The big bombastic punches are flying, and if you aren't buckled up folks you better strap in cause there's a lot of screen-shaking hits.
I think the overall episode is solid. There's a bunch of wailing on Kaido as this giant punching (or swording?) bag, but there's a strong sense of Kaido's near limitless invulnerability. You can see it in Luffy's eyes as he throws everything he has into punch after punch, coming away short of breath while Kaido raises again and again from the smoke. Kaido is not the smartest or even flashiest villain Luffy and company have ever fought but his absurd endurance makes him one of (if not the) deadliest.
Even Zoro, Kid, Law, and Killer cannot seem to tip the scales (fnarf) in a meaningful way. This is saying something especially given how quickly Zoro tends to dispatch enemies post-timeskip.
All the visual flourishes in the episode are in the solid to great territory. Lots of wonderful energy and smoke effects as to be expected, but all done with a keen eye to scale. The sense of Kaido's size comes through really well in the framing of certain shots and how slow he moves relative to Luffy's attacks. He is less a flying floe and more a floating one, gently bobbing in the air under the barrage of punches Luffy is delivering. This good direction - coupled with the strong, ominous orchestral music - gives it all the air of a kaiju film, and that's precisely the tone that should be struck with Kaido and Big Mom on the field.
Other subtler visual touches are much appreciated too. I love the juxtaposition of the CP-0 leader's eyes and the Go pieces on the table with those rhythmic snap zooms for tension. The POV shot of Zoro helicotpering up the front of Kaido is great too, really giving us a sense of what it must be like to fight Kaido in this form for the average human (or, at least average in height - Zoro is beyond average).
Japanese studio to handle production slated for broadcast, streaming globally― Kadokawa and Singaporean game developer and publisher Garena announced on Monday that they are co-producing an anime adaptation of Garena's Garena Free Fire battle royale shooting game, with a Japanese studio handling the animation. Kadokawa's Kadokawa Qingyu subsidiary is the production manager. The anime is planned to b...
Healer Nanna's powers have one very unique caveat: she has to have sex with the person to heal them. See why Rebecca Silverman calls it "a cute story, decently racy, and generally good, fluffy fun."― One of the fun things about Seven Seas' Steamship line of racy manga aimed at a female audience is finding which romance tropes are prevalent in any given release. While every genre has its tropes and s...
What's the perfect recipe for waifu supremacy? Lucas and Nick look at fan-favorites from Yu Yu Hakusho to Spice & Wolf.― What's the perfect recipe for waifu supremacy? Lucas and Nick look at fan-favorites from Yu Yu Hakusho to Spice & Wolf. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the participants in this chatlog are not the views of Anime News Network.Spoiler Warning for discussion of the s...
Train to the End of the World and Voice Actor Radio are getting a lot of love these last few weeks! Discover which other series stand out in our weekly user rankings!― Let's have a look at what ANN readers consider the best (and worst) of the season,
based on the polls you can find in our Daily Streaming Reviews
and on the Your Score page with the latest simulcasts. Keep in mind that these rankings...
Crystal Kay previously sang themes for 2004's Fullmetal Alchemist and Nodame Cantabile― Recently, Anime News Network was able to sit down with singer-songwriter Crystal Kay and talk about not only her involvement with anime over the years but also what it was like to grow up in Japan as the child of a Korean-Japanese mother and an African-American father. Anime fans likely know of Crystal Kay throug...
The plot is excellent in the romance camp. Everything that happens is to get Eui-joon and Gunwoo together, and it works pretty well.― You can read The Dangerous Convenience Store in English two ways. The first is to read it on the manhwa site/app Manta, which has all seventy-five chapters and four bonus stories available. The second is to read Seven Seas' print (or ebook) edition, which, as of this ...
Some older mysteries inch closer to resolution as the true nature of the Abyss slowly comes into view, and long-posed questions start to be answered.― Sometimes, being a fan of Akihito Tsukushi's acclaimed Made in Abyss series means acclimating to suffering. Like many Western devotees, I was introduced to this bizarre, squishy, disturbing world via the 2017 first season of Kinema Citrus' fantastic a...
60th, final episode of previous anime streamed on YouTube on Friday― The official Twitter account for the anime of Penguin Box's Odekake Kozame (Little Shark's Outings) manga announced on Friday that the manga will get a new anime series. Update: The staff revealed a visual for the new series in a press release on Saturday. The previous anime series debuted on YouTube last August, and its 60th and f...
As Slam Dunk reached its final stretch, I can see why this series is considered the sports classic that it is today.― This is the largest batch of Slam Dunk episodes that I've reviewed thus far. Originally, I wanted to review the show in more even seasons, but given its overall pacing and release, it wasn't easy to find a moment where it felt right to stop and start again. However, as we approached ...