The First half is a very Samurai Jack-esque formula and for those of you who haven't seen Samurai Jack what I mean by that is a lone warrior (in this case Casshern) thrown into a world he doesn't fully understand (because he has amnesia in this instance) while meeting interesting one-off characters every episode. It's less about the story itself and about exploring this world and the different ways everyone deals with what is basically the robot apocalypse (and the world is already pretty messed up to begin with). My favorite episode is probably episode 2, which is about a community of robots that decide to peacefully accept their death until...well obviously I'm not gonna spoil it but it gives great insight into the tragedy of our main character: Casshern.
Casshern is an interesting character, at the beginning of the series we learn that he's an amnesiac robot. The only three things he knows for sure is that A: He is the one who caused the ruin (that robot apocalypse I talked about earlier) B: His name is Casshern. And C: Most robots believe that if they kill and consume him that they'll then become immortal and able to withstand the ruin. As he ventures across the landscape his character arc revolves around him learning and coming to terms with the fact that he's a killing machine.
There's also a host of side characters including: Ringo: An optimistic little girl robot. Ohji: The Robot Engineer that watches over Ringo like a parent or guardian. Lyuze: A female robot who vows revenge against Casshern since he apparently caused her sister's death. Friender: Just an awesome robot dog. He's the Rush to Casshern's Megaman, that's all you need to know.
"So you like the formula that the show's using and there's a host of interesting side characters, so why did you say that you only liked half of the series?" I hear you cry. Well that's where the second half of the series comes in.
About halfway through the show the writers suddenly remembered that they had a plot and decided to focus on that, this is where the show falls apart. Not everything is explained and the things that are aren't explained well. The main premise of the show aka the fact that there's "The Ruin" that's killing robots is going on isn't even all that well explained. The Ruin is just...the robots rusting until their body parts and insides start deteriorating. And that sucks but...did that not happen before? Were these robots literally immortal before that? Never explained. And it's like this for most plot points, it's vaguely explained but never really delved into, especially when it comes to the Luna situation. Why did killing her specifically make the ruin happen, what was special about her? (This isn't a spoiler by the way.) Why can Friender withstand the ruin? This isn't a spoiler or a reveal, he can just do that...deal with it.
Both the Animation and Sound Design are great, the actions scenes are pretty damn smooth. But I've never been all that critical of Animation or Sound design anyway so don't take my word on that part.
Despite I this I still think the show is overall worth it. The first half more often than not makes up for the lackluster second half, with it's interesting one-off characters and self contained stories about people's unique reactions when confronted with an inevitable death. It's just a shame that most of the intrigue of the first half is wasted so badly.
