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This season of Digimon is so bad I am quite simply enraged.

The worst part was that the show doesn't betray it's true terrible nature until the final 3 episodes.

You can watch the first 22 episodes and find nothing too wrong with the season on a whole. It's not interesting and nothing happens, but it's not overtly painful, just boring and unimaginative.

This season continues the original Xros Wars tradition of Super Evolution and DigiXros, something I was never too big a fan of because it's different and I don't like things that are different...
I kid I kid. I may not be a fan of DigiXros ... and how it meshes with the established Digimon levels, but hey it's not my place to judge on that.

The new protagonist Tagiru takes the reigns from Taiki, in a move I suspect was meant to pay homage to the way Adventure handed the reigns off in 02. Only one problem, the show begins a trend of not understanding the most important parts of the things it tries to pay tribute to (COMPLETELY RIP OFF), and getting them completely wrong. For you see, the reigns aren't actually handed over. No. Taiki soon is back with Shoutmon, leaving Tagiru as some sort of crony.

Ever wanted a show to focus on and follow the life of a henchmen? Don't care about the established boss or superior leader? Want to see how a run of the mill day goes, but with Digimon?
What's that? You said no? You want kickass action, a topnotch protagonist and a deep engaging story?
Well then you might see why the first 23 episodes are painfully boring and banal.

The formula for episodes 1-23 go something like this:
Evil Digimon shows up and starts wreaking havoc and kidnapping humans, no one cares or makes a fuss, Tagiru bumbles around with his partner Gumdramon, they finally manage to subdue the baddie, roll credits.

Now there are 3 opposing hunters and Taiki and Yuu are there, but the show does nothing to develop their characters at all so I won't even bother describing them.

Now let's begin the PAINFUL BETRAYAL THAT IS THE LAST 3 EPISODES my lovelies...
You see, in these last three episodes, the season realizes they have no bug baddie, and need to set something up QUICK!
So what do you think they do?
What's that? You said they pulled something out of their ass?
Ooooh if only!
Nope!
They pulled something so far out of their ass, they pulled it right out of Tamers!
I could only sit there and seethe with impotentent rage as the Quartzmon plot unfolded in some parody of the masterful D-Reaper final showdown. From the digitization of the human world, to using a loved one as a power source, to so much of it but without any of what made Tamers so amazing.

Oh but it get's worse.

This season has no lovable or memorable protagonist, so guess what?
That's right they start spewing the protagonists of each season prior into the show, even taking some of the most loved characters from Adventure and Tamers and throwing them in as half minute cameos too.

To understand how bad this season is, you should just go watch the Redlettermedia reviews of the Starwars Prequels.

The way they compare the garbage that is the prequels to the original trilogy, showing how the prequels had to try and steal whatever imagery you hold dear from the originals is a fair comparison to how this show sucks in anything you might have loved about Tamers, Adventure, 02, Frontier, and Savers and tries to make you think it's as cool as those seasons.
Except by trying to rip them off it only exposes how little creativity or depth it has.

I wept a little when I finally realized what this season had done.

I don't know how they intend to salvage the franchise from something like this, because this was a horrible blow...

Okay, this'll be brief and to the point.

Obviously this is hentai, and typically you'd watch hentai, because it hits on a few of your fetishes, not for the dialog, story, characters, etc... It feels like someone forgot to tell that to the folks who made this....

Checking the handy H Genre List, you see that this show contains: -anal sex -bondage -bukkake -dark skin -double penetration -enemas -fantasy -furries -incest -large breasts -nakadashi -older women -paizuri -piercings -public sex/nudity -teachers -tentacles -transformation -tribadism -watersports -yuri.

While I may not be a fan of watersports, a large number of those other categories were fairly tempting. So ... now you know why I ended up watching this thing.

Scene 1:
I skipped past the fairly vanilla first portion, (because like I said, it was vanilla, and it also happened to be the portion containing the watersports), though what portions I did see of it, were fairly decently animated, with okay art. The dubbed voice acting was far worse than any abomination I've seen 4kids pull, from what little I heard of it, while skipping through. Overall, this first portion might have been worth a 3 or 4 overall, assuming the original voice work was better than the dubbed version, that is.

Scene 2: This was the portion that caught my interest, and led to my being suckered into wasting my time with this anime. I was promised things like: Furry, tentacles, transformation (girl to guy, and back again), fantasy, large breasts, etc. While all these things were technically present, they really end up being ignored... Most of the entire segment are still frames being moved about and voiced, cheesy sound effects. When it comes time to move into the actual "action" of the scene, most of it ends up being more still frames, and half of them are of the character's faces...

Scene 3: By this point, the my main reason for wanting to watch this show, at all, was gone. So I ended up just stopping there...


Overall, if you like vanilla sex, with some watersports, enemas, cheating, terrible voice acting, and such, you might enjoy the first third of this anime. If you were thinking you'll find some hopefully passable depictions of some of the more deviant stuff, particularly from the second third of the show, then don't even bother.
Sure most hentai is relatively poor overall, but this was so bad, it was literally not watchable in my opinion... The only reason I don't mark it a 1 in my review, is because the first scene is halfway not a piece of excrement...
So yes, overall, a 2.

UPDATED through episode 6 now (was ep 3)
I've seen a wide sampling of fantasy anime, and there's a feeling you get when a series has that "something special" to it, and I most assuredly feel like Dog Days has that something that sets it above and apart from the many other anime in the genre.

They don't waste time bringing the protagonist into the new fantasy setting from his everyday life. Setting up the protagonist as a rather self assured, athletic and likable foreign exchange student, and then immediately transitioning to the new fast paced fantasy setting.

Dog Days follows a tried and true fantasy plot; ... the protagonist is faced with two "warring" factions, and helps to turn the tide for the faction he was brought in to aide. There is some exciting acrobatics and magic thrown in for some exciting action.

There are some unique, childish almost methods for waging war on neighboring countries, but rather than find it boring, I found it to be wonderfully refreshing. However don't be mislead by this, as there are some nicely placed portions of fan service.

Dog Days may not be breaking the mold for fantasy anime, but it has a self aware humor that has had me enjoying every second of it so far. I'll be greatly looking forward to seeing how the rest of this season turns out!

Edit: Okay now that I'm halfway through the series, I'm going to have to adjust my score down a point to 9 overall. For a 12 episode season anime, to still be dealing with effectively an extension of the first conflict all the way to episode 5, is a bit of disappointment.
That said, I still have high hopes for the rest of this season, and based on the conclusion of ep 6, there are intimations of some deeper, and more consequential plot points to come!

There are few manga out there that truly deserve the title of "masterpiece," but this is one of them.

-Story-
First off the story is perfectly laid out. There was never a part of the story where things slowed down or failed to grab the reader's interest. The writers managed to draw out the story long enough to really allow the reader to get truly involved in the plot and all it's little twists, without overextending it to the point where things start to become tiresome or overly repetitive.

-Art-
Not much to say here except beautiful, stunning and deserving of the 10's "masterpiece" label. To be a ... bit more specific and informative I'll add a few more things. The battle scenes are drawn superbly. The characters, the scenery, clothing, accessories, etc. all of them are represented with high quality work on the artist's part. Honestly after seeing some of the different parts and the art used to depict them, I get excited when I think off how they'll be shown when (/if) Psyren becomes an anime...

-Character-
The characters are unique and compelling, like any character should be in a well told story. Even as the cast of characters grow, the author makes sure they aren't neglected, every character grows, they all have a level of character development that I have a feeling many people will end up having their own favorites (not just the protagonist/antagonist...). My favorite part, and probably the most crucial one is that these character feel real, real enough that you might find yourself sitting there and nodding your head, imagining that if you were there you would have done just what they did (rather than railing against an obviously foolish and unrealistic course of action (think about when you're watching a movie and you see something and immediately moan silently or aloud, "NO! Why? Why on earth would you do that?!?)).

-Enjoyment-
Well besides the fact that this series just jumped up to the top of my favorite manga, and this is my second time reviewing anything on this site, I suppose I could say a few other things to indicate how much I enjoyed this series. However it seams like I already said the majority of the reasons I enjoyed the series in my analysis on story, art, and characters.... So I'll just say I can't wait until they make the anime... XP

Blade of Heaven was one of the first manga (first manhwa, though I'm not particularly clear on the distinction between the two...) series I read when I was just getting into manga and anime in general, and as such I have a particularly nostalgically biased viewpoint. Nevertheless, I'll try to give a fair review...

Without going into too much detail, the story was both well written and unique, though admittedly cliche. Despite it's cliche nature, I can certainly tell you that the entire series was a real page turner that kept me eager to learn what happened next all the way to the very end. Unfortunately, ... looking back as a slightly older more mature reader, I realize that the writer botched "big picture" areas of the plot. Things like: creating believable dramatic tension by pitting the lead character against increasingly difficult enemies, having an overall main foe to serve as a foil for the main character and his beliefs, and maintaining a well thought out "flow" for the story.

The art is fantastic, no ifs ands or buts about it. The fighting scenes are stunningly depicted, the weapons are awesome, and the characters are designed and dressed in a way that I found both appealing and more realistic (than some of the ridiculous costumes found elsewhere in the realm of anime/manga).

I'm a little conflicted in my scoring for character. The author never really depicts the majority of the characters in a way as to make them significantly unique or compelling. That said, he did things right when it comes to the main character Soma. In all the anime I've watched, manga and books I've read, and movies I've seen, I've never found a character quite like him. He's really one of a kind in my opinion, and one of my all time favorites. Of course this didn't really help distinguish the other characters, and really brought more attention to the fact that they were more bland/not very memorable/very cliche.

I already mentioned my nostalgia for this series, and that'd be because I enjoyed it thoroughly! I seriously debated lowering my enjoyment score (from a 10 to a 9) because of the faults to the story and supporting characters, but in the end I have to say that couldn't have enjoyed this series more. The right way to approach this series is with the idea that the main character is without comparison, the fight scenes are plentiful and epically portrayed, and that you probably shouldn't be thinking about the details too much, otherwise you won't enjoy the series as much as you could have...
It might be fair to say that younger (or young at heart) readers will find the series more enjoyable and better overall for those reasons...

So overall I'm giving this series an 8 (or "Very Good") for it's fantastic art, the one of a kind main character Soma, and plentiful epic battle scenes. The detractors of course being the flawed story mechanics, and lack of memorable characters aside from Soma.
People who enjoy a more light hearted character/story without all the angst that seems to be a common plague to the protagonists/plots of most anime/manga, and plenty of awesomely drawn fight scenes between mighty foes, will love this series as much as I did...