Betterman Review – 77,5/100

When I first read about Betterman, and how it was set in the same world as GaoGaiGar (according to Anidb, at least, I expected this to be some kind of fun and GAR mecha action show. And with the same mindset, I started watching this series. What I got, though, was something slightly different. Sure, there is action, and there are mecha, but Betterman is much more suspense than that it is about action.

You can almost classify this series as horror. Throughout the series, the bad guys throw all sorts of huge monsters, creeps and psychological attacks at our protagonists, and the main focus is much more on trying to not die than to kill the enemy, because more often than not, they get saved by some outside force. This series does have its problems, but this series does succeed in never losing steam, making the action-scenes worth watching.

The big problem with this series, though, is that it doesn’t have anything that makes it really worth watching; it misses that final “oomph” that makes the viewer glued to the screen. Any area that it could have delivered in is flawed somehow. Take the setting: it’s surprisingly deep, spiced up with a lot of scientific analysis in order to explain all of the supernatural stuff that gets thrown at the viewer’s screen. A lot of interesting facts and titbits pass the screen. Unfortunately, the creators do tend to get lost in their own techno-babble, making their scenes unnecessarily confusing with all sorts of different terms and jargon. Especially the final episodes, when everything is supposed to get revealed, feel like a huge information-overload, due to the overuse of techno-babble.

Thankfully, the final episodes are saved by the characters, and they make sure that the series leaves on a good note, rather than an overly confusing one, but their problem is that their development starts awfully late for a 26-episode series. They only show a bit of depth to themselves around the final quarter of this series, and the villains are even worse off with no depth at all. Most of them feel just incomplete and uninteresting, and this series would have been much better if you actually were interested in the final villains. I do have to give credit to the male lead, though. For once, he isn’t a shy boy, or a voice of reason. The overall cast is also fun to watch in those few moments when they’re not serious, and my personal favourite was the rather eccentric Akamatsu.

Overall, because of these flaws, this series never hits any heights, but it is a very consistent one. The different parts fix each other’s weaknesses, making this enjoyable through the end, and because of that this series never hit any real lows. It always has some kind of creep that’s attacking our heroes, so if you’re into suspense series, you could give this one a try.