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If Anime was a family, Samurai Flamenco would be that one cousin living in his parents' basement who's so wierd and awkward you can't decide if you should laugh at him or feel pity, but in the end it turns out he's a guy like us, only a bit insane.

That said it's really difficult to juge SamFlam. Depending how you interpret it, it's either brain-damagingly stupid or refreshingly brilliant.

The story starts simple - a young guy wants to become a superhero in a non-super mundane world. He meets a policeman, who's a little weirded out by the idea but is eager to help the ... protagonist not get arested/beaten up, and soon some more people sympathetic to the idea of superheroism show up. But as you settle yoursef to watch Kick Ass: The Anime, everything goes full bananas (I made a pun!). Basically it puts a fairly normal bunch of geeks in a world of often heavy-handed shonen/sentai parody with little to no continuity. The parody part is mosltly in "so bad it's good" teritory, while character developement and characters' reactions to the grand oddity their lives have become are treated seriously and with as much realism as possible. It creates a chaotic plot, jumping from one sentai trope to another whithout warning, which is not bizzare enough to call it a mind-screw, but surely is pretty surreal.

First I thought the plot is a pile of smelly kaka with chunks of a good slice-of-life now and then, but looking back I realised the genius of it, which I cannot describe whithout spoilers, so I'm putting my interpreation in SPOILER section at the end of this review.

As for other aspects, such as animation and sound, it's pretty standard - there are no grand desingns, super-fluent action scenes, or breathtaking backgrounds to marvel at, and music is so medicore you don't even pay attention to it. It seems the studio didn't put that much effort into making SamFlam, but it's good enough not to cringe. You're there only for the plot.

I did enjoy Samurai Flamenco very much, in a sort wtf-am-I-watching way. Slice-of-life parts made me invested and it had some moments when I felt tears coming up my eyes.

SamFlam derailed, then blew up and now it's orbiting Saturn. It made me so hectic I couldn't sleep whole night after watching it. Surely one of a lifetime experience. I shall give it 8 Sit Downs/10.

SPOILER TL;DR

After revealing that Flamenco is a magical word making your wishes come true, everything falls into place. All that weird stuff happening was Masayoshi thinking how cool it would be if X turned out to be true and the universe did his bidding, that's obvious. BUT is goes beyond that. After the Aliens arc he's back to the mundane world and is immidietly targeted by a stalker who attacks Masayoshi's friends personally. Keep in mind Masayoshi is STILL reality wraper. But he couldn't wish to harm his friends and have a tragic backstory, right? Oh, but he does. The whole "now it's sentai" part of the show starts IMMIDIETLY after Masayoshi proclaming his parents' death doesn't touch him this much and cannot be his origin story. He thought instead "I don't wanna this gritty Batman-style sh*t, I wanna fight mutants and aliens!" and so he does. Then he ends up in space, and needs to deus-ex-mahina himself from there, so he imagines some grander power explaining what's going on and putting him back on Earth. I'm pretty sure he didn't meet the will of the universe or whatever you wish to call it, but Masayoshi himself is an irregularity strugling to wrap his head around why he's living in a real-life sentai, so he explained it to himself like he understood it - that's why the explanation is so all over the place, taking bits from Evangelion and Gurren Lagann. Masayoshi sure does like shonen (sadly he didn't see Haruhi Suzumiya). Back on Earth, the thought of tragic backstory started surfacing again, possibly because Masayoshi already used his favourite tropes and cannot think of anything else. And that's why it's so important that he rescues Goto as Masayoshi, not Samurai Flamenco The Godlike Abomination - SamFlam would be complete with a tragic backstory, but it's time to turn the powers off and go for real life. It's funny how his wish for nemesis got fullfilled - said nemesis was one of the kids who Masayoshi called troublemakers. He wished they would stop being apathetic, that they would love him, and boy, it turned out like a deal with the devil. Either that or during ep 7 Masaoshi had gone mental and that whole thing's in his head.

I'd love to give that show a good 9+. I really would. Sadly, No.6 is a prefect example of anime screwed up by a bad ending. Last 5 minutes of the show make the overall score drop by one. Still, it's a great, compelling story for those, who love drama with a piece of action.

Story:
Anime follows the story of Sion, who lives in a perfect, utopian society of city called No.6, and Nezumi, who falls the victim of authorities ruling mentioned town. Two boys join forces to discover the truth about about the city, as well as themselves.
As you can see, ... what we deal with is a dystopian society - perfect at first glimpse, but rotten at the core. On the other side we have people living ouside the city - animals spending their lives in the slums. At that point No. 6 breaks typical sci-fi convention - in films like Equilibrium or Book of Eli, those who oppose the system are good, almost bleached out guys. In No.6, it's the choice between being happy, but manipulated, or constantly in danger, but free.
Sion and Nezumi spend their days in the latter part of the world. Surrounded by violence, rape and filth the're getting more and more drawn to each other.

This way we got to the strongest part of the show - character developemet. Both boys are sensitive and inteligent, as a contrast to a harsh world surrounding them. Still, it's not flat. Nezumi, natural-born badass, likes poetry (if you like finding tropes in anime, you'll be in heaven). Sion, a full-heart pacifist and humanist can punch a guy in the face. Besides, Nezumi confronting Sion is a big clash of ideologies. It's really great to watch as they try to explain each other their point of view, and how the other one reacts. Both of them, treir relationship, how certain things slowly change their personality, is a piece of well done, deep character developement.
Not to mention solid, interesting bacground characters.

Art, Sound and Setting

There is not much of "music" in No. 6. Soundtracks played in background are not someting that touch your heart and makes you think "I love that track! Need to hear it more!" but they create the atmosphere nicely. However, I have to mention beautiful elegies sung by several characters. Quality of art in the show is good, there are scenes with bad animation, but sudden drop of quality between highly appealing scenes is something common in recent anime's. The overal look of characters is nice to watch, and bg are rich.
As or the setting, some scenes, like dialouges, ale played flawless, which is great for a series full of it, but other scenes seem to be a little bit too rushed (especially most lyrical ones). I think that is beacuse the series is too short, and director still tried to make it a little bit more metaphisical.

No. 6 was great, touching story to watch. It gets strange at the end, but still I highly reccomend to watch it.

Puberty - the process of becoming an adult. Your body evolves into something monstrous, your parents become someone you can't recognise, people around you seem dangerous, you feel trapped, and yet like an outsider. In Dawn all of those feelings are a fear factor.

Story(8):
The plot mainly focus on a protagonist, Takashi Nagasawa, a normal hard-working (which is quite unusual for a min character) highschooler. Due to strange flow of event he is obligated to fight the Nigtshift, zombie-like creatures. The story seems pretty standard highschool horror, and it is indeed. Besides scary things we have a lot of romance and ... a peak on student's life.
And plaease, don't get the wrong assumption from the first chapters - the beggining is quite harsh and strange, but as the story flows it becomes better and better.
What I found refreshing is that, in spite not being that gore (although there are many disgusting scenes, so if you have a weak stomach, I advice you to not read this) really gives you the chills by the paranoidal feeling of insecure, and please notice it's quite hard to do in manga, since "peak-a-boo" or "long hallway" scenes don't work out.
Also, there are a lot of side stories - I don't know if mangaka did it on purpose, but every little story follows another "puberty fear", like the ones on the beggining of the review. It could be a coincidence or unconcious action or a brilliant psychological trick on the reader.

Art (9):
The drawing style is what is called "the old one". Manga looks like made in 90's, and before you shout "oh God, I hate it!" I have to tell you something - I'm not fond of this art style either, but I like drawings in Dawn very much. Just look at the cover of the first volume. To me, it's amazing. Moreover, all characters are drawn neatly, monsters have a lot of detalis and action scenes looks cool and you can see what's going on without any difficulties. But, if you're looking for some eye candy - there are no typical bishounens or big-breasted short-skirted girls. Go read HOTD instead.

Charaters (8):
Besides the main protagonist, manga doesen't focus much on anybody else. He's a likeable character, however it's strange that he's a "geek" and yet he doesen't seem very clever. I think he's someone everybody can relate to, beacuse he has typical higschool problems (besides the zombie one) and no idea how to solve them. I like side stories guys too, you don't get much info on them, but enough to feel empathy.

Enjoyment (9):
After an average beginnig I became quite sceptical torwards Dawn, but as the story progressed, I became more and more lured to it. I enjoyed it as it has some inteligent horror and mystery-flick, with comedy/romance between it for your nerves to rest. Sadly, not all the volumes are translatd, so we have to wait a bit to know the story ending.

Overall (9):
Dawn is an interesting story all mystery/horror fans should be familiar with. I have to admit, 9 is a exessed score, (for me it goes only to almost-the-best manga) but I noticed many readers don't touch the manga if the review score is less than 8. (side note: don't minus me if there are some grammar mistakes, English is not my native).

Dogs: Hardcore Twins is a spin-off of "Dogs" series. This short story is a kind of extra, like a gaiden.
Story: (6) Well, it's just a short story about two lovely girls hwo happen to assasinate people. Also, we again meet an "ass-lover" mafioso, whou lost his job beacuse of Batou. Their meeting become a series of gags. It's pretty funny, but not much, compairing to the rest of series.
Art: (9) I really like Miwa-sensei art, but it doesn't get 10 beacuse he hates doing backgrounds and some panels looks hollow ^^'
Character: (8) The same old guys from "Dogs"
Enjoyment: (9) This one-shot is ... pure entertainment, paced with action and comedy, quick to read and quite funny.
Overal: (7) It's defenitely not the manga you must read, but I reccomend it to all "Dogs" fans, especially the ones who like the evil twin sisters.