My favourite anime of all time for a long time standing. There are so many good things about it and I really cannot recommend it enough.
The depth in its story and characters is unrivalled. The chimera ant arc is undoubtedly a masterpiece. Layered with depth with all its symbolism, criticism on humanity and society and a great narrative about perspectives.
Story:
Hunter x Hunter is - above all else - a thrilling story about perspectives. Every character is well fleshed out and layered, each goes through their own development - be it in a positive or detrimental way. It is unbelievably refreshing to see that for once, the villains aren't out to get at the world or the protagonists "for the sake of being evil". It's refreshing that for once, the villains don't give a flying f*ck about Gon, his friends and his stupid little adventure. The villains are their own characters - not an obstacle that the protagonists have to overcome. They have their own goals in life - it's simply a matter of them having conflicting ideals to the protagonists that makes them "villains". The story is without a doubt a 10/10
Characters (and a little extra rambling):
No character in the anime is entirely good or entirely bad. There are blurred lines between hero and villain. The first time watching, you may think Gon is your typical one-dimensional shounen protagonist, but upon further inspection, you'll find that he is not. He is in every sense of the word a child. Selfish, innocent, hypocritical and narrow-minded to the core. Alexcandr on youtube does a brilliant analysis of his character and skewed moral compass.
Togashi uses Gon's complete childishness and plonks him into the Hunter X Hunter world - a cruel and unforgiving place that mirrors our own. It's fascinating to watch. I could go on and on about each and every character, but there are dozens of youtube videos and reddit threads that you can read about each character after you're done watching. Characters are very three dimensional and layered. 10/10
Art:
The art is solid and consistent throughout the anime, without any moments that appear rushed or like there has been a sudden drop in budget. The art isn't as brilliant as say - Shingeki no Kyojin, Mob Psycho or Kimetsu no Yaiba, but it's still pretty damn impressive. An 8.5/10
Sound:
Beautiful, memorable soundtrack. I lsitened through the OST and for the first time I recognised every single one. They're emotional and warm-hearted exactly when they need to be. Blends beautifully with the narrative. A solid 10/10
Enjoyment:
Absolutely love it. Some parts are admittedly slow, but it has decent pacing. The greed island arc is a well needed pace-breaker between two of the heaviest and darkest arcs in the anime. Trust me, greed island was a well-needed breather before the chimera ant arc where all hell breaks loose and Togashi hits you with every ounce of his mastery. There are lots of funny, heart-warming moments in between the heaviness of the ideas presented throughout the anime.
A 9.5/10.
Overall a 10. Absolute masterpiece. I feel as if those who didn't enjoy Hunter x Hunter as much didn't grasp the depth of the story or didn't care for it at all. If you're into that kind of thing, you'll love it.
--- From here on there will be minor spoilers for the CA arc, but they will be as minimal as possible---
You may have heard of either overwhelmingly positive - or negative reviews about the much-talked-about Chimera Ant arc. I'd just like to point a few things out.
A lot of people seem to dislike the CA arc. I can see why. Madhouse followed the manga religiously, and where there is "narration" in the manga for the CA arc, it works in the manga, since you can read at your own pace - and it just works. In the anime adaptation, it does its work brilliantly in some points - but at other points, it slows down the pacing to a snail's pace, and there are a lot of areas where I think the narrator is redundant because we can see what the character is doing. There definitely could have been some areas where there was more "show" and less "tell." Hxh is by no means perfect, but it's still phenomenal. No other anime has resonated so much with me. I can't even begin to tell you how emotionally invested I am with these characters.
I digress, but CA arc has been labelled a masterpiece because of how thematically deep it is.
It's extremely nuanced and rich with themes about the different sides of humanity. The ending song, "Hyori Ittai" for the CA arc literally means "two sides of the same coin" - referring to the fact that monster and human are just two sides of the same coin. You'll see it all throughout the arc. You might also notice some character parallels - look out for them, they're great. I'll give you a clue - it's between Meruem and Gon. And boy is it brilliant.
There are some points where all the characters in the room are developing at the same time, and it is pretty damn crazy. It gets dark though. Very dark.
And also, Leorio and Kurapika do not appear as much throughout the adaptation because Togashi switches his characters in and out of the story as the characters go about chasing their goals - as I mentioned earlier, this is a story about perspectives - goals. Whilst some characters do the things they need to behind the camera, the spotlight moves to the most interesting action out of the 4 protagonists. For the majority of the time this is Gon and Killua since they have the most interesting 'current objective' out of the four protagonists (Leorio's studying to become a doctor, Kurapika is looking for leads on the phantom troupe). In the current manga arc, the focus is on Kurapika.
We might get an arc on Leorio, or Leorio and Kurapika... if Togashi ever finishes Hxh (the author has some serious back issues and is in bad health).
That was quite the rant, but I hope I've convinced you to give it a shot :)
