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- LocationShanghai, China
- JoinedJun 13, 2009
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Jan 27, 2010
Summary Scores
Story: 9
Art: 7
Character: 10
Enjoyment: 9
Overall: 9
The reason for the submission of this review is that I thoroughly enjoy the series (so much so that I read 870 chapters in 2 weeks, whilst going to school), and that the other half caps review is trash.
First off, the premise of the story is very similar to any other shounen manga, Eyeshield 21, Naruto, etc. I could go on. However, it is unique in the fact that boxing is a blend of both the action and the sports genres - leading to none of that ridiculous superpower crap, yet not sounding completely unrealistic and solely created to
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maintain interest I might add, when a new ability or move is created.
In the first few hundred chapters the story progression is relatively quick, with Ippo advancing through the Pro Test, the Rookie Tournament, Japanese Rankings, and finally the Boxing Championship.
However, past this point it is simple title matches - that is not to say the enjoyment is greatly diminished. I still enjoy it to this day, definitely one of the higher rankers of shounen manga.
The art is pretty archaic, not so much so that it is downright unattractive; but, it still maintains that aged feel of classic manga. Although it has somewhat progressed throughout its publishing the overall feel is still there. I personally don't mind it, but to say I prefer it to the the standard of modern art styles would be incorrect. Although, the actions scenes are brilliantly illustrated, utilizing in full huge swishes of wind and the like.
Character design is, again, good, but nothing amazing.
Characters, the part where this manga truly shines - Takamura is undoubtedly the most popular character; his antics make him a very likable chap. However, he is not simple comic relief. He carries an aura of idolization, with all boxers in Kamogawa Gym, save Ippo's eventual kouhai - looking up to him. This admiration is not unwarranted, Takamura's record is superhuman and he is an absolute beast in the ring.
Ippo, somewhat standard fare, the young, naíve boy unhappy with his current life experiences a contextual epiphany and suddenly desires to become 'stronger'. However, Ippo is unique in that he does not start off as a complete wimp, containing power equivalent to those several weight classes above him.
The rest of the support characters are sufficiently likable, one may find themselves sympathizing with Aoki and Kimura's plight, being overtaken by their kouhai and never being able to retrieve the Champion belt.
I also found the Itagaki puns hilarious.
Enjoyment was very high, the fights keep ones testosterone at its peak, at least with what a manga can achieve at any rate. The training is amusing, the large amounts of manliness, guts, effort flying around is enough to get one's posterior on the edge of their seat.
Overall, Hajime no Ippo is one of my favourite mangas to date, and a shining example of a good shounen sport manga.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Jan 15, 2010
In its everlasting quest to turn everything it possibly can into an anime of some sort Japan has now created a slice of life anime based around the ups and downs of a young man attending Tokyo's Agricultural University.
Rating stories in slice of life animes are somewhat pointless, save rating the concept. The concept here is undoubtedly unique, I have yet to see, or even hear about another anime centered around agricultural shenanigans. The story basically comprises of Sawaki and his other first year friends attempting to fit into university, and meeting a delightful cast of characters along the way. There are small dashes
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of pseudo-romance, but the main focus is comedy.
On comedy, this show performs. It is absolutely hilarious, although somewhat mature at times, being subtle at points. If I were to have to put it into a category, it would be mature-slapstick. Slapstick with actual intelligence behind it. There are also inserts of educational information littered throughout the series. These are usually enjoyable, but it depends on whether one enjoys these quirks or not. Personally, I loved them, it is a great thing for one to have.
Some other things that one may also find somewhat comedic are the microbes themselves, as they look ridiculous. They are basically personified, magnified versions of the biological selves. They have high-pitched, chibi-like voices and when I thought about microbes being depicted in this way I could not help but giggle.
8/10
The art is solid, but nothing special. It is not the focus of the series, but it does the job well enough and is not garish in any aspects that I should so bee inclined to find that it ruined the comedy or the atmosphere of any particular scene. The female characters are attractive enough, (leather anyone?) and the design of the faces makes for great facial expression.
7/10
The sound, was quite forgettable for me, writing this review some time after I have watched the series I must confess that I have forgotten practically all of its soundtrack and BGM. Although this isn't exactly a bad sign, it isn't a great one either. I did recall that the ED was somewhat ridiculous and included rockets of some sort.
However, as I did not recall it failing the show in any capacity, I can safely say that the majority of viewers will not be irked by the soundtrack, nor BGM.
7/10
The characters, one of the shining, focal points of the series. The majority of viewer's favourites would be no other than the seemingly geriatric Itsuki, Keizou (who was apparently tinkering with potatoes all the way back in WWII). He is possess amazing athletic prowess, and great knowledge, and is, absolutely, amazingly, hilarious. A wise old sensei at one moment and a cunning deviant the next. An unpredictable enigma that takes orders from no one, but it is a kindhearted joker in a most unsuitable shell.
Hasegawa, the apparent tsundere is actually not that. As they have no place in a pure slice of life comedy. Her leather outfit speaks rebellion and that is what she is. Initially rejecting Sawaki's ability and being a very badass slice of life character overall, accentuated by the metric tonne of makeup; femme fatal if I ever saw one.
Sawaki, the show's protagonist is a young man who seems to have accepted people rejecting his ability and now in this new environment, whereby his ability is accepted, embraced, and thoroughly abused for the sake of science; he is not exactly overjoyed at all times, but one can safely say he is enjoying himself. His demeanor isn't bubbly or talkative, but can get extremely involved in particular things. Not so much a cynic, but almost, his early personality is quite laid back and simply follows along with whatever happens to be going on at the time. He later picks up and becomes a vey likable character, his shining moment being at a festival.
9/10
In terms of enjoyment, I enjoyed it, immensely. The hijinks, the ridiculous university activities and quirks. The adorable microbes, all contributed to this fiesta of nonstop comedy. With aphrodisiacs, sake brewing, a 3 day festival involving paper fan beatings and the most disgusting food ever to grace this planet, one will be rollicking in their seat.
A very, very enjoyable anime.
9/10
Definite recommendation!
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Oct 13, 2009
First off, the reason that I am writing this review is that I feel this series is too overrated, the two current reviews here are both exemplary of that.
Summarized review:
Story had the potential to be great 9-10/10, however, after a while it gets really old, and all the cleverness is taken away, leaving a big sob show.
Art - I am a big fan of this style of art, the huge noses, 2D characters, angular character design etc.
Sound - Nothing memorable, nothing to complain about.
Same goes for characters and enjoyment, will get into more detail in full review.
Overall : 6, vastly overrated due to
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people saying it deals with the evils of humans in such great depth, and is shocking realistic, etc.
However, I feel that the majority of a viewing audience will realism that the real world is no utopia, and Kaiji does not realize this, it takes it audience to be the sorts of people that have no concept of the harsher side of life.
Full review:
Story: The initial concept is quite good, i.e. it has the potential to work itself up to a great storyline, however, after the first Jan Ken Pon arc I felt that it really started to fall flat on its face, there being no more mindgames, techniques, devious characters, just grown men crying.
However, it does manage to redeem itself slightly in the e-card battle, which I felt was quite well done, however, the tissue box lottery was ridiculous, more screentime was devoted to the actual planning of it that the actual execution. Additionally, the spontaneity and randomness of Kaiji's actions in this case do not seem to fit in with the rest of the show.
7/10
Art: As previously mentioned, I am a fan of this style, it is exactly the same as Akagi's and I feel it does not spoil the show in any way. The art style is basically, very flat and 2D, very large noses, extremely angular faces. However, the backgrounds, props, etc. are all drawn very well and in a normal fashion.
The art may not be for everyone, in fact most people dislike it, yet I feel that this is actually the strongest point of the show.
9/10
Sound: Nothing memorable, there was probably some BGM playing during the sad scenes, of which there are innumerable amounts.
The OP and ED are suitable, but not amazing, and I give the director credit for not taking any old Japanese pop idol with an amazingly high voice and having her do some poppy song that would be completely inappropriate for this sort of show.
6/10
Character: The protaganist Kaiji, I personally disliked him, not immensely, but the dislike was there nonetheless.
The reasoning? Basically, he has been living as a bum for an unmentioned amount of years, but I assume since he graduated/left highschool. You think this would harden the man up, make him be aware of the evils that are present in the majority of people. However, he seems to think that all people are good, he unwittingly trusts them, in other words he is a bloody fool.
Yet in other cases, e.g. the game of E-Card he shows that he is amazingly resourceful, can think of great strategies, and can smooth talk to deceive any man. It is just very unusual and flawed in a sense.
Other characters worth mentioning are Tongegawa, my personal favourite character from this show, Kaiji put it quite well saying that Tonegawa is a 'Snake'. Like a snake, he is tricky, apathetic, and devours the 'have-nots'.
This is another failure on the show's part, usually one would empathize with the protagonist, yet here I find myself actually liking the antagonist more.
There aren't any other big characters beside these, there are the two people who initially help out Kaiji on the ship, but they are very linear and behave in the fashion one would expect them to.
6/10
Enjoyment :
Although I did find myself initially enjoying the show, especially the first arc. After that the enjoyment level quickly dropped, I found myself hating Kaiji in ever-increasing amounts. His stupidity, his predictable actions, all attributed to this hatred. Then came in E-Card, if it had ended on that I would have probably given this show a 7/10 instead of a 6, as that was quite magnificently done and well thought out. However, instead of that the director chose to put in some crappy badly thought out ending whereby it just becomes even more obvious what an idiot Kaiji is.
That being said the ending was fairly open, leaving the possibility of a season 2.
6/10
Overall: 6/10
I found that Akagi was vastly superior to Kaiji, however, if you are a fan of Hagiwara, Masato (I definitely am, most badass voice actor around), and the style of art, and several mindgames that are logically thought out (few and far between in this show, I'm afraid, although they are still there), give Kaiji a go.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Oct 12, 2009
Another addition to the Kara no Kyoukai series of films.
To me this film does not seem to be anything more than a 'filler' if you will. This is due to the fact that there is little no development of any of the characters and the only thing that this particular addition brings any light to is the confirmation that Azaka Kokuto does have an elder brother complex.
Speaking of which, it is done in a very cliche manner, however, it does attempt to explore the past of Azaka and Mikiya the reason being 'Azaka does not remember the exact moment that she fell in love
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with him.'
The rest is entirely, almost sickenly cliche there are no real reasons given as to her love for him, from the film's point of view it is basically just 'it was bound to happen, let it be.'
Onto the actual story:
It has a reasonable premise, a suspicious string of deaths, a prime suspect, the supernatural aspect of fairies is also added. However, there is no building upon this, the actual perpetrator is revealed very quickly without any intelligent reasoning, simply 'revenge'.
Within the story there is also a factor of jealousy that Azaka feels towards Shiki in being too close to her brother. Azaka is initially very cold to her, yet towards the end of the movie this attitude just seems to fade for no apparent reason.
This is where I feel the movie failed the most on.
6/10
Art:
There is something about Kara no Kyoukai art that I simply cannot dislike, in other words, it is AMAZING.
There is no other word to describe it, I adore the character designs for one, but my main praise is for the fight scenes, not only are they beautifully choreographed and animated; they also seem to bring your whole screen alive with the fluidity of the motion.
This movie does not fail on this aspect either, in Azaka's fight scene with Ouji, her senpai, in the church; I found that my mouth was agape for the entire sequence, with the entire light spectrum flashing before my eyes and the fairies all over the place. Simply marvelous.
9.5/10
Sound:
The ED was nothing memorable... there were the standard sad tracks played in the BGM when Azaka is reminiscing about her days with her beloved brother, pretty standard.
There was also the usual 'epic' sort of music played during the fight scenes that I found fit quite well, however, the fact stands, there was nothing MEMORABLE.
It was decent, but at the end of the day, for the most part, remains forgotten.
Voice acting was also just... fine, nothing outstanding, I also found that Shiki's voice sounded a bit flat and nasally for the few lines that she did speak in this film.
7/10
Characters:
I find myself actually disliking Azaka for being such a possessive brat over her brother with Shiki, who actually doesn't view Mikiya as a love interest.
In addition her depth is equivalent to that of a puddle upon a road after a light drizzle of rain.
Read - VERY SHALLOW.
Her love for her brother is simplistic at best, her personality is one of the ultimate stereotypes of anime, quite disappointing overall.
As the story was mainly focused on Azaka I found that the other characters were basically omitted on the development area. Shiki, Touko and Mikiya all get basically no development relative to Azaka.
6/10
Enjoyment:
I usually tend to enjoy all Kara no Kyoukai films to at least a certain degree due to the fantastic artwork and choreography; and I'm afraid Boukyaku Rokuon is no exception, despite my previously bashing of pretty much every aspect except the art.
I did find myself having fun during the fight scenes, especially Azaka Vs. Senpai.
So all in all, 7/10.
I expect the final movie to be AT LEAST the standard of Mujun Rasen, ufotable do not fail us now!
Conclusion: If you have seen the previous 5 movies, watch this one, if only for the sake of continuity, however, if you have not then do not bother.
You would not understand what was really happening anyway, and I do recommend watching the rest of the movies, 1-4. As 3 and 5 are simply brilliant and are amongst the top anime films ever created, next to
Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone.
TL:DR
Story : 6
Art: 10
Sound: 7
Character: 6
Enjoyment : 7
Overall: 7
Good fight scenes, crappy main character with very limited depth, typical brother complex to boot.
Sound is nothing special, but nothing very out of place either.
Good starting premise for the story, but fails to build upon and ends up being borderline mediocre.
Worth watching, if only for the fight scenes.
Above all - still DECENT enjoyment.
Splendiferous!
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Aug 19, 2009
This film, no, masterpiece deserves more than just a round of applause my friends; for it is one of the greatest movies in this long line of epic tales.
The story begins when Ash, May, Max and Brock journey to LaRousse.
This magical city is really cool! There are numerous flying robots that patrol and regulate the city and they are super kawaii desu~
The story continues when Ash stumbles upon a pokemon contest, now this is where the movie really shines; the battle scenes!
The sound, the animation and the pokemon truly come together to put on magnificent shows of flashy fight scenes, the choreography is amazing and
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animation top notch!
Later, as Deoxys is born, the story becomes more intrigueing as the city is overrun and taken over by said Pokemon.
Suddenly munchlax evolves, and they all lived happily ever after.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Aug 19, 2009
A true masterpiece of the Pokemon franchise, this 20 minute rollercoaster is action-packed yet has a heartwarming undertone that teaches us about friendship and that hardwork can overcome all obstacles; in this case a toppled ramschackle playground.
There are also light-hearted moments of comedy that will have you rolling in the aisles, hint: Snorlax antics!.
there is no true villain in this short story, it is far, far too complex for that, however, some pokemon do generate antipathy from the audience. Namely, the houndor, however, in the end he bands together with his fellow Pokemon to complete a feat of architecture so magical that it sears
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the viewer's very retinas with sheer awesome.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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