Mar 30, 2014
Samurai Flamenco is a Frankenstein's monster of an anime. It can neatly be chopped into 4 arcs (1-7, 8-14, 15-18, 19-22) and these arcs all feel incredibly different in tone, message, point and quality.
Story:
The major problem with the story is that when watching the show I really hoped they would pull a: “IT WAS AN ILLUSION/DREAM/SHOW ALL ALONG” type of stupid twist, because if they didn’t the show would be utter nonsense. The show is a writing disaster, it feels like the writers threw a lot of ideas and hoped the audience would accept them or that some of the ideas would stick. In the
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end only what happens in the first and last arc matters to the plot. This leaves episodes 8-18 or half of the series as a pointless waste of time plot wise, I guess the cast develops somewhat, but compared to the first and last arcs it’s not a lot.
On the positive sides there are some flashes of brilliance in the series, the show is clever at the beginning at how they poke fun at the super hero formula and how it shakes it. It’s mostly a more lighthearted Kick-Ass with a hero who fights with stationary (so it’s not illegal weaponry).
The story gets a rating of 3. It goes in too many places too quickly and barely develops anything long enough, but the first 7 and the last 3 episodes are actually pretty good.
Art:
Not much too say, the animation is bad if you care about that, although the characters do have their tics and move somewhat interesting. Humans look OK, although nothing stands out. The monsters look silly, but charmingly silly. Backgrounds are bland as hell, Offices, back alleys, the city and dingy places are were most of the action takes place.
Art gets a 4 it works and is functional. Although this is bad for the type of super hero show the show is for most of the runtime.
Sound
To be honest I don’t remember any of the soundtrack of the show. The OPs were OK but the endings were too jarring, since they were cheesy J-POP maybe it was intentional but I’m not sure.
Voice acting wise the cast is pretty good, no real stand outs but no one letting the show down. Characters sound like they’re supposed to and all the engrish is actually pretty funny and appropriate.
Sound gets a 5 the voice acting is great and funny, but everything else is a blank for me.
Character
The characters of the show are actually above average. Our main character Hazama Masayoshi is a super hero Otaku and is so dumb he can only work as a model because of his pretty face. He believes in justice, truth and the Japanese way. He decides to become a super hero (Samurai Flamenco) because it was his dream. Following closely is Gotou, a straight man cop who has to rein in Masayoshi and soon enough they develop a close (somewhat homoerotic) friendship. Mari is a member of a band of idols who also becomes a super hero for shits and giggles. The other characters mostly works, Samurai Flamenco’s mentor, the guy who makes weapon. Masayoshi’s manager who is trying to find out if he’s Samurai Flamenco. Moe and Mizuki, who are Mari’s friends and also become super heroes. There’s also Akira, a shady guy who runs a newspaper.
With this the cast would be perfect, but the writers managed to screw up, there is only 1 good antagonist who appears in the last 4 episodes. Worse yet are the Flamengers, a group of one dimensional characters (they have a gimmick they repeat each time they appear), who steal the spotlight from Gotou and Mari for various episodes and stick around until the end (albeit with a reduced role). When they first appeared, I honestly thought they were parodies of badly written characters, so I guess they weren’t since the plot took them seriously.
So characters get a 5 most of them work but the Flamengers and antagonists bring the show down immensely.
Enjoyment
Samurai Flamenco is enjoyable for all the wrong reasons. At first it is genuinely enjoyable, then after episode 7 it becomes a train wreck until episode 19. The last episodes are less terrible, but not as engaging as the first ones, although it is the most tight and structured plot the series has and the conclusion is as hilarious and baffling as only this show could offer.
The enjoyment factor gets a 6, sometimes for the right reasons and sometimes not, you certainly won’t be bored.
Overall
Samurai Flamenco is a well-intentioned anime and has glimpses, but it falls flat on its face when it comes to executing the actual plot. The show tried to do lots of things but in the end didn’t do a damn thing.
Samurai Flamenco gets overall a 4 out of 10.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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