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Unless you like getting bamboozled in almost every episode, B: The Beginning is the right anime for you. This series combines mystery, horror, crime and psychological manipulation all in one package.

Storywise, it certainly does present an intriguing story but it disguised its plainness by utilizing its heavy suspense. A typical watcher might wonder and come to the conclusion that the story is impressive, but really it’s common: there’s a secret shadowy group that somehow relates to the two main character’s own backstories/struggles. The series reveals more info progressively or in other words, every episode will leave you wondering what in the diggity doggity just ... happened? As you become dumbfounded about what you watched after every episode, the one after that will explain little by little how the entire plot ties together. You get confirmations and flashbacks. No anime that’s rated for older audiences and focuses on adult themes could ever live without flashbacks. The series basically prioritizes it as the main method to divulge the crucial goodies. After feeding you the episodic plot dose, there is still a longing for more. Basically, the series doesn’t reveal enough info. The way the dialogue explain it forces you to use your damn brain to think critically to tie everything together. If the series’ goal was to manipulate us like that it may be very well that it works. So, the story is uniqueness disguised commonly that is handled with the utmost complexity in order to make it feel “good.”

Aside from the story, characters were undeveloped enough to prevent that feel-good relationship you’d find in a good series. The show divided itself into two plots that connect to one main plot each with its own MC. This leads to not enough development time for both of them as the show moves around perspectives of the two a lot.

The Sound was amazing. It’s better than your average series, though the same soundtracks were repetitively played. A lot of scenes have background music playing which helps the immersion and emphasis of what’s going on and that’s a feature that most series lack. The tactic that quiet ambiance in scenes don’t apply to this series’ beliefs and it definitely distinguished its importance. Maybe I’m exaggerating the sound direction quite a bit but that is honestly how it felt to me.

Animation/art was obviously superb. At first glance one could tell that a lot of effort was put in. The fight scenes were fast paced and regular movement was more detailed than that of a typical seasonal series. Production IG definitely defends its quality once again. The art style tries to mimic and appeal to the production of a mature theme which would make sense given if the art was slightly cartoonish it would ruin part of the enjoyment.

So, should you watch B: The Beginning? Aside from the messy story and characters, an animation and sound-focused watcher would enjoy it more. Maybe people who would love to invest their brain power could as well. It all depends. I wrote this review on the fly, so it may be apparent that I have not devoted 100% of my efforts into it but hopefully it should give you an idea if you are planning to watch.

NOTICE: Keep in mind that I do not have high standards for watching anime. It's going to take a lot of negative aspects to convince me that the anime is second-to-decent or bad or in some cases, so bad I gotta go to bathroom for a long time. :))))

Oh hey, you just read the disclaimer and you're in luck, because this anime is one of those bad animes! First of all, this is my first review, so wish me luck, and I'm super late to the party. I apologize :( Anyways, let's get with it!

STORY: 3 - So the main story of this anime is ... what I consider the generics/commons. There's these unknown enemies known as blahblahblah and select people train to be these fighters to fight them off to save the city. Sounds like a couple animes you probably know right? Yeah, this type of story is bland and boring if you don't modify or throw in some plot twists. While watching this anime, I could see that some of the story was progressing, like training the failing E601 team to become better wizards. However, the plot shifted to a tournament? It's good to have some augments that don't interfere with the main storyline as much but it directly shifted to the point of the tournament and the monsters, known as "beetles" didn't really matter until the couple last episodes. Basically, generic story is generic, and the main plot was stalled. I didn't enjoy that.

ART: 4 - The animation is ehhhhh, but I expected something more better since this is 2015. The animation looks like it was from the 2009s or lower. Heck, I think the animes from that time had even better animation than this! The fighting scenes didn't really leave an impact on me, as everything looked so boring. The CG used looked so bad that my eyes were burning (not literally), and overall didn't provide a smooth experience. Given all this, you could tell that the studio had a low budget, or they were simply lazy. Come on, you guys could've done better.

SOUND: 6 - The sound is the only thing that's good in my opinion. Nothing felt out of place, the sounds matched and blended in the situation given, and I liked Iori Nomizu's performance of the opening. The ending sort of moved me as well.

CHARACTER: 5 - Characters received a 5 because they do variate. You've got the generic main character, Kanata, who is an excellent ace, but also a traitor. Anime like this these days tend to have a main character who is undefeated, or a traitor. We have Lecty, a girl whose shyness gets in the way of her pride and her skills, Misora, a girl who tends to not listen to anybody and has a goal to be like her mother, and Rico, a girl that thinks she is a goddess of beauty. I did see some character development throughout the anime, like Lecty overcoming her shyness and Misora improving herself to be like her mother. All in all, characters were fine, but not great.

ENJOYMENT: 3 - If you have high standards for watching anime, you can immediately forget this. It will not appeal to your expectations at all. If you're a casual or don't really give a crud about any anime you watch, be my guest and take a look!

OVERALL: 2 - So, overall this anime was garbage. I sort of regret giving it a shot. Story was painful and terrible, as well as the animation. The sounds and characters were the only factors that were decent. As I said, if you watch any kind of anime, no matter what it is, feel free to watch this.

That wraps up on my first ever review! I don't know if I did well explaining the pros and cons but whatever xD. Man, that was a pain to type.