Blood Blockade Battlefront - Reviews

HAIII!~ (╯◕‿◕)╯*:･ﾟ✧❤

Interested and wanting to Leonardo Watch this anime? Lemme help!

Welcome to my Kekkai Sensen aka Blood Blockade Battlefront review! Let's see what bones brought us this time :D

I am a good person! And I like my bones (especially collarbones)!

BUT there are bones that I do not like lately and it's that DAMN STUDIO BONES that can either bring you a masterpiece show such as FMA or Noragami, or they bring you coffin princesses with bad eyebrows or they force someone to spin off Soul Eater just so fans could shut up for a while... *sigh*

Now when it comes to this show, it definitely does give studio Bones vibes... from 2006...

However, despite the show starting off lousy, I really liked how it all turned out. The story is interesting and funny, decent visuals and sound, fun characters. Let's get into details :D

STORY

So the story focuses on Brock from Pokemon Leonardo Watch, a teenage boy who wants to find his sister who's in a wheelchair in the world filled with mutant humanoid creatures. And so, by a cruel twist of fate he meets a person who gets him into an organization called Libra (my horoscope sense is tingling). With Libra, and his special eyes which see everything, Leo and the people from the organization fight the forces of evil together.

The whole story is sort of episodic, each episode has a ''new event'' and they're all well connected and it all makes sense. I would even say the story is the best asset this show has.

What really amazed me is how interesting, funny and simply entertaining this show is. The comedy is nicely delivered and there's a lot of it, which I liked. The animation pretty much lives up to the comedy which is sort of important, but more about the animation later on.

What I really like is how unpredictable the story is, I would HATE if everything went on the way I expected it at first, since I had a bad first impression of the show.

I was very sceptical with this story, but it really surpised me that it turned out like this. In conclusion, nicely done story with a decent amount of comedy and episodic storytelling.

I liked the finale and the ending was decent.

8/10

ANIMATION

Not bad, Bones. But I know you can do better!

Was this show made in 2006? The animation does have a lot of details and I just can't say the whole animation is bad. However, judging on today's anime standards, this animation gives FMA and Soul Eater vibes which wouldn't be bad a few years ago. So the animation is good, but it ages back a few years.

Aside from that. I love the environment. How they made NYC look like a dystopian paradise. Very realistic approach when it comes to the environment and even the famous architecture of NYC.

I'd like to note how characters are animated. Very typical to the Bones studio (circa 2006). I kind of liked seeing that. This kind of character animation brings back memories when it comes to some Bones releases, and I can't say that's bad.

So on the good side it's well done, lots of details and greatly done environment, but on the bad side, it doesn't fit 2015 standards. So I'll give it a solid 7/10

SOUND

The overall sound is good.

When it comes to the music, it's not usual to see this kind of music in anime. The whole Jazz/Blues soundtrack really fits New York City (despite this being in a future). And that's what I like! It's not unusual for Bones to have a decent soundtrack.

When it comes to voice acting. Very professionally done. I hate to say, but my perfectionist side (basically 85% of me) noticed some bits and pieces that were wrong with the sound. First and third episode had some parts where the sound was off/out of sync, which REALLY ruined my first impression of the show. However, this didn't happen later on so I'm still content with the sound quality.

I love the music, I like the voice acting, so I will squint a bit and give it an 8/10.

CHARACTERS

Lots of characters, and although I feel like some characters deserved a better development, I do think that the characters they developed nicely (Leo, White, Black) kinda ''patch up'' that issue.

The main character has a superpower, the ''All seeing eye'' (ilumeneti confermd) ''Eyes of God'' that can see basically anything. Not very original, but I like the way they presented it. Usually main characters have superpowers that are either ''stupid looking but become powerful'' or ''gorgeous OP af lambo bambo magic sparkles $$$ kind of thing''. In this case his eyes look sort of... unattractive?... unusual? I don't know how to describe it, but in my opinion, it doesn't look good, but hey not everything can be pretty *shrug*... at least he's useful *shrug*

I really like Aligula (one of the antagonists), her personality is what this show needed even though she didn't get much air time. I also like the girl (White) and how they unexpectedly involved her in everything. I won't go in details because that would probably spoil your experience.

Another thing. Almost all of the characters from the Libra characters are likeable, but they lack development. I feel like there are too many characters to find out more about them (they could take notes from Durarara!!... just sayin'), and the fact that the story is sort of episodic doesn't help.

I'll give it a 7/10

OVERALL

Despite all the disappointment I had with this show on a first few episodes, this show is more than decent. I was almost convinced that I would drop this show on episode 3 or 4, but I'm so glad I gave it a chance.

It turned out great in the end, and the Bones studio is still healthy and it didn't get osteoporosis yet ^^

Thank you for reading this review! I'd recommend this anime to Misty, Ash and Pikachu to support Brock in his new adventures! anyone who is ready for some futuristic, steampunk (well... kinda), New York City Ghoul, action packed, organization, monsters, filled with blood, blockades and battlefronts, hamburger, pokemon, anime... just do it. Be ready. Pretend it's black friday and you're alone in a mall. Just get rekt with this anime.

Rate if you found this review helpful, funny, or just like it. I have more anime reviews so check them out if you want!

Thanks and have a nice day ^^

If this anime isn't among your picks this season, you're really missing out.

5 episodes in, and this show just keeps getting better and better. The plot centers around an introverted photography enthusiast (he calls himself a reporter, but so far we have never seen him report to even a magazine) who joins a group of humans who have gained supernatural powers living in the craziest, dangerous city based off of New York merged with the portal to the underworld. The city is even worse than Durarara's Ikebukuro, and you wonder why there are even normal people living in it. Imagine Hamatora, but 5 times better but with a plot that strings together well (just ignore the resemblances between the protagonists of both shows).

It also has unabashed comedy that isn't your usual slapstick and while it may not have the most original storyline, it has the best screenwriting I've seen so far. Those who keep criticising re-used frames and cheap angles in anime will love this. There are scenes in which the action and dialogue are so chaotic you don't know where to keep your eyes on, but that only means there's something new when you re-watch the episodes. The romance isn't obvious but will come as a nice surprise and isn't overly dramatic like most.

I can't say much about the other characters yet, but goodness what a gem the protagonist is, especially for those who hate cocky or overpowered MCs but despise wimpy ones. The protagonist is definitely neither of those. Blood Blockade Battlefront (stupid-sounding as the name is,) or Kekkai Sensen has a little to offer everyone. It has tragedy, but not as tragic as Tokyo Ghoul so it still remains lighthearted in spite of some really awful things in it, and you won't get a sob story dragged onto you every two episodes as is becoming the trend in recent seasons. And such good choice on the opening and ending songs, though I've always been partial to BUMP OF CHICKEN.

In short, watch this. Trust me, you won't stop grinning. People have even stopped trolling in the comments section for this show.

I can't say I really enjoyed this anime. The concept was good and the characters were decently interesting and I did like the little monkey and it was certainly better than listening to the drunken idiots across the street.......It isn't labeled episodic, but it felt episodic which is something I tend to dislike. This made the story feel choppy and like there were holes. This is also a 12 episode anime and like many other 12 or 13 episode anime, it feels somewhat rushed. 

There are times when it feels like the story opens up a can of worms and doesn't bother to clean up the mess. In other words, it mentions something or introduces a new problem and then doesn't follow through. The story isn't well told or explained and the characters are shallow or 2 dimensional. It caught my interest at the beginning but I became a bit frustrated when the events of one episode did not carry over into the next and seemed almost disconnected entirely. With the lack of character development besides the main character, I found I wanted to know and like the other characters but didn't know them well enough to. Again, and I have said this before, I don't think most animes should be just 12 or 13 episodes long. I imagine that it part of the problem. In the end, I still don't fully get what I just watched. Also, I really liked the burger loving character but he only got one episode and was never seen again :(

The animation was about average. I reallydon't like it when characters are drawn so it looks like their eyes are closed all the time. It's one thing for a minor character to have eyes like that, but the main character having it is worse. That is just my personal opinion on the matter. Like how do those characters even see. I get that his eyes are special but I doubt he can see through his eyelids!!! There are other ways to hide special eyes too. I just don't like it. 

I know this show got a decent hype and some really great reviews, but that means nothing. This certainly isn't as bad as some of the other shows people get all hyped about like :cough: SAO :cough: but it's not overly amazing. I did aprecciate that the characters actually got hurt sometimes though. It usually bugs me when no one ever gets hurt when doing a bunch of crazy stuff. 

Blood Blockade Battlefront is not a waste of time, but I don't hesitate to say that it's potential is largely wasted. It could have been way way better. 

For starters, animation, visuals and music are awesome. Many times I just kept on watching because it was so amazing and stylish to look at. The background music is very diverse, but all of it is good. As for the Op, I finished downloading Bump of Chicken's cd. The version of the anime I watched was the dubbed one, but no complaint whatsoever: they did a good job - and I always watch anime with subs, so I know what I'm talking about.

Now for the downside: the story and the characters. The story has a very interesting premise and all in all it's developed decently, just that too many things are left unresolved and unanswered. And not just the main plot point about the protagonists eyes, which I can imagine is left pending to be developed in a second series. Countless times during the episodes things are just brought up and then they're not developed. So why bother bringing them up in the first place? Same goes for the over-arching story, too many plot holes for my taste. The story is set in Hell Salem's Lot, a sci-fi New York City where 3 years before the beginning of the story a sort of multi-dimensional hole opened up connecting NY with the alter-world, so that all kind of weird monsters from that other world poured into our world. The city is wrapped in a bubble and there's a barrier keeping it all together, so normal people and monsters live - more or less peacefully - together. It's obviously more complicated than that, but it's an intriguing setting - and the visuals help a lot in making it so riveting.

The characters are developed little or none at all. Which is the other major pitfall of this anime. Our hero, Leonardo Watch, arrives in Hell Salem's Lot and manages to become part of Libra, a secret organization of super-humans. So there are many different - and interesting - characters that could and should have been developed more, starting from Klaus, Libra's leader. But no such thing happens and at the end of the anime we know as much about them as we did at the beginning: next to nothing. Leonardo, being the protagonist is a bit more developed and so are the twins, White and Black. Even the antagonist remains a vague and hazy figure, with no background and no explanation of his motives.

In conclusion, great visuals and sound, good comedic moments, an interesting premise, likeable characters, overall entertaining. But a lot of wasted potential.

I remember seeing the first episode and aboslutely loving certain things about it--the atmosphere and just design overall, funny, personalities of the characters and the personality in the voice acting, good music--but I was worried it would be confusing and get  a little too silly or nonsensical.

So I went out and got the manga, and everything made much more sense to me, I understood the plot better, got a deeper feel for the vibe of the show, grew more attached to the characters, and so on. When I went back to the anime I appreciated it on a whole other level. 

The characters and their interactions are such gold, the villains are great especially the theatrical Femt. The little details and monsters/aliens everywhere are so great. There's many little things that are hilarious...

I'm no professional anime-reviewer, I just think this show is completely unique and original in concept and feel...and thought that i should strongly recommend that anyone read the manga first! the art is amazing, and the story moves fast. I guess that means my only critique of the show is they should have looked back on it as someone didn't know the story and might not understand it as well, and try to make it more clear... OK that's it for my opinion, anyway :)