This another one of those typical shounen series. With long fights, hugely powerful people and, of course, a male protagonist. I kept watching for the first ten episodes, just because the world, setting and magic system the creators created for this anime is hilarious. Every single nickname of every single warrior is horribly clichéd. So much that it actually becomes funny (for example, the strongest fighter in the kingdom named himself Scarface). When special martial arts techniques are executed, not only do the people executing them say the technique names once or twice, it also appears in huge lettters on the screen, in order to make sure that the viewer knows the name of the moves (which make no sense, by the way). The magic system is even more hilarious. Magic is sealed in cards, and when those cards are summoned, the cards start talking with an excessively overdramatic voice, telling who they are and what they do ("I am a flame! I scorch my enemies!"). When I saw these for the first time, I really couldn’t stop lauging.
This series surprised me even more when around the tenth episode, an actual story began to form, which is very rare among most shounen series. We saw some really interesting character interactions, motives and developments. Unfortunately, there were still the extremely long fights and sometimes, the scenes became a bit too dramatic, which didn’t do the series any good. The ending, also was (as expected) a horrible mess.
The character art itself looks a bit messy, and mostly typical for a shounen anime. I didn’t really care for it. EXCEPT when a character was either extremely beat down, or full of despair. At these moments, the creators managed to produce some of the most awesome-looking images ever, which really grab you, and take a while to let go. The music in this show is also awesome. The tunes realy give a reason to sit through the battles, and they really set the mood for the anime.
Why you should watch this: if you’re into shounen anime, you should watch this. But this is also a few good laughs worth for the ones who love shounen-parodies.
