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This show starts out very strong, and retains a solid core the entire way through, but seems to lose it's way toward the end. The early episodes of monster hunting, hyakkimaru's self discovery and early strife, the eerie and evil curse that hangs over him, and the lives of regular people in bad times are very interesting, and very competently executed, if leaning a little on the dramatically maudlin. But that makes sense really, it's focussing on tragic events, and so tradgedy is the correct genre.

However, it is toward the middle of the series that for me, the endless tradgedy, wailing and almost fetishistic delight ... the show takes in introducing new characters (Which are all very likeable and well written by the way, that's something this show does very well), building them up with a black and white (In both literal and metaphorical sense) tragic backstory, usually involving dead parents, disfigurement or other horrific and upsetting material, gets a bit much. For it seems less that the show is introducing them for any point at all, and more just to be shocking and depressing for no real reason. Practically everyone Hyakkimaru and Dororo meet dies, practically every village he passes through burns, practically everyone hates him for no apparent reason, and the ones who don't are all calmly and pessimistically resigned to be tools for cruel fate, or some other such nonsense, usually meted out to them by the edge of a random samurai asshole's blade as he was just passing by and needed to get his sensless cruelty quota done before he left the area.

It is particularly with Tahomaru, Mutsu and Hyogo where my main gripe with this style lies, as throughout the whole series you get these little asides of Tahomaru doing worthy deeds, helping the poor and generally being the most perfectly stand up hero type little lordling you could ever imagine, as his two assistants stand by smiling inanely and saying over and over again what a good guy he is and how they will stand by him to the last and not let anything harm him. It's so appallingly obvious the show *wants* you to get invested in the characters from the hamfisted way it keeps doing this, that from their first introduction it's clear they are going to die at the end. And it's all so contrived, from the way that Tahomaru just becomes a completely different person whenever he comes face to face with Hyakkimaru, specifically to give Hyakkimaru a reason to hate him, how Mutsu and Hyogo never give him advice about this *one* specific issue when they are seen to about practically everything else, how the mother never does anything but make any situation she is present in worse up until the end of the show.

The thing that makes no sense to me is how any of them think that by killing hyakkimaru everything will turn out all right anyway, the demons that he has killed are dead, and if *he* is killed, how will that remake the bargain?

The ending also has nothing to say in particular, Hyakkimaru says something or other like 'oh but i'm going to be human now' after killing hundreds of random people about a day before, which the show seems to conveniently ignore, Mutsu, Hyogo and Tahomaru all die for literally no reason and in completely avoidable circumstances (much as expected, predictability at least is a constant in this show), as do the mother and Hyakkimaru's foster parent, Lord Daigo is left alive however, and laments 'Oh misery but what if i hadn't made a deal with the *demons*, that might have meant things would have turned out better', like no shit, they literally told you themselves that it was a terrible idea. And Hyakkimaru, after slaughtering a whole castle to get him, or rather her back, just ups and leaves dororo with some random punks they met about two days ago, and it's inferred that they don't meet again until dororo is an adult.

It's just a very dissapointing, messy ending, and indeed arc, it's predictable, it's unsatisfying, and it's got nothing to say other than perhaps having the same motto as of all things cuphead 'don't deal with the devil', good advice no doubt, but I hardly think it's a surprise to anyone who has even a modicum of sense, something admittedly lacking in a lot of the otherwise well written characters of this show. And my final verdict rests almost entirely on the last half of the show, if it had continued as it had started, or at least resolved in an interesting manner, this would have been a 9 or possibly a 10.

This anime is in general fine, with decent animation and story, it's definitely going to keep you entertained enough while you watch it, however, for fans of the game, be warned, this is not a great adaptation.

The anime adaptation alters the traits of the main characters, turning Alicia into a rather generic tsundere, Faldio into that shirtless slightly creepy womaniser archetype, and rosie and largo into 'grr always angry' grizzled veterans. Now i'm not saying that these weren't aspects of their characters in the game (Except Alicia, she was never even a bit Tsundere), but the great thing about the game's characters is they all ... have many facets in addition to these that make them much more interesting and well rounded. Alicia for example is a fearless, cool headed warrior while remaining optimisitic and understanding of even her enemies. But the worst offender by far is Welkin.

In the game, Welkin is a very defined, quite unique character. He's socially awkward in some situations but charming, knowledgable, and intelligent, He has a good head for combat strategy and he doesn't beat around the bush when the time comes.
In the anime, he's just socially awkward. To the point of practically being an oblivious idiot most of the time, he doesn't understand basic interactions, and how he functions well in combat at all escapes me.

Another great shame is we never get to really see anything from the many side characters of squad seven, not even the fan favorites. Sure you see Marina or Wendy in the background of X scene, possibly firing a gun, or Oscar standing stiffly next to the Edelweiss in Y scene, but they never actually interact with the main characters at all. So dissapointing.

All in all, it's enjoyable, but if you are coming in from the game looking to spend some more time with all your favorite cool characters... you might want to reconsider. I haven't even seen my boy Walter yet even in the background.

Oh good grief.
How did we get from season 1 to this?

This show has really gone downhill, characters have become 2d and unlikeable, the plot makes barely any sense and the pacing, oh good grief the pacing, it's agonising. Sometimes they will just gloss over something we are told that happened but sounds incredibly important, sometimes they will take half an episode posturing and exclaiming 'damn, I've never fought anybody this strong before' 'haha, but now I will use my trump card' 'but you see, that wasn't my real *real* secret weapon'

It's like mindgames written by a 7 year old, where these edgy psylords breeze through ... everything with absolute ease and suffer repeatedly from wild mood swings, sometimes kuzanoha cares about hyumans, sometimes not, sometimes he will say 'we need to be quick' and then hang around aimlessly watching while some random smurf in armour gets skewered, sometimes his will say 'now I can take my time' and instantly squash an opponent.

It's so bizarre, and the characters have become unlikeable parodies of what they originally were, and it doesn't help that basically there's no challenge for kuzanoha, nobody can even scratch him, so what's the point in investing in the show? You know he's going to win, and on some level he's so obnoxious now you don't really want him to.

Also for some reason all the most powerful characters/items in this world always have to be connected to japan in some way, which is contrived to say the least. Awful show.

An interesting core concept of an immortal-oni crime busting duo pales quickly when the author decides to go the route of 'let's see how many public domain fictional characters (and some historical ones) we can shove into a gothic mystery show', and of course Sherlock Holmes is there, and of course the author feels the need to show how awesome and better than sherlock holmes his original character is.

This show has become embarrasing at this point, what could have been a really cool concept with, by the way, some REALLY good animation, artsy design, and excellent (initial) atmosphere, is dragged down onto the level of ... trashy B show, with increasingly terrible (and in a lot of cases painfully derivative) writing cribbed from the likes of Agatha Christie and Marjorie Allingham, and of course Arthur Conan Doyle, this show attempts to stand on the shoulders of giants, quickly losing it's balance along with any semblance of originality.

I do not reccomend this show at all unless for someone who only wishes to see how painfully bad a concept like this can be executed.

There is nothing quite like this show, and stumbling across it as I did through a typing mistake on a rainy summer night, the show immersed me in a way I had not ever experienced before.

The Setting of Ozanari Dungeon is not a wholly unique one, but it feels so fresh compared to others in it's genre, perhaps because it came out within the era of grand fantasy and the advent of roleplay games, from which it draws greatly. It is compelling, with a feeling of humanity in a world that is far greater than that which we see, the bumbling characters comedic and likeable ... lend the setting of the anime a sense of extra grandeur, in a way it is hard to describe. It is almost as if seeing the world through the lens of someone who does not fully understand it, and thus capturing the feeling of wonder and excitement therein.

It is undoubtably a comedic show, but you can get more from Ozanari dungeon than a couple of cheap laughs. It is indeed a shame that this did not get any more episodes.

This is an excellent OVA series that exists in almost total obscurity, for while it is short it is definitely sweet. For a type of person like myself who is looking for something very specific in terms of good fantasy anime with a style unlike that of the hackneyed DND wannabes, with good character dynamics and excellent design, this series is a must.

The story, while not exactly unique in it's themes (the search for the handwavy 'ultimate power' that possibly doesn't exist but possibly does.) is excecuted well, and the short series manages to get you invested even in it's fleeting duration, mainly due to ... the fact the characters are both interesting and likeable.

The setting itself is also compelling, with great ruins spanning huge portions of the mostly wild landscape. Deserts and grasslands, jungles and oceans, this setting has it all, and all of it s beautifully drawn.