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This is a gore for the sake of gore series and the ending is terrible. The only thing that kept me watching it was a desire to know what the king's game was and if they ever figured out a way to beat it. The explanation ends up being ridiculous and the secret of how to end the game gets revealed very poorly. They could have made the ending one of noble sacrifice but instead its just wanton killing and death. Actually pretty much all of the twists in this series are poorly delivered and sometimes not even fully explained. I'm honestly sorry i watched ... it instead of watching 12 episodes of something else.
Characters are also very important to me in anime and there is only about 1 likeable character in this whole series and even he gets ridiculous in his self sacrifice BS. This is another series where pretty much everyone ends up dying but your never given long enough to get to know anyone to really care that they died.
Overall I think the story had a lot of potential but was very poorly delivered both in content and in poor dialogue between characters.

I want to start by saying i haven't read the manga. Apparently there is a lot of controversy about how the show deviates from the manga so if you, like me, have not read the manga and would like a review based solely on how the anime was then this is a review for you.
This is a show that follows a group of assassins who are heading a revolution to over through a vast and disturbingly corrupt government. That might sound similar to things you've watched before but trust me its not. The main character tatsumi is a country boy come to make money ... in the capital and accidentally joins the assassins when t hey safe him from a seemingly nice family of nobles who take in people such as himself in order to torture them for their amusement. That's the sort of crazy corruption going on in this government.
One thing I love about this show is that it is not black and white. You will end up following both a group of rebels and the empire assembled task force sent to kill the assassins. There isn't really a character worth hating among any of them and while some of them are seriously crazy they all have different reasons for fighting and none of them are inherently right or wrong and the empire squad isn't necessarily blindly loyal. Also while some others have said there is a lot of gore in this show I don't really think that's true. There are some gruesome scenes but they aren't in your face about it or linger on the gore so it just comes off as the sort of horrible stuff that happens when people fight in wars with extraordinarily powerful, almost mythical weapons. Also said weapons, known as Imperial Arms, have some really cool designs and powers.
Another thing i like about this show is that you really get the sense that there is a whole functioning world and we're just seeing one story taking place in it. You get snippets of citizens just going about their lives and there's some sort of monster killing and experience gaining system in this universe that everyone abides by but it never really gives you any long drawn out explanations on how it works because its not really important to whats going on in the story. Plus we alll know how rpg leveling works right? Right. So moving on.
Oh my last tid bit for anyone wanting to watch this show is: don't get attached to anyone. I really can't think of a single stereotype that this show follows as to who lives and who dies. As soon as your sure you have the system figured out and you know that guy is gonna die this episode then nope, he makes it through. And you feel their deaths too. Even the usual arbitrary romance doesn't happen between who you think it will. (or matter much which is something i like.) The characters are also all from different walks of life, have different interests and personalities so there's a favorite for everyone.
OVerall a great show and definitely worth the watch.

Don't watch this if you want a satisfying ending.
No I'm kidding. Do watch it just don't expect the ending to give you what you want. (maybe i'm just bitter.)
Also be aware this gets started really slow. However if your a fan of mob movies you'll be used to that kind of thing and probably like this. Actually I think this would be a good anime to show some one your just introducing to the world of anime because it really doesn't have an anime feel to itl It's an animated mob TV series completely with conspiracy, betrayal, prohibition era politics, and of course gun fights. ... I found the story to be slow and kind of lacking but then I usually feel that way about mafia inspired movies/series so again if you like that genre of western film you'll actually probably like this. I definitely think it was at least worth watching and it was a nice change from the sometimes zany and convoluted world of anime. You should definitely give it a try but be prepared to watch at least through episode 5 before giving up.
The only other things I've seen that I'd say somewhat compare to this are maybe darker than black (one of my faves) and phantom: requiem for the phantom (an anime i hated.) So take whatever you can from that lol.

I found this series to be rather unique in the way it was handled. It's a story about civilization after an earth shattering period of war and No. 6 is a "utopian" city built after the fast. Its not the most unique of concepts but the way it was handled was quite interesting. Their culture is clearly very different not but there isn't any lengthy dialogue to explain the differences, you have to learn them through context. I personally really liked this about the series and its interesting to see how different culture groups handle the same topics. There's also a really unexpected twist that ... you learn near the middle about how the utopian city was built and why it was really built that was very different from most twists in stories like this.
The characters in this were also well developed and had very interesting relations with one another. If your a fan of shounen ai like i am there's some very shippable characters in there. ;) (And they make shipping them way easy). I also loved the voice cast in this and appreciated that they found actors close too the original japanese. There's a singing part that's crucial to the story and instead of trying ot change in to english and sounding awkward they left the japanese singing in so the english voices had to be close.
The art in this series is also very streamline and clean. IT also has none of the odd "anime-ish" type chibis or screaming so if your looking for something to show new people to the anime world this might be a good choice (Especially if they like stuff like divergant and the giver books). Also its nice if your just some one that likes more serious things.
The one con i have for this series is the ending happened pretty suddenly and wasn't greatly explained. If your paying really close attention you can figure out what happened but liek the rest of the story they don't sit around explaining things over and over so i recommend you watch all of this pretty quickly so you don't forget anything that was said and you can figure out what happened. Also the characters didn't end up where i wanted them to in their relationship. -.-
I think just about any anime fan could enjoy this series but if you liked things like wolf's rain, ergo proxy (not quite as dark), guilty crown (without the fighting), and psycho pass you'll probably like this.

I don't give 10s very often but this show is so wonderfully well rounded I couldn't not. The artwork is beautiful, the characters are lovable and dynamic, the story draws you in and makes you want to know what happens next, the music is varied and perfectly placed, and above all else this is a fantastic love story.
If you are a BL fan or just a fan of visually appealing anime this is a must. But grab a box of tissues because you'll cry for sadness, joy and beauty. This is definitely one of the most beautiful BL stories I have ever seen. The character's ... love for one another carries them through all the hardships of the championship and as their love grows they both grow as people, learn from one another and are better off for each other. Likewise the art in this series is so carefully constructed. The fact that the artists could actually make the skaters look elegant and fluid or powerful and strong and overall it just looks like real figure skating is so impressive.
Even if you aren't a fan of BoysLove watch this show for the beauty and the characters and who knows maybe you will become a fan. I normally give comparisons to other shows but this one is so spectacularly different I'm not sure what to compare it to and I think everyone should watch it.
Edit: i'm still obsessed with this weeks later and i can't get the intro song out of my head!

Firstly I think an important thing to know about this series is that nearly every episode has something else happen after the credits so don't turn it off too early!
Also grab a box of tissues. If there was a category for "saddest anime i've ever seen" this would win. But sad in a "the writing is so good it makes you feel these peoples sorrow" kind of way. The show is called DEATH parade so be prepared for the fact you probably aren't going to see your favorite characters get the ending you want them to.
Beyond those helpful points I think this anime is a ... beautiful study on how complex human emotion can be. Just because some one says one thing that doesn't mean that's what they really mean and even though it might sound awful it might also be just the thing the other person needs to hear. But does that make them a bad person for saying something so awful, or a good person for being able to do that for some one they care about? And that's just episode one. Try to dig deeper than just whats on the surface of this anime as you watch it.
I think you'll like this series if you liked things like the black butler manga (not so much just the anime, also the main character reminds me of snake), death note, hell girl, and psycho pass.

Normally I try to keep anime and manga reviews separate but in the case of this series I think the manga needs to be taken into account. I also want to make note that I am HUGELY particular when it comes to anything dealing with vampires so if I liked a vampire series there must be something good about it.
Overall I really enjoyed this series. I adore all the characters and being some one that does yaoi shipping all the time I love that this series just hands you the material on a silver platter. This is another series that has a character for everyone ... to fan over and the voice cast is very spot on as well. The story is also very unique in the idea that the vampires serve the humans they drink from and are bonded to them. It does have a slight black butler feel to it so I feel like fans of that series (which I am one of) would really enjoy that aspect of this show.
However, this show does have quite a few faults that can't be ignored but I feel like its import to say that most of these issues could be solved with a second season. I quickly went and found the manga to read and I realized that episode 9 of the anime is chapter 31 of the manga. I think what's happened is the anime team decided that rather than trying to properly introduce 14+ important characters in just 12 episodes they choice to pick out the story arches that focused mainly on the 2 main characters and probably intend to fill in the rest of the content later if the first season does well and gets green lighted for a season 2. I could see how the story arches could easily be told in a different order than they are told in the manga in order to make that possible so most issues should be fixed if a season 2 does happen.
With that in mind i have two issues with this series. First is that virtually no questions get answered as to why the vampires powers work this way or even the details on exactly how their powers work or even larger picture questions "like are these the only vampires in the world or are there others that don't work this way". You are told in the manga that a lot of these things are a mystery even to the vampires themselves because they don't particularly like what they are and don't want to investigate it any further. My other issue is that the ending of this segment of the anime is super fast and doesn't explain at all how the issue actually got resolved. I haven't fully caught up with the manga yet but I suspect that the wrap up of the last story arch was happening pretty much at the same time as the anime was being produced and again the ending could always be better explained in the first episode of another season.
Overall I really enjoyed watching this series for the story theme and characters (and this has to be the funniest role i've ever heard chuck huber do). I would recommend it to anyone that enjoys things like black butler or even blue exorcist but keep an open mind to the potential it could have in the future or even read the manga as well.

I want to start by saying two things: there is absolutely nothing original about this anime and yet I powered through 7 episodes in one sitting. It has all the right things to be a well rounded show that anyone can enjoy and over all its great to watch. I gave the story a 6 because its pretty much your typical "main character struggles to obtain his dreams and ends up surpassing all expectations". However I will say the main character is still struggling and admits all his own weaknesses and the need for team work so it makes him very endearing.
The things that really ... sold me on this anime were the characters and voice cast. There's a character for everyone to adore and the relationship of the main character to his rival is fangirl quality. (i don't want to say you should pick up this series if you miss naruto buuuuuut.....) Also I felt like the show has done a good job of slowly introducing us to all the characters in a memorable way which a lot of series struggle with when you have a classroom type setting with a lot of people to know.
I would also like to add that the artwork is pretty cool. Its some sort of perfect middle ground between american comics (which the show is inspired by) and typical japanese animation. The storytelling and character designs also straddle the lines between the two which makes for a pretty cool dynamic. There's also great humor all over the place and even though the situations are always fairly series there's a light hearted fun approach to the whole thing. Being some one that tends to watch a lot of dark, morbid anime (ie: tokyo ghoul, AoT, darker than black) and also does not like comedy/romance/slice-of-life; i found this series to be a good break away from my usual types of shows without falling into the easy pitfall of anime ridiculousness.
Overall I think this is a series anyone could enjoy and is definitely worth a watch. I would probably recommend it to people that like things like assassination classroom, fairytail, (*cough*naruto*cough), and maybe even something like yu yu hakusho though not as focused on the fighting so far. It has already been announced that there will be a second season and I'm definitely looking forward to it.

i want to start off by saying the intro video to this season was my favorite of any of them. Its the first one that i watched every episode.
As to the actual anime this chapter was definitely the best of the 3 chapters of x2. The main storylines that i was interested in got wrapped up nicely and the ending was pretty dramatic! However, i still feel like there was way too much going on. Some of the more minor storylines didn't get a conclusion at all and in effect ended up being totally pointless. There are WAY too many characters, most of which didn't ... really have an impact on anything, and some of them i still can;t explain how they ended up where they did. So like i've said on all the other reviews if you haven't watched the previous parts of durarara your going to want to rewatch them or at least skim them. In this case you might even want to rewatch season one because a couple people that haven't been in it since then are going to pop up and become important for no reason.
All in all the best part of season two but still not as good as season one and still left a lot of loose ends.

The first episode starts out slow but by the end has you believing this will be a thrilling anime. the characters are really cool and the concept is unique, but the rest of the anime doesn't deliver at all. Most of the episodes that follow after that seem to be more comic relief than anything else and the reasons for what the characters are told to do don't make any sense.
However the last 4 episodes are all pretty good and the ending is pretty emotional. All in all this was definitely worth watching and the character backgrounds were pretty interesting to learn but i felt ... like the anime itself didn't make good enough use of the great concept and character designs it started with.