Just finished binge the entire show on Netflix and thought it was very engaging and powerful.
I never read the manga or saw any of the original anime but did a quick search what it was about and have heard great things about the source material. Also I heard that Miura's Berserk had taking influence from the manga which made me even more interested.
The first few episodes was to me utter madness, there was a lot of gore, nudity and bright colors. It left me in shock but captivated me at the same time, reminiscent of the first time I read Berserk or like watching the music video Mihonichi Me! Me! Me! for the first time. I could not stop watching and jumped right to next episode as the previous ended.
Now to the rating.
Story: 8/10
The story spaning through the series is very interesting and engaging. It caught my interest right away and kept me engaged to the very end even with some hiccups along the way which was all based on pacing errors. The pacing was throughout a bit to fast for my taste and it seemed to me that the story would have felt less rushed with a couple of more episodes in there. But as I don't know the source material I can't say if there wasn't anymore material to work with. If that is the case it still isn't an excuse as this series still needs to stay on it's own two legs even if it has to deviate from the source material in doing so. That is the reason the story gets an 8 instead of a 9 or 10. The premiss and philosophical ideas and the ending would get a 10 from me if it weren't for the pacing.
Art: 9/10
The art felt a bit dated but I actually think they did that on purpose as the animations are really smooth and good overall. The design of the characters and locations where overall very good and pleasing to the eye, especially the demons. The work with extreme colors was really striking and made the more intense scenes even more engaging and fun to watch.
Sound: 8/10
The ost was outstanding and I really loved it. It had that 80ies feel to it and I caught myself thinking about Carpenter Brut. The only downside is that there weren't enough of it. The opening and closing was both also very enjoyable but got a bit old after a few episodes when you binged so I skipped them after a while. There was also a bit of rapping which I really enjoyed. When it comes to sound effects it didn't really stand out but it didn't annoy either so I guess they were decent. The voice actors did all a very good job (Japanese) and fit the characters to a tea.
Characters: 8/10
I don't want to go into the characters or the story too much as I feel like you'll enjoy it more if you know less. Overall the characters was all introduced in a good way but had some problems with more in depth development. This also boils down to the extremely fast pace the show had which hurt both the story and character development. Even though the show had this problem they showed enough and made me feel like I had a sense of everyone's purpose and values. It made me care for pretty much all the characters that were showed even the demons.
Enjoyment: 10/10
I for one could ignore the flaws I mentioned and I loved this anime. It's the in my opinion the best one I've seen in a long time. If it had a better pacing and more fleshed out story and characters it would easily be a 10/10 all around. It needed some more episodes!
Overall: 9/10
At first fresh out of finishing it I was very close to give this show a 10/10 disregarding it's faults. But after typing this review I've thought about it some more and feel like the pacing still is to big of a problem to give it a 10. It's an amazing anime with an amazing premiss but rushed. They still make it work wonderfully but not perfectly. I would still recommend it to everyone, especially to people that likes Parasyte: The Maxim and Berserk.
I really wish they would give Berserk to the guy's that made this one. I'd love a Black swordsman arc in this style (not as rushed though obviously).
Now I will go to bed and listen to Annihilation by A Perfect Circle on repeat while I cry myself to sleep. (You will understand after you finish the anime, cheers)
