Wrestling and anime have a lot in common. They are both hobbies looked down upon by society as a large and have most of their fanbase communicate online. They are also full of idiots and elitists hating on “normies” and “casuals”.
Story:
As far as I could find out, this anime is a sequel to the original Tiger Mask, but ignores other sequels to it. Since the original is solely available in Japanese, I have no idea how this one correlates with it, so let’s just judge it as a show on its own. A young guy named Naoto picks up the moniker of Tiger Mask to make it big in the wrestling business and find the man responsible for crippling his mentor and make him pay. At the same time, his former training partner Takuma has the same intentions, but joins the evil organization to destroy them from within. The whole plot isn’t much to write home about, but a simple story well executed can still be a good one. Tiger Mask is pretty straight forward, which is definitely for the better, as the writing doesn’t feel like it could handle big twists or a deeper storytelling. Almost everything that happens is easily predictable, but the show never tries to pretend that it’s going to surprise you. A very nice addition to the cast are the stars of real life promotion New Japan. They give the whole story a more realistic feeling, showing us that this isn’t a fantasy world with made-up guys doing impossible moves, but a show about somebody wrestling. Of course the Tigers still have impossible finishers, but you get the idea.
7/10
Art:
Tiger Mask looks very reminiscent of old 80s sports shounen and doesn’t really try to be more eye-pleasing than absolutely necessary. The animation is kept very simple, which isn’t a bad thing in itself, but here it comes across as rather lazy. Like “the kids won’t notice” kinda lazy. It’s certainly not a budget issue, as the last three episodes DID look spectacular and it makes it all the more jarring to know what maybe could have been.
5/10
Sound:
The opening song is a newer version of the classic Tiger Mask theme, which, even though it’s pretty cheesy as you would expect from a 60s cartoon, still works fine today. I don’t know if the ending theme is a rehash too, but I thought it was pretty cool. The rest of the soundtrack is basically just some stock music. I somewhat missed entrance themes, but that’s just me being a wrestling nerd. In terms of voice acting I didn’t notice anything remarkably good or bad, it was a solid performance. Just a shame that the New Japan guys weren’t voiced by themselves (except for the final episode cameo).
7/10
Characters:
Naoto is a good main character, he’s serious when fighting, he can be a bit goofy when outside the ring and he has some flaws that almost prevent him from reaching his goal. Takuma is a good anti-hero, with noble motives but behaving like a bad guy. However, I found the villains to be weak. Even The Third didn’t have much more going on than just being that one incredibly strong guy who likes to injure people. The side characters were a lot of fun though. Furukawa Mask was hilarious, Haruna and Wakamatsu were fun too. I especially enjoyed the many cameos by New Japan heels, like Naito or Kenny Omega. In total, the cast was fine by me.
7/10
Enjoyment:
Tiger Mask had a few lengths when it looked like this is going nowhere or might even end up becoming a long-runner. Thankfully, the stronger parts made up for it and ended up making it a quite entertaining show. However, as with probably most other sports shows, if you are not interested in the subject of wrestling, there will be little for you to enjoy about this anime. It isn’t really able to stand on its own as a compelling story and could easily bore you to death. IF you enjoy wrestling however (especially Japanese), I’d say it’s at least worth giving a shot. A solid sports anime, nothing more, nothing less.
6/10
Overall:
6.4/10