Katanagatari - Reviews

At the very beggining I will cut to the chase, Katanagatari can be quickly described in one word, "art"

While it still remains an Anime, the quality in all the fields is simply astonishing. By looking a bit closer, listening a bit deeper than you'd usually do while watching, you'll find yourself surrounded by a truly japanese, gentle and yet incredibly rich world. By taking your time while watching Katanagatari, you will grant yourself a time of true quality. 

This does not need my further babbling, I will end my review by saying that work as rich as this do not often appear in our commercial world. Katanagatari can be viewed as both, just an anime but also as art, it gently leaves the choice for you to make.

Katanagatari...You know i never wanted to start watching it.50 mins eps?In dog years that's...Well eternity.But hey i'm all about challenges and all than zen crap..Once again for the sake of my sanity and because the admins and indeed the whole world thinks you all need pampering i must warn that every review of mine is not for kids..Gotta protect the new generations or something like that..Let's start shall we?

So storywise this is simple,plain and indeed as stupid as it gets sometimes.Female MC goes off at an abandoned island where our male MC lives with his sister,away from the world and its' troubles and tries to recruit him to help her find some legendary swords in order to save the world..And then....OH MY FUCKING GOD...

You know that the mastermind behind this is also the one behind Monogatari series?If you didn't know u do(thank me later)..So there is a VAST amount of dialogue..But here's my problem.In Monogatari the dialogues are indeed of comparable vastness but that somehow isn't in the way of the overall story,in fact it gives it a unique character and acts as a boost of some sorts.And you don't miss any part of the action because of the dialogues..Here i'm afraid it's ass backwards,the dialogues for the most part they're just in the way.I can summarise it as such..An anime that everyone keeps talking and then some action might happen..And it's not like the dialogues have anything to offer to the greater picture most of the time..If it was toned down and was more action packed i wouldn't have a single problem.Basically they took a good formula and went mental with it turning it up to 11.Big mistake there.

Another problem i had was that Dragon Ball vibe i got..The fights were tremendously similar to that of DB..Only worse because everyone had given names to the attacks and the felt compeled before each attack to share those names with the audience..I'm not kidding you,it's like going to the pub,someone spills your pint and when u turn to punch him in the fez you start shouting ''ROSE SHIT PUNCH" and then "CAT ANUS KICK".......Anywho back to the story..It's a weird mix of predictable and unpredictable.We have two protagonists,Yasuri Shichika and Togame,locating one of the twelve legendary swords at each episode.Before each ep you already know that they're gonna get the damn swords,so the suspense part goes to hell.Before they get the swords they have to fight the sword owners and in the process kill them..The only aspect i can call a surprise was how many they didn't actually kill.Seriously almost everyone dies.Some eps are close to perfect and well-paced.Others are downright awful and are entirely a mind bending acid trip where the characters are supposed to learn something important.

The characters are far from perfect but they're somewhat very very enjoyable.Togame's character is overall stagnant.She hardly evolves,aside from her feelings and attitude towards Shichika.This wouldn't be a prob if  a case could be made that her character wasn't so...Stock-ish.She is stereotypical,high-tempered,a green eyed monster,easily embarrassed and unable to make a name for herself on her own.She definitely improves later on,showing us her strategic spirit and clear mind,but she is ways far from being interesting or unique.Her backstory is the exact opposite,but it's shown in such a way you can't possibly care.

Shichika is like a robot..He's supposed to get tremendous character development,changing from an empty tool to a caring human being.Unfortunately,that's not character development enough.What would be good character development is to go from a human being to one that makes you interested in,care for.And,well,never got that from Shichika.I just wish he had more personality.

There are a ton shit of characters and trust me they are worth it,but for the sake of keeping it as compact as possible i'll leave it at that.

The animation is great,no other words for it.It's a sort of painting-like quality that makes you feel like you're staring at a classic Japanese painting.Some characters are...Less art-y..They're shit actually but still unique.

Soundtracks and VA are also sweet.

Ultimately this show is great.It's far from perfect but it grabs you by the balls nevertheless.I know that contradicts my whole review but somehow it's special.And special is what i'm looking for here.Something you can't put your finger on.Yes it has many faults,yes it tries to be many things at once,yes it tries to handle more than it actually can,yes the dialogues are as vast as the universe..But still,it's a loveable anime.It has personality,it has soul..It's like your kids..They might decide one day to learn drums and at one point you'll want to strangle them..But if anyone tries to harm them you're gonna kill them.

It's def not for everyone.It's a matter of taste.And it certainly isn't what most people consider it to be.But i love it and so will you i suppose.

Katanagatari was a nice change of pace to the rather dissappointing anime I have been watching lately.  It is rated very highly, and it is not a bad anime.  However I could not feel truly impressed with it, simply glad that it was not as bad as others that I have viewed recently. 

The first thing that catches your eye is the very simplistic style.  This was used noticbly well in some scenes, and made the anime look very cheap in other scenes.  I find beauty in simplicity, but I suppose I should expand on that.  Simle is nice, but sloppy is not, and those two things are not directly related. 

Next thing that you find is the humor of the anime.  It is pretty witty and very joking for most of the anime.  The humor is very wordy, which is not a problem, the problem arises in the wordy serious moments and logical explainations.  The characters talked and talked and talked until they ended up backed into a corner (logically) with no way out but a complete bullsh*t excuse.  Which brings me to my next point.

Some of the episodes in this anime were pretty much dinosaur turd.  It was not the action, or the music and sound.  most of the time, they tried to cram some big long explaination of how something works into a scene, half of what they say sound like something a 5 year old made up while playing with the other kids. . . . .  part of an anime is immersion, sometimes you need to shut up and let my mind fill in the gaps for the sake of the immersion of the anime.  Saying too much and ending up not making sense does no good.

Story: The story was ok, there a nice foundation, I thought (until characters started saying too much and made up a bunch of crazy stupid things), as well as character progression( again they spoke about it so much that it started ruining it a bit).  The story progression which used the history and drove the character building was pretty solid.  I didnt feel that the problem of the day style hurt it too much.

However I will say this, and it is the reason that this section gets a 7 from me.  This anime didnt feel like it accomplished much.  I have watched 24 episode animes where I felt truly fulfilled in how much was accomplished.  This anime was 12 episodes of 50 min (same as about 24 ep of 25 min) but by the end I felt like for all the time spent not as much was accomplished.  I personally believe this has to do with relativity, specifically, perception of time, perception of distance travelled and the percieved difference of the peak vs starting point in the plot.  To that end I was a little unimpressed.

Animation:  Not all parts of the anime required great animation.  but it was pretty good when it counted.  The simple art style helped with this a bit.

Sound: Just fine, some of that music might actually stick in my head.  I liked Samauri Champloo style of rapping with traditional japanese music.  This anime adapted that, and it was neat.

Characters:  All the characters had one problem in common.  They were all egotistical loud mouths.  Now I actually liked some characters and really enjoyed some of the character building, but through most of the anime there were always 2 or 3 characters that I just wanted to punch in the mouth and tell them to shut the hell up and let the others do their thing. Also, there was a ton of talk in the anime.  I mean "talking up" characters.  "Oh shes so strong", "he is an incrediby strong. . . . "

I DONT CARE, SHOW ME, DONT JUST SAY IT.  This goes back to characters talking too much.

Overall:  7, not as good as I was expecting considering its score.  The main point was that characters spoke out of place waaaaaay too much. This sometimes put the plot in a bad way.  I still recommend watching Katanagatari.

That...was............AWESOME!!! Totally was the anime to bring me back into the anime world. I watched these all the way to the end!

I really shouldn't have enjoyed Katanagatari nearly as much as I did. There are so many flaws to point out that it would be a futile task to list them all without writing a longer text than that of the script. And yet, it does so many things right that somehow it manages to overcome each and every one. In short, whatever issues there are in the series, it makes up for them with a load of personality. Graceful would be the absolute worst fit of a word to describe how this works, but perhaps intelligent... not that either. It just works out somehow. Don't ask me how.

The texts resort to cliches, but make up for it with ample wordplay and humor. The voice acting goes over the top, but adds a lot of flavor that keeps the show entertaining. The use of catchphrases and cliches in the writing should be annoying, but is somehow endearing. People calling out their special moves is something to scoff at, but somehow, even that is turned into a point that adds color to the scenes. There is childishness to nearly everything from script to art, but that is contrasted with a mature relationship between the protagonists who are both a comedy duo and lovers (without the love being used as a sledgehammer to the face of the viewer).

When Katanagatari has so many faults that I find absolutely unforgivable in other shows, the fact that the writing is earnest and skillful with the artwork simplistic yet full of character makes up for it. Really, it should not have been enjoyable. This is a show which should have been relegated to teens. And yet it isn't only that. It manages to be that and more simultaneously.

The long episodes lend themselves to having character development, plenty of dialgue that sits on the border between cheesy and humorous, while still having fight scenes to sum everything up. It definitely helps remove the annoyance from the tired premise by adding a fresher structure that is (mostly) episodic yet still with enough time to give characters at least some background. All of these fancy ways of describing the contrast between the flaws and successes of Katanagatari in essence is futile. What doesn't change is that it gives a tired genre and tired cliches new life and in that is a massive achievement.

Writing (Story and Characters):

Expanding on the writing of Katanagatari is an easy task. On one side, there is very little original about the story, and it is executed in the most obvious of ways. This does not matter in the least since it is done in a very sharp and intelligent way. There are no hidden twists, not really. There are no surprises, not truly. Still, the writing is a breath of fresh air on what has to be the single most overdone premise in anime history.

From the perspective of the story, very little goes on here that has not been done to death. It is a (mostly) episodic structure where every episode has on main villain, plenty of dialigue, and some backstory. It is done without anything hidden, all you need to know is given to you. Still, Katanagatari manages with good execution where others fail. The fact that the story has already been told many times hinders it, but it still remains well above average because of the clever execution.

Protagonists: girl on quest, loyal fighter at her side. There are plenty of antagonists, each with their own agenda. What is truly surprising is that even the most minor characters aren't one dimensional. The insistence on adding backstory to everyone pays dividends by the cast rising above the cliches that they seemingly are. While very few are truly deep, none are one dimensional. Of course, the fact that the writing does not go too deep into how the characters tick and relies on tried and true cliches for the most part is what stops this from being a truly strong cast... but it is well balanced and manages to be quite good.

When combined, the story and characters fit the concept perfectly. The one thing that is really going for Katanagatari is that the double-length episodes allow both the story and characters to shine where other shows in the genre have failed spectacularly. Witty dialogue and not hitting us over the head with the fact that the protagonists are lovers (yes, they are) is refreshing. In many ways it takes a page out of Spice and Wolf, showing the more mundane side of a relationship rather than the obvious romance. Actually, the humor of them being caught in compromising positions when on screen they are mostly completely innocent is hilarious. The writing manages to work on many fronts, and in doing so overcomes plenty of the weaknesses of the genre.

Art (Animation and Sound):

What can I say? Crude but effective is the easiest way to describe the animation and voice acting. There is a gorgeous soundtrack and some well done backgrounds that manage to add a lot to Katanagatari on many levels. But most of all, the artwork manages to turn its weaknesses into strengths quite well. That is actually a recurring theme for the show - like the writing, the artwork has no right to work as well as it does. Kudos to the director, seriously.

The animation is perhaps the weakest point of the art. There is a reliance on simplifying character designs to add humor, gimmicky shots abound, and the fight scenes can get very stilted with single-frame shots or blurring instead of motion. Still, these actually manage to work within the context of the show. Katanagatari is light hearted fun at its core, and the animation's faults end up being just an extension of that. Of course, technical perfection would have been better. But that being said, the animation's personality fits so well with that of the writing that it manages to be solid despite the many (glaring, repeated) issues. And some of the backgrounds are just gorgeous.

Whereas the animation had many faults, the sound had very few. The soundtrack is fantastic, with a good choice of electronica, jazz and more traditional forms of soundtrack music. The voice acting does go over the top, but does so with a lot of personality which fits very well with the tone of the series. The effects are professional and do their job (which is usually fight scenes which aren't meant to be gritty but rather cartoonish), even if the effects during the cheesy humor bits are bordering "too much" territory.

Does the artwork bring the story to life? Yes it does, spectacularly. There are plenty of faults with the animation, but cleverly enough those faults are used for either humor or exposition. Still, this show could have done with a larger budget in order to clean up some of the messier bits of animation (though I have to admit that the retro video game sequence was magnificently bad and should never be changed at all). The lively tone of the series is possible only because the art is intelligently used. All the flaws are forgivable, and the moments of glory are there.

Overall:

I know Katanagatari is supposed to be bad. Everything about it is something I don't want to enjoy. And yet here I am, recommending this wholeheartedly. Really, this is a fun show to watch which revels in the cliches and abuses them in the best of ways. How Katanagatari manages to work is a mystery, and yet I found it extremely fun and enjoyable.