KEKKAI SENSEN

DESCRIPTION

CAST

MANGA ActionKekkai Sensen
OVA ActionKekkai Sensen: Ousama no Restaurant no Ousama
ANIME ActionKekkai Sensen & BEYOND

REVIEWS

• 

  Gruffle

  30/100
  A lack of connection or final point to it's episodic nature was this shows ultimate downfall...

  I have to go very much out of my usual formula to review Kekkai Sensen, because it is a rather complicated case… This is also going to be a very quick review, seeing as the shows “flaws” are huge, and can be summarised quickly.

  For starters, the show looks AMAZING, and is in my opinion the best looker of spring 2015. What truly sells the visuals is the directing. It gives of a sense of uncontrollable energy and fun, which upped the overall score for visuals quite the bit. The soundtrack is also pretty sweet. I actually found myself listening through the opening, instead of skipping through it, just because how amazing the song is. Same goes for the ending. Simply put, very listenable. As for the rest of the soundtrack, your usual mediocre background tracks sprinkled with some great standout tracks in-between for good measure ^_^

  Talking about the story is the hardest part. After watching each episode, I had myself thinking; “Man, that was a great episode!”. The comedy is on point, the plot was amusing, the characters were entertaining, the shows structure was original (see recap episode 10.5), etc.. Overall a great show! And this worked out very well for the first 7 or so episodes, but after that point, one thing in particular became very apparent. Every episode feels like a separate work on its own, with only the main cast and the location to tie them together. There is no semblance of a story at all. One episode ends with the main cast looking over an army of demons, the next has our main character bribing a mushroom with hamburgers. What little there is of a story is basicly, New York is surrounded by a fog that has connected the demon world to the "human world". How? We're never told... In this new New York, monsters and humans have to co-exist. In the midsts of all this, our main protagonist has decided to move to New York, where after a series of coincidences, begins working for Libra, an organisation centered around keeping threats at bay. Aaand thats about it... There is hinted towards a story from time to another; the world is threatened by vampires, Leonard has self-doubt issues, Libra is a group of misfits trying to make a living, etc. but it is all so very subtile, until it is slapped straight in our face like a plot twist. The thing is, it is not a plot twist, just a speedy plot point. My major gripe here, is that it feels like the story is being sidetracked for comedy, or rather filler episodes, which have no place in a 12ep show. It could have been along the lines of character centric episodes, but the aforementioned "filler episodes" are merely arbitrary comedy skeets...

  You could make the argument that Kekkai Sensen is a ”slice of nothing ever happens” comedy, and should be judged accordingly, but the show occasionally, tries hard to get its story across the board, and thus has to be judged as so. If Kekkai Sensen had been something along the lines of Kara no Kyoukai or Haruhi Suzumiya, where the episodes were not released chronologically, then the aforementioned ridiculously bad pacing and poorly tied together story could have been due to me just not understanding the plot due to unconventional conveying, but I can’t even put the blame on such a scenario.

  As for the characters, there are just too many of them. But they all have two things in common. They are all based on character tropes, and they are all ridiculously two dimensional. I could go in depth (or as far as possible with the rather limited personality each and everyone were given) about each and every character, but instead il just list a few of the main. You hardly need anything more than this before you know everything about the characters. You have your run of the mill easygoing main character (Leonard Watch), the asshole (Zapp), the tough but straight guy (Klaus), deluded villain (Femt), obligatory love interest (Mary/White) and the whimp (William/Black). To the shows credit, episode 11 is pure characterisation, telling about the past of some of the main characters, but it is very much a "too little, too late" scenario. Instead, they should have put this episode closer to the mid-point. Indeed, it could take some of the suspense away from the anime, but at least the story would have been a tiny bit less non-sensical.

  To summarise, Kekkai Sensen is a show that had a lot of potential. Every episode in and of itself were great, but the episodes themselves had no semblance of connection. The show falls flat on its face due to horrible pacing, limited character characterisation, little to none character development and a too short of a runtime. Say, if Kekkai Sensen had received a 26 episode runtime, the MABY the characters and the story would have had the time to be fully fletched out, instead of being the rushed mess that it is. The shows main selling points are definitively the animation, music and comedy, and with the exception of the aforementioned being great, there is very little to talk about... Kekkai Sensen could have been great, but ultimately is a rushed mess, and the final episode being posponed indefinitely further underlines that statement

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• 

  CaninnTurtle

  77/100
  Kekkai Sensen immerses you in, perhaps, the best anime world I've seen, despite other imperfections.

  (Disclaimer: I will cover both seasons of Kekkai Sensen in this review, but I won't go into spoilers at all, except for maybe in the characters section.)
  I had fun with Kekkai Sensen. It may have taken me weeks to finish 24 episodes and two ovas, but I had a pretty good time. However, I can't ignore the fact that it really polarized me overall. Sure, I enjoyed it, but there were a lot of times where I literally groaned and struggled through another seemingly pointless episode. These downs were what made me take nearly a month and a half to actually finish Kekkai Sensen, even though I'll say that it was a pretty good show.

  You can't talk about Kekkai Sensen without talking about how beautifully and fluidly it was animated and how banging the soundtrack was, especially season one's. For the animation, the fight scenes are undoubtedly some of the best in anime, the way that each character has their own fighting style and applications create for some impressive sequences. Even if the character models weren't drawn immaculately all the time, you could always count on the animation of each episode to impress.

  Before I go down the rabbit hole that is the soundtrack, I want to make a minor note about the voice acting, especially the dub being fantastic. It was always an epic moment when characters like Steven or Klaus went in for their final moves and suddenly started spewing their the names of their finisher in another language. Anyway, just wanted to show some appreciation for great voice acting.

  Now, the soundtrack. I don't how I'm going to say more than, "It's so good." To be honest, it may be one of the best soundtracks in anime, if only for the fact that it's so varied and fitting to its setting. Every insert song or instrumental piece fits into the jazzy, urban atmosphere that Hellsalem's Lot exudes. However, nothing in the first 23 episodes could prepare me for getting blindsided in the feels by the best song to come from the soundtrack. Honestly, if I was more fickle, I'd raise my score for Kekkai Sensen by 5 to 10 points for Tortoise Knight alone, but instead of talking more about it, I'll just link it here:

  Favorite Character: Mary Macbeth (White)

  

  I mean, let's be honest, the only character challenging her for this spot is Chain. The thing about White though, is that she really provided Leo with interesting interaction outside of his work with Libra, which was a nice break from the chaos of Hellsalem's Lot. The first season really needed White to help provide you with more of a personal connection with Leo, who honestly, I thought was pretty useless most of the time. But around White, you couldn't help but cheer for him to get the girl, because their interactions were so damn cute.

  This is the part where, I take a turn from my radiantly positive attitude. I mentioned earlier that I was extremely polarized by Kekkai Sensen. Most of that polarization is from the episodic nature, I think. It's so hard to binge out Kekkai Sensen, because it feels like there's no thread tying the world together. Instead, every episode is a single story, making the good episodes feel really fulfilling, but making the bad ones excruciating. I don't think this issue was helped by the fact that I wasn't interested in Zapp very much, and he dominated many of season one's episodes, which set the tone for me to watch the series. In fact, I can't say that I loved many of the simple, one-off episodes that dominate the series. There were a few that I really enjoyed, like Gilbert and Chain's episodes in season 2, the hospital episode, and the Aligula episode in season 1. There are a couple more that I at least was pleased with, but these few were the standout one-offs to me. I think a lot of the episodes that didn't impress me simply didn't have a good focal character, which made me bored of them from the beginning. A lot of this may be just my taste, but I feel if someone doesn't like all the characters, you're going to struggle through certain episodes.

  Kekkai Sensen's greatest strength is loosely tied to my complaints too. See? Polarizing. Anyway, Kekkai Sensen's greatest strength lies in its world. Enter Hellsalem's Lot, perhaps the greatest world in anime:

  

  What makes Hellsalem's Lot so special? It's simple: the city is it's own character. Kekkai Sensen simply wouldn't be the same without the craziness of the city that they never fail to show us with each episode. We think we've seen the most unbelievable thing the city can throw at us, then it turns around and throws something else at us. The thing is, the city provides us with a sort of continuity that we take for granted after living in the city with the characters for a little while. It becomes the norm for us too, which is what makes it so special. All these crazy one-off episodes are basically created at complete freedom, because of how much room to maneuver the setting provides the writers. Honestly, it's really impressive. I think the fact that each and every citizen, alien or human, is drawn really helps immerse us even more in the world. We see the weirdness, instead of get told how weird Hellsalem's Lot is.

  I find it hard to actually criticize Kekkai Sensen, because I realize how well it pulled me into the setting now that I've written all of this. In fact, I think all it would take to love Kekkai Sensen is more of an overarching rhyme or reason to the story. It gets touched on here and there, but mostly gets ignored. I guess Michella doesn't really matter that much after all. I kid, but it would be nice to see some progression to the plot behind Leo's eyes and her blindness. I'm probably asking for Kekkai Sensen to become something that it isn't though, so I'll be happy to be a fan of what it is, rather than what I think it should be.

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• 

  ZUCCIN

  78/100
  although the glaring problems, Kekkai Sensen creates a interest meld of fantasy and action that is a must see

  

  How have I not found this sooner? After the genuine shit I have wafted through, I was not excited to begin a generic-looking anime. But I was genuinely surprised by the uniqueness of Kekkai Sensen, a true diamond in the rough of anime. Despite this it's not all sunshine and rainbows, there are some glaring problems with how it's structured.

  story: 7.5
  The anime follows the story of Leonardo Watch, who after a chance encounter with a god, gets the all-seeing eyes of the gods at the cost of his sister's eyesight. Thus, he begins his adventure through the supernatural thoroughfare of Hell Salem's lot, meeting an assortment of demons and befriending the members of the anti-blood breed group, Libra. It starts off as the most cliché shit, being the typical action fantasy about demons and humans. But that takes a turn around episode 4, with the introductions of blood breeds, the story's version of vampires. It sets into motion the rest of the series and introduces the main push that is present throughout the rest of the season. The one glaring problem is that despite this, the episodic nature kills the hype to shit. each episode at the start of the series features no overlap, future episodes beginning to create the overarching story. This presents the double-edged sword of a good episode is amazing, but a terrible one (which is most of these) is painfully boring, like the episode about 4d chess for the fate of the universe. It becomes less of a problem later, but for fuck's sake, I don't care about a mushroom who likes burgers. The anime only story arc at the end is welcome tho, giving a person a general enemy and aim for Leo to overcome

  

  Character and setting: 7.3
  the characters are a mixed bag really. Some are layered, some are fun, some of just total badasses. But then there are the aforementioned chess masters and mushrooms. White and Black are welcome additions as anime-only characters. But they are kinda cop-outs for problems with the beginning of the anime being the mixed bag. But as much as Zap and Leo and White are good characters, Hell Salem is a better one. It's breathing with the cosmic horrors of the other world, taking the best parts of New York and emphasising them in the chaos of the destruction by the otherworlders.

  animation: 8.2
  the animation is smooth af. The city is oozing in filth, the characters stylish and the action scenes detailed and animated with flare. Only a few episodes are flat (mainly episodes 1 and 10) but it coincides with the episodes that are more chill and expositiony, so good animation is forgiven here.

  

  Music: 8.2
  the op and ed are fucking killer and the soundtracked varied. It goes from high octane action to melancholy in a heartbeat but in a natural way. Trust me its something you hear and immediately know you are gonna enjoy it.

  best episode: episode 12, a good ending to a good arc
  worst episode: 10, massive exposition dump that is anime only, making it inserted in a fucked way

  overall, although the glaring problems of the boring and disjointed episodes, Kekkai Sensen creates an interesting meld of fantasy and action with killer animation and setting that is a must-see for anyone who has a remote interest in action fantasy.

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