Brave Beats

This review was written upon finishing the entire series of 22 episodes. Yet another hidden gem to come out of Bandai Namco Pictures, Brave Beats is the spiritual successor to BN Pictures' previous work 'Tribe Cool Crew.' For me personally, I think this show is highly underrated; mainly because of how it looks at first. Some may initially see the show as some generic Saturday morning cartoon, which is understandable, but that doesn't necessarily mean you should automatically ignore the show itself. The story gets a 7, I'll start by saying that this show does not the most complex story in the world. Brave Beats is abouta small group group of kids (very small), who combine powers with dancing aliens to form a sentai-type group of dancing superheroes whose goals are to collect a bunch of plot-important stones that give them additional dance moves and powers. I won't fault anybody for saying that this type of story is very generic in other shows of its genre, because frankly that's pretty much what the show is for the most part. After a good chunk of episodes (Around a third of the show,) the story does take a relatively more complex turn to degree, enough so that would convince most viewers that the show could potentially have been directed to a wider demographic than just kids. Each episode plays out as an "Adventure-of-the-day-" type format, where the characters encounter an issue within the first half of the episode, to which they usually resolve said issue by the end. If you're expecting romance or drama from this show you'll be disappointed to know that the show does not revolve around those two concepts, but rather the show has three or four episodes, excluding the ending episodes, dedicated to those types of situations. Art gets a 9 from me, This is essentially what makes or breaks the anime for most people. If you're expecting a detailed and intricate art-style to accompany this show, then this may or may not be the one for you, depending on your interpretation of the art. The show features a relatively simple art-style, however it isn't so simple that every character looks generally the same. Each character in the show is designed uniquely, down to the least apparent background character. Although the majority of the episodes' feature average effort into art, the show shines its brightest when the characters in the show are dancing. During the dedicated dancing segments of the show, the show's artstyle switches from traditional 2D to 3D CG models dancing. Although some would consider the CG animation to be sub-par, I personally enjoyed the dance sequences shown through this artstyle. Sound gets a 7, Now this section is unfair, mainly due to the fact that I am comparing the soundtrack of this show to that of Bandai Namco's Previous "Dancing Show" 'Tribe Cool Crew.' The soundtrack for Brave Beats is very limited, making use of a handful of original tracks; none of which I found to be quite memorable. That being said, the soundtrack that was present during the show did accompany the dancing themes well and, making the experience of watching a unique dancing 3D CG segment that much more enjoyable. The characters and character development in this show gets a 8 from me, The cast of the show isn't exactly generic, however it's not as though these characters haven't been the centre of another show's cast before. There isn't much to say about character development because the show doesn't focus on character development too much. The most character develop we see out of one character is a flashback to their past revealing few hidden details about them; however other than there isn't much to say about the depth of cast. With a combination of surprisingly exciting dancing animation, as well as fun and unique characters to accommodate the 'adventure-of-the-day' storyline, I'd give my enjoyment of the show a 9 overall.