Before you start reading this review, I will tell you it will contain spoilers... that said, I will assume the reader has already watched the anime (wholly or not). You have been warned…
Story:
I hesitatingly started to watch Hitman Reborn after playing Jump Ultimate Stars, a DS game with a wide variety of shounen anime characters. Tsuna was one of the playable characters and I found him most interesting. I had never heard of the anime and didn’t really know what to expect. The storyline is somewhat unbelievable, with baby mafia hitmen and whatnot, but that’s why you have imagination for. Every anime has its own reality after all… and I liked this reality from the get-go. The anime starts off under a comedic angle, spending 19 episodes to make the viewer familiar with the characters. And though they were a lot of fun to watch and made you laugh a lot, if I had to sit through 203 episodes like this, I would’ve given up before reaching 50. I had nothing to worry about however, since episode 20 puts an end to the first slice of life arc and starts an arc with a lot more action in it. Now, a few introduction episodes are not bad, of course, but 20 are far too many. I can remember several episodes that could easily be left out, like the one where Moretti is introduced in (only to appear a few more times along Iemitsu’s team). When writing a anime, aiming for an audience that likes shounen, don’t start with 20 episodes that most of those Shounen fans would call pointless filler. But enough whining about that 10% of the anime that disappointed me a bit.
As I advanced in the anime, I really started to like this whole story. There’re a lot of epic moments and the fights are always different. I had to get used a bit to the box weapons introduced in the Future Arc, but I soon started to like that new style of fighting. This anime has excited far more than any other anime ever has…
However, with every anime, there’s always a few negative points. First, from experience I know that shows (anime or regular ones) that involve time and dimension travel tend to mess up around that aspect. It’s sad to say, but Katekyo Hitman Reborn is no exception. Especially the fact that one week in the present is 10 minutes (or so, don’t remember correctly) in the future and that later on, one month in the future is 3 days in the present. Aside from that, they use the 10-year bazooka. The 10-year bazooka shoots someone from the present to 10 years in the future, while the same person from the future is brought back to the present… past… whatever. The present and future person switch places for 5 minutes. The problem here is that, when someone goes back to the present, stays there for a week and then uses the 10-year bazooka to shoot itself back to the future, he logically should arrive in the future with a week difference between the point where he went back to the present and when he came back to the future. He used the 10-year bazooka after all… right? Wrong… at least, that’s where the inconsistency here lies.
Furthermore, according to this anime, every time you make a choice, new dimensions are made, with in each dimension playing out the scenario what would’ve happened if you made another decision… However, that would mean that in one second a billion new dimensions are created by one person’s possible actions alone. It’s a bit unbelievable, but okay, why not.
My second point is the fact that, if you don’t read the manga (like I do), the anime leaves the viewer with a lot of questions. What’s the story behind the arcobalenos? Why did Colonello push Lal Mirch away at the last second? More of those questions… I’m sure they will be explained in the manga eventually, but it still leaves the viewer confused.
The story gets a 8.5 from me.
Animation:
Now, let me state one thing. I’m not a person that pays too much attention to the animation. When determining if I want to watch an anime, I mostly look at the level of animation, but that’s pretty much all. As long as I don’t think the animation-style is ugly, I’m okay with it. That said, I don’t really know how to rate this. I don’t think the animation stands out, but it wasn’t bad either.
Let’s give it a 9…
Sound:
Just like with animation, I’m not really a person to pay much attention to the music either. I mostly skip over the opening themes and don’t watch the ending themes. The OST was great though. Future Hibari’s theme song was a great one. I don’t know much about voice acting, so I’ll leave it at this.
A 9 for this one.
Characters:
This is where, I think, the anime stands out the most. An anime always starts off with characters that have generic personalities. It’s hard to show a character’s original when they are first introduced. There’s always a character from another anime that looks a lot like that particular character (physically or personality-wise). Of course, Katekyo Hitman Reborn is not exception. There’s the extremely unlucky, but gentle, Tsuna, the hot-headed Gokudera, the silent and “cool” Hibari, the annoying Lambo etc. However, as you advance in the series, you will soon notice that the characters get developed very well from the get-go. I especially liked it that a lot of the running gags of this anime always involve more than one person, mostly two. When certain people meet, you inevitably know what will be happening. Hibari and Mukuro meet? They get in a fight. Gokudera sees Bianchi’s face? Gokudera falls down to the ground, feeling another stomach ache coming up. Bianchi spots adult Lambo? Adult Lambo has to run for his life to not get killed by Bianchi. I-Pin sees Hibari? She immediately activates the Pinzu-Timed Super Explosion. There’s more of those. And it doesn’t matter under what circumstances, these things will happen.
I think a 10 is a well-earned rating.
Overall:
Try to get past the first 19 episodes… after that, this is anime is beyond epic, proving time and time again that this is not just a simple anime. A must-watch for every shounen fan!