Blade and Soul Overview:
In Blade and Soul, Alka, a member of the clan of the sword (an assassin) is on a mission for revenge after her master was killed. However, she’s got a long road ahead of her.
Blade and Soul Review:
I did my first impressions (when I was about mid-way through this series) awhile ago. I don’t really want to change any of my opinions having finished it, so I’m going to keep this prettty short.
Alka is an incredibly dull protagonist. She does not improve as the series goes on, though she does at least emote a bit in the second half.
The other characters are all one note personalities and a lot of the characters exist only to get cut down and give their tearful and blood-choked last words. Too bad we aren’t given any reason to care about any of these characters and so their deaths just become another speed-bump on the road as we drive… well that’s an interesting question. Where does this anime try to take us?
Originally we had Alka hunting down the one who killed her master for revenge. Then just after the midway point that character is killed in a fairly unspectacular fight sequence (lightning does not make your lame fight look any cooler). Right. Central villain dead, many episodes left… What now?
Clearly we now have the betrayal of the character who has been oh-so-helpful up to now (only we all kind of knew she was shady from the start) and her motives are ridiculous. Okay, Alka did kill the supposed love of her life when Alka was an assassin. But, she doesn’t go after Alka. No she, helps Alka, get’s her to make friends with someone else and then said friend bites it. And you justify this how?
Also, the underlings of the first villain escape that mid-point fight and you just know they are going to be a pain later on.
Basically, it’s a mess. When it isn’t being obvious it is only because it dove off the cliff that was sign-posted turn back in some failed attempt to add tension through surprise (and it fails miserably at every turn and then has to claw itself back out of the ravine it just flung itself into).
About the best I could say for this show is it is watchable. It isn’t interesting or exciting and it doesn’t ever really improve, plus any interest I had in it kind of failed after that mid-point battle anyway, but it also doesn’t do anything so horrific you would contemplate throwing the disc (or at least I didn’t). Not much of a recommendation but that’s the best I’ve got after finishing Blade and Soul.
Thank-you for reading 100 Word Anime.
Join the discussion in the comments.
Karandi James
I’m enjoying it a lot more than I expected. The scenery is lovely and the mobs are hysterical. It has a very soft, comical feel so far that reminds me a little of the very much missed Zentia. The questing is all over the place though!
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I watched this when it first aired. One thing can be said about the VA for Alka. She got paid for not turning up most of the time. That’s how many lines Alka had. I can see what they tried to do. The usual silent main lead (or player character) is normally left to the player to inject personality and a voice to the character. Good review.
There’s strong and silent and then there is boring. The studio should have paid her by the line.
So, basically a bit like fast food: occasionally it is fun to eat at Mc Donalds 😂 Passing on this one for the moment (unless my fast food cravings come up again 😀)
Kind of have to agree with that analogy. The show is functional enough but isn’t particularly good or interesting.
I’ve been waiting for this review and…guess I’ll give this a pass. Got a good laugh out of your descriptions though.
Sounds about what I was expecting from an adaption of an MMO title.