Darwin's Game
a review by KilluaMorales
a review by KilluaMorales
What's up everybody! Killua Morales is back and as promised, I'm gonna review an anime from the Winter season of this year. There were a lot of anime I wanted to look at, but I've decided to focus on one of my personal favorites, and that's the battle royale anime, Darwin's Game. Let's begin shall we:
This may come off as your typical fight to the death anime if you're familiar with series like Fate/Stay Night, The Future Diary and BTOOOM!, and you would be right. This story is very simplistic, but it's an effective simplicity. It's the psychological factor that makes this anime more entertaining than you would expect from the survival game genre. You really pay close attention to the main characters' mental state when fighting and understand each of their motives. As far as the survival game part, you're given basic groundwork for what's occurring in the anime, so you're never confused, and you're never bored because further detail about what occurs is shown through the action scenes.
What makes this anime more interesting and entertaining than normal is the characters. Each character is kinda stereotypical, but there is variety in between them. Unfortunately, that's all you get, variety. After seeing these characters, you don't really get much from them besides the main two.
Kaname is basically if you mixed together the special abilities of Shirou Emiya from Fate/Stay Night with the edgelord personality of Hajime Nagumo from Arifureta. He has very strong values, but he won't hesitate to kick someone's ass if they piss him off. He's no coward, so he's much more likable than Yukiteru Amano from Future Diary, and he's pretty damn smart too, so he's no stereotypical protagonist. He starts off like a bland character, but you start to see how he adapts to what's happening and how he plans things out making him well-developed and a bad ass. Of course, the characters around him are no slouch either especially his main love interest.
Shuka is a tamed version of Yuna from Future Diary just give her Rider's chains from Fate/Stay Night. She comes off as a psychopath, but she's not. She's a normal girl that just knows how kill you up close and personal and from far away. After meeting Kaname, she becomes not only very girly to the point that it can be cute but also very protective of him to the point that it can be considered stalker-ish. When she's fighting, she can be merciless and holds nothing back. It's a shame that we don't get much about her backstory because it would have been nice to see why she's so damn merciless, but it's whatever.
You can't have a survival anime without an introvert now, can we? Well you get that in the form of this little girl who's also good with a sniper rifle. She's basically the informant that gives out much needed information to others for the right price, so mix together the informant in Izaya Orihara from Durarara!! (minus the manipulation of others) with the sniper skills of Shinon from Sword Art Online, and this is who you get. You would expect something from this character, but she doesn't really have much development since she doesn't get a lot of screen time. You just get what you can out of her that involves her information gathering and marksmanship, and that's it. It's a bit of a let down since she's a very interesting character, and you do see a bit of her backstory, but she remains the same character even after meeting Kaname.
This was a character that had a lot of potential. He started off as a character that join the game for money with his brother but became vengeful after a gang killed his brother. It was the perfect opportunity to see him grow while obtaining revenge, but his motives were completely sidelined after meeting Kaname where he becomes your typical right-hand man. I personally wanted to like his character simply because he wields a light-machine gun with a clip you normally see on a Tommy gun, but that's all you get from him which is a huge letdown.
A character with split personalities, how can you mess a promising concept like that. Oh I know, by focusing too much on one personality and not seeing the other come out unless a fight is occurring. This was another character I wanted to like. You have sweet and shy Sui who is the biggest pacifist you'll ever see that can control water and her split personality Sota who's as big a psychopath as Shuka and can turn the aforementioned water into ice. When you first meet these two, you would have thought that it was fight scene involving twins, but you're thrown a curve ball when you learn that it was split personalities. It was a well developed start but we never see how it comes to fruition. You just get what you can from their action scenes and afterwards all you see is the timid Sui being scared of violence. It's not a bad thing, but it was another let down due to how much potential the producers missed out on with this character. Speaking of missed opportunities.
This is my favorite character from the manga, and I was looking forward to what they would do with her character. You have the best fighter in the game who becomes captivated by Kaname's fighting prowess to the point that she tried to make him the heir of her clan while bearing his children. That was a story concept I could get behind that's rarely ever seen in an anime (Hell, the only anime I've seen do a concept like that is Kengan Asura, Akame ga Kill!, and Isekai Cheat Magician). You have a strong and independent female character being interested in an equally strong male character to the point that she wants to marry him and start a family. How can you miss an opportunity like that? Oh I know, by bringing it up at one moment, and then completely forget about it along with the female character as well. This was the biggest disappointment I've seen in this anime. How exactly do forget about the top fighter in this survival game and never bring her up again! I hope we get another season because they way she was completely sidelined was a huge kick in the nuts.
All in all, it was a very promising story, but the characters were very much wasted especially the villain who was a complete psychopath just because. Yes his character was entertaining at first, but let's face it, he will never be Vaas Montenegro.
The art and animation by studio Nexus whose known works include:
and the co-production with Silver Link:
was the biggest highlight of the show. You see a lot of detail put into this series especially with the breathtaking backgrounds.
Not now Keanu. Another time, but thank you.
Back to my point, the art style was one of the best parts of the anime with the action scenes being the stand out. You feel the intensity in each action scene. That's how it feels in most of the action scenes, but other times it's just average. The animation during the opening credits was kind of misleading at times with it trying to make the characters look bad ass, but in all honesty, it was
The character designs however were as bland as a cup of hot tea with no flavor or sweetener. Just one look at each of the characters, and you'll know what their personalities are like making the characters all the more bland than they already were. The only stand out character design was Shuka's design with her red dress, blonde twin tails and chains which fits her character to a tee.
Then there's the sound, which was the best part of the anime. The soundtrack was well made with a combination of techno, orchestra, and electric guitars giving off the intensity of the action scenes and the emotion of the dramatic scenes. The OP theme and ED theme were serviceable. They do their job setting up the tone of the anime, but it's not anything special if you listen them by themselves.
The voice acting is where the sound department really stood out. You could really feel the emotion the voice actors put into their roles from Yusuke Kobayashi (known for voicing Subaru from Re:Zero) voicing the smart and sometimes ruthless Kaname to Reina Ueda (known for voicing Mira from Dimension W) voicing the ruthless and Yuno-inspired Shuka. Each voice actor stood out in their own way (I just wish their characters were more likable). The stand out of the voice actors was Yoshitsugu Matsuoka (whom you all know for voicing Kirito from SAO and Ren from The Rising of the Shield Hero) voicing the Vaas wannabe Wang. It doesn't surprise me that he can voice a psychopath since he's voiced Petelgeuse from Re:Zero. His voicing of Wang is nothing compared to Petelgeuse, but it was a job well done.
In the end, the animation was just above average, and the sound department was a hit out of the park. It was the only thing redeeming the anime.
What more can be said about this anime. It was a promising concept that had a lot to ride on, but the characters are what brought down the anime. If Nexus took the time to properly develop the characters like the manga, this could've easily been the best anime of the Winter season. As it stands, the only redeeming factor about this anime was the animation & sound, so we can say that this is an anime with style but barely any substance.
With that in mind, I can say that Darwin's Game is...
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