Shakugan no Shana - Anime - AniDB (2024)

Shakugan no Shana - cool name for a cool character in a meh show. Lots of wasted potential.

Animation

Nothing real special about it to me but I'm no expert here so I'm just gonna shut up.

Sound

Nothing special about the music either. Mostly skipped through OP/ED, kinda liked the first OP.
BGM at times maybe a little too epic, bordering on buffoonish-pompous. Overall not a big problem and works well enough.

Voice acting made me roll my eyes as early as first episode. And then I rolled 'em some more!
See, there are two common anime problems here. First it's simply the voices - some are overdone to the point of parody, except as far as I can tell it's not a parody, these guys are serious with this stuff. Think voice acting straight from a primary school performance of Little Red Riding Hood, complete with the Sinister Laugh, etc. And that makes listening to some characters, and especially to the bad guys real painful. Male lead Yuji sounds like a complete tool too, and his bland lines don't help his cause much either.
Which leads me to the second problem - the things the characters actually say. I predict some of you gonna argue this should go under story or character, or whatever, but I decided to add it to the sound section because it's just so aggravating to listen to. Again, don't get me wrong, all anime fails in this department, it's just that this one fails a lot more than average. All the redundant blabbering, and especially restating every given name in full/readdressing everyone in full each time a character opens their mouth makes me conclude either a) it's an anime for preschoolers and retards, or b) our heroes must all secretly be gunning for the Cpt. Obvious of the Year award. The dialogue is often lackluster, unconvincing, and unrealistic. Trust me, it's just bad, even by anime standards.

Fortunately none of the two problems affect our main heroine that much. This is my first encounter with miss Kugimiya Rie, and after all I've read about her I was thinking, This better be good. And she delivers. You've gotta wonder though, how much of my appreciation for her comes from judging her performance against the rest of the cast?
Anyway, I really enjoyed her Shana. From the "Urusai! Urusai! Urusai!" which sounded strange the first time but then I just loved it, all the way down to the little "Ah!"s and "Ugh!"s. Although it must be said someone should teach her some manners when eating. Hehe.

Story

Okay I'll try to be brief and not go on a rant here, as I probably should. Yeah it's that bad.
This show is based on a series of light novels, and experience tells me they have to be better than this. It doesn't take a genius to figure out exactly how much effort the creators put into squeezing a coherent and sensible story out of the novels - about half an ass worth of effort to be precise. The pacing is a huge problem on a micro level, I mean the way the particular scenes are scripted, there is a lot of filler and repetition. The story lacks direction and develops without any real purpose. Not to mention there's plot holes big enough you could drive a goddamn tank right through.
Okay you may think I'm being harsh, but it's just frustrating and kinda sad really to see an okay concept wasted like that. I mean sure, these novels aren't winning the Nobel prize in literature, but it's so easy to see where the guys who adapted them could have done a better job. Just frustrating. Okay time for something positive.

Character

(s)

You're probably thinking by now, How did this guy even finish watching this, he bashes it so much LOL!
Well let me tell you: I'm a sucker for little girls. And it turns out I'm an even bigger sucker for young, fiery-eyed, angry, zettai ryouiki sporting tsunderes brandishing their swords all over. Seriously, take a second to consider it: How awesome is that!?
So yeah, I pretty much only finished this because of Shana. And it's not just that I like how she looks. Okay, I'd lie if I said I didn't enjoy the occasional fanservice... Tried real hard to pay attention and still had to skip back like three or four times

because

while Shana was enjoying a bath just to catch that invaluable

view

piece of information the omniscient Alastor decided to share with us just at that moment.
But there's more to it: her personality is also a big part of the attraction. She's strong on the outside but full of doubts inside, and just about the model tsundere, won't admit anything, won't listen to you, and gets all blushy angry, fast. Trouble ensues. So yeah, uh, I could relate to her, you bet! Hehe. Anyway, Shana pretty much carries this show.

Unfortunately the other main characters weren't exactly my favorites. Like I said earlier, Yuji is a tool. I mean yeah, you could say it's kinda part of the plot, hehe. But he just comes off as a big loser to me in most everything he does. And the way he handles Shana... at times it's just miserable and difficult to watch for a guy.
Then there's the other girl, Yoshida, and she's just there mostly to make sure Yuji won't hook up with Shana. Annoying.
All the other characters range from nondescript cliche to possibly interesting, no real standouts.

Value

I'm not buying this unless I get filthy rich, and I'm not rewatching anytime soon. I might watch the following seasons, and I just might rewatch this one some day, and it should be pretty clear by now why (hint: see second line under "Character").

Enjoyment

I watched all of it so it's not that bad. Still a disappointment. You deserve better Shana!

SummaryAnimation - 7 - yeah, cool view bro.Sound - 5 - no Kugimiya this goes down to 2.Story - 2 - extra point for getting my imagination going. It's so bad I can't help but think up my own version.:brickwall:Character - 5 - was gonna be 9, but I guess all the other characters too, right?Value - 3 - not buying.Enjoyment - 5 - wasn't watching for the story anyway.

Shakugan no Shana - Anime - AniDB (2024)
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