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Mar 3, 2015
KHR is like any other long shounen series; For someone relatively new to anime, it can be very fun and addicting. If you are too familiar with the tropes used in this genre, it can become a real chore and way too predicable.
Story: The plot progresses in the usual shounen way: The weak and optimistic protagonist trains, and starts fighting enemies who seem much stronger than him, and once he defeats them they often become his allies. The first 20 episodes were fillers, but since I found them funny I didn’t really mind. The battles drag out a bit sometimes, but they are well
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done in general and there’s enough suspense to keep the viewer interested. The biggest problem however is the filler episodes; they were initially funny, but the same jokes keep getting repeated again and again and it becomes annoying fast. Even without talking about the recaps, some episodes were just completely unnecessary, like before each battle they have at least one episode where the characters just encourage each other and talk about the upcoming battle.
Characters: The cast seems pretty diverse, but all the characters can fit in an archetype in some way or other. They gain maturity and confidence during the battles, but it seems to revert once the battle is over, and they are back to repeating the same catchphrases again and again. Many of the jokes are based on character antics, but after 200 eps, it becomes really predicable and repetitive. Another thing that really bothers me is the female characters; even though some of them are strong, their strength is nothing compared to the male characters, they hardly participate in battles, often can’t do anything without help from the males (Chrome, cough* cough*). And while it is important to have a female character who can’t fight but serves as moral support, having two of them is way too much especially when one is portrayed as very annoying and immature. Many of the characters who don’t fight are very uninteresting; Despite tagging along for 200+ episodes and getting a lot of screentime, they don’t get character development at all. Hibari Kyouya was especially poorly written; he is some lone wolf who practically wins every battle in 1 min without effort or remarkable injuries, and he doesn’t have character growth at all. In other words, he can be easily qualified as a ‘Gary stu’.
Art: While the character designs are interesting, the art is very inconsistent. It improves through the series, but was never really detailed and every once in a while it is still possible to see poorly drawn frames without pausing the video.
Sound: The osts were decent, but they get kinda annoying after being repeated 98343981 times, especially when you can easily predict when they will be played. Most of the openings and endings however were pretty good and original. The seiyus’ voices fit the characters well, but some of them may annoy you, like Haru and Lambo’s.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Mar 2, 2015
Before I start, I just want to say that the manga is much better; it goes much deeper, and despite the things that are being dragged on It is much more successful in terms of plot twists and character development. I won’t compare the two too much, but I have to say that the time limit and the pointless dramatic scenes are what ruined the series the most.
If you are the type of person that watches anime purely for enjoyment, then by all means go ahead and watch. If you are the type of experimented watcher that analyzes everything, then you probably will be
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very frustrated and disappointed.
Story: Some aspects of it seem very promising. From the beginning I have been interested in the truth behind the titans, and in the possibility of a time loop, but sadly there are too few clues and it is definitely not one of the things the anime focuses most on. This could turn out to be a masterpiece with big twists if it wasn’t being dragged on and on with pointless drama. The drama’s not surprising considering the setting, but it’s hard to emphasize with characters weeping when you don’t even know them. If they wanted it to be truly sad and dramatic, they should develop the characters first, get the viewers attached, and then break them instead of animating 3737329 scenes with random strangers talking about their dead relatives. I also just don’t see how the author can bother to give characters full names only to kill them 1 sec later, it seems like he’s doing it for pure shock value, which is a characteristic of poor writing. Another bad thing was the slow pacing, filled with long footages of characters being upset about their dead friends. Sometimes it does make them more strong-willed, but becomes a pain to watch when done too many times, especially when it has no effect on character development. Even the training scene was pointlessly slow; the potato scene was funny and all, but training for 4 eps is too much when the whole season has only 25. Even though some scenes had really successful suspense, and came with nice plot twists as well, it could be done in a much more efficient way.
Characters: My favorite thing about this show is that it’s one of the only shounen series that give significant roles to female characters, who wear the exact same uniforms as the males and aren’t seen as inferior at all. The cast overall is diverse, but since much of the time limit is wasted on pointless dramatic scenes the secondary characters don’t get any development even though some of them are really interesting in the manga. As for the protagonists, Eren seems to be the typical hot-headed protagonist, and Mikasa, even though she has incredible strength, doesn’t really stand apart from other strong female characters. Armin was a bit more interesting; Although he lacks the strength, he compensates by making strategies and being motivated. This type of character doesn’t occur frequently in shounen series, and because his flaws are more obvious, he has more room for development. The three protagonists have more deepness than the others, but their pasts are rather cliché and overly dramatic, as if the producers are begging to viewers to feel sorry for them. It’s nice to see that the three complete each other well with their distinct skills and , but there could be room for more originality and character development.
Art: The animation is very fluid, the animators were particularly careful about some action scenes, which seem to have way more frames per second than the usual anime. The backgrounds are really realistic and detailed, and the outfits and weapon used interesting as well. Another good aspect is that the characters have distinct faces, which is rare in anime. Some of the viewers might be turned off by the Titans that look absolutely ridiculous, but this was intentional.
Soundtrack: Definitely one of the best soundtracks of recent years. The first opening is so memorable it would be hard to skip. The osts were very fitting and some stood out as well.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Mar 1, 2015
I initially dropped this halfway, but decided to give it another chance since I wanted to discover what made this series so popular, turns out the rest didn’t really improve and while this show has some qualities, the negative aspects really stand out too much for me to make it enjoyable.
Story: I’m not an expert when it comes to the RPG genre, but even though the games are interesting and the moves rather easy to understand everything else just seems like a waste of time. The plot looked very promising at first, the ten pledges and the idea of using games to decide things
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were rather interesting. This, however, was quickly ruined by the amount of fanservice scenes and the failed attemps at being funny.. Although tension is built at times, the filler episodes are extremely boring, and paintful to watch since the character barely have any development. The gaming aspect might be interesting at times, but is kinda ruined by the poorly designed characters and fanservice. Betting everything they got might add tension to the games, but makes the outcome too obvious. The main thing that ruins the plot is the episodes between the important games. Because the characters are little more than clichés, these episodes are long and boring, and the humour, which mainly consists of characters overacting, becomes repetitive, predicable and rather annoying. Some important information is being inserted during these episodes, but every time it basically goes like ‘you will never defeat [nation] because …’ in which Sora and Shiro would reply ‘blank never loses’, and end with Stephanie panicking. Sora and Shiro’s past was cliché, and not detailed enough to be able to make the viewers empathize with them. Not only that, but Shiro’s overly moe voice ruins the dramatic effect .
Characters: The characters are little more than stereotypes, the type of characters you see 37632 times, just with different names and designs. While considering the setting it’s logic that the protagonists are overpowered, they turn out to be rather uninteresting since they hardly face any struggles or character development. Sora’s hikkikomori issue is only joked about, and not really addressed until the end of the show. Since he was a hikkikomori before, you’d expect him to have difficulty interacting with others and probably some self esteem issues. But no, his social skills just come out of nowhere, even though he probably hasn’t spoken to anyone other than Shiro for a long time. Another aspect that has always bothered me is how his perversity is regarded as joke rather than a serious issue, especially considering the fact that he even lusts after really young characters even though he’s 18. More to that, the only opposition to his perversity was Stephanie whining, which was ineffective of course. Shiro is the just the typical kuudere character, the only significant personal issues she seems to have faces was during the match with Kurami and after being separated from Shiro, which was expected and barely changed her character. Furthermore, they seem to win while barely trying, they rarely ever struggle, and don’t do their duty as rules or Imanity. Every one of their quotes can be pretty much reduced to ‘we will never lose’ ‘checkmate’, or something perverted. The worst is Stephanie Dola; despite always tagging along the main characters, she’s mainly here for the fanservice. She’s unintelligent compared to Sora and Shiro, and can only complain her horrible treatment, which makes her extremely annoying. By saying only some cheesy lines, they manage to have her under their feet. Often she will just state obvious things, basically everything about her is just a waste of screentime. Although they try to add some character depth with her issue with her grandpa, it just seems really cliché. If they removed that character, almost nothing would be changed.
Sound: While the soundtracks and seiyus’ voices were fitting, nothing really stood out. The voices are very cute, but get annoying after a while since the same tones are overused and even dramatic scenes sound like a joke with the overly cute voices. I guess they spent too much of their budget on the art to make better soundtracks.
Art: Probably the greatest thing about this show. The art is very detailed and colourful, and the backgrounds are very well drawn. However, the characters look like typical moe characters, which is a waste since their outfits are really interesting. Furthermore, I’m really turned off by the fanservice, I understand that it’s supposed to appeal the male viewers, but the fact that it even sexualizes children is disgusting, and just makes this show seem like little more than bait for old perverts.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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