A quick review of Banana Fish (No open spoilers)

I was totally blind before going into Banana Fish, I didn't know what to expect and how should I prepare myself before going into it, maybe that's the reason I was so shocked when the show was taking some really dark turns. But epsiode 9 just made me realise what I was watching and how I should perceive it. Even if Banana Fish dwells into variety of topics, in its roots, it's still about human conflict, cycle of hatred and revenge. Ash, who is already stuck in the world of hatred and revenge and has suffered since he didn't even have basic understanding of it, meets somebody who is completely unaware of those things and his life is totally devoid of that kind of circumstances. I think what Ash saw in Eiji from the start, that was something Ash couldn't get in his life ever, which is...

Freedom is a reoccurring theme in Banana Fish, the name of the second opening song is "Freedom" and it talks about getting away from the nightmare, the nightmare that the drug Banana Fish causes and the nightmare that the drug named "hatred" causes. Ash tells Eiji that he envies him because "he knows how to fly", not only this but there is so much beautiful symbolism in dialogues throughout the whole show. Akimi Yoshida is just a brilliant author in all aspects. The manga is old and the artstyle reminds me SO MUCH of Naoki Urasawa's artstyle, Idk it just looks so similar for some reason. Well getting back to the theme of freedom of Banana Fish, there's a really similar character to Ash which is also brilliantly written...

The living hell Yut Lung talks about is nothing but the cycle of hatred and revenge in which both him and Ash are stuck. And Yut Lung doesn't want to drag Sing into it because similarly the last time Ash dragged somebody into it... that ended up real bad.

Spoiler, click to view

Yes I'm talking about the best boy Shorter 😭

I think the drug Banana Fish is nothing but like a physical manifestation of the concept of cycle of hatred and revenge, a person doesn't consume it, it consumes the person just like hatred. Well then how do you get out of this cycle of hatred and revenge? How can two people living in completely different worlds manage to exist together? The answer is simple... By adapting to that particular world. Basically if you live in a world full of hate, you just have to learn how to love and Eiji is the one who keeps that possibility, that chance to learn to love, alive for Ash. I don't know what I expected from the ending but I was kind of shocked by it, they left it open for the viewers but in my opinion, it's obvious that

Spoiler, click to view

Ash is dead,

there were just so many death flags for him throughout the show and I think he was really into the depths of cycle of hatred to just get out of it that easily, there were just so many people after him after all the chaos he caused, Lao happened to be just one of them. Besides learning to love, there's one more way to achieve freedom... one more way to achieve the essence of love...

The first opening song briefly foreshadows

Spoiler, click to view

Ash's death

, if love can't be the hope for him, then there's no hope other than his fate, his death for him.

Banana Fish really focuses on emotions of the characters which makes the characters just even more loveable and relatable. Not just the main characters , there are so many loveable side characters which have really less screentime, Max, Blanca, Arthur, Cain, Jessica, I even remember the gigachad Fly lol. The OSTs also improve the experience of anime and MAPPA again didn't disappoint with the animation. It's just an immediate classic and I don't think there are many shows which can give me the vibe of Banana Fish. I can't think of any negatives except probably, some dialogues felt like too cheesy and edgy, I don't know if that's even a negative cuz most of the characters are teenagers and teenagers are edgy lmao. Also some supporting characters feel slightly ignored in the last five episodes and I also wished them to show some aftermath of everything, but honestly, you can ignore all these negatives because of how great the whole ride of Banana Fish is. So yeah, Banana Fish is just a really really great show and I don't want to be repetitive about it SO GO AND WATCH IT RIGHT NOW IF YOU HAVEN'T YET!

About rating: I rate shows only in the multiple of 5 to not make it complicated