Garo The Animation

As for the episode itself, I pretty much just found it to be trashy fun. The exposition was sloppy and the writing generally slipshod. However, the action was nice and there were some fun scenes. The episode probably did linger a little too long with the prostitute and the joke stopped being funny about half way through, but it still reminded me of one of those trashy fantasy novels so I got a bit of a kick out of it.

I was also amused that all of the opening exposition pretty much amounted to pillow talk, but if they'd made the scene a bit shorter and did more with the action scene at the end then the episode would have felt tighter. However, all in all, I think it added to the trashy fun, especially because the episode couldn't have been more obvious about the set up that she really was a demon. Still, kind of porny that she pretty much eats dudes with a demon ghost that comes out of her vagina.

I'd disagree with Joe about the character designs. I think the show did a pretty good job of making them look more mature than the average anime character while at the same time no looking too off from what one would expect. Although, the King's adviser did look pretty funky and his voice was pretty damn off sounding too. I do like the main dude had a rather generous patch of chest hair just because it isn't something you see in anime very much.

The voice acting was also pretty damn spotty and over the top. The main dude sounds like he is goofing off, the adviser sounds like he recorded his dialogue in the broomcloset and the rest of the cast is taking their roles so damn seriously for such silly dialogue. However, I liked the weird mix and thought it added to the trashy tone overall.

Thinking about it this episode was didn't have a whole lot to it. A ton of exposition to set up the plot and then a couple of action scenes, but I found it all to be good fun in the end.

That's really about it.

Fire, good start.
Soldiers standing around, good.
Papal municipality, good?
Heretics at the stake? This is my kind of show!
Inquisition, CLEANSE THE WORLD OF THE HEATHENS
BURN THE WITCH
Fernando, Spanish inquisition? Definitely. And that obviously evil adviser, his voice.

That sexy witch is burning, damn these bastards. They will all burn.
That one with the talon is definitely a witch. Or pedestal. Charm.

Wait, what? A baby? Those fiends!

ZOMG DAT ANIMATION. FUCKING CHECK DAT SLOW-MO RUNNING JUMP ACTION AND SHIT. FUCKING PIMP BITCHES HOW HE FUCKING RUNS AND KICKS THAT- FUCK MAN, DIS FUCKING ANIMATION AND SHIT. FUCKING METAL HORSES AND HE IS FUCKING SURFING IT WHILE IT FUCKING JUMPS AROUND AND SHIT AND FUCKING FREEFALLS-

This show is the fucking tits.

King sounds... not super old. Or really old. Adviser sounds old. And genocide of a magical species is nice.

GARO in fancy letters

Man, dis OP. All of it. Dat animation. Some o' them faces. That guy who is obviously getting all the bitches while surfing metal horses and wild guitars solo in the background as magical shit explodes.

Ga-ro.

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Oh shit, hockey is back.

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Commercial

Yeah. That- wait, what? Birth by death and the demon knight stole her soul and the baby while he was at it?

Man they don't fuck around with their inquisition. Some real awesome shit is going down son. Guy gets torn in half, another gets fucking knifed in midair by some beast ass knife throwers, a third gets stabbed in the back by some doucher and a hot gal who is sending does in the back is ganked from behind as well, because soldiers don't give a shit about fairness.

Ugh, fucking cockbags. Using witches as their toys because women spit when their names are mentioned.

What a fine story it was
Shoo guy, the lady is all that matters.
I... can accept them both being in the same shot. As long as the gal is there.

Another side The boner side.
Still the boner side.
Must be about sexy witches.
Sealing demons. With their dick.

Sexual healing priests.
Nope, king is dead.
Oh, he's alive? Dang. He was totally getting on in the years. Was only a matter of time before the black plague got him.

You already tapped one.
Sexual love, and a sex guitar plays.

Is he searching for his balls?

No comment.

Nailed it!

She wants to tap it?
Man, I did not see that twist of the son being the demon baby. Totally did not. Because it's so unp- Titties!

Wor- wait, no, that ain't worth it! He didn't even get to touch it! That was NOT worth dying for! He got a chump death, thus, he was a dick in life.

Those punk ass bitches in the bushes are so boned.

Who would want to go back.

Haunted vagina?

Half-Face is badass.

Haunted vagina, definitely.
Hmm... definitely worth it.
Hold on, I'm questioning it.
Hmm... give me a moment.

Makai Kingdom.

Shit, does his giant balls protect him from heat or is he just badass as fuck?

LION KNIGHT IS GONNA FUCK UP EVERYBODY
Fuck son, Two Face is fucking keeping up with- woah, he was a monster. And check this ominous chanting for this badass aerial firefight! Dis guitar

DAT ANIMATION

VIOLENCE

SLASH SLASH

FUUUUUUUUNRABAAAAAAA

BOOOOOOOM

Prince Alfonso, he had better not be a raging douchebag. And this really reminds me of the Spaniards with all their names and stuff.
That collective aawwwwwww- or ooooooooh, it's the stuff.

That amulet looks familiar. When did we see it last?

Oh, is evil adviser evil? PLOT TWIST

If next episode is boobs than I can accept the voice.

I kind of love this self-imposed doom that humanity is placing on themselves by killing witches, unknowingly killing the very beings that protect humanity from demons. And also that demons seem to be the ones orchestrating the witch hunts by manipulating royalty.

And I do mean Game of Thrones, not A Song of Ice and Fire, because the books didn't have the same sexposition that the show did, and that was pretty much all I could think of through the brothel scene. Yeah the writing might not be the best, and the exposition dump was quite long, yet it wasn't overwhelming with the information, they played it as well as they can by showing the flashbacks and giving us some action through it.

The armour designs are indeed exquisite, and the transformation scene was also pretty great, even if it was in CGI. The fight scene at the end was pretty cool, I didn't expect the demon to grow so huge, and it was good that the soldiers didn't have a clue what he was and ran screaming when they saw him. Little touches like that are what help you keep immersion in the story.

Also, I really like the simple artstyle it uses when it's not in CG, and that OP animation is the best in the season so far.

I think it'd be a better story if the concept of the saved baby lingered for a while and the actual son got revealed later rather than all in one episode which made it too obvious a setup and thus had zero impact.

Like thrown said, the king's advisor is obviously the villain here, from the 1st time I saw his face and heard that voice it was too obvious.'

I didn't dig the gold armor quite as much as the chrome one but yeah, the action was pretty nice.

well ...........I don't know what else to say, I'm just clinging to that moment with the chrome knight flipping over the guards, that was awesome............everything else was kind of meh...

Mostly cause the Horror was pretty lame. Looked like a rejected Silent Hill monster. I do like this Emma chick though. She's feisty.

On the contrary I thought this was a much stronger episode than the first and watching this I realized I genuinely like this show. The writing is still sloppy, but I think its style has its own charm to it as blunt and obvious as it is most of the time.

Tae called this Game of Thrones the anime and I tend to think of it more as what you'd get if you combined Game of Thrones and the old Xena and Hercules series from the 90s. The amount of cheese from those shows fits the tone of this show perfectly but Garo has more of an edge to it which makes it a bit like Game of Thrones too. However, there is no moral ambiguity here, the good guys are good and the bad guys are fucking evil as hell. There's no middle ground. Even Leon's father is a good guy even if he is shameless rogue and womanizer. I do like how we have the father son combo for main characters as it helps to balance out Leon's angst.

Most of all this episode was once again pretty fun. It might not have had the obvious sexposition of the first episode, but it gave us more information about the world and the dire state things are in. The horrors are winning and the knights are depleted, the king is powerless and the minister is so powerful he can even accuse the queen and have her arrested. It's a good old fashioned good vs evil fight with the evil having a big upper hand giving the heroes a real obstacle to overcome. It's simple but the good kind of simple that I can get behind. A fun action series that doesn't have to take itself perfectly serious or try for a gritty tone.

Emma was awesome and I am happy she wasn't a simple damsel in distress needing to be saved. Instead our heroes pretty much barge in on her and ruin her plan a bit. She looked pretty damn awesome when she was fighting even if the horror was a bit lame this episode. Twist was probably obvious but this show has no sense of subtlety anyway.

Then we have Leon's freakout which looked pretty damn awesome actually. I love the look of the armor when they transform and damn did he tear some shit up before his father stopped him. He's got a lot of issues and I doubt they will be handled with any kind of grace, but hey I'll take the awesome looking freakouts. Leon's probably the weakest part for me so far, but we have his father to balance all that out.

As ZK said that despite the writing being pretty awkward it has it's own unique appeal that I think really adds to the show so I actually don't mind it as much as I would've thought which is a very rare thing for me to honestly say.

Is it a very basic tale of heroism of these armoured guys overthrowing the forces of evil? Absolutely but yeah I find the general nature in it's simplicity actually nice for a change and like the sort of rough camp edginess factor present. It's obviously not the most intricate of plots with how easily predictable in structure it is yet that doesn't matter to me as it's the sense of good old fashioned adventure I'm in for here and of course all the delicious cheese that comes with it.

This episode in my opinion felt like it was dragging less compared to the previous one even if I did think the sexposition was amusing in a way. I think the corny little moments with some of the dialogue here were also pretty funny in their own right, like that one part where Leon goes and enters that chamber where the girl spouts out the I smelled you coming line got an actual genuine laugh out of me. Although earnestly speaking....nothing beats the evil machiavellian bastard advisor who is always just for the most part hilariously great I find, every time he talks with that weird ass sounding voice and how over the top he's played always gets to me. He's the perfect kind of douche that just works well enough within the context of the show that I want to see him get decked right in the face (Much like the rest of these evil as can be villains currently).

Speaking of which on the character front, they're all so fun still that it more than makes up for the level of depth at the moment which I would normally complain about . Leon's father's roguish attitude's steadily growing on me with his funny perverted side. Emma was cool as hell indeed too and was immediately likeable , being capable was definitely a major plus as I do get a bit tired of seeing completely weak heroines. Leon himself though is kinda irritating especially if he's going to stay as this mopey angsty teenage dude all the time and reel in too much melodrama later is what I'm worried about which would muddy it up slightly. A little character development down the road would be nice on that regard for him but yeah as ZK's mentioned already his dad does enough so it's not entirely overbearing for me personally yet.

Also, the CG even if I usually dislike it most of the time in my anime still looks rather nice this episode and as always loved how the action looked fairly competently done. Finally, I did think it was a good touch how it turns out good old Leon isn't such an invincible badass without having some sort of flaw and vulnerability. Although it's strange how I'd also be almost okay with them easily kicking a lot of demon ass every episode and being all awesome as well heh.

This episode wasn't as good as the second one, but it was more of a one off thing for them to go get the ring. The episode actually does a decent job of showing how low the Makai Knights have fallen as well as how poor their relationship with the Makai Alchemists are. Just for that this episode serves a pretty nice purpose. I think this episode also shows how close the Knights can be to falling to the darkside. Their powers are rough to handle and it seems like demon temptation is all over the place, especially since they use demons as a part of their building their power.

Was anyone else thrown by the voice of the being in the ring? It didn't sound like a bound demon at all. I laughed when I first heard it because it sounded like a joke. Still, the ring now gives Leon a power boost. Once again it feels like a high fantasy adventure where they have to gather quest items along the way even dealing with betrayals along the way.

The animation was bit sloppy this episode but I didn't think the action looked bad at all. I quite enjoyed the bits we got and the lady alchemist remains pretty damn cool. I like her string weapon. Leon managed not to have a freak out this time which is also pretty nice and even though he's still pretty angsty I found him less annoying this episode even when the focus was more on him.

Then at the end we see the prince getting saved by a Makai Knight in Purple armor and I want to know more about that guy. Hopefully he'll be another cool character to join the cast. The good guys here are shaping up to be a very rag tag team of underdogs which is pretty classic as well. I'm sure the Purple Knight and the Prince will be joining up with Leon and his father at some point with the lady alchemist being an off again on again member. I suspect the prince might also be able to summon some armor or maybe he will gain some other ability at some point.

This was more of a standard and quieter episode that's main objective was mostly about the ring among other things which I still appreciated nonetheless even if it didn't feel as eventful as I would've liked. We had Marcelo being the throw-away bad guy here and all things considered on a more serious note, I'm slightly concerned about this delving into a formulaic monster of the week approach. Not to say it's not entertaining as is right now but at some point it would be pretty nice to deviate a bit from that and start changing up.

And as ZK pointed out, yeah the ring's voice had me almost crying from laughter. I was expecting a deep threatening voice but all I got was something that sounded so weirdly muffled like he was literally talking out of a telephone. It was pretty ridiculous to say the least although apparently I heard the demon sounds exactly the same in the live action tokusatsu series.

Leon I think I'm undecided on whether I like him or not yet. I mean despite not going berserk this time around, he still came off as a bit too whiny in the bar. Also, his immediate distrustfulness of Emma this episode was a little irrational and hotheaded from my point of view as she didn't really come off as a particularly bad person or at least hasn't done very much to appear so otherwise. It's a minor thing though.

On Emma herself, I'm glad she's stuck around as I was afraid she wasn't going to be a recurring character but it seems like she will be, actually pretty interested to find out more about her. Although at the moment I'm guessing her primary thing is that she's there to keep tabs on Leon what with that tracking bug and is going to play a semi-caretaker role as she's concerned maybe about him going off like that. (Probably killing him in the process somehow I'd assume if worst comes to worst)

Finally I thought the end was cool with the purple knight and left me wanting more however at the same I couldn't help but imagine power rangers in my head when we're getting all these different coloured guys here.

On the subject of Leon, I can see why some people won't like him, he is a standard hot headed protagonist that struggles to control his anger, it's been done many times before and he doesn't really stand out above any others. However, I've been able to overlook it so far because his dad, and now Ema, are pretty good foils to it, and it usually ends up with him storming off in a huff. I foresee character development.

Marcelo was a little bit of a throwaway villain for our main characters this week, but I liked the action, I love how dynamic the Makai Knights movements are, and the CGI is really working for me with regards to this. Yeah the rings voice threw me too, and it was quite funny, we'll see how that goes in later episodes as I assume if it has a voice it will feature more as a character.

Ema was pretty great again this week, I'm glad she wasn't just a 1 week feature, and having her there really illustrates the discord between the Knights and the Alchemists. Of course the fact that she's awesome in a fight and pretty witty too, makes her one of the characters I'm hoping we get to see more of.

Like Gen, I was pretty pumped at the end there when the purple Makai Knight showed up, it hit that child in me that was super pumped about the Green Ranger all those years ago, except this time we get blood and gore.