Hell's Paradise, also know as Jigokuraku, is the third members of the Dark Trio (Jujustu Kaisen, Chainsawman and Hell's paradise) and It is in my opinion, the worst in the dark trio (Worst doesn't mean bad, just not better than JJK and CSM). Even if it is the worst, I would still recommend it to most people. Well now that this is out of the way, let's talk about Hell's paradise strong point and weak point! And We are starting with the strong point, because if I start with the weak point, Hell's paradise fans are probably gonna be mad at me lol.
Just before starting this review, I just wanna say that my first language is French so They're some chance that I do some grammatical error in what I am saying.
[STRONG POINTS]
-Characters design: Hell's paradise got a characters design that I think that everybody can enjoy, wether You are a new anime watcher or an old anime watcher. Humans or monsters, the characters design never disapointed me, even if I think that they are better in the manga, I don't think MAPPA did a bad job with it. The strongest point with Hell's paradise charaters design is that I feel that every charaters from the main cast could be the mc and that is quite suprising to me since in most anime I can pretty much easily identify who is the mc without even watching the actual show.
-The opening: I mean what can I say exept the fact that this is a fricking Jam!
-Unique setting and environment: I mean come on! Who wouldn't think that the idea of a battle shonen where most of the main charaters are just criminal is not cool? Not only that, but the setting is just a fricking battle royal! Isn't that just fucking cool!? And It is not just that, the island where our cast of characters are stuck is like super original and dope! Like the island look like a literal paradise, but it is in reality just an pretty terrific island, some would even say that it is hell!
-Colors: Most of the anime or shows that have a lot of a dark and gory element tends to have not a lot of colors in them, but this is not the case in Hell's paradise! For the time being, pretty much everythings that we have seen in this show showed us a bunch of vibrant colors, wether it is the vegetation, the characters or the fire power of Gabimaru.
-Gabimaru: I believe that Gabimaru is overall a pretty interesting and funny charater that is very easy to love. I like seeing him becoming a little more human episode by episode and realising that maybe he is not that holow inside of him like he think he is. I also really like that is final goal is just to have a calm life with his wife.
Yuzuhira: Not only she's hot, but she's also a pretty entertaining character overall AND the girl who do her voice in SUB is Takashi Rie, the same girl that made the voice of Megumin, Emilia, Hoshino Ai and many others popular anime girl.
[WEAK POINTS]
-The Animation: Okay maybe the animation is not bad, it's actually pretty good, but I do think that compare to all others recent anime that Mappa did this is clearly not they're best work, actually it is the weakest in term of animation and I don't know if I can really blame them since this season they also animated Vinland Saga and next season they are doing JJK, so I understand that they put more effort in those more than Hell's paradise (But not gonna lie I think JJK and Vinland deserved way more the amazing animation treatment since they're better shows).
-Death: As you may already know Hell's paradise is not your typical shonen, because compare to classic shonen like One piece or Naruto, a lot of the characters from the main cast got some high chances of being kill. My problem is not that some characters dies, my problem is that for the time being, the way they have killed some characters was pretty much obvious and not surprising. For exemple, the death of Tenza (The blonde guy) did not surprise me and I know that the reason why the author killed him was just to say to us: "Hey look! People can actually die in this shonen!", but it is executed so poorly. I mean come on the guy was like super beat up and a few minute before we discover that he died we saw a whole flashback, like seriously the moment that I saw the flashback I was like "Oh! He's going to die" and guess what? He fucking died! The flashback of his story didn't feel natural, It feeled forced and it was like the author was trying to say to us: "This is why you should be sad that he died".
The 13 episodes: Hum... Why only 13 episodes, like seriously wtf, I don't know about you guys, but personnaly I can't really get invested in an Shonen that only have so few episodes. Maybe If they would have made 24 ep I would have been invested in the characters and the world, but since they didn't I don't feel like I got anything bounding me to this show, like if they annouced that they wouldn't do a season 2 I wouldn't really care since I don't have for the moment any feelings toward it.
The fights: I am going to keep it real with you guys, the fight in this show are so fucking boring! They are the kinda fight that every time they come to the screen you're like "Well I guess they are fighting now". I am not saying they are shitty fight, like I saw worse than that "cough" My hero academia "cough", but I clearly not the kinda fight that keep you on the edge of your seat.
The characters: Okay I know I said in my strong point of the show that I liked that all the characters are cool, but it would have been nice If the creator haded some characters that are just total dick or psycho, I mean come on! They are criminal! It would have made so much sense and It would have haded variety.
In the end this is still an anime that I enjoyed and that I would recommend to everybody who like battle shonen.
