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- May 30, 2015
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Was surprised to see just now that this classic hasn't been posted yet. Anyway, unless you guys want to include manga in this one I'll also make a manga counterpart to this if there's interest.
Criticism
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
- It is often praised as the best that shounen has to offer. It is, unfortunately, still shounen, and while it does often avoid many of the pitfalls of "battle shounen," the key words there are "often" as opposed to "always" and "many" as opposed to "all."
- There is little progression character-wise, and when there is, it is often slight. The characters are more developed in the perspective of the audience than they are in the here and now, Ã la Jay Gatsby, as we learn more about them over time. Which is fine, but otherwise, they are (largely) static, and this is still somewhat of a longer series even if it didn't overstay its welcome like most other battle shounen.
- Despite the creativity of alchemy in general, Edward's fighting style is very pedestrian and not all that creative. This is a bit of a shame as he is the protagonist and therefore the one we see fight the most often.
- The beginning of the series was rushed, as Bones expected the viewer to have seen FMA 2003 already, where the introductory episodes are essentially the same. This still affects FMA:B as a standalone work.
- The comic relief is often out of place and weak, although there's less of it as the series goes on.
- The final fight was kind of full of PIS. 99 times out of 100 the good guys should've lost.
- There's a little bit of pseudo-philosophical babbling here and there.
Cowboy Bebop
- Some of the episodes, quite frankly, just didn't need to be there. They could've been removed and you wouldn't lose anything in the way of characters, story or thematically, or at worst you'd only lose a little thematically/in the way of motifs. At best they were funny, at worst they were trying to be and just weren't. For example, the fungus monster thing. Or the one with the shrooms.
- The main antagonist, Vicious, despite me liking him, makes me think of wasted potential when I first think of him. His motivations are left somewhat unclear, he invokes the "I'm a badass because I use a katana in the age of guns" cliche, and he's just not very compelling to me. His relationship would Spike is almost the only thing that makes him compelling at all, which is disappointing considering his importance.
- Though I think it has merit, it often gives off a "style over substance" feel to me. I mean, just look at how many homages it makes to western pop culture. There are so many, which is cool, but it makes me wonder how much of Bebop is really just...Bebop. Keep in mind that I didn't get all these references or anything so they don't affect my opinion too much, but that's just one example.
Bakemonogatari
- The quality is inconsistent.
- It's more plot-focused than other entries in the series, but that's just not its strong point. Most prefer Bake to Nise. I prefer Nise because there's more focus on what this series does best: style and presentation.
- I spoke of inconsistent quality before. This is easily most noticeable in the snake arc. Nadeko is by far the least developed character in the show. The arc felt like the least meaningful in general (not that it was totally meaningless). The "fanservice" was also utilized more poorly. This is more Nise's forte, but still. There are other issues, but this is in general the weakest arc by far.
- Kanbaru was a better character than Nadeko, but she was also a little weak. Many of the arcs go "character has problem, problem is resolved, character is back to normal," but that would be an oversimplification. Not so much with Kanbaru compared to the others though. Still love her but yeah.
- The Monogatari series is sometimes lambasted for being a "slideshow." The criticism is, admittedly, sometimes warranted. See, for example, episode 7. It ain't a literal slideshow, mind you, but you can tell that there's something amiss, which is irritating, out-of-universe (i.e. budget) reasons be damned.
- I do often feel compelled to pause those screens full of text that pass by within a second even though I don't need to, which can be annoying.
I might do more later.
Praise
Attack on Titan
- Jean is one of the better developed characters. He is probably the only one who we see being affected by the war in a realistic way, and the only one who feels truly human, the only one who learns in any way. The show would've been far more interesting had he been the protagonist.
- While I do kinda think that the power-up in this series (people becoming Titans) is pretty meh/cliche/predictable, it does at least present an alternative to a "these kids, for some reason, overcome a threat that most adults failed to overcome or even challenge" narrative, which is similarly cliche and shounen-esque as well as harder to execute, whereas at least once you get past the issues with the other route, the end result will be a little more believable (I guess).
- The feeling of terror in the first episode, albeit overdone, was fairly well executed.
- Though I mentioned a power-up, it does appear to be devoid of the "shounen heroes get a new power-up every arc" formula. Despite the existence of some battle shounen tropes it is mostly devoid of that structure in general.
- Though not without issues, art and animation are far superior to the manga, despite the manga's grittier/more sinister tone.
Another
- It does do a decent job of setting up a darker/creepy atmosphere, especially earlier on.
- The unintentional camp. This is always good, intended or not. It makes up for the fact that much of the story felt poorly done. It makes me feel like even if it is, I shouldn't take it all that seriously.
- There is at least some noteworthy foreshadowing to be had. The story clearly wasn't devoid of planning despite the subpar execution (I hear many of the anime's issues are nonexistent in the source material anyway). It isn't as though the 'big reveal' was a random asspull.
- To add to what I said about the atmosphere, Mei's presence is certainly a somewhat intriguing/mysterious one in the earlier episodes.
Btooom!
- There were sometimes some good strategies used by the main characters in battle, despite the death game's limitation in terms of variety and creativity.
- It, unlike many other anime that involve games, harbors little to no delusions about the nature of otaku/obsessive gamers in the beginning. It's a bad thing. It's unhealthy.
- It does at least touch on the moral dilemma of killing other people to begin with, even if it ultimately isn't handled that well.
- Some of the <del>cardboard cutouts</del> side characters do an okayish job of presenting various psychological issues (or just issues in general) associated with being thrown into a death game like this (aside from "killing is bad" like I mentioned before). Trust and deceit (Taira and Murasaki), mental trauma (Taira), as well as acceptance of the situation turning one into a stone cold killer (Nobutaka).
Might do more of these later as well.
I think I maybe went overboard but oh well. So how about you guys?
Criticism
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
- It is often praised as the best that shounen has to offer. It is, unfortunately, still shounen, and while it does often avoid many of the pitfalls of "battle shounen," the key words there are "often" as opposed to "always" and "many" as opposed to "all."
- There is little progression character-wise, and when there is, it is often slight. The characters are more developed in the perspective of the audience than they are in the here and now, Ã la Jay Gatsby, as we learn more about them over time. Which is fine, but otherwise, they are (largely) static, and this is still somewhat of a longer series even if it didn't overstay its welcome like most other battle shounen.
- Despite the creativity of alchemy in general, Edward's fighting style is very pedestrian and not all that creative. This is a bit of a shame as he is the protagonist and therefore the one we see fight the most often.
- The beginning of the series was rushed, as Bones expected the viewer to have seen FMA 2003 already, where the introductory episodes are essentially the same. This still affects FMA:B as a standalone work.
- The comic relief is often out of place and weak, although there's less of it as the series goes on.
- The final fight was kind of full of PIS. 99 times out of 100 the good guys should've lost.
- There's a little bit of pseudo-philosophical babbling here and there.
Cowboy Bebop
- Some of the episodes, quite frankly, just didn't need to be there. They could've been removed and you wouldn't lose anything in the way of characters, story or thematically, or at worst you'd only lose a little thematically/in the way of motifs. At best they were funny, at worst they were trying to be and just weren't. For example, the fungus monster thing. Or the one with the shrooms.
- The main antagonist, Vicious, despite me liking him, makes me think of wasted potential when I first think of him. His motivations are left somewhat unclear, he invokes the "I'm a badass because I use a katana in the age of guns" cliche, and he's just not very compelling to me. His relationship would Spike is almost the only thing that makes him compelling at all, which is disappointing considering his importance.
- Though I think it has merit, it often gives off a "style over substance" feel to me. I mean, just look at how many homages it makes to western pop culture. There are so many, which is cool, but it makes me wonder how much of Bebop is really just...Bebop. Keep in mind that I didn't get all these references or anything so they don't affect my opinion too much, but that's just one example.
Bakemonogatari
- The quality is inconsistent.
- It's more plot-focused than other entries in the series, but that's just not its strong point. Most prefer Bake to Nise. I prefer Nise because there's more focus on what this series does best: style and presentation.
- I spoke of inconsistent quality before. This is easily most noticeable in the snake arc. Nadeko is by far the least developed character in the show. The arc felt like the least meaningful in general (not that it was totally meaningless). The "fanservice" was also utilized more poorly. This is more Nise's forte, but still. There are other issues, but this is in general the weakest arc by far.
- Kanbaru was a better character than Nadeko, but she was also a little weak. Many of the arcs go "character has problem, problem is resolved, character is back to normal," but that would be an oversimplification. Not so much with Kanbaru compared to the others though. Still love her but yeah.
- The Monogatari series is sometimes lambasted for being a "slideshow." The criticism is, admittedly, sometimes warranted. See, for example, episode 7. It ain't a literal slideshow, mind you, but you can tell that there's something amiss, which is irritating, out-of-universe (i.e. budget) reasons be damned.
- I do often feel compelled to pause those screens full of text that pass by within a second even though I don't need to, which can be annoying.
I might do more later.
Praise
Attack on Titan
- Jean is one of the better developed characters. He is probably the only one who we see being affected by the war in a realistic way, and the only one who feels truly human, the only one who learns in any way. The show would've been far more interesting had he been the protagonist.
- While I do kinda think that the power-up in this series (people becoming Titans) is pretty meh/cliche/predictable, it does at least present an alternative to a "these kids, for some reason, overcome a threat that most adults failed to overcome or even challenge" narrative, which is similarly cliche and shounen-esque as well as harder to execute, whereas at least once you get past the issues with the other route, the end result will be a little more believable (I guess).
- The feeling of terror in the first episode, albeit overdone, was fairly well executed.
- Though I mentioned a power-up, it does appear to be devoid of the "shounen heroes get a new power-up every arc" formula. Despite the existence of some battle shounen tropes it is mostly devoid of that structure in general.
- Though not without issues, art and animation are far superior to the manga, despite the manga's grittier/more sinister tone.
Another
- It does do a decent job of setting up a darker/creepy atmosphere, especially earlier on.
- The unintentional camp. This is always good, intended or not. It makes up for the fact that much of the story felt poorly done. It makes me feel like even if it is, I shouldn't take it all that seriously.
- There is at least some noteworthy foreshadowing to be had. The story clearly wasn't devoid of planning despite the subpar execution (I hear many of the anime's issues are nonexistent in the source material anyway). It isn't as though the 'big reveal' was a random asspull.
- To add to what I said about the atmosphere, Mei's presence is certainly a somewhat intriguing/mysterious one in the earlier episodes.
Btooom!
- There were sometimes some good strategies used by the main characters in battle, despite the death game's limitation in terms of variety and creativity.
- It, unlike many other anime that involve games, harbors little to no delusions about the nature of otaku/obsessive gamers in the beginning. It's a bad thing. It's unhealthy.
- It does at least touch on the moral dilemma of killing other people to begin with, even if it ultimately isn't handled that well.
- Some of the <del>cardboard cutouts</del> side characters do an okayish job of presenting various psychological issues (or just issues in general) associated with being thrown into a death game like this (aside from "killing is bad" like I mentioned before). Trust and deceit (Taira and Murasaki), mental trauma (Taira), as well as acceptance of the situation turning one into a stone cold killer (Nobutaka).
Might do more of these later as well.
I think I maybe went overboard but oh well. So how about you guys?
