Yu Hakusho. They could have used more from it that I missed but I doubt it.

- Voices
The cast here all did a great job with the voices. I have no complaints. For our Main cast we have Rica Matsumoto as Fuusuke who is known for the voice of Ashe Ketchum or Satoshi from Pokemon. Megumi Hayashibara as Rihoko, who is also Lina Inverse from Slayers. Jurota Kosugi as Touji who also has voiced Asuma from Naruto, Arlong from One Piece and Jonathan Jostar from Jo Jo. Then finally we have Mitsuaki Madono as Aichou who has voiced Kon from Bleach. They are all experienced and delivered their lines amazingly.

- Art

The character designs are nothing to write home about, almost all of them have the same kind of faces aside from Fuusuke, Mekira and Kisumi. I did like though how much effort was put into Rihoko's wardrobes though. Nearly every other episode she had a new outfit for the ENTIRE run of the show. Which is impressive. Character designs overall got the job done though. They were following the Mangaka's art, so no complaints. Oh yeah, there are literally no frames in which characters look off character or goofy, which is extremely surprising.

The backgrounds, and environments are beautifully drawn. Very Colorful and vibrant. Something that only hand drawn Animation cells can achieve. I really enjoyed looking at all the lush green countrysides and towns, snowy mountains, big blue oceans and skies. Just very nice to look at. I can't praise it enough.


-Animation

The animation is fluid and there were no reused animation sequences. You can clearly tell they had a good budget with this series. The fights are well done, regular movement is well done, Vehicle movement is well done. This is just a well animated show.


- The setting
The story takes place in more of a Western setting. If I had to guess likely the early 1900's since there are planes, trains, automobiles, telephones and other kinds of early technology. The technology in this Anime is actually very consistent.You won't find anything that will break immersion here. In terms of locations you'll see everything from countrysides, deserts, islands, snowy mountains, small villages, small towns and huge cities. There's definitely a lot variety here.

- The World building
The world building is excellently done here. The people that live in it have real problems and feel like real people. We get to see how the aftermath of the War has affected these people through each episode and it really immerses you into the world and care about the people in it. Definitely the strongest point of this series was how this is handled.


- Overall enjoyment

I really enjoyed Ninku. The World was great, the main cast was great and aren't preachy like in a lot of Shonen Anime. However I do wish that there were more fights but the fights it did have were well animated and didn't drag. I also would have loved if more time was spent on developing and using the cast of villains they had as well as made the plot a bit more tight.

Overall I think this Anime is really underrated. For the World Building alone and Main cast I really recommend this. If you're a fan of Naruto it's also a treat to see where Kishimoto the author of Naruto drew a lot of his inspiration and ideas from.

If you're a fan of Shonen give this a shot but be warned this is not a battle Shonen, Characters aren't going through training arcs, tournament arcs, or getting power ups and having long dragged out battles. So if that's what you are looking for you won't get it here. However if you want a different kind of Shonen that is different from the norm I really suggest you watch this.

- Final Thoughts

It's really a shame that a show that had so much money and effort put behind it just couldn't take off the way they expected it to. Cause this Anime had great production value for its time and even had several video games and other merchandise. I'm guessing kids couldn't really connect with some of the adult themes in this Anime like they could with other shows at the time.

Ninku really is an interesting piece of work. I've never seen a Shonen Anime that made the world and characters all feel so.. well real. Truly a lost gem in my opinion even with its flaws.

This Anime is essentially X-men, except with generic powers, characters and story. Seriously you're better off reading the X-Men. The art, animation and sound in this anime are top notch. The budget clearly went toward that cause everything else is so damn average. It doesn't help the fact that the action sequences are far and few between cause the rest of the Anime is boring exposition and info dumps with bland forgettable characters and this goes for ALL the films 1 through 5 are just mostly snooze fests. I Literally I cannot remember a single character from these movies. Not even what they look ... like, hell I can't even remember a single one of those well animated action sequences and that is really sad cause they were the only reason why I stuck it out through all 5 films. Even after that I remember still being disappointed that there weren't enough of these scenes. It looks, great, sounds great, is very nicely animated but it just lacks anything that will make you really remember it cause outside of high production values it does everything else just really average. It's not bad enough to make you remember how bad it is but it isn't good enough to make you remember it either. By the time I finished these films up I just felt disappointed. I can't really say I can recommend these films. There's nothing new here that Western Comics hasn't done already and to invest 4 hours of your time into 5 films that you may or may not enjoy isn't really worth it. This story could have been done in one movie and been MUCH better paced and enjoyable. I'd say, check the first movie out, if you're luke warm about it and want to continue watching to see if things get better, Seriously... don't. It doesn't. Just gets progressively more meh. 6/10 cause of its budget.

I noticed some reviews of this show have been biased from manga readers. I have also read the manga too, but I wanted to try and give a review from the point of view of someone that hasn't read the source material.

Lets get started


- Brief synopsis
A middle aged salary man named Yamashita Kazuo on his way home runs into Fighter Tokita Ohma and see's him beat up a another huge fighter. The next day Kazuo is invited to talk to the owner of his company where he is dragged into the world of the Underground fighting circuit called "The Kengan fights".There he is re-acquianted ... with Tokita where their journey begins to compete and attempt to win the Kengan Tournament.

- Story
The plot is basic enough. Company CEO's have fighters represent them and fight for them in Kengan Matches. Fighters fight to see who's strongest, and other personal reasons. Their CEO handlers are in it for the prize(money, property, and whatever to further their companies.) Every so often there's a Kengan Tournament where only the best of these fighters come together to compete to be Champion and win their boss the position as the new Kengan Comittee Chairman. The whole story is basically one big Tournament arc. I know that will scare many away but it's really about all the subplots between characters that really makes it not just another "people fighting" anime.

- Characters
Characters are everything from cool looking to Drag Queens
To walking stereotypes that have their own fighting styles. That's about it. No developement of any sort in the 12 episodes. Though some of the cast do have their back stories touched upon.

-Pacing
Very fast. It can be jarring at times when it goes from fight to fight so fast with no grace period in between.

- Art and Animation
The anime consists of 3D CG models and 2D hand drawn art. CG is used for the fights and 2D is mainly used for static stills or scenes with not much movement. Sometimes however you have one character thats CG in a frame with another character drawn in 2D in the same frame. It looks odd but I didn't find it as jarring as other people have said.

They also use a really stylish way of presenting the visuals to the viewer during flash back scenes or when the narrator is explaining something. It's a combination of still images and audio showing you what's going. So the camera would show an image then pan over to another image that will either have the narrator speaking or a character(or character's).

Overall the 2D art looks fine. The CG is decent and surprisingly quite fluid(can be clunky at times). Is it as good as say the "Ultraman" 2019 CGI Anime? No, but is it as bad as the "Berserk" 2015 CGI Anime? No. In my opinion it's a decent middle ground.

I personally didn't mind all of the different art styles and techniques used though I do understand how some would dislike it. I'm unsure whether it was a design choice or budget issues. I jmagine both due to the fact both the video for the OP and ED are quite lackluster and you can tell they didn't have the funds to put effort into them they'd have liked to.

- Music

The opening theme (The King and Ashley by My First Story)
I really enjoyed the opening song and was anticipating it ever since I heard the snippet from the PV(Preview) for Kengan Ashura months ago. It's a Pretty good Jrock song that does the job to set the tone.

The ending theme (Born this way by Bad Hop)
I enjoyed the ending. It's Japanese Rap. It balances out the hard hitting opening by having a more mellow and melodic ending. Works especially well since every episode ends with a fight.

The rest of the music consists of heavy metal and other insert music that is quite forgettable.

- Sound
Sound effects are fine, the audio sounds great. When the announcer is introducing fighters and commentating, her voice is powerful and has a lot of energy and flare. You really feel like you're actually at the Kengan Tournament.

Voice acting (viewed in Japanese)
All the characters sound exactly as I'd imagine. They really put together a great cast. I'm especially impressed with the announcer Sayaka Katahara(voiced by Mana Hirata). She really did a fantastic job playing the role of "Master of Ceremonies" and doing super hype fighter introductions and commentary.

I can't speak on the dub but it does have veterans like Johnny Yong Bosch so it should be pretty good even if they used the same actors for multiple roles unlike the Japanese version which is understandable.

- Enjoyment
This is where I'm going to diverge from looking at the anime as is.
Honestly it was just ok. Even before the anime aired I knew it would be hard to adapt it properly and I was correct. A lot of character interaction was axed as well other events that took place before the tournament started that are referenced later in sub plots and in the plot itself. What makes Kengan Ashura is its characters more than the fights.

In the manga they're so individualized with their personalities. We don't get to see that in the anime due to them removing interactions. In turn it just makes the whole show feel like a bare bones adaption that's too fast paced. The anime rushes from fight to fight with just enough plot so you don't get completely lost. I can understand why they did this though. The way the Manga is presented makes it hard to adapt. Easier to adapt fights than a ton of character dialogue and interactions that only real work in comic format and don't translate well when animated

. Overall I'd say it's more of a Kengan Ashura lite. If you just wanna see cool characters fighting each other and don't care about much else than I recommend this. In my opinion they accomplished what they set out for. A show that can be enjoyed on its own as a stand alone and that can also make people want to seek out the manga for a more complete experience.

- Introduction

Well where to begin.. I remember hearing about this anime about 10 years ago. The art looked out dated and didn't peak my interest. Then early last year I was checking out some of Tomino's non Gundam Works. After finishing Space Run Away Ideon I decided to give Aura Battler a go. After a bout a year I finally completed it. How do I feel about it? Well lets find out

Lets start with a synopsis

It's about a Japanese Boy named Sho that one night while riding his Motorcycle he ends up being transported to a land named Byston Wells. Soon after arriving he finds ... out he's in Lord Drakes Kingdom(who is the main antagonist of the anime). Due to not knowing what's going on Sho ends up enlisting into Drakes Military where he meets another man from Earth named Todd Guiness. After a few fights in their Aura Battlers Sho ends up seeing that Drakes intentions are to conquer the land, thus defects and ends up meeting Neil Givens that's leading a group of freedom Fighters in which he joins.

- Sound
The music used in this anime is nothing special. Nothing stands out or is memorable other than the intro which is very catchy and the ending which is also quite nice.

- Art
As someone that enjoys hand drawn shows, this one just didn't age well at all. Character designs are just OK. Some characters can look really weird at times. The Aura Battlers.. a lot of people have said their designs are one of the best parts of this series. I personally think they look kind of messy. Most of them use colors that don't make them pop so a lot of the Battlers come off as looking flat.Overall look just didn't click with me. Backgrounds are pretty well done. Didn't see much wrong.

- Voice acting
Nothing much to say here. I saw the Japanese version. They all did a good job.

- Animation
Like other mecha anime during the time. You'll find recycled frames here too. Animaton during battles are alright even though sometimes it can look janky. Character movement is ok for the most part too. It gets the job done

- The Characters
Not the best written characters Tomino has come up with. I didn't care for any of the main cast protagonists. They were likable. I just didn't care. The antagonists were a mixed bag. It was basically either them wanting to rule because they're power hungry. Or them just wanting to fight just to fight. The most promising one was Shot Weapons motivation and wanting revenge. Unfortunately nothing came of that. To be honest the most memorable thing about these characters are their names. Except Cham. Cham is the best.

- Overall Story
It's just decent. It starts off strong. Different from your average Mecha anime. After the first like 20 episodes the pace becomes terrible. Pretty much every major player is introduced within those episodes but instead of progressing the plot it decides to waste your time. Not much of anything happens again until around episode 30.The plot picks up again until around episode 40 in which it devolves into more battle of the week. Until the last like 3 episodes. I'd compare it to a race. Runner starts off strong slows down in the middle then picks up speed a bit again. Then in the home stretch gets second wind runs faster than the start but ends up falling on its face and crawls to the finish line.

- overall enjoyment
I wouldn't watch this ever again. It wasn't terrible but it felt like a huge waste of time in the end. I honestly enjoyed the first 20 something episodes the most. After that it was hit or miss. Had to push myself to finish this.

- Overall thoughts
I really think this anime could have felt like less of a disappointment if it got one last episode to properly wrap it up and give us a real ending. Other issues I had were the Mecha battles. They were boring to watch. Recycled animation and just weren't interesting. The overall anime had great ideas but failed to execute most of it well. It took long for the plot to progress at times. During those times it was hard to keep my interest. Final thing is the subplots abruptly all end with subpar conclusions. I think if this series ditched the mechs it could have spent more time on plot and characters.

Do I recommend it?
Honestly unless you're a Tomino completist, not really. I also certainly can't recommend this to mecha fans either. This whole anime just felt like a huge waste of time due to the ending that essentially kicks the viewer in the nuts and gives them the finger. I'm serious. You spend all this time watching this poorly paced show and get rewarded with nothing. I can forgive a poorly paced show with a good or great ending but this is neither. Just stay away from this show. Not worth the time with that episode count. Yea Dunbine was ahead of its time and had some cool ideas but at this point theres nothing you probably haven't already seen here in modern anime. Bottom line. If you have expendable time on your hands and have the patience. Try it. If you have limited time and value it. Don't bother.

Before I start this review I'd like to say that I have not seen the whole series, but I have seen half of it and I believe it's enough to give the gist of what this series is about. So anyways, on to the review. The story is basically about your average cowardly kid named Kenichi Shirahama who isn't very strong and is always being picked on constantly, because of this he attempts to learn Martial Arts through books which didn't work very well obviously. Kenichi then meets this girl Miu who after beating up and saving Kenichi from a gang of thugs offers him ... to train at her dojo. Unfortunately Kenichi did not know what kind of dojo this was and agreed. This is where he meets the masters which he will be trained by. There are 5 masters and each are masters of their art, these arts are Muay Thai, Karate, Weapons, Jiu Jitsu and Kung Fu. Overall the story is enjoyable and even good for the most casual anime fans. The characters are fun and the way the characters interact can give quite the good laugh. It teaches you that you must work very hard towards a goal and it does not come easy, which is shown through Kenichi's training. The fights scenes are great to watch and aren't over very over the top, the fights can actually become quite technical and every movement and attack has an explanation behind it. Another great thing about this anime is that everything Kenichi learns is applied time after time in each fight. Overall if you if are interested in Martial or train in the Martial Arts like myself you will probably enjoy this anime and will get excited to see many of the techniques you've seen or have even done yourself, in the anime being used. If anything at least give this anime a try, it's not the best anime ever made but it is a very fun watch.