The story centers around Kenichi Shirahama, a mostly typical highschool boy who is unfortunately picked on and bullied for most of his life. But just as he's getting used to the idea, he meets a very unusual girl who changes his whole perspective. She does what he couldn't do: protect people. With that girl in focus, he determines he no longer wants to be pushed around and sets out to change himself through martial arts. But really, it seems that he bites more than he can chew, as he finds himself confronted with ever tougher opponents as things progress. But thanks to the girl, Miu Furinji, we find Kenichi training with five (sometimes six) of the best martial arts masters in the world.
The series does an excellent job building each character and makes everyone (besides random grunts) a joy to watch grow and open up as people. The masters are hilarious in how much they differ yet still come together to build something greater than the parts in Kenichi Shirahama. Even his former bully turned grudging friend, Haruo Niijima, is an interesting supporting character that provides exposition, builds situations, and offers comedic relief through a mischievous, methodical, ridiculous, self-centered, slimy persona that creates a real love/hate relationship for him.
Action scenes for this fighting-level anime are superb, not only giving intense matchups but describing a variety of moves and techniques that are pertinent to their respective styles. Seeing how things play out while learning some things along the way makes the fighting that much more interesting to watch, which reminds me of watching Initial D in that sense.
While being a comedy, with some romantic interest sprinkled in, Kenichi doesn't let that take him too far off track. Miu is really an amazing fighter, better than most of the enemies throughout the show, but is also a super nice, caring girl who becomes an excellent friend. This is a refreshing role to see a girl in, one that gets extended to other supporting rivals later in the series.
On top of all that, Funimation did an excellent job casting the characters and giving engaging dialogue that entertains all the way through. There are times when I do get tired of Funimation's recycling of their voice actors in all-but-typical roles which doesn't help with my suspension of disbelief. But I feel their choices here fit pretty well for the variety of characters they had to work with.
Overall, the show has great pacing, great comedy, great action and great characters. Although they do touch on some of the masters' backgrounds, I wish they had delved into some of the others some more. And I really wish weapons master Shigure was given more opportunity to show how she trains Kenichi. But the series otherwise pulls everything together thoroughly and keeps its focus on the battles to come.
