__The Story of Yasuke or the Story of Saki?
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A series labeled historically accurate but to what end?

__The Mecha & Magic Elements
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Where should I begin. The tale of Yasuke was meant to have historical elements within the series. However, the addition of the mecha and sorcery fighting completely drowns out the ability for the watcher to know which scenes were accurate to the tale and which scenes were fiction. I saw that the mecha figures were added within the preview of the show and was skeptical, but upon watching the series they added no value other than to add to the fighting scenes. I feel like the addition of sorcery is common when it comes to old-age series, since in the past in those times they did in fact believe sorcery existed, but the mecha was hardly explained. In fact, the villagers were in awe of Saki’s magical powers, but did not once blink at the talking robot that far exceeded the technology around them. The mecha addition felt forced and because of that so did the sorcery. To me it felt like the writers were afraid that the historical accurate story wouldn’t have been enough and went overboard trying to make the anime exciting.

__The Characters & Storyline
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As I mentioned previously the flashy fight scenes felt like it took over the majority of the show. The series was named after Yasuke but by the end of the show it felt like the writes wanted the watcher to care about Saki more. Aside from those two, I also felt like the side characters were one dimensional. Per example, Haruto (the robot) along with Nikita and Ishikawa all set out to kill Saki for money, the moment the priest was killed their duty ended. Within a 3 episode time span they went from being money driven to sacrificing their life for the villagers? The 180 was too big and the writers just wanted to use preexisting characters in a feeble attempt to make loosing them more emotional. Instead, it came off as rushed writing.

The Animation & OST

Probably the saving grace of the series. Within the last five years especially, MAPPA has dominated the animation industry and has single handily raised the bar of the fluidity and consistency of what animation can look like. The CGI within this particular series was done with good taste. Along with the OST that was lofi hip hop and tried to mix the old with the new. The gamble paid off and it is a soundtrack that will personally exist within my study playlist. If you came for the series for flashy fight scenes alone then I can say in confidence one wouldn’t be disappointed. The gore from the blood was a bit too excessive for my taste but I will respect that it was a stylistic choice.

Final Thoughts

As a person of color I had extremely high hopes for this series but it is with huge regret that I cannot give this show a high rating. Perhaps I’m being even tougher on it because of how important the quality of this show needed to be since it is rare to have an anime show primarily pronounce a black character. The series was only six episodes and it feels like the writers were painfully aware of the space they had and tried to accomplish too much in too little time. I think if they pulled away from the mecha plot line and focused on as many realistic events as possible it would’ve been just as fine. If the series was not only 6 episodes, I probably would not have finished it. This isn’t a series I would ever feel the desire to watch a second time. If I could change anything from the series I would either not have thrown in the historical element in it at all or had focused on making the series a more realistic fight.