Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance Review

    Blade dance is an underrated harem that has its faults but counters by overcoming common issues within its genre. I have watched a plethora of harem anime and the bad ones usually have poor pacing as well as a lack of character progression. The question every director of a harem series has to determine is how do you balance the amount of fanservice and harem humour with actual plot progression. I have seen a number of other harem anime where a whole episode is spent on harem cliches. For example an entire episode could be spent randomly going to a beach while the world is falling apart. However in Blade Dance the director smartly puts the focus on the plot when needed. Each episode has a healthy dose of fanservice and plot progression to a point where I didn’t feel dissatisfied with either. I would say Blade Dance is about average when it comes to fan service. This is surprising considering the fact that the director Tetsuya Yanagisawa is also the director of Highschool DxD which is the epitome of excessive fan service. The fan service is not too extreme where it feels out of place. The only exception is after an intense battle where the protagonist becomes unconscious, wakes up and usually finds a girl in his bed. That happens a lot, but oddly it acted as a breather for the audience after intense action so in retrospect it does seem to have worked. And if you have to put it somewhere, it’s a smart place to put it. 

    The characters on the show can be hit or miss, both in the characters themselves and how a viewer perceives a character. If you look at popular tv shows with many seasons like the Walking Dead there are well developed characters who grow. In a harem show it is near impossible to provide adequate character progression to all the girls as well as the protagonist while balancing plot progression and harem fanservice in only 12 episodes. Therefore sacrifices have to be made. Most of the shows character growth comes from the female lead Claire as well as the male protagonist Kamito. This makes sense because they are the first characters introduced in the show while the other girls are introduced later. The sacrifice is that while the other girls in the harem are developed in term of breast size, they are not as lucky in terms of character growth. This is fine but it bothers me when one girl in the harem, Rinslet,  inexplicably is not there and randomly shows up when it is convenient. We learn nothing about her, even her personality is very similar to another girl in the harem which makes her entirely forgettable.

    I would say the protagonist is above average. He is clueless like every other harem lead, but he is not a wimp and is competent even though he is emotionally scarred. He is still an enigma both to himself and to the audience, we don’t know what exactly happened to him. However it doesn’t matter because we see his faults and insecurities and can see his growth. The real x factor is the female lead Claire Rouge. Either you love her or you hate her. For a while I hated her, she was whiney and possessive, her traits made her cute at times but at other times she was annoying. However by the end of the show her character changes completely. Personally I believe that actions and decisions make a person. At one point I was thinking, “Here we go again…” but surprisingly Claire makes the right decision and changes completely. Whether this change was rightly deserved is up to the viewer, but I thought this change was refreshing. Looking back her character was a foil to the other characters on the show and even helped to galvanize their own character growth. She literally talked some sense into another character a number of times. Both Claire and Kamito are similar in that they both felt alone, the person they loved abandoned them, but the two learn to lean on each other and others for help which I thought was a well executed theme.

    The show does have its faults. There are times when things just do not make logical sense or when a character seems to contradict themselves. They often seem to break the rules of the world it setup. The art and sound is average for a harem anime. The opening and ending became catchy over time but they are standard jpop tunes and are not exceptional. If this was a stand alone series I think some characters like Rinslet shouldn’t have existed. It felt like she was there simply because they needed a blonde girl in the harem. However this is based on a light novel so I think she had to be there for the sake of the franchise. Considering this fact, the ending while predictable was very satisfying. There are still more questions, the blade dance (battle) between different schools has yet to happen. Will the other girls in the harem figure out the MC’s former identity? What is this demon lord business? What happened 3 years ago to the protagonist and his partnered contract? The show exemplifies a director making the most of what he could in the 12 episodes he was given. I don’t blame him for not trying to fit everything in because it would feel rushed. It is satisfying because the central themes introduced at the start were brought full circle and resolved with characters who smartened up. It felt like the first book of a book series like Harry Potter, even though there is more plot to discover it ended on good note which made logical sense. It is unlikely a sequel will come to fruition but if it did I would want to watch it because I want to know what happens next. If you decide to watch this series you will be surprised by how fast the episodes fly by and how invested you become to the story and characters.

Story: 8.25/10

Art/Animation: 6/10

Sound: 6/10

Character: 7/10

Execution: 9/10

Enjoyment: 8/10

Overall: 7.5/10

Gakusen Toshi Asterisk Review

A-1 Pictures has been a hit and miss anime productions studio. They have given us gems like Your Lie in April, The Flower We Saw That Day, Space Brothers, Gate Thus the JSDF Fought There!, Ao No Exorcist and arguably SAO. But they have also given us duds like  Denpa Kyoushi, SAO II, Occult Academy, Fractale, Uta no Prince Sama and sadly Gakusen Toshi Asterisk. While the list of A-1 anime is varied, the one thing that you can generally expect from an A-1 Pictures anime is good towards excellent art and animation. However every season the question you always have to ask is if the premise, plot and characters live up to that same standard.

Story

Let me first start of by addressing a certain problem I hope does not become a trend in anime. Before going into this anime it is important to note that there is a second season due out in April 2016. In this same season we got the second season of the harem series Shinmai Maou no Testament. The first season ended at this boss fight and the main crux of the story was never resolved. I haven’t watched the second season but I’ll assume it gets closer to having a real ending. In the past there have been harem anime with sequels. I’m thinking of Highschool DxD, Zero no Tsukaima, Rosario no Vampire, Heaven’s Lost Property, The World God Only Knows, Sekirei, Date A Live. Say what you will about these anime but the one thing I personally can say about them is that I feel as though they can stand on their own without needing a sequel.

Unfortunately Asterisk feels like a 3 legged chair, incomplete and uncomfortably so. From the premise I was under the impression that this would be a tournament style anime. There is a tournament called The Phoenix Festa but that only begins on episode 9 out of 12. Therefore I assume season 2 will be all about this tournament and mostly all of season 1 was really just set up for it. There are 4 girls in the harem so really the first 8 episodes was just about getting to know the girls as well as learning more about the protagonist. There were also the standard harem cliches which felt like a checklist of things that had to be in there. I do wonder if it would have been smarter for the tournament to begin earlier and we could have somehow learned more about the girls as the tournament went on. I get that the purpose was so that we would feel more for the characters when the tournament began, but to be honest the matches in season 1 are only the preliminary rounds so I felt no sense of danger for any of the characters. In comparison to Maou no Testament the last episode didn’t even feel like a boss battle, it felt like a normal episode. So what we are left with is a action anime season where the audience feels nothing because there is no sense of stakes and there has so far been no real sense of danger to the characters. It really does feel as though season 2 should have been part of season 1. I really hope harem anime splitting into 2 seasons and having the 2nd season released 6 months later doesn’t become a trend. If Shakespeare can write plays without a needed intermission I’m sure a tournament style harem doesn’t need one either.

Characters

You got the main tsundere girl who's a princess, the shy/timid girl, the flat chested stoic girl and the voluptuous older blonde president. So yes everyone is a trope and to be honest I wasn’t interested in anyone except the blond president Claudia who is obviously not the main girl. To me good characters have to be more than one note, they can’t be 2 dimensional characters (pun intended). Yes every girl has this spontaneous and unexplained love for the protagonist but with Claudia there were these moments where you can just tell that there is more than meets the eye. That this girl is suffering and her cheerfulness is just a facade to hide the darkness inside her. Perhaps her interest in the protagonist is more out of a need to have someone to confide in. The problem is that season 1 didn’t really explain any of it but just gave hints about it. I might watch season 2 just to learn more about her. The female main love interest seems honorable and noble (again pun intended because she’s princess), but in no way is she interesting but simply transparent. In many ways she is Claudia’s foil, where the main girl is usually on screen while Claudia rarely is. Finally about the male protagonist, I get that some people find him annoying and say he’s the typical harem lead. However i would say that a typical harem lead is oblivious, that is something I wouldn’t say of this protagonist. You can tell by the subtle ways the protagonist interacts with the girls that he thinks of some as love interests but others as friends or the little sister type. Also he isn’t dumb either, in battle he is shown to be quite strategic and level headed. He isn’t overpowered due to a concept known as a “limiter” (which hasn’t been fully explained) where his power is restricted. Therefore I would say he is a decent towards good harem protagonist. The only issue I have so far is that as with many other harem protagonists, he as person is not very interesting and always does the right thing. In many ways both the male and female leads of the show are similar in a most uninteresting way.

Art/Animation/Sound

This is probably the one reason to watch the show. Just watch the opening and listen to the ending of the show to get an idea on the art, sound and animation. Everything is just so bright and vibrant, crisp and clean. The score of this anime is very fitting for whatever scene it is in. It uses subtle sound effects in certain places to enhances certain sensations which affects how you feel and interpret a scene. You have minor arpeggio scales on the piano for mystery or suspense, upbeat synth tracks that fit the setting of this high tech world, a snazzy jazz track for some humour. In fact it is rare to have empty spaces where there is no background music in a scene. I feel like it’s important to talk about the battles in this anime. They are by no means the best I’ve ever seen in terms of strategy but they sure are impressive to look at. In a battle there is not just one battle theme, the anime uses different tracks depending on the situation in battle. In battle there were some tracks that sounded like they were from final fantasy, but my favorites were the ones that used synths and techno beats. In terms of visuals, the action flows effortlessly with no drops in frame rate. I was particularly impressed by the use of lighting which made certain sequences seem to glow in surrounding darkness affecting the tone of battle. With the change in lighting they even made sure to effectively include shadow in battle. A scene that comes to mind was when a character is about to meet their end and you see their shadow against the ground representing their doom. There is so much detail, you see sparks, light particles change in air dynamics. I find it amazing that they were able to put so much detail in battle without sacrificing the overall look of the rest of the show. Lastly I want to talk about the weapons in the show. By the end of the series you realize that the weapons themselves are characters in their own right. The weapons are representative of it’s wielder. There is particular care and thought placed into the weapons from their design, colour, sound effects, even the angle at which they are drawn in. Early on I found the scene when the protagonist first obtains his weapon to be downright scary. The vibrating sounds the weapon made were menacing and dangerous like hearing an electric saw inches away from your head. You begin the realize that the weapons themselves seem to harbour certain feelings, they can be joyous or noble, but others can be malice or evil. I commend the anime for using the art and animation to enhance the story.

Final Thoughts

Story: 3/10

Characters: 4/10

Art/Animation: 9/10

Sound: 8/10

Enjoyment: 5/10

Overall 5/10 (Note I deducted a 0.5 due to the lacklustre ending)

Four episodes into the anime I gave it a 6.5/10. In my impressions I wrote

“In recent years similar shows to this series are decent and fine at best but this series could actually be good. I wonder if this concept has been rehashed to such a degree that the imperfections have diminished. Analogous to a chemist purifying or concentrating a certain solution. Perhaps so, perhaps not.”

Looking back I’m not sure why I was so optimistic, perhaps I was blinded by the gorgeous visuals and didn’t put enough weight onto the characters. I was enamored by the setting and wanted to learn more about the high tech society. However by the ending of this season I have not really learned anything new about the world itself. Infact I have more questions now then I did at the start. That is the frustrating thing about this anime, there was opportunity to be better than it is. However the story is told in such an uninteresting way with mostly bland characters. I continuously have to ask and remind myself what the stakes of this anime were. Sure characters have their own motives for winning the tournament, purpose, money, reputation, discovery. The problem is that many of these motives/stakes are glossed over and we are never reminded of the stakes until the very end. The anime fails to follow up on the motives and fails to explain why these motives exist which limits the world building of the show. This makes the anime less engaging. The lack of interesting characters hurts the harem aspect of the show and the lack of emphasis on the stakes hurts the storytelling. So what you are left with is mindless action. However the tournament doesn’t begin until episode 9. So for 8 episodes you have an anime that doesn’t really excel at anything save for the few action sequences and some moe/kawaii scenes if that’s what interests you. This is what I call popcorn anime, anime that is pretty to look at but serves little to no other function. If you are a fan of harems you may be able to get over the tropes and may even fall in love with some of the girls. Personally I’m one of these fans, I come home from school and just want to mindlessly watch something that’s cute, sometimes funny, and pretty to look at while I eat dinner. But for non harem fans, it is a waste of time, equivalent to staring at dynamic/animated wallpaper for a few hours. But hey, at least it’s not static wallpaper.

Ore Monogatari!! Review

The first shoujo anime I ever watched was Sailor Moon. I was around 6 and I would watch the show with my older sister every Saturday morning. I didn’t understand plot elements, the romance, all the jokes, but I do remember having a great time and it being a fond memory. I will admit that since childhood, I have not watched many shoujo anime. In fact I have a tendency to avoid shoujo anime. The esoteric world of shoujo, with it’s soft color pastels, large eyes, bishounen protagonists are all foreign to me. I often find I get bored, busy, or drop the show in favour of a show I find more interesting. However Ore Monogatari has proven to be an exception. Every Wednesday I searched for the subbed episode and found myself watching Ore Monogatari before all other anime. In the shower I would sing the protagonist’s catch phrase, “I love her” in the style of “Uptown Funk” by Mark Ronson. I would chat on skype and other formats expressing my love for the show. The show just felt so different, so fresh to many of us. However one day I spoke to an anime fan who has seen a great deal of shoujo, she admitted that she didn’t understand my fascination with the show. She stated that the show may not be as groundbreaking and different that I thought it was. I wrote this review as a way to explore my own opinions and thoughts about this series, I hope it is a benefit both to you and me.

Characters

The reason why I felt this anime was so different was because of the protagonist, Gouda Takeo. In the opening of the show there is a scene of Takeo atop the Empire State Building, an allusion to King Kong. Takeo is similar to King Kong in that he is enormous, his size causes others to fear him and to misunderstand him, but beneath that scary exterior lies a heart of gold. It is only when people get to know Takeo better, do they start to realize how great of a person he is. Going back to the Sailor Moon reference, the male lead Tuxedo Mask is a handsome, mysterious, bishounen type character, everything Takeo is not which I found refreshing. There is a complaint that Takeo is far too simplistic of a character. Some find this annoying, but others like myself find it endearing. No matter how many times Takeo said “I love her,” I never once found it annoying because I felt the character was being genuine to himself.

Besides Takeo the other main leads are Yamato and Suna. Suna is Takeo’s good looking best friend and Yamato is the girl Takeo loves. The three characters have great chemistry with one another. Perhaps some of the best moments are when Suna and Takeo play off one another. The two complement each other so well with Takeo being very blunt and direct while Suna being more reserved and laid back. The anime spent time to show their history in the form of flashbacks. Usually I am not a fan of flashbacks but some of these flashbacks were so funny and cute that they were a joy to watch. The flashbacks also helped to make these characters feel more real and genuine. I would classify Yamato as being a “girly girl” who is very cute and reminds me of a rabbit with large eyes. As a love interest she would be any person’s ideal. However as a stand alone character she is far less interesting. The only thing I know about her that is not related to Takeo is she is a good at making desserts. With so much time and emphasis being placed on exploring the background of Takeo and Suna, I would have liked to have learned more about the female lead.

Story

This is where Ore Monogatari falls flat. I have begrudgingly acknowledged that aside from Takeo not being a bishounen lead, Ore Monogatari appears to follow the standard shoujo format I have come to expect. The male leads saves the female lead from being groped on a train, romance ensues. It is always Takeo who saves the day with Yamato or her friends being a damsel in distress. The conflict of whether Takeo gets the girl, gets resolved very early in the series. This is a 24 episode series, after that initial conflict nothing much if anything happens. Instead the show begins to shift focus on secondary characters and simple misunderstandings between the leads. I did enjoy some of these shifts in focus, but in a 24 episode series I would expect more focus to be placed on the leads themselves. Especially when this anime is named “My Love Story!!”.

I feel the main problem with the leads are that they are too perfect. Takeo may not be the ideal boyfriend but he always does the right thing and Yamato is the perfect girlfriend. This makes the show fairly predictable even in the finale. However in a real relationship people are not always perfect, they fight, they argue. Simple misunderstandings tend to evolve into something more serious. It can be argued that this romance anime is meant to portray young, teenage love and that the two have not reached a sour point in their relationship. That is fine, however the fact remains that this is a 24 episode series, there is opportunity for more than just budding love.

Ore Monogatari reminds me of a one shot romance manga. For those unfamiliar, a one shot manga is a manga with only one chapter. I make this comparison because I feel as though Ore Monogatari does not have enough substance to warrant it being a 24 episode series, it could have easily been cut down to 12. Lastly I will say that I strongly identified with Takeo’s struggles of having a low self esteem, thinking you are worthless, placing others ahead of one’s self. It was one of the reasons why I first loved this anime. However this theme is only brought up in the beginning and ending of this anime, this theme is so strong that I wish they would have brought it up more. This and other dark moments of the show are when I felt the most engaged. However the show brushes off many of these moments and never addresses them again.

Art/Animation

The style very much follows the standard art conventions of shoujo anime. Soft colour palette, characters with large eyes, Suna looking like the typical bishounen character. I would be lying if I said there was anything extraordinary or different when it comes to art and animation. I will say it is all very fitting, the whole point of this artstyle is to give a sense of warmth and feeling of Kawaii, and that is exactly what it gave me. The cutest parts are the inner monologues some characters have, where their thoughts and feelings get physically manifested by cute little drawings. The artstyle is noticeably simplistic, and some scenes feel washed out.  It is almost as though the show is run through one filter when some scenes would do better without it. In regards to the characters designs, Takeo is huge and Yamato is petite. When the two are together their physical characteristics are highlighted. For example when Takeo and Yamato hold hands, her hand looks at though it were a baby’s hand next to his. There was a joke made by one of Yamato’s friends about how they would kiss. When I picture it in my head I can’t help but laugh, I keep picturing Takeo’s enormous lips and I wonder how exactly it would work. My point is, I wonder if the character designs inhibits the anime from being taken very seriously. I get that Takeo is drawn this way to play up the laughs, but perhaps it is a double edged sword.

Sound

S.E.N.S

I feel as though this is Ore Monogatari’s most overlooked aspect. I would describe the musical score as being subtle and whimsical with a soundtrack that at times can be flat out gorgeous. The group responsible for the musical score and soundtrack is S.E.N.S, the duo also did the music for Kimi Ni Todoke which has a similar feel to this series. However I would say this is a vast improvement mainly due to the added orchestral elements to this soundtrack. Often a track starts with a simple melody on the piano or guitar but then orchestral instruments like the violin, harp and flute fill in the empty spaces. Many tracks like “Story of Mind”, swell to a climax that allows the listener to succumb to a state of euphoria. The issue is that the musical score for this anime mostly uses that first thirty seconds in a track where it is often fairly simplistic. There are tracks like “Hurry Up” and “Dull” where I had to take off my headphones and make sure I was listening to the right soundtrack. At a certain point songs can get very complex with many underlying tones. I understand that the score has to fit the anime and the producers wanted the show to have a warm simplistic feel, however I do feel bad for S.E.N.S. because it feels as though many of their efforts had gone to waste. There must have been a better way of incorporating this beautiful soundtrack into the score.

This is a romantic comedy and S.E.N.S were able to make the comedic score not sound juvenile by using Takeo’s physical and mental characteristics. An example of this is the song “Eye of the TAKEO” which is an allusion to Eye of the Tiger from Rocky III, however sounds more like Rocky’s theme from the original Rocky film. Takeo is often compared to a gorilla and S.E.N.S play this up by producing tracks like “Clumsy” and “Health First” that sound like they could come from a Donkey Kong video game; they even subtly incorporate 8 bit music to the track. The one aspect I wish the soundtrack and score used more of were jazz tracks which I thought would complement the tone of the show perfectly.

The voice acting was very fitting however I will say that some voices can be polarizing. What can seem very cute and sweet to one person can sound very annoying to another. An example of this is Yamato’s high toned voice that has a very distinct accent. I would like to give a special hand to Takuya Eguchi who is the voice of Takeo as well as Hachiman from Yahari Ore No Seishun Love Comedy. These two characters couldn’t be more different both in voice and characteristics which helps to emphasize Eguchi’s range as a voice actor.  

Conclusion

Characters: 6/10

Story: 4/10

Art/Animation: 6/10

Sound: 7/10 (Would be higher if they could have used the soundtrack better)

Enjoyment: 8/10

Overall: 6/10

While Takeo is looked down upon by many females of the show, every male character who meets Takeo loves him. Takeo is manly, great at sports, all the girls don’t fawn over him, honest, loyal and always has your back. Someone you want to be friends with. I think that is why so many guys I have talked to, including me, fell in love with this show. We do not want to see some pretty boy have all the girls fall in love with him and also get the female lead. We relate to Takeo’s struggles of self esteem, not being incredibly handsome and being awkward around girls. That is why I feel that Ore Monogatari is a great introduction to shoujo for many male fans who like me were initially wary of the genre. I have heard of other great shoujo shows and now I want to explore the genre more. I think this show is perfect for couples out there to watch together. I see tons of articles like “Chick Flicks Your Boyfriend Will Love”, I feel this would be the anime equivalent of a movie on that list. The show does have it’s faults, flat characters, lack of plot progression, repetitiveness, reliance on tropes, however the characters are so endearing that many of these faults can be overlooked. That being said endearment can be polarizing, if you don’t enjoy this anime 3 episode in I would recommend you to drop it.

Gate Episode 7 Review

Hello master, would you like some tea, a shoulder massage, or maybe a snack? After being tortured to the point of unconsciousness, Itami found himself in a comfy bed surrounded by a collection of anthropomorphic maids. This scene was straight out of a Japanese maid cafe, complete with hot tea, photo sessions and lively conversation. The only thing missing was a plate of omelette rice with my name written in ketchup. As shown in the previous episode, monster girls exist in the New World. The previous owner was said to be quite “liberal” in having monster girls as maids for his household. A noble class system and hierarchy exists in the New World, is the beast race considered inferior and of low class?

The episode introduced one of Princess Pina Co Lada’s subordinates, Bozes Co Palesti. Palesti appears to share many of the traits of her princess; short tempered, proud and quick to fall to conclusions. I hope the two characters progress in different ways throughout the series because at this point they both feel one and the same.

Much of the humour stems from the Princess’s attempts to rectify her mistakes in order to maintain the newfound treaty. Every time she tries to make things better she only manages to make the situation worse, leading to Itami actively trying to avoid her. At this point the Princess and her Rose Knights appear to be utterly useless and incompetent, exposing their lack of experience, political diplomacy and organization. As shown by the training montages, the Rose Knights pale in comparison to the well oiled Japanese JSDF. The real worry is the Princess and Palesti both going to Japan, what would happen if they had another political mishap? Would this force Japan to play a new hand in how they deal with the world beyond the gate?

The female sage Lelena is proving to be an integral intermediary between the two nations. It begs the question as to why Lelena is acting as the translator instead of a member of the JSDF? We have already seen Itami’s party communicate with people of the New World without the need of a translator. Is there really a need for Lelena to overwork herself or be a security liability in a negotiation between two warring nations?

The reaction from the New World inhabitants to the technologically superior JSDF never gets old. In this episode you see both the Princess and Palesti hesitantly enter an automobile and visibility are taken aback by the vibrations of the vehicle. It is interesting to see how these characters make sense of what they are seeing, for example Lelena believes that the guns shoot bullets because of an enchantment to the gun’s cylinder.

Next episode the inhabitants of the New World pass through the gate and into Japan. Luna remarked on having to wear warm clothes because it is Winter in Japan. Is being cold the least of their worries? Will they die from, or bring some sort of disease? How will Japan, the world and specifically the victims of the Gate attack react to them? And perhaps the biggest question of all, how will otakus around the world handle seeing a goth lolitta from another world?

Date A Live Review

This series is the anime equivalent of The Bachelor. The Bachelor is a tv show where a guy dates a pool of women all vying for his affection. Throughout the show the girls often get jealous of one another and get into fights. By the end of a date or an episode the bachelor presents the lucky few with a rose, anyone who does not receive a rose is eliminated. Much like The Bachelor, Date A Live focuses around a high schooler named Shidou, who must date a collection of girls. The girls are humanoid beings called Spirits who come to Earth and in the process of doing so cause massive earthquakes than can destroy entire populations of people. In order to stop these tremors, Shidou must seal the powers of these Spirits by making them fall in love with him. Therefore instead of dating to become famous like in The Bachelor, or dating to get married in real life, the purpose of dating in Date A Live is to save the world. Yes, as corny and convoluted as that sounds this is essentially what the show is about.

Story:

One of the fundamental differences between The Bachelor and Date A Live, is that the concept of elimination through the process of a rose ceremony is lost in Date A Live. If Shidou stops dating or makes the girls upset, the girls will regain their powers thereby being a danger to society. The purpose of this review is not to question the morality of either show, but you have to admit that in real life most guys do not openly date multiple women at the same time unless they are polygamous mormons. The obvious reason for this is because people get jealous, jealous people get angry, anger causes discord in relationships thereby ruining them. The show addresses this in a serious manner at first but eventually becomes a running gag as though it was conveniently brushed aside. This unsolvable flaw is eventually address by a deus ex machina solution of having the girls believe that Shidou is “saving them” which makes everything all ok. However the issue still remains, if Shidou ever develops truly romantic feeling for one girl, the other girls will eventually get upset and unintentionally destroy the world.

But this is not real life, this is a god damn harem anime. There are 2 types of harem anime, the first type is where the protagonist eventually or will eventually choose a girl, the second type is when essentially all the girls are chosen, a harem ending. Part of the fun in a harem anime is rooting for your favourite girl or rooting for the harem ending. However in Date A Live because Shidou can’t ever choose a girl, the anime limits itself to the harem ending. Therefore upon reflection, I felt part of the fun to be lost due to the plot.

“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” This is a theme that was brought up with particular emphasis in the second half of the season. I found this to be the most interesting and something I wished could have been explored further.

Characters

The characters in general are very cute and have their own little quirks. In a sense, this very fact is a double edged sword. The majority of the cast has been written to be very one dimensional in order draw a sense of endearment from the audience. For example, the first spirit Shidou encounters is a girl named Tooka. Tooka’s is written to be dumb, she constantly thinks about food, likes having her head scratched, acts like a child, naive to a point of believing anything that’s been said. Tooka encounters some heartbreaking moments where I really felt bad for her, however her reaction towards these events felt artificial, fake and contrived in order to keep with this kawaii persona.

The protagonist Shidou really bothered me. In the anime he constantly tells girls that he wants to save them, that they will be together forever, etc. However when one of the girls gets angry at him for dating or kissing someone else, there were many instances where Shidou looked baffled as though he couldn’t understand why these girls felt this way. One of the most basic facets of being human is the ability to relate to one another. Shidou seems to lack this, he never once looked at the situation from the girl’s point of view. This leads to a heartbreaking realization, every girl does fall in love with Shidou, however Shidou never truly loves them back at a romantic level.

A character I really enjoyed was the primary antagonist, Kurumi. Of the characters she is definitely the dark horse. Her actions are not just evil, they are downright demonic and at times terrifying. So much of the show is cute and happy that the audience forgets the weight of what is actually going on. People are dying and not in a honorable or romantic way, but instead in a most violent, bloody and painful manner. Kurumi’s presence brought a shocking realization of this fact that I found to be quite effective.

Art, Animation and Sound

Here is where the series truly shines. Each girl has their own colour palette and real thought was placed into their attire and appearances. The characters designs perfectly fit the personalities of the characters. However besides the main characters I did notice small lapses where for instance background characters all had the same face. The animators were smart in having what I call “moe” scenes, where the art style completely changes into a less detailed cute style allowing them to cut corners. The animation is fluid, there are some intense action sequences where I never noticed any dropped frames. My favourite piece of artwork from this series was the over the top view of the city, the city is covered with craters which showed where the attacks and earthquakes took place.

The music in this anime was beautiful and very fitting. Simply listen to the opening of the show to get an idea of what to expect. The battle music took advantage of string instruments like the violin, scenes filled with warmth were accompanied by uplifting piano arrangements, comedic scenes had appropriate effects to suit the mood. Besides the music I have to praise the voice actors for this show, I wouldn’t make any changes.

Final Thoughts

Story: 4/10

Characters: 5/10

Art/Animation: 8/10

Sound: 8/10

Enjoyment: 8.5/10

Overall: 6.5/10

Date A Live is like your summer blockbuster movie, where a lot of money is put into production, you have a great time while watching the film however after seeing the movie you start to realize that many of the plot element didn’t make much sense. The reason why this happened is because the show tries it’s best to be lighthearted and cute but at the same time deals with dark themes and concepts. At the end of the season I still had many questions that were left unanswered, which I’m assuming was intentional because there is a sequel, Date A Live II. At this point some of you might be asking why the high score? Yes, I had many complaints about the show, but the bottom line is that this is a harem anime about dating multiple girls in order to save the world. People who enjoy harem anime will definitely enjoy this, I know I sure did.  If there weren’t so many unanswered questions and unresolved conflicts I might actually give this show an 7.5/10 because I know harem fans will love it. Therefore have fun, enjoy the ride, but please do not think too hard about it.  I know I did and my head is still ringing.

Highschool DxD BorN Review

Knockers, juicy mangos, mounds, marshmallows, bazookas, cupcakes, twins, rack, warheads are all less than stellar innuendos to the embodiment of what High School DxD has come to be known for… Breasts, breasts and more breasts. High School DxD BorN is the third season of High School DxD, a franchise that has securely found it’s place in otaku culture. If you do not know the story by now this is not the review for you.

Story

Following the events of season 2, Issei and company travel to the underworld to compete in a tournament between promising young devils. This tournament is what has become a staple of the franchise, a rating game. A rating game is an opportunity for devils to gain esteem and fame in the underworld as well as to gain ranks in the devil hierarchy. However events do not go as planned, the Gremory family get involved and as usual have to save the day.

Besides the fanservice what I find the most interesting about the franchise is the mechanics of the underworld and the hierarchy that exists. There is surprisingly a large amount of detail and depth put into the rankings, the families, strategy all of which can be pretty overwhelming. What bothered me this season was that there was little to no mention of these mechanics because the tournament that was supposed to happen, never really happens but instead gets rudely interrupted.

This season introduces Norse Mythology to the series. Recently I have been watching a tv show called Vikings on History and have become infatuated with all things Norse. I was happy to see how certain plot elements were taken from Norse mythology, albeit with an anime twist. Who knows, you might learn something. Head count, we now have Devils, Angels, Fallen Angels, norse gods and... cat girls? Yes I said it, nyaa!

Characters

This season in particular puts particular emphasis on the other females in Issei’s harem, Koneko, Akeno and Asia. Of the three I felt that Koneko’s was more interesting because it introduced backstory to the character similar to Kiba in season 2. Speaking of which I always wondered how Kiba feels about having every female member of his family fawning over Issei. There are hints of a possible love interest for Kiba, so have fun looking for it because it only lasts a second. Koneko attitude towards Issei somewhat takes a complete 180, instead of acting tsundere Koneko now wears her feelings on her sleeve for him. Looking back I still do not feel that this was not deserved and only served to satisfy a certain anthropomorphic trope.

Many new characters are introduced to the show adding to the intrigue. One character that I didn’t understand why was even introduced was a valkyrie called Rossweisee. Rossweisee serves Odin, is incredibly beautiful and constantly complains about not having a boyfriend. She has no purpose to the story and as of yet has no relationship to Issei.

Issei this season is his usual overpowered, oppai loving self. What I found interesting early on was Issei recollection of a certain painful event that occurred during the first episode of the franchise. It answers the question as to why Issei doesn’t choose one girl, perhaps why his relationship with Rias never goes anywhere further. The conclusion of the season addresses this plot point, Issei recognizes this fault, however Rias and the other girls of the harem seem to have no idea so it is never fully resolved.

Animation and Sound

Despite being a show filled with demons and fallen angels, Highschool DxD always finds a way to visually pop off the screen with it’s contrasting color palette and art style. There is a noticeable lack of quality this season as compared to season 2. This is typical of a series in it’s 3rd season and is to be expected. It’s not a deal breaker so long as you keep your expectations low.

The music this season is largely a disappointment. The words forgettable, boring, typical comes to mind. I found myself constantly skipping the opening and ending. Nothing this season particularly stands to mind.

Final Verdict

Story: 6/10

Characters: 6/10

Art: 5/10

Sound: 4/10

Fanservice: infinity /10

Enjoyment:7.5/10

Overall: 6.5/10

Of the three seasons so far, High School DxD BorN is by far the weakest. However I was able to watch the entire series in 1 weekend, therefore I still enjoyed the show despite it’s faults. If you have seen the first 2 seasons, I would say you should watch BorN but with the caveat of keeping your expectations low. The fanservice and comedy is abundant, yet the plot especially towards to end of the series drags. The plot drags to such a degree that much of the drama introduced never gets fully resolved. The whole season feels as though it’s filler or set up for possible future seasons.

As a final note, I first started watching this season when it was first airing and stopped due to all the censors (for obvious reasons). It has been less than 2 months since the series stopped airing and I was able to watch the entire season uncensored. Don’t worry, I didn’t faint from loss of blood due to excess nosebleeds.