Jigokuraku is the newest member of MAPPA’s line of adaptations of Shonen Jump titles, and just like the previous two, this one is garbage. What I had heard from Jigokuraku before made me afraid, after all, I hear it being compared to Jujutsu Kaisen and Chainsaw Man which is an immediate red flag, but I know some people recommend some series over the most superficial reasons, so maybe, this one won’t be actually that similar to those, maybe this one will be good right? Well, the answer is sadly no, I cannot even say I’m disappointed because I’m not, it turned out to be exactly as to what came to my mind the second I hear it was compared to those series.

The very first episode is already dumb, when the MCs changes his character abruptly by something he should have obviously known before, as you see Gabimaru started completely willing to die but no one could kill them because their methods were obviously bad, suddenly when the girl Sagiri talks a little to him he remembers that he has a wife and now wants to live. I don’t know if Gabimaru is dumb or simply has dreadful memory because the instant he remembered she existed he turned very differently from how he was introduced as if his wife suddenly materialized instead of her existing beforehand. And with that said, everything from Gabimaru is terrible he is the most OP character, so there is no tension when he fights, he won’t get stronger or develop because he is already the strongest and already has a clear goal in mind and his “development” was remembering his wife on the first episode. There some shinobi rules as well that he has to follow, but some of them are broken as much as they are said, stuff like “never get into a fight with an unknown enemy” is broken every single time, because he is in a completely unknown island. Sagiri is a person a girl executioner with a great fear of killing people and wants to achieve the same painless killing method her father could pull off, which is so painless that can cut the head of someone and that head would continue talking because the person didn’t realize they died or something, she gets subjected to people looking down on her for being a girl d that she clearly isn’t fit for the role of executioner, and while that is true, she tries to prove she has some worth, she is probably the only character that I can barely care what her development may be even if it will be pretty obvious and her personality is extremely uninteresting, sadly, she gets easily sidelined by the amount of characters introduced later so we are far off of seeing her actually achieving anything.

This suffers the same syndrome these edgy series have always suffered, it kills character left and right without giving me a reason to care about them, this series killed so many of its characters in so many dumb ways and so quickly that I cannot remember their names. And sometimes when it wants me to care about them it gives them flashbacks the very second they are dying as if I was watching Kimetsu no Yaiba or something to tell me their whole story to feel bad for their deaths, but I don’t, because they are cardboard cutouts without much if any character whatsoever that talk like robots, I could only laugh after the death of a certain character because it came out exactly as I’m describing it. Characters not named Sagiri and Gabimaru are even more empty, Yuzuriha is literally just there doing nothing, deciding to not go into most of the fights and her ability which covers her in definitely-not-cum is made as if I’m watching some ecchi anime where it is trying to make me think the slimy white liquid she is covered in is cum. There are two edgy brothers, one more edgy than the other and when more edgy they have less character. I honestly cannot care to mention some of them, I remember more this character that was hyped in episode 2 just to die stupidly by the next episode, he didn’t get a flashback at least.

There is this energy called Tao that some people within the island aled Tensen can use t and that makes them extremely powerful and unkillable and these unkillable person that can use it, they are what you can call the main villains, due to their Taos they are stronger than everyone and no one can face them in a battle, except Gabimaru, of course. And when the time comes where a little group of selected characters survive the dumb killings from the first part, they discover the way to fight the unkillable enemies they were facing because they just bullshited their way to their new powers unlocking Tao, and lacks a basic consistent power system that most action shonen series have. And I’m not impressed, what should I be impressed here anyways? I mean, I guess the body horror where people are turned into flowers is not so commonly seen? But I guess that’s the best things I can give credit for.

I hope I can see MAPPA doing a good looking or even well animated show again, because I haven’t seen them doing it in years. Jigokuraku looks unsurprisingly ugly, it has the absolutely dreadful and soulless MAPPA’s filter just like Jujutsu Kaisen and Chainsaw Man which immediately makes it visually appalling, it is also subjected to obviously bad animation having no impact on any of their actions outside of fights, janky movements, bad compositing, ugly backgrounds, even fights don’t look that good either, they are extremely lackluster even for MAPPA standards, it is just my usual MAPPA’s animation complain that they haven’t managed to get over.

What was I expecting? Probably a series that is entertaining to watch, sadly Jigokuraku is as uninteresting as they come, it is just another ugly edgy schlock that MAPPA vomited out just like Chainsaw Man was and just like the next season of Jujutsu Kaisen will surely be.

Thank you for reading.