A certain anime taught me a long time ago, never judge an anime by it's animation style. Always give it a chance. That anime was Gankutsuou. Since then, I've learned that whether an anime looks like it's for children (Made in Abyss, Madoka Magica), made with substandard animation styles (Now and Then Here and There, Kono Sekai no Katasumi ni) made with cheap CGI (Knights of Sidonia), or just weird styles you're not used to (Gankutsuou, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei) you always give it a chance. I am adding Kengan Ashura to that list as yet another example of a great anime that was hidden behind trash design.
Beyond the atrocious CGI, is amazing action, intriguing characters, laugh out loud humor and over the top memorable moments. What other anime has Ronald McDonald out here participating in death matches while Barack Obama watches on? What other anime has a dude leaving trails of naked chicks in the entrance tunnel before coming out to fight? Kengan Ashura is like Tekken, Jojo's Bizarre Adventures, Baki The Grappler, UFC and WWE all just got drunk and said: "Hey, you guys look sexy after these 9 beers.".
This anime is intentionally ridiculous. You've got Panasonic, Bandai, Nintendo and McDonald's, out here hiring mercenaries, psycho killers, and pro wrestlers to fight each other to the death to secure contracts for lucrative multi-billion yen deals in underground death matches. (Apparently "secret underground death matches" take place in massive stadiums before 70,000 people, though.).
In the middle of this, you have Ouma Tokita: Your typical stoic MC on a quest for revenge in the midst of the madness. And by his side, is the comedic relief, Kazuo Yamashita. Kazuo, in over his head as Ouma's manager, is the source of the best comedic moments of the anime and really breathes life into the duo. Ouma, by himself, would be boring outside of his fights. Just another brooding tough guy. But, paired together with Kazuo, it brings life to both of their characters.
As for the fights they are very entertaining to watch. While CGI is ugly as sin when not properly animated, it has one advantage over traditional anime, in that the motions are much smoother. This leads to some very fun fights. The fights in Kengan Ashura are brutal, nearing Mortal Kombat levels a couple of times. (But, the gore is not too excessive, and if you're not into that, probably only one fight will really bother you.) As with any tournament battle anime, you get all kinds of styles and powers. People who fight with hair, people who appear to transform, etc... It leads to some interesting combinations and characters and that's the main thing that sets Kengan Ashura apart from alot of tournament animes: Fights not containing the MC are actually interesting.
Usually, in these kinds of anime, the creators breeze through the rest of the cast's fights. There's not a lot of effort put into them. They may spend a little time focused on the MC's top sidekick fighting, or the main villain's fights in the tournament, and breeze through the rest. But in this anime, they actually put in the time to make each fight entertaining in it's own way, and flesh out the characters a little bit. While the focus mainly resides on Ouma, they actually put significant time into getting you familiar with other characters that have little or nothing to do with him, like Cosmo, Lihito, Sekibayashi and the Kure Family. This really helps the anime a great deal, as the rest of the tournament doesn't feel like filler when the MC isn't in it. In this entire season, Ouma only has 4-5 fights out of about 15-16 fights in the season, and I was still engaged and entertained by every fight.
There's a lot to love about this anime. It's a shame that the CGI drags it down for so many people. But, at the end of the day, this is anime and good animation IS important, so I don't blame those who are turned off by it. But, Kengan Ashura is much like an ugly date. It may not be much to look at, at first. But, if you get to know it, you'll probably love it.
Give ugly anime a chance!
