Aug 18, 2022
Look, if you like Tekken and have a fairly deep understanding of Tekken canon, you won't have the best time here, but it won't be a complete waste of your time either. First off, be a super weeb and watch this shit in Japanese. Trust me. You'll get to hear the majority of the Japanese-speaking characters' actual voice actors, which is a nice treat.
Music – Disappointing, to say the least. Tekken has a specific sound and the games, as much as they grow and change, have a certain feel to the music. This was just generic, nothing special, nothing stood out and the opening
...
and closing themes were just created to be skipped. Music 3/10.
Animation – This was strange. The movement wasn't terrible, but the art and animation takes getting used to. What was truly, truly enjoyable was the accuracy and fluidity of the characters' movements during the fights. It wasn't perfect, but if you play a lot of Tekken, you could see and appreciate how much they incorporated several key moves from each character's moveset into their fighting. King actually initiates the Reverse Special Stretch Bomb, Arm Breaker Combo and various other moves. Jin does a lightning screw uppercut, and spams 1,1,2 (too much). Jun's movements were true to her character as well.
Story – Could have done way better, especially given the major characters in the cast, but if you only going for 6 episodes I guess this is the best you could do. This is obviously non-canon, but where it adapts major canon, it does have a tendency of either simplifying key elements or completely ignoring them. There were several liberties taken with some of the story, and the relationships between characters. What was annoying was the off-screening of certain bouts, as well as the strange decision to have Jin's relationships with Ling Xiaoyu and Hwoarang form part of the training montage/time-skip. Ling's inclusion also doesn't get the attention it deserves and aside from a single line about her amusement park ambitions during the awesome fight against Nina, Ling is... yeah, sadly underutilized. Her movements during combat were some of the best; however. It would have been nice to have things develop around other characters a lot more carefully. 6/10. Certain characters were mere throwaways, and there was also the anachronistic inclusion of guys like Leroy Smith (what was the fucking point?)
I play loads of Tekken, and there was a lot of care taken when this anime was made. As someone who has played Tekken since Tekken 3, and played pretty much all of them, I can tell that the fights were choreographed with fans in mind. However, there were clear shortcuts taken at certain points. Again, you see the Mishima-Style 1,1,2 implemented throughout like a constant call out to fans. It's like "Look, I'm accurate when it comes to the movements of the characters, surely you like me now", and honestly, yes, that was great, but there was an over-reliance on certain moves. Hwoarang initiated the Flamingo stance constantly and if you know anything about Hwoarang, you understand that he can't guard like that, not to mention the fact that beginners who don't understand his movements end up invoking the Flamingo stance constantly during fights when they're just trying to do what Hwoarang does best – kick the living shit out of people.
Fight choreo is a 7/10 that could have been a straight up 10. This was simultaneously a love letter to Tekken and its mechanics, and also a missed opportunity. However, like I said at the very beginning, you'll like this. It's just that it could have been way better.
Watch it in Japanese. I don't know if characters like Nina and Paul are voiced by their videogame voice actors in the English dub, but I don't really care. Part of the fun with Tekken is having characters from opposite sides of the globe (and the order of living things) understand each other when they talk. King growled like an actual human with human vocal chords, which was unsettling. They shouldn't have done that. I'm nitpicking at this point, because really, this was actually not a terrible fucking time. I watched ALL of it.
Overall, somewhere between 6 and 7 out of 10. It wasn't complete and utter shit, but it could have been fucking incredible too.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
