Chargeman Ken

There comes a time where an anime or really any piece of fiction or art moves you so much that you will never forget the experience. How likely a person is to forget a piece of art is often linked to its quality. This is something that I have seen countless times as a negative criticism for many anime or manga. If you read enough reviews you will see sentences such as:

A forgettable experience...

Forgettable characters...

I cannot find myself looking back at this...

unmemorable...

I don't think I will remember this in a week

If we are using memorability as a contention for judging the quality of media then certainly the 1974 anime Charge Man Ken has a solid argument to be one of the greatest anime of all time.

Ok calm down Mods, this is not a troll review. I'mma start being 'serious' now.

I am going to do something that I was piously against in reviewing media that is to NEVER give spoilers. But given the unique nature of this anime and my utter lack of interest for ANYONE to watch this, I really don't give a shit anymore. In fact, giving spoilers will not do jack shit because the whole 'story' is literally just a convoluted unexplainable mess of contrived events.

I am just going to be frank. Charge Man Ken is bad. It is terrible in every shape and form. It is literal dog shit. I am the type of person that never liked shitting on a production because I know that at the end of the day this was made by a human being and I try to empathize with the strangers working on any art no matter how terrible it may be. But even the creators of this anime really did not give a shit because according to the wikipedia page of this horrendous anime:

The low budget caused Knack Productions's staff to become apathetic toward the show and largely skip work on it in favor of going to the beach

So the gloves are off and I am going to laser blast this like Chargeman Ken as it rightfully deserves.

I have never seen a more lazy animation in my life, most of the 'animation' presented are just prolonged still images that occasionally zooms in or pans. And yes the work of the animation work is already lazy enough but the production team one up that laziness by literally reusing the same animation multiple time again and again to the point it is literally impossible to ignore. I consider myself quite an unobservant person, I have watched anime with friends before and was constantly impressed when they are able to immediately recognize duplicate animations used in literally 10 episodes ago or longer. The amount of reused animations is so staggering high to the point I would often be confused to whether I have watched the same episode. And no I am not talking about the dumb transformation scene where Ken just basically just puts on a helmet.

Presenting:

Chargeman Ken Rolling

Chargeman Ken Shooting

Bad Guys Dying

Not only they keep reusing the same animation they keep reusing the same exact music tracks. And there like literally 4 tracks for the entire 65 episodes.

The generic cheerful background music

The generic suspense music

The generic sad music

The transformation theme song

Maybe there is one more?? but I honestly I don't think I care enough to notice or recall.

And I almost forget to talk about the art... its just so ugly. The background art is honestly whatever but the way the characters are drawn are literally so uncanny and ugly to the point that I cannot take the anime seriously LITERALLY at first glance.

Okay then what about the 'story'?

EVERY single episode follows THIS EXACT FORMULA

Evil Juralians have a stupid evil plan > They manage to trick Ken into their 'trap' (EVERY SINGLE TIME) > Ken transforms by putting up a helmet > Ken Kills all the Juralians > END

Where the Juralians come from? How Ken gets his powers? Does he actually have powers or is it just his powerful high tech arsenal? Why is Ken the only one fighting?

I wish someone can answer those questions about the story too because these are questions I don't think even God knows. Ken just heroically foils the plans of the Juralians for 64 episodes without effort and literally just blow up their base in the last episode that is 65.

There is one episode where the evil Juralians capture and tortures a random human scientist and try to get him to tell them Chargeman Ken's weakness. He screams: 'KEN HAVE NO WEAK POINTS!' Whether he did it out of bravery to not reveal his secrets or that is genuinely the case... we will never know...

There is so much more shit to talk about but I think I said enough, if you want a more detailed breakdown on how terrible this 'anime' is you can hear all about it from one of my favorite youtuber if you are interested in this video:

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Despite all the criticism I did genuinely enjoyed watching it. Cringe so bad its good comedy is not usually something that I am into; there was a time I tried to watch The Room because its famously hailed as 'so bad its good'. I never understood the appeal. To me its just BAD. There is literally no entertainment value, I stopped watching after literally 10 minutes or less. Charge Man Ken is something different man, I don't know if its the fact its a goofy looking cartoon or for whatever reason. It is so baffling stupid and bad that there are literal times I laugh to tears and just retort in a high pitch voice against my computer screen like 'what da fak broooo???' Watching Charge Man Ken is like sniffing glue or watching a train wreck, you know its bad but for some reason you can't stop. My advice is probably do not binge it, there are certainly times where I watched multiple episodes and felt like I am getting too much brain damage. Based on my professional opinion I prescribe no more than 3 episodes a day to keep your mental health in check.

In all seriousness if I am rating based on enjoyment this is probably a 10/10. But I am so sorry, this is so blatantly bad in every way it does not deserve more than 1/10. But just because of how much I enjoyed it I have to at least give it a 2/10.

Should you watch Charge Man Ken? No is the obvious answer. I don't think this sort of humor is for everyone. If anything its pretty mean spirited to enjoy. Enjoying the disaster that is Charge Man Ken is somewhat akin to making fun of people with mental health issues. You decide if this the sort of entertainment you are into.

Definitely an unforgettable experience, but for all the wrong reasons.