After finishing Stein;s Gate, Berserk, and Fate/Zero, I thought that it was time to begin watching Claymore. It did not disappoint compared to the other three series. I'm a fan of Berserk, as well as Shingeki No Kyojin, so watching a show similar to their types of style and genre was a good appetite.
The story starts with a boy who lost his family from demonic predators called Yoma, as they feast on humans and are able to blend in with humans with their type of appearance manipulation. To face against such demons, an organization created a hybrid of female humans and Yoma warriors known as the Claymore, which brings us to our main protagonist, Clare. Claymores are detested by society for the fact that they still hold Yoma flesh in their veins, and as Raki, the young boy, realizes that Clare shows similar qualities with himself, they bond. Now, Clare's determined to protect Raki, as well as holding a strong ambition to defeat the main antagonist that terrorized the days of her youth.
Now, this is a special story. I cannot compare this to SnK as it was made afterwards, and Berserk is kind of different in regards to its plot as well. So in terms of story in the shounen/18+ mix, Claymore excels.
Moving on to the art, the character designs are kind of repetitive as almost every Claymore have silver/blonde/white tinted hair, silver eyes, etc. The thing is though, that is their character. My rating of art, however, comes from the design of the Awakened Beings and the Yoma themselves. The kaiju have unique designs, symbolic, or religious. The aesthetic deigns almost remind me of Berserk as well, pardon me for comparing the two so much but both are fantastic fantasy series. However, to argue against my rating for the art, the animation is sometimes lackluster as characters lack faces as the scenes zoom out, although it might also be the quality of the episodes (i'm not watching this in 720p). The demons actually look like demons though, and sometimes do appear quite frightening. Horns, spikes, wings, the demonic designs in Claymore are unique.
The sound is mediocre from what i've heard so far. The soundtrack is nice and all but sometimes the voice acting suddenly downgrades in quality mid sentence, although again this might be from the source that I watched this from and might not be from the creators of the anime themselves. Although, I won't really put sound as something in the overall grade in the first place, so this doesn't weigh as much as the others, if not at all.
The characters are kind of a weak point here, as a lot of the Claymores you see in the series die. Although, Clare, Raki, Priscilla, and Teresa are each the better characters of the series. Clare especially, as you see her suffer through the death of her comrades countlessly just like Guts from Berserk, or Eren from SnK to compare the suffering each characters have lost in their own respective series. Clare is one of the better female protagonists in all of Shounen/Seinen, viewers and readers might see why as they read or watch the source material. Raki has appeared annoying at first for me, but he's generally the voice of reason or the "pussy" character, but at the same time you'll see that in his own way he grows semi-interesting, but depends on the person. Personally I still dislike him. In terms of Teresa and Priscilla, I will not spoil them for the reader of this review so go watch/read this.
Overall I did enjoy Claymore a lot. Did I enjoy it as much as Berserk, however? No. Berserk still remains the pinnacle quintessential king of Seinen/Fantasy in manga history, although Claymore is definitely an amazing follow-up. is it better than Shingeki No Kyojin? In my humble opinion, I view Claymore as the better series, yes. However, this doesn't mean that SnK isn't a good series, it just means that some artists/studios are doing a better job handling the fantasy elements of their own respective shows. Claymore is a series never to forget in terms of fantasy shows/anime, however there are existing flaws and cliches that appear often, especially the ending, but most series have their own bits and stuff as well.
Overall, Claymore is a 7.8/10 series, however due to MAL's system of only using whole numbers, I shall round it up to an 8/10 that it deserves, instead of a 7.
