~~~ (To be fair here, I didn't know about the webtoon before I watched the anime so please keep that in mind. Also, please take a look at the original webtoon!)
Tower of God is about a boy named Baam who has to enter the Tower in order to follow his friend, a girl named Rachel.
Let’s start with the animation because I really don’t get why people hated it so much. I mean, I don’t think that all of the frames were perfect and the fight scenes do not have the best choreography but all in all, I was really happy with how they did it. I’m no expert when it comes to animation but as your average anime viewer, I was pretty pleased with how they designed the characters and scenery. I also loved the colors and transitions!
It was really great seeing how the characters move and I think that they even included the style of the actual manwha in some of the scenes. The story may not be the most original one but it feels like a nice adventure fantasy sci-fi with many twists and turns that most readers did not expect. This is a question of taste but personally, I really liked that the story and characters reminded me a bit of the Hunter X Hunter series which is one of my all-time favorites.
About the characters;
What we can definitely say is that every character is very well written- even the minor characters or characters that are not necessarily present in other arcs.
Many people complained about the protagonist Baam. A lot were saying that he is way too boring and generic. A typical Shounen hero character. While that may have been true for the very first season I'd disagree because this basic naïve personality of Baam is definitely important for the story and the development of not only his own character but also the other characters he interacts with. Because he seems so simple and doesn’t know a lot about this world we also don’t know anything about we learn with him and it makes us feel engaged. We also meet most of the other characters through Baam’s eyes and it feels like the readers aren’t biased as they would’ve been with omniscient narration.
Not to spoil too much but he will learn a lot about this world is harsh and sometimes cruel. It’s also thanks to Baam’s personality that the other characters can shine as much as they do. Especially, his teammates Khun and Rak who appear to be heavily motivated by Baam in terms of goals and character development.
In the original comic there’s also a lot of comedy and while they did include some of that in the anime I feel like they should’ve done that more especially the comedic elements involving Baam. His innocence is not only sweet and likable but also funny. I think that for the main character it is very important that they have at least some flaws or insecurities. For Baam it’s definitely his naivety and the need to stick to his ideals even when it’s not possible. Still, I understand why people would view this character as boring and not engaging enough because in the first season that may be an issue. Personally, I still enjoyed this character though because I like the cinnamon-roll-must-protect-characters. (I see you there, Khun)
Another critique was the role of Maria who seems to have a much bigger meaning in the anime than the manwha but I think it’s hard to say whether that’s true or not because she hasn’t really appeared in the manwha yet. We don’t know the whole story surrounding her and Khun and who knows, maybe she has more meaning than we thought. For me, this wasn’t really a big deal but I understand why some fans were disappointed with it since they cut out a lot of other scenes from the manwha.
In my opinion that was a more pressing issue with the anime because 13 episodes are way too short for a series like Tower of God. In terms of length, it should’ve been more like Hunter x Hunter or Naruto minus the filler episodes. I hope that Crunchyroll will change that for upcoming seasons if there are going to be any.
The hate on Rachel:
I’m not going to talk about this too much because I don’t want to spoil you but yes, there are plenty of reasons why people dislike her, and honestly, so do I. Nevertheless, Rachel is a very important character and a key to the story. I’m not a big fan of character-bashing in general and I don’t think that it makes sense because the creator probably chose her to act like that for a reason. Don’t get me wrong, I think that Rachel is very unlikeable but I also find her fascinating because she’s so driven by ugly human emotions we’ve all experienced at some point. Jealousy, anger, and frustration play an important role when it comes to Rachel’s behavior and her attitude in general. I’m excited to see what is going to happen with her and who she really is.
The music and voice acting were really great and I especially enjoyed the English voices for the dub. Just go listen to the Tower of God OST, it is really beautiful! The voice acting for Princess Yuri done by Kira Buckland was very great and stood out to me even though she doesn’t even have that big of a role in the first season. I also liked the English voices for Rak, Khun, Rachel, and Endorsi a lot but the whole cast did a great job if you ask me. My secret favorite character has to be Shibisu by the way. Gotta love the tracksuit
Now for the manwha itself, you can probably guess that I do enjoy it a lot. It’s currently on hiatus but I’m looking forward to reading more in the future. Do I think it’s the best? I don’t believe in such things as ‘the best’ so no. However, to me, the manwha is both entertaining and emotionally touching. I’ve come to love most of the characters and the world they live in. The conflicts are interesting and there are twists that caught me off guard. The world and hierarchies seem well thought out and play an important role throughout the different arcs. Baam may be a bit overpowered but for good reason and he isn’t the only character who shows growth in their abilities.
All in all, I’d definitely recommend reading the manhwa and watching the first season of Tower of God.
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I want to do a very detailed analysis of the manhwa in the future and explore some of the characters and relationships in more depth but that will take some time because the manwha has been going for what? Ten plus years? But I’m going to do it! Anyway, I hope that the criticism of the viewers will be heard and that the series will be improved for a second season. Tower of God absolutely deserves at least two more seasons if you ask me.
